Now this is funny, Intel does a "Whoops"

[Movieman]

Read this one, funny..
http://www.brightsideofnews.com/news...onference.aspx

[BeepBeep2]

Hmm. Hydrogen powered trucks.
I can see one of those exploding in magnificent fashion, killing everything around it, too. You can run almost any gasoline combustion engine on hydrogen I believe, if the air/fuel mix is right...the problem is the storage of the hydrogen and the fact that you need boatloads of it. If anyone managed to set the truck on fire...

[kuroikenshi]

I can see one of those exploding in magnificent fashion, killing everything around it, too. You can run almost any gasoline combustion engine on hydrogen I believe,

Gasified power plants usually CAT combustion engines with some minor mods, the storage of hydrogen would not be much more different than storing LPG Gas on a car. the benefits? hydrogen pisses all over both conventional and high performance liquid fuels. you wont have a clean burn unless you also inject liquid oxygen, which is a monumental task alone.

Movieman-Drag-Car-Feak (aka angry Irishman) would also know about this quite a bit

[WangChung]

I don't get it.

[MrBean]

I don't get it.

Hydrogen & small mishap = very big kapoofff....

So, all people at the convention thought this was a real Hydrogen-injected truck, and decided to keep away from it, even exiting the parking-lot on the opposite street.

[BeepBeep2]

Hydrogen & small mishap = very big kapoofff....

So, all people at the convention thought this was a real Hydrogen-injected truck, and decided to keep away from it, even exiting the parking-lot on the opposite street.

Yes, it is much more dangerous IMHO than LPG. It doesn't take much to ignite it and there doesn't need to be much of it to burn. 4-5% saturation in air can burn...so lets say there is a fuel leak in the transfer line and the truck driver lights a cigarette...

[defect9]

...the problem is the storage of the hydrogen and the fact that you need boatloads of it.

That's what the trailer is for

[BeepBeep2]

That's what the trailer is for

But boatloads of hydrogen in a metal vehicle of any type is a ticking time bomb...gasoline just burns, and when it explodes it doesn't have much explosive force...great for movies and such.

Hydrogen explosion would send steel flying everywhere...

[MrBean]

But boatloads of hydrogen in a metal vehicle of any type is a ticking time bomb

But, that truck's trailer only had the appearance of steel, it is actually made up of a blend of unobtanium and a nano-tube/cf - very strong, flexible, and able to contain the liquid Hydrogen without a problem

[[XC] Lead Head]

But boatloads of hydrogen in a metal vehicle of any type is a ticking time bomb...gasoline just burns, and when it explodes it doesn't have much explosive force...great for movies and such.

Hydrogen explosion would send steel flying everywhere...

No it wouldn't. For something to explode, it needs to have tons of oxygen (or another strong oxidizer) and usually be contained very tightly in a small area. Hydrogen does not have its own oxidizer.

It would actually be safer then gasoline. Liquid fuels spread all over the ground in the event of a tank failure from a crash, slowly cooking anyone trapped inside of the car. A hydrogen fuel leak that got ignited would just shoot a jet of fire out. No oxidizer can get into the tank because the hydrogen pressure is so high, therefore there would be no explosion.

Gasoline and gasoline vapors are heavy and stay low the ground, which is why when a gasoline tank ruptures, the whole vehicle is engulfed in flames rapidly. Hydrogen is lighter then helium, so in the event of a tank failure the hydrogen rapidly rises and dissipates. This greatly reduces the chance of a dangerous fireball or explosion. If the fuel has floated away - it can't burn.

[Manicdan]

shame they used such a non aerodynamic truck to show off a new fuel type, makes me think they really dont care about the technology at all other than showing off that they have it.

[Andrew LB]

But boatloads of hydrogen in a metal vehicle of any type is a ticking time bomb...gasoline just burns, and when it explodes it doesn't have much explosive force...great for movies and such.

Hydrogen explosion would send steel flying everywhere...

Hydrogen will always plagued by "the Hindenberg Phenomenon" no matter how safe it gets. Last I heard, one of the tests that all hydrogen tanks certified by the Department of Transportation for vehicle use must pass is being shot by a .308 armor piercing military rifle round without rupture. I've personally spent a lot of time shooting that round and the non-AP variant, and both are extremely formidable rounds.

[kuroikenshi]

Hydrogen will always plagued by "the Hindenberg Phenomenon" no matter how safe it gets. Last I heard, one of the tests that all hydrogen tanks certified by the Department of Transportation for vehicle use must pass is being shot by a .308 armor piercing military rifle round without rupture. I've personally spent a lot of time shooting that round and the non-AP variant, and both are extremely formidable rounds.

I thought the Hindenberg has Helium inside of it.... more to the point, It was shown that the gues and additives in the canvas were the agents that caused the fire, Hydrogen burns clean, the flames in the old footage showed differentcomposition of flames.

[Sparky]

But boatloads of hydrogen in a metal vehicle of any type is a ticking time bomb...gasoline just burns, and when it explodes it doesn't have much explosive force...great for movies and such.

Hydrogen explosion would send steel flying everywhere...

You've watched too many movies Gasoline does not burn in liquid form, let alone explode. Only gasoline vapor burns. So every time you see a car's gas tank explode it is simply for effect and has no bearing on reality

I thought the Hindenberg has Helium inside of it.... more to the point, It was shown that the gues and additives in the canvas were the agents that caused the fire, Hydrogen burns clean, the flames in the old footage showed differentcomposition of flames.

No it was hydrogen which is why it burned up so explosively fast.

[Manicdan]

pressure in the fuel cells is what will cause any problem if there is to be one

for gasoline the tank itself is too saturated with gas fumes that no air get in and thus cannot blow up. mythbusters tried it.
the only way to get a gas tank to blow up is if the whole thing was ripped apart.

for a hydrogen tank, which is usually going to be very strong, if it ever got a hole, could lead to a problem if that hole let the whole tank tear apart releasing the hydrogen quickly

so in sum, gas or hydrogen, the tank will not blow up unless all of the fuel is released quickly

[iddqd]

If we're talking about fuel cells, you can store hydrogen really safely as a compound with a transition metal - the metal will give it up quite readily to react with something wickedly electronegative (like, for instance, oxygen). Pressure isn't a problem at all this way - however, you're lugging around a bunch of metal.

You could also go for the trivial solution and just have a steel cylinder; but to get a strong enough cylinder to withstand the pressure it would have to be really heavy. You could also do something fancy like a thin steel cylinder reinforced with carbon fiber on the outside, but then you end up with something that's both expensive and difficult to produce (you'd have to X-ray the carbon fiber to make sure it doesn't have any faults). Would be nice if we could make carbon fiber more cheaply, and more reliably. Another good material for a tank would be an amorphous metal - but again, we can't really produce them in any meaningful quantity easily.

Basically, we're going to have to wait for materials science to catch up before fuel cell cars become viable.

The pressure inside a fuel cell shouldn't be a problem - there's no reason to keep it under high pressure. The biggest problem with the fuel cells themselves is that you have to use platinum as a catalyst (very expensive), and if your fuel contains impurities, the catalyst will slowly get 'poisoned' and eventually have to be replaced. Yet another problem for material science to solve. You could actually probably skip this, and just burn the hydrogen gas in a turbine; turbines are comparably efficient to the fuel cell + electric motor approach.

In fact, all cars would become a lot more efficient if the industry just switched to turbines overnight. But they don't care.

[kuroikenshi]

You could also go for the trivial solution and just have a steel cylinder; but to get a strong enough cylinder to withstand the pressure it would have to be really heavy. You could also do something fancy like a thin steel cylinder reinforced with carbon fiber on the outside,

Well so it turns that a combination of Aramids such as Kevlar, inter-woven with carbon fiber and sandwiched in between layers of aluminum is far stronger than steel alone, and lighter too.

[Movieman]

You guys have missed the whole point of this thread.
Intel parked that truck outside Qualcom's convention but they parked it in a place where NO ONE saw it.. That is the "Whoops"...

[cegras]

Hydrogen will always plagued by "the Hindenberg Phenomenon" no matter how safe it gets. Last I heard, one of the tests that all hydrogen tanks certified by the Department of Transportation for vehicle use must pass is being shot by a .308 armor piercing military rifle round without rupture. I've personally spent a lot of time shooting that round and the non-AP variant, and both are extremely formidable rounds.

Conflagration != Detonation

You guys have missed the whole point of this thread.
Intel parked that truck outside Qualcom's convention but they parked it in a place where NO ONE saw it.. That is the "Whoops"...

Seems like we're the only ones that read the article!

[Movieman]

Conflagration != Detonation



Seems like we're the only ones that read the article!

I read it, the point was Intel is battling with Qualcom and this was/is a little attempt at corporate war..

[kuroikenshi]

Ah! thanks for that correction Dave.

I did read the article though... actually more like skimmed over it whilst having breakfast.

[cegras]

I read it, the point was Intel is battling with Qualcom and this was/is a little attempt at corporate war..

Yep, I was saying that given the discussion, us two were apparently the only ones that read it. Or maybe everyone else found the main point boring

[Hornet331]

Yep, I was saying that given the discussion, us two were apparently the only ones that read it. Or maybe everyone else found the main point boring

More the second one... it wasn't really a "news worthy" news at all...

Also ITT urban legends about hydrogen...

In fact, all cars would become a lot more efficient if the industry just switched to turbines overnight. But they don't care.

Short answer: No

look up the efficiency of turbines compared to otto motor or diesel engines.. when we talk about cars you need to consider mechanical efficiency and turbines suck at this. They are good in power plants where you can use the excess heat in a combined cycle (using the exhaust heat to power an additional steam turbine and use that left over heat for distric heating) where you can push the overall efficiency over 60%, but pure mechanical efficiency is sub 30% and thats for highly optimized turbines. Otto engines have between 35-40% and diesel engines between 40-50%.

Turbine engines usually have other uses, they are not very picky when it comes to what fule they burn so if you are not sure what fuel source you have available a turbine is better.

You could save a lot fuel if everyone just would drive a diesel powered car. (in fact in my country already more the 50% of the people drive a diesel car)

[HWaddict]

I agree Hornet311 and it seems to be too much action movies in this thread

[cegras]

Besides, the steam for turbines is superheated to ~500 C to maximize thermodynamic efficiency.