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HHO
jacko - 20/4/08 at 09:08 AM

Hi all has anyone used [ water for fuel ] HHO if so have you any plans how to make a kit
try [ Google water for fuel ]
Jacko

RazMan - 20/4/08 at 09:30 AM

This comes up from time to time and never seems to really develop much. General concensus seems to be that it is a nice idea but not practical due to the volume of hydrogen required to actually run an engine - the power needed to split the water molecules would be enormous and therefore a huge alternator would be required, consuming vast amounts of engine power.

Having said that, you can buy the kits on eBay ..... but then you can buy a lot of things on eBay

cossey - 20/4/08 at 09:45 AM

the amount of energy required to split up the water into hydrogen and oxygen is the same as the energy given when it is burnt.

so given that alternators are about 85% efficient and the engine is about 25% efficient it will require 4.7bhp of power from the crank to make 1bhp from burning the hydrogen.

there is no such thing as energy for nothing

JoelP - 20/4/08 at 12:13 PM

i had the misfortune of googling HHO. My head is in my hands

quote:

Our easy conversion guide will show you how to use electricity from your car's battery to separate water into a gas called HHO (2 Hydrogen + 1 Oxygen). HHO, also called Brown's Gas or Hydroxy, burns smoothly and provides significant energy - while the end product is just H2O! HHO provides the atomic power of Hydrogen, while maintaining the stability of water.


And this peach

quote:

Water can be used to fuel a car when used as a supplement to gasoline. In fact, very little water is needed! only one quart of water provides over 1800 gallons of HHO gas which can literally last for months and significantly increase your vehicle's fuel efficiently, improve emissions quality, and save you money.


This is a scam. The webshites are just trying to drum up interest to sell a product that is scientifically flawed (or is that fraud?), its fundamentally impossible.

RazMan - 20/4/08 at 12:21 PM

If 1800 gallons of gas lasts for 'months' I wonder how much gas is actually injected into the engine. I don't know what the airflow figures for an average engine are but I would bet that it is far more than 1800 'gallons' of air for just a few minutes driving.

mangogrooveworkshop - 20/4/08 at 12:25 PM

link to video

MikeRJ - 20/4/08 at 01:14 PM

These snake oil peddling scammers are no better than the Nigerian "millionaires" who need you to help get their fortune out of the country.

jacko - 23/4/08 at 06:42 PM

Any more info would be helpful

iank - 23/4/08 at 06:55 PM

Well you could start here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservation_of_energy

Then try here
http://www.chem1.com/acad/sci/pseudosci.html

JoelP - 23/4/08 at 09:31 PM

quote:
Originally posted by jacko
Any more info would be helpful


Basically the energy you put into water to split it into hydrogen and oxygen (a process called hydrolysis, or water splitting) is exactly equal to the energy you get back from burning the two together. Hence although having tanks of O and H in a car is a great way of storing energy and carrying it about, you dont get any benefit from it. The energy you get is the same as you put in to split it, less any losses through inefficiency. Obviously it is then pointless to use energy you have generated in the car, as you are really wasting it moving it though forms (for instance, burning petrol in an IC engine to turn an alternator to make electricity to split water into stored chemical energy to burn it again, assumedly in an IC engine again... you see the pointless cycle?).

Now, assuming a hydrogen fuel cell has H and O in it, its a quite efficient way of turning stored chemical energy into electrical energy, certainly better than the efficiency of a petrol engine. So if you have split the water somewhere else, say at the local nuclear power plant, it works quite well overall. Electric motors and regenerative braking etc. You have no emissions from the vehicle, and for those who care, no carbon footprint.