Brown gas.. stop and think a second.
The truth about these "generators" is that they're not going to really gain you anything.
You have to use electricity from your car to produce the hydrogen and oxygen mix that will be put into your engine. Anybody who knows the first thing about automotive electrical will know that the more electrical load you put on your alternator, the more engine torque is needed to turn the alternator. The bond between the hydrogen and oxygen that you're breaking takes just as much energy to break as you can get from it by burning it (which just reinstates the bond). Along the way, you're going to lose a lot of that energy to heat and wasted motion... and more heat. Most energy lost in an engine is in the form of heat.
I'm sorry, but these brown gas generators are snake oil, guys. Google "laws of thermodynamics" and "TANSTAAFL". It'd be great if they worked, but laws of physics are laws that can't be broken.
Use solar to make brown gas and then somehow separate the hydrogen out, then you've got (mostly) free energy.
FWIW, I've got all the ASE automotive repair certs. Master and L1. I know a thing or two about how engines and electrical work.
Ecomike said:
Seems a DOE research project back in 1976-78 showed that small amounts of hydrogen fed to diesel engines improved the MPG about 25% above and beyond the fuel used to generate the electlricity to generate the hydrogen. Seems the hydrogen feed improves the combustion process enough to improve the power and energy yield of the diesel engine running 95% diesel, 5% (apx) hydrogen.
So you're saying that they're running just hydrogen, not hydrogen and oxygen together? I can't see how you'd get an actual advantage from adding fuel
and oxygen (in a stoich mix, no less) to the mix already going into the combustion chambers. Adding another fuel (hydrogen) would make sense.
Problem with the "hydrogen generators" is that your alternator is on-demand. You want more juice, it takes more power. You're not getting more power from the hydrogen and oxygen you just used that electricity to split apart than you'll get from putting them back.
Ecomike said:
I have also read that the people trying it on gas engines are having problems with the stock O2 sensor and computer controls, and they are working on getting around the A/F ratio computer control problem.
That would be if you're adding only hydrogen, which is adding fuel. You'll kick the fuel trims too far lean, which will set codes and check engine light, and possibly a fail-safe mode.
Any tinkering with the A/F control in the computer will have to be done legally, as bypassing or eliminating emissions control systems is illegal in the US under the Clean Air Act.
Ecomike said:
The interesting thing about the 70's DOE research was that it also reduced diesel exhaust carbon, soute (sp?), PM, and unburned hydrocarbons to current EPA limits with out filters and cat converters that are going on this years models.
Only because they're reducing the amount of carbon fuels being used by using a non hydrocarbon fuel, in this case hydrogen.
The study you mentioned doesn't sound like they were running "brown gas", but instead actually using hydrogen gas.