Re: ethanol

Bob Ward <bobward@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:

>On Tue, 15 Apr 2008 07:40:09 -0700, ctbishop@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 (Charles
>Bishop) wrote:
>
>>I thought one of the benefits of diesel was that it took a variety of
fuels.
>
>Not without some degree of tinkering, I'll bet.

The concept can burn just about any burnable liquid, and probably
burnable non-liquids like coal dust.  But your injectors would be
pretty specific for a particular liquid.  If you change the
characteristics of the burnable liquid too much, your injectors no
longer treat it right when adding it to the hot aif of the combustion
chamber.

I seem to recall an "Amazing Race" episode where three of the teams
cheerfully put gasoline into the diesel SUVs that they had been given
for that leg of the race.  I think all three of them ended up waiting
at the side of the road for mechanical assistance.

>I think they should look into bringing back steam cars, myself.  

A number of very smart people tried it in the early seventies.  If
Toyota is betting on batteries and garage outlets, I'd go with Toyota.
(and with nuclear power plants to supply the extra load that the PIH
cars would need.)  My car was originally designed with an
ultracapacitor, but they switched to NiMH after studying crash
effects.  Apparently it's easier to make batteries crash-safe than
capacitors.  
-- 
Tomorrow is today already.
Greg Goss, 1989-01-27