Hydrogen power in a car, no fuel cell

Factual Questions
1

I have information on a device that is basically an electrolysis unit that generates hydrogen and oxygen for use in an auto engine. The engine powers an alternator that generates electricity that is used to convert water to H2 and O2, which run the the engine, make the car go, and so on. It looks OK to me, but a friend says it’s a perpetual motion machine that defies the facts of physics and can’t possibly work. He says the water is not the fuel, and I say the hydrogen in the water is, which allows the engine to run and generate enough power to do everything. Does anyone know how much electrical energy (Watts) is needed to make one cubic foot of H2 at 65psi? The promoter says he can “crack” water efficiently because he has a better way of using the electricity that goes to the electrodes in the water – he modifies the current electronically. He also says he can adjust the output of the electrolysis unit to get the proper balance of orthohydrogen and parahydrogen to allow the auto engine to run well. DC is used in the electrolysis unit. If anyone can shed light on this I would appreciate it. TIA.

2

Assuming you’re talking about these folks

Genesis World Energy
Here is an extensive analysis of their claims

Answer > Yes, it’s a scam, a classic one.

3

Oh that definitely sounds like “perpetual motion technology” at work. Basically, you can never get any more energy from a system than what has been input to it. A crude way to sum up 2 of the laws of thermodynamics is “You can’t get something for nothing and you can’t ‘break even’ either”.

Basically, this “engine” is similar to putting photoelectric cells on all the walls of your house, and when you use the lights, the energy these supply to the photoelectric cells can then be fed back into the house current and you’ll have more than enough electricity for your entire life !!!"

Nope. Physics does not work that way.

Astro made a good posting about this too.

This fraud goes back to the days of John Keely in the late 19th century.
http://www.totse.com/en/fringe/free_energy/keelhoax.html

A few decades ago, Joe Newman came out with a “revolutionary” method of generating energy. He even made an appearance on the Johnny Carson show. It seems he is still, to this day, trying to bilk money from people.
http://www.phact.org/e/skeptic/new_sol.htm

With a Google search you can find out much more information about these 2 con artists. No doubt there have been many more frauds of this type.

4

That right there is an indication that this scheme is not based in scientific fact. :dubious:

5
      • Electrolysis cna be used to separate hydrogen and oxygen which can then be recombined and burned, but there is a net energy loss when this is done.
  • One direct application of this method is a “Brown’s gas” welder. Directly separating water into hydrogen and oxygen means that you have a perfect mix of gasses that is totally consumed when burned (so that in both theory and practice it burns nearly-perfectly clean, and doesn’t contaminate the welding work with unspent gasses), and that implodes when ignited instead of exploding–which makes the flame much quieter and allows for some unusual uses as well that other welding gasses don’t do well, or can’t do at all. The welding machines do not “store” the separated gasses at all, because doing that would introduce errors into the mix when they were re-combined–the welding machines are made to only produce the separated gasses on-demand.
  • Brown’s gas welders are very simple in principle–IIRC the electrodes dipped into the water need to be stainless steel, and the current has to be DC–and hydrogen comes off one pole and oxygen off the other. The welders are very expensive to buy, however–and take industrial-electrical-sized hookups to run. They need LOTS of electricity to generate enough gas for a welding flame, which should tell you something right there. The “energyoptions” link below makes a number of claims, I don’t know of those are all true but various sources who have seen and used these machines say that you can do some amazing welding with them.

http://www.energyoptions.com/tech/browns.html
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&q=brown's+gas+welding&btnG=Google+Search
~

6

It’s coceivable that some intrepid inventor has come up with a more efficient way to crack the water or to generate the electricity, but that just means that you’ll lose energy more slowly. It’s like pouring water from one bucket to another and back again: Even if you do it really carefully so you spill almost no water, you still won’t end up with more water than you started with.

To this day, I still don’t understand why so many people are willing to accept claims of perpetual motion devices. They’re all impossible, without exception.

7

Thanks for all the info and links. Would appreciate further data, especially links, on electrical power sources for autos, motorcycles, etc., so if anyone has more for me, please pass it on.

57THAI