Water only car

[flapdoodle]

This (maybe) makes a bit more sense than the zillion AA cells in a hybrid car.
http://techon.nikkeibp.co.jp/english...080613/153276/

Video here:
http://uk.reuters.com/news/video?videoId=84561

Incidentally, when I went to the Toyota dealer here they were very evasive when I asked how about the live expectancy and replacement cost of the battery pack in their hybrid.

[DRW]

I also wonder if there will be a glut of cheap, used Prius's for sale with dead battery packs in a few years.

[bobc455]

"On June 1 Honda is slashing the cost of its batteries from $3,400 (excluding installation) to as low as $1,968 on an Insight or as high as $2,440 on an Accord hybrid. Toyota also plans to substantially cut battery prices, which now stand at $3,000 (excluding installation), down from $5,500 on the original Prius." - http://www.newsweek.com/id/138808/page/1

-Bob Cunningham

[theholycow]

I'm skeptical but I'd love to hear that it really works like they imply.

The basic power generation mechanism of the new system is similar to that of a normal fuel cell, which uses hydrogen as a fuel. According to Genepax, the main feature of the new system is that it uses the company's membrane electrode assembly (MEA), which contains a material capable of breaking down water into hydrogen and oxygen through a chemical reaction.

That secret "material" is the key to the whole thing. They're claiming to split water using less energy than is produced from the resulting hydrogen. What is the material, how much of it is used, and how much energy does it take to get/make that material?

At the conference, Genepax unveiled a fuel cell stack with a rated output of 120W and a fuel cell system with a rated output of 300W.

I might need a little more than 300W to drive on these roads...

[quadancer@bellsouth.net]

Well, they did say they ran out of time to put out the 500w version. Just because our present knowledge and the concept of energy loss is locked in people's brains, it doesn't mean that there aren't massive energy sources to be tapped into for less.
When zero point energy comes out, I'm gonna vote for it.

[GasSavers_JoeBob]

Originally Posted by DRW

I also wonder if there will be a glut of cheap, used Prius's for sale with dead battery packs in a few years.

Sounds like hacker's heaven to me!

[runcar]

There has to be more to the Genepax water car than is being described. As described it appears to be a hoax to me because there are way too many unanswered questions about how this is supposed to work. Perhaps with more disclosure (and full patents) the makers will fill in the blanks and it will probably turn out to be a car partly powered on water by a hydrogen on demand system that uses other chemicals besides H2O as part of the fuel.

[bobc455]

Dave- That link doesn't explain anything, except that water seems to generate free energy with no other inputs. Some sort of miraculous "chemical reaction" is great for a kids cartoon, but doesn't explain anything.

If water could be made to generate "free electricity", as shown in the cute cartoon, it would have a lot broader application than just cars.

-BC

[itjstagame]

Wow, crazy. That'd be pretty neat to split with a chemical reaction and then recombine to the original state and create energy. If they somehow used fission or fussion I could see getting enough power from water, but water isn't that conducive to fission and there's no way you could ever get back to plain water after any kind of reaction and still have energy left over.