So I gather that this deal fell thru.Since when?
Future of alternative fuels in the military
- Thread starter Rish
- Start date
We have the F/A 18, but no superhornet. Australia is committed to the JSF, and is the only one to be completely(US still unsure).So I gather that this deal fell thru.
Our chief of defence is a pilot, and he loves the JSF, and he won't be saying no to it, no matter what. The superhornet deal is news to me, as we never accepted, maybe offered but thats it
Anyway, off topic but keeping the facts true, which is what we're here for, that a links to cheap porn.
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You are correct, the Australians went with a up grade program. The U.S still plans on getting the JSFs and they are cutting back on F-22 orders. Australia is a major player with interest for the JSF.
A
Aussie Digger
Guest
Boeing made an unsolicited (and largely unreported) offer to the Australian Government a little while back for a deal on SH's, should Australia be interested. This was examined and probably now creates the basis of Australia's "fall back" plan should significant problems occur within the F-35 program, but at this stage it has been rejected and the centre barrel replacement project is continuing to refurbish our "legacy" model Hornets, which will then be operated until the F-35A (and possibly "B") can replace them...
Thanks for the info Eckherl.
Didn´t know about that. Must learn more about those turbine engines.
Good thing they burn almost every fuel available, much more flexibility.
Does the engine need some adjustments prior to switching fuels, or is it just fill the tanks and go?
Regards.
.pt
Didn´t know about that. Must learn more about those turbine engines.
Good thing they burn almost every fuel available, much more flexibility.
Does the engine need some adjustments prior to switching fuels, or is it just fill the tanks and go?
Regards.
.pt
You would have to perform field modifications if you were to switch fuels, during the first Persian Gulf war we had a Battalion Commander that was inquiring to have us run aviation fuel in our M1A1s because he figured we would get better horsepower, luckily after major begging he stopped looking into this, I think with us convincing him that with a bunch of tankers that have never seen combat before and had taken up the habit of chain smoking cigarettes while being around combustable ammunition was bad enough that aviation fuels would really be bad.
The division commander also told him to worry about other things instead of more horsepower.Gas turbines normally require a different sized injector to match the fuel that they burn and really, that is about it.
For example; if I wanted to use a "Capstone" GT to power my office building I have the choice between Hydrogen, LNG, LPG, Diesel, Gas, ethanol, methanol and bio-diesel. just swap out the injector and you are good to go.
They don't fatigue any more then usual.
cheers
w
I have never been involved in actual field testing and was told that in the event of a emergency that this was feasible to do, the modifications would be done I would assume at battle maintenance level operations. If you want me to Waylander I can ask around at the Armor branch and find out what process they need to go thru and find out how reliable the field modifications are.
I´m getting confused...
About the M1 turbine engine, ok, i now know that it can burn different fuels with some modifications, namely fuel injectors, thanks to Eckherl and Wooki kindly explaining.
But the Leopard MTU Diesel engine???
Waylander, perhaps you mean different types of diesel, biodiesel, etc, but does that engine run on alcohol or gas??
If it´s a diesel engine, it´s an impossibility..diesels are combustion engines, not explosion engines like gas run engines...Thats what i learned anyway...
.pt
About the M1 turbine engine, ok, i now know that it can burn different fuels with some modifications, namely fuel injectors, thanks to Eckherl and Wooki kindly explaining.
But the Leopard MTU Diesel engine???
Waylander, perhaps you mean different types of diesel, biodiesel, etc, but does that engine run on alcohol or gas??
If it´s a diesel engine, it´s an impossibility..diesels are combustion engines, not explosion engines like gas run engines...Thats what i learned anyway...
.pt
Diesel engines are ideal for burning nearly everything because of the high compression ratios you can get. e.g. 34:1
So I could literally take a pick and go out and rip up the road I live on and use the pieces of asphalt as fuel. But to do that you need to to heat the asphalt (bitumen) to a temperature where it can flow through the injectors. And that is what waylander is talking about. Using a bit of gas to help the combustion of a trickle or syrupy like fuel, just as you would add ethanol to gasoline to increase its octane level.
Once the engine is warmed up you can cut the gasoline injection. Its also why you have "glow plugs" in a diesel to help the engine start.
High compression ratios are great for burning fuels that have high levels of impurities in them. A good example is wet steam.
If you inject water into a diesel engine (as you see in a tractor pull in the USA), the engine struggles with various rates of combustion and non-combustion (It revs while idling). Increase the fuel consumption and the engine slowly comes up to speed and becomes smoother and then you get the benefits of water spreading or atomizing the fuel within the combustion chamber and thats why "hill billys" think they are getting more power using water. Its partly true. But what they don't realize is that at 750 degrees C, water completely disassociates into hydrogen and oxygen and burns giving you that classic red glow of a hydrogen fire that you see exhausting out of the smoke stack.
Another thing people don't realize is that water begins disassociating at 100 degrees C, so If I pressurize the resultant wet steam to 4 bar and then inject this pressurized steam into a diesel engine with a compression ratio of 34:1 there is enough free hydrogen and oxygen in the mix to ignite.
Water is a great fuel, so long as it can be heated and ignited, so its ideal for powering things that get hot. Hypersonic aircraft would be a good example but for the the 2nd part of the equation... getting it to ignite.
Anyway Diesel engines are a fantastic because of the compression ratios they can achieve and you can control irritating things like ignition. And as they are designed for reciprocating high compression they are normally (excuse pun) built like a tank. Given all these attributes, you have a world of possibilities with regard to fuel selection over and above turbines, because turbines are fragile.
Inject water into a turbine and see how fast the blades fracture. It is quite spectacular.
There, how was that for an essay?
: :nutkick Cheers
W
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Grand Danois
Entertainer
Very nice. Was fascinated by the "hill billy" water compression part. Enjoyed it. But it leaves me with a question. In a diesel, would you not use more energy compressing the water, than you would get out of the combustion?
But it leaves me with a question. In a diesel, would you not use more energy compressing the water, than you would get out of the combustion?No, as a rule, running on a lean mix you would get about 10% more power than you would using diesel.Very nice. Was fascinated by the "hill billy" water compression part. Enjoyed it.
Some patents claim 600MPG, but I have to scratch my head at that one. Besides USPTO patent examiners are a bit suspect to begin with.
Realistically, if you modified an existing diesel to run off water, you would need an electric heating system, which is easy enough to do with a stainless steel heating element like your coffee perculator. When you started the engine you would have to wait (until the water boiled) and then use a starter motor like normal to get the engine to fire.
So you are going to have a larger battery bank then normal (perhaps four batteries as opposed to one) to make this engine work.
It appears that the faster you produce steam, the more horsepower you can get (logical, as it means more fuel) so, you have to strike a balance between the engine running an alternator which supplies the electrical energy to heat the water and providing horse power to the ground so-to-speak. That translates to around 10% more power and 45 to 60MPG.
Also a fully enclosed system that recovers the heated water (exhaust) improves your efficiency (maybe up to 100MPG), but then you can't really use fossil fuels to give it a boost if and when you want to.
Whatever you do, you will go through more batteries than normal. But not more than twice the rate, I would imagine.
What would be interesting is to actually determine how much O2 and Hydrogen is produced at these low temperatures; As it follows that if making steam is more important (as to the reason why free Hydrogen and Oxygen are produced) than actual temperature, then you can start mucking around with water making technologies that boil water at low pressures.
Anyway, I love this stuff, as I want to use it in cooling leading edges and then just pump it into a compressing machine called a SCRAM jet
The race is on!!Cheers
W
Todjaeger
Potstirrer
Granted this thread is a little old, but I was wondering if there were any recent developments. Either in terms of alternate fuels (aside from petroleum based fuels) or work on alternate/hybrid engines for ground vehicles. So far, aside from some testing, I haven't heard for a military vehicle having been fitted with an HEV engine.
Also, can anyone tell me the approximate ratio for distances travels by a vehicle powered by a tank of diesel and a tank of alcohol (ethanol or methanol)?
-Thanks
Also, can anyone tell me the approximate ratio for distances travels by a vehicle powered by a tank of diesel and a tank of alcohol (ethanol or methanol)?
-Thanks