jay.chen@sourceinterlink.com
Holy crap, some genius has just figured out how to save the world with 100mpg fuel economy and, in one fell swoop, broke the laws of physics, chemistry, and thermo-dynamics, again. A couple weeks ago, one of my friends over at Motor Trend sent me a link to some new fangled bolt-on fuel saver kit promising to make just about any car on the road today crank out a fuel economy numbers just shy of cold fusion. I'm not sure if he sent it as a joke, or was really curious, but this I had to see. Maybe I could even install it after my Tornado and electric turbocharger came in the mail.
So, after sitting through the first of two 30-minute clips at www.preignitioncc.com/default/flashHafcHi.htm, that looked a lot like the Hale-Bopp worshiping Heaven's Gate cult videos, I was ready to kill myself. Curiosity really does kill the monkey. The idea that this company can double your fuel economy with a ragtag accumulation of random hardware, called their Hydro Assist Fuel Cell (HAFC), had me incensed. Even worse was the idea that some poor soccer mom in the armpit of New Jersey would, and probably already had, fallen for this.
The company starts off by introducing their fuel-saving solution, which comes as two kits, the Hydro Assist Fuel Cell and the Pre-Ignition Catalytic Converter (PICC), which hasn't been released yet. It takes them 10 minutes to establish this point. So, you find out that the HAFC is basically made of four totally non-related components; a so called fuel cell (that's basically a stainless tank with electrodes wired to your battery to allow your car to run on water gas), a fuel heater/ionizer duct taped to your radiator hose, some covalizer fuel additive and, of course, the magic black box they name the Optimizer that intercepts the signal coming from your O2 sensor and tricks your ECU into giving you the fuel economy that the OEM's have conspired with the government to deny you. These people were hitting the comet dust way too hard. I tried to forget about the matter.
The water gas topic reared its ugly head again when a good friend approached me about making his car run on water gas, or brown gas, because of all the forum buzz on the topic. Even after explaining to him why the process doesn't work, he was still willing to try it anyway. Desperation can make you do stupid things. So, I'll break down the concept of water for fuel for all you imaginative fuel savers.
The internal combustion engine is an air pump. In order for the engine to do work, ambient air has to be compressed and then expanded. Fuel is used in the expansion process and it's the energy stored in the fuel's chemical bonds that the engine's power comes from. Fuel is essentially a battery, or a means of storing chemical energy and taking it with us where we go. We use petroleum-based fuels, since it stores a lot of useable energy, is easily transported, and takes relatively little energy to process to a useable state. As of now, it's the best bang for the buck for energy available on a large scale.
Petroleum based fuels are made up of long hydrocarbon chains where hydrogen atoms are bonded to carbon atoms. It's the energy stored in these relatively weak hydrogen bonds (H-bonds) that power your engine. The weakness of these H-bonds is also why fuels are so volatile and unstable. By sparking the air/fuel charge, you catalyze an oxidation reaction, also known as fire, that breaks the H-bonds releasing energy.
You can use anything that stores chemical energy as a fuel. The H-bonds found in organic molecules in wood can also work as a fuel, but it's just harder to light and stuff into your gas tank. That's why we prefer gaseous, or liquid fuels, which fit better in some sort of gas tank.