BUILDING A HYDROGEN FUELED CAR

Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2008 5:11 am

Am interested in building my own car that will run on water/hydrogen...
If you can share info or site to check out am willing to learn everything as I already know how to build a gasoline fueled car or race car, but wanted to find out more on solar, wind and hydro electricity any help or insight would be appreciated. The only girl in my area who fixes cars. Razz

Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2008 8:22 am

Zarillian wrote:

Am interested in building my own car that will run on water/hydrogen...

This is a tall aspiration, but one I wish you all the luck with. I recently saw a science channel presentation about a man who did this on his own. Not only did he produce the car, but also a complete system to generate electrical power from solar panels to split the hydrogen from water using electrolysis. He also had a hydrogen storage system capable of storing enough hydrogen to power his house and car for a year. If I remember right, the entire system cost him about 500,000.00, and he built it mostly from scratch.

There’s basically two ways you can power a car with hydrogen. You can combust the hydrogen in a standard internal combustion engine (like BMW has already done), or you can use the hydrogen to produce electricity through fuel cells to drive an electrical motor. The fuel celled vehicle is much more efficient simply because electric motors are much more efficient then internal combustion.

Quote:

If you can share info or site to check out am willing to learn everything as I already know how to build a gasoline fueled car or race car, but wanted to find out more on solar, wind and hydro electricity any help or insight would be appreciated. The only girl in my area who fixes cars. Razz

There's much to learn here about this new technology. First, it’s important to understand that the energy stored in water (hydrogen) doesn’t just magically release its power. It must be stripped from the water molecule using energy. The trick is using renewable, non-carbon based energy to do that stripping. Hydrogen can also be easily stripped from any hydrocarbon fuel, like gasoline. So while the use of hydrogen as a fuel source is completely clean, we still must develop other energy sources to produce it as a fuel source.

Here's a couple of websites to get you started, hope they help some.

Honda's first production hydrogen fuel celled car

Hydrogen electrolysis

BMWs Hydrogen internal combustion car

Here's a production method that's really cool...
Hydrogen from Algae

This subject has long been a personal passion of mine, so if you'd like to discuss it more I'd be happy too. As gas prices continue to rise, I find it likely it will be sometime more and more people begin to think about.

Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2008 12:32 pm

Yeah, we can stay in touch I'm going to see a friend who builds race cars and
has built many a vehicles. He has an engineering degree. We will talk lots more for we have to find alternatives. Was also looking at Brazil and their sugar cane. stay tuned will kepp ya posted as to what I find out and thanks for the info.I also found this video... well so much for that!

Just Arrived Joined: Aug 29, 2008 Posts: 5

MockingGods wrote:

Zarillian wrote:

Am interested in building my own car that will run on water/hydrogen...

This is a tall aspiration, but one I wish you all the luck with. I recently saw a science channel presentation about a man who did this on his own. Not only did he produce the car, but also a complete system to generate electrical power from solar panels to split the hydrogen from water using electrolysis. He also had a hydrogen storage system capable of storing enough hydrogen to power his house and car for a year. If I remember right, the entire system cost him about 500,000.00, and he built it mostly from scratch.

I believe I have read about that some where Shocked

but that 500K price mark....it may seem like a lot but when you power your house AND car for a year basically for free I think it adds up, especially with prices today.

Posted: Mon Sep 08, 2008 5:42 am

royevans wrote:

MockingGods wrote:

Zarillian wrote:

Am interested in building my own car that will run on water/hydrogen...

This is a tall aspiration, but one I wish you all the luck with. I recently saw a science channel presentation about a man who did this on his own. Not only did he produce the car, but also a complete system to generate electrical power from solar panels to split the hydrogen from water using electrolysis. He also had a hydrogen storage system capable of storing enough hydrogen to power his house and car for a year. If I remember right, the entire system cost him about 500,000.00, and he built it mostly from scratch.

I believe I have read about that some where Shocked

but that 500K price mark....it may seem like a lot but when you power your house AND car for a year basically for free I think it adds up, especially with prices today.

This technology may be coming. I’ve seen something similar from Honda, where they supply a complete, home-based system to produce the hydrogen fuel.

The gentleman presented on the science channel produced all his technology from scratch or had it engineered for him, which is very expensive. I’m sure if this line of fuel/energy production becomes more popular it will also become cost affective, especially when you consider the ever increasing cost and rarity of fossil fuels.


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