Complete waste of money and time!

The only reason that the hydralic hybrid F-150 that gets a combined 30mpg is not for sale is that Ford wanted more research money. Why go into production when you you can get money for nothing.

The hydraulic hybrid has already been proven to be efficient and lightweight; only mass production will make it competitive. Two good examples are the EPA UPS truck and the Artemis automobile conversion.

For examples that run on rails there are the Parry People Mover prototypes and the two production versions that are now training crews for revenue operation as commuter rail vehicles. The people movers use an ordinary low speed flywheel for energy storage.

The INNAS NOAX Chiron hydraulic free piston engine has many advantages including very high efficiency. It can compression ignite hydrogen and methane and any other fuel for HCCI because it has an infinite compression ratio. It is already computer controlled, so it needs no other mechanism to change output to match demands. It can be coupled with the Artemis motors or the NOAX hydraulic innovations, but NOAX is ignoring it in their hydraulic hybrid proposal. It is probably more efficient than any possible microturbine.

Microturbines have been used in many series hybrid busses and generally operate more efficiently than standard engines, but standard engines can be operated much more efficiently and at much higher average power in series hybrids. But no major car manufacturer would dare put a 10 kw car on the market, and 100 kw turbines are too large for a car and would always run inefficiently.

Any size battery with any power output can be added to a hydraulic hybrid car with an appropriate electric hydraulic pump to make a plug in hybrid. In fact a person operated pump would allow a hydraulic hybrid to be moved by human power over short distances if necessary.

Hydraulic hybrids are obvious for human powered vehicles. Artemis should build one for the next Tour de France or a non electric valve version can be made by INNAS.

Engine off brakes and steering are best handled by motors run off the battery as is air conditioning. This is also a good step towards plug in operation. LG already produces free piston refrigerator compressors that are highly efficient and would allow for a welded leak free no-hose automotive air cooling system. Lead Acid batteries are quite good enough. Alternators could be mounted on drive shafts or wheels to generate electricity. In fact, a hydraulic hybrid car with a small auxilliary battery powered pump could run a mile slowly off a standard starting battery.

Methanol from any source should be the next official fuel. It will in the future be made by nuclear reactors from water and recycled CO2.

For high efficiency a large single piston Chiron engine would be ideal but for balance two might be used. Antifreeze protected water may be the best hydraulic fluid.
..HG..

Hydraulic hybrid transmission is ideal pair to diesel engine.

What a crock! The Audacity Of Hype.

Aerodynamic improvement pathways? How about Psycho Pathways?

"Innovative aerodynamic improvement pathways for commercial and personal vehicles.

For personal and especially commercial series hybrid vehicles, engines are sized to provide required power during high-speed driving. One area of substantial potential efficiency benefit is decreasing the vehicle's aerodynamic resistance at highway speeds."

One needs a heart of stone to not laugh...

Hydraulic in-wheel infinitely variable transmissions are on the way people.

Lightweight vehicles that need no power steering or brakes. In fact the in-wheel pumps are the brakes. Good bye Midas.

Storage can be accomplished by any means you wish. Pure electric, IC, steam, or combinations of all. Vehicles that can easily be converted from pure electric to other energy conversion sources for long distance travel. Interchangeable power supply modules instead of two separate city and highway vehicles, makes much more sense to me.

With the elimination of the majority of powertrain components, and a very simple in-wheel drive pump-motor. You have a vehicle with 25% fewer components than the most basic cars now made, as well as significantly less expensive to produce, with 500k mile powertrain life expectancies.

Manufacturers can make a good profit on the most basic 10K price car, that most people can easily afford. A 40k Chevy Volt! Not for me.

Powertrain platforms that can be easily upgraded as battery technology improves, instead of being made obsolete before they are even paid for by the owner.

A single vehicle that is easily adaptable to the specific requirements of the individual owner in any situation.

Danm

Google (or search engine of your choice)

EPA hydraulic hybrids

Virginia Tech School of Engineering (april 08 article on this site)

Page 64 of the Journal of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers

Ingo Valentin-one of the pioneers of the hydraulic hybrid and a participant in the Automotive X prize

The 100 MPG car-in particular the statement by John Kargul (of the EPA) that the hydraulic hybrid will be as significant as the assembly line.

Kargull also stated "I can hold a 500 HP hydraulic motor in one hand."

We can debate the future progress of the automobile and clearly demonstrate our own individual perogatives, or we can begin a path to development for an adaptable powertrain platform that would accept any energy consuming source of energy.

Hydraulic power transfer systems are a very mature industry. The problem is how do you efficiently recover and reapply regeneration of decelerative forces. Currently hydraulic systems are approaching 75%, while electric recover is only a fraction of that amount. A 3800 pound EPA test vehicle has averaged 80 MPG.

Consider an extraordinarily simple pump-motor located in each wheel, that cost the same and weighs the same as the converntional friction braking components you can eliminate. A variable displacement rotary pump, that provides foreward-neutral-reverse functions through a simple adjustment of the stroke of the pump.
Recovered energy can be stored in an accumulator or a flyheel to be reapplied directly to the wheel itself.

Now you have no need for the hundreds of components necessary to accomplish the same functions in a conventional powertrain. Each wheel has one pump-motor, connected to a central energy accumulator, fro 4 wheel regeneration.

The system is capable of providing the energy for a single acceleration event up to 80 MPH, at the limits of the tires ability to maintain traction with the ground, 0-60 times equal to an F40 Ferrari. The same system through a virtually instantaneous change of 2 inches in stroke position can recover the vast majority of that same energy.

This is a system capable of many cycles of acceleration and recovery without any engine power whatsoever, at efficiency rates approaching, if not exceeding, the efficiency of any conventional powertrain.

The non reversible power source (energy consuming) is responsible for only maintaining pre determined levels of accumulator pressure, or flywheel RPM.

This means you no longer have the engine (or motor) operating as a slave of the powertrain. Now it can operate only at its peak efficiency, regardless of its configuration, and only when energy storage levels are low enough to require replenishment. No idling, no throttle restriction, not WOT fuel wasting operation.

Hypermilers demonstrate the effectiveness of the tactic every day. In some cases they have achieved mileages that easily exceed 100% and in extreeme cases even 200% of EPA mileage ratings of conventional vehicles.

Combine this system with engine designs approaching 60%, sepcifically configured for the application, and the calculated mileage is 60MPG for a large pickup truck (EPA estimates-not mine).

gary

Hi Gary,
Thanks for the input. In addition to in-wheel hydraulic motors, a fully-mass-balanced-4-cylinder free-piston engine as described by Mr. Fitzerald several months ago here in GCC would further raise efficiency up several notches. Capable of infinitely-variable compression ratio and very low internal friction, free-piston engine can be capable of 50% thermal efficiency, thus making 80-100-mpg family sedan a reality. The hydraulic drive system eliminate the needs for rotational output of the free-piston engine. The free-piston engine is directly connected to piston hydraulic pumps that also serve as engine starter. Excess engine output is stored in hydro-pneumatic energy storage tanks.

yesplease: Reducing aerodynamic drag would be nice. But that is a truism.

Car makers, plane makers, truck makers, as well as national labs and universities have been theorizing, testing, and measuring what can be done for decades.

No doubt several hundred scientists and engineers worked on it today somewhere around the world.

At this point having the EPA spend a few hundred thousand to solicit and read a proposal about innovative ideas is money down the drain.

We witness here a ritual of the Church Of Paperwork; the faith that a sufficiently high pile of paper must contain the answer to any question. The Priests are Monkeys With Word Processors.

Unfortunately the Monkeys also have tax dollars.

Faith cannot be disproved.

Roger, the engine configuration was the original concept, with the core innovation being the adjustable crank journal.

At the time of the original RIDE posting on GCC (2006), the powertrain configuration was in its earliest stages of development, with a simple model that reversed the pistons and cylinders, with the cylinders rotating around the journal, and pistons without connecting rods connected to the outer rim of the rotating block assembly.

The reversal of pistons and cylinders constituted a new configuration, and I was not going to reveal that configuration until the patent application was completed. Only one provisional document had been submitted at the time (2006) of the first GCC posting.

With the reversal (cylinders rotating around the center journal) the balancing issues that would have existed in the original configuration (with displacement changes at the perimeter) were addressed, so there were no inherent balancing issues that could prove to be insourmountable. Another advantage,especially in a 4 cylinder configuration was the flow of fluid through the pump-motors was consistent, regardless of the stroke position, eliminating the necessity of dampners for pressure fluctuations, or the potential for pulsations at the wheels themselves when power was applied. Low speeds inherent with direct in wheel drives also allow the pump efficiency to remain very high at any reasonable speed the vehicle may obtain. the swashplate pumps in the EPA designed drives suffer severe efficiency losses at higher speeds over 1000 RPM.

Moving the pump-motors to the wheels themselves also separates the power application and structural integrity issues into 4 components, requiring much less strength than a single larger pump and the connecting power transferring components.

To answer your original question:

It's not so much that I have continued trying to promote the engine design, although I still think the issues can be resolved and it may eventually be superior to free psiton designs, which were reported by EPA to be in the 58% efficiency range several years ago.

The in wheel drive is a much more practical method of creating a system that could be quickly incorporated into existing vehicle designs, beginning as a "launch assist" option on existing vehicle platforms.

After incorporation of "launch assist" you also have the capability to change engine operation strategies to maximise existing engine efficiencies, without idling or WOT operation, when travelling at constant speeds.

Third stage is a dedicated powertrain without the necessity for existing transmissions, prop shafts, differentials, or axles, as well as brakes, except for a simple mechanical emergency brake similar to what is used by Mercedes currently.

Once you have reached the third stage, then it is fairly simple to use any engine design in direct comparison to any other, with an income stream to finance development if further research proved the concept to be viable.

EPA documents several years ago referred to direct generation of hydraulic pressure using free piston designs, but it seems like the one you have referred to has addressed the vibration issues by using opposing free pistons.

Any free piston engine while a significant improvement over typical IC engines is still a reciprocating engine. I still believe the rotary design has the potential to surpass the free piston configuration. However it may never need to be proven as long as free piston engines can reach the efficiency levels above 50-55%. Of course the advantage of incorporating engine and flywheel in the same component still appeals to me. Although it may not be quite as efficient as an accumulator, that efficiency loss could be offset by less costly components as well as lower overall vehicle weight, and overall cost.

regards
gary

K, regardless of what has been done in the lab, we haven't seen much in the way of aerodynamic improvements, especially w/ commercial vehicles. Since most of the lab work done tends to focus on results, not ease of use or practicality, which are what makes or breaks aero improvements outside of the lab, we haven't had much in the way of practical results.

Putting a boat tail on a semi trailer and reporting the results in a paper is great, but what needs to be done is a boat tail that's practical in that it's durable, cheap, is near universal, and can be moved out of the way for unloading/put back up for travel in a few minutes. Similarly, while it's been know for quite some time that a tear drop shape is ideal for aero, it isn't practical, and practical implementations of aero band-aids such as VGs, production boat tails/bed covers for pickups, etc... Are very advantageous, but unlike papers on aerodynamic improvements, not very common.

On the political front,documented research also serves to torpedo the whole "we can't increase FE w/o more money" mantra Detroit seems to have adopted.

@MG,
High-pressure hydraulic system can reduce the size of the hydraulic motor significantly. It's doable.

Actually, it's in-hub motor instead of in-wheel motor. The wheel can be removed easily, but the motor stays behind, firmly attached.

Gary: shape shifting can lessen drag. otherwise airplanes wouldn't have flaps, etc.

I don't visualize how reducing drag could be combined with a collision protection function.

But perhaps it could. Drag from bumpers was one of the first problems tackled years ago. Cars probably can't reduce drag much more in that area.

Trucks are mixed. Some are still quite poor. The builders know what to do but it hasn't yet been worth the effort.

My exchange with yesplease was about whether the EPA money and another big paper will improve the matter. I can't see how. Ways to improve are well known. And well known to be limited. Each one adopted requires a compromise somewhere else.