Hi All, Was just thinking 'bout the possibility of a set of turbines in the grill area. Can/do they make a turbine the size of a common muffin fan? Seems like you could have a half dozen or so inside the grill area to help top-up the batteries. Or has this been proven to be impossible or not worth the effort? Just wondering...
IMO, I don't think the turbine blades would be big enough to turn a generator to do much more than keep the 12v battery in full charge state, but every bit helps. I like your idea. Why not put a generator on the cooling fan which is already spinning and offset the electric it uses?
Are you suggesting that putting small wind turbines on the front of the car will recapture more energy than the amount required to turn the turbines in the first place? Perpetual motion machines are fantasy.
I don't think the OP is under the impression that this set up would capture more than what was required to get the car moving to that speed initially, but rather that the turbine/generator system would simply recapture some of the spent energy. Theoretically, the system would still allow passthrough for cooling purposes, and the air flow utilized is going to flow through the grill with, or without the add of the proposed system.
Why not put a turbo on and instead of pumping air into the intake it turns a genny? Why not hack your regen system and make it more aggressive? Why not use radiator coolant as a boiler and turn a turbine generator with the steam? I think the problem is not the turbine in the original question its the generator end...it would be heavy and it would be big, and where would that go? Remember, a motor and a generator are the same thing its just a matter of whether one is feeding in or feeding out.
BTW I am not trying to be a jerk but I have worked around power generation equipment and the generator is always much bigger than the turbine.
I agree with your point. The system is unlikely to be feasibile in a real world application. I was only attempting to outline what I understood the OP's original theory/thought was. Any design on a scale small enough to integrate with the existing car would be unlikely to generate any measureable/significant power.
Then I guess it would have to be more like the one Ford is looking at in this article? Hybrid and Electric Vehicles » Green Patent Blog®
“Green Patent Blog†looks like a patent attorney’s site. He makes money by getting people to file patents. A patent does not have to work it just has to be original from anyone else's idea. The problem with that patent is that it takes energy to move that air through the fan and turn the generator. Therefore it it takes more energy (by the gas engine) to move the car through the air. So the net effect is that you loose more energy not gain more, because nothing is 100% efficient. Just stick you arm straight out of a car window going 60 miles an hour and tell me it takes no more effort to hold your arm there than when the car is standing still. You will get the idea.
