On Jul 12, 9:23 am, Dancing Fingers wrote:
On Jun 26, 10:23 pm, Orval Fairbairn
wrote:





In article .com,
Dancing Fingers wrote:

Hi Guys,
I remember years ago Kitplanes did a series on the potential for
batterry-powered aircraft. Recently, I watCHED Future Cars on the
Discovery channel and this guy had developed a car that ran on
compressed air. This seems like a more viable fuel for aircraft then
batteries. Has anybody looked into it?
just curious.
Chris

You ned either:
1. a very long hose attached to a compressor or

2. a filament-wound balonium/unobtanium air tank filled with air
compressed to 100,000,000 psi.

Otherwise, you just can't carry enough compressed air around to make a
practical vehicle.

The "Future Car" ranks right there along with Moller's "Skycar," in that
it is all vaporware.

I certainly don't think that compressed air would power a airliner but
it might be viable for small commutter flights. It seems like the
heat issue would only be an issue on the ground, during refueling,
although cabin heat would be a challenge. I was really wondering if
anyone had ever calculated the energy per cubic foot compressed air
can hold, relative to gasoline, diesel and hydrogen. There's a new
engine being developed, the Quasiturbine, that would be perfect for
this application.
For what it's worth.
Chris- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

You can put the "quasiturbine" right in the same category as the 'air
car" and "Moller's flying car" all of them are vapor ware. To
address the 'quasitubine' specifically, It has been "under
developement for at least 10 years and I think longer with no
progress. It is an extremely complicated design for a rotary engine
with little or no improvement over the original Mazda (IIRC) rotary
engine.

The heat problem is not in getting rid of it. The problem is that
that heat was produced while compressing the air and is then thrown
away. Right there should be a clue as one of the major reasons why
and "air engine" is not an economicaly viable design. That heat costs
money and represents energy that cannot be recovered.

Harry K