A car that runs on water?

[GaryC 7]

I have seen things like this before but somehow this seems a little more legit. What do you all think? It would certainly change things!

http://www.yahoo.com/s/899388

[*julez* 124]

A car that runs on water! It must have legs!! A true miracle!

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

I can't view video content from work, so I am pasting text from another site (I assume this is referring to the same news item) for those who have the same problem I do...

Tired of petrol prices rising daily at the pump? A Japanese company has invented an electric-powered, and environmentally friendly, car that it says runs solely on water.

Genepax unveiled the car in the western city of Osaka on Thursday, saying that a liter (2.1 pints) of any kind of water -- rain, river or sea -- was all you needed to get the engine going for about an hour at a speed of 80 km (50 miles).

"The car will continue to run as long as you have a bottle of water to top up from time to time," Genepax CEO Kiyoshi Hirasawa told local broadcaster TV Tokyo.

"It does not require you to build up an infrastructure to recharge your batteries, which is usually the case for most electric cars," he added.

Once the water is poured into the tank at the back of the car, the a generator breaks it down and uses it to create electrical power, TV Tokyo said.

Whether the car makes it into showrooms remains to be seen. Genepax said it had just applied for a patent and is hoping to collaborate with Japanese auto manufacturers in the future.

http://in.reuters.com/article/lifestyleMol...SP7366720080613

[Niels Bohr 72]

The way it works is by using Aluminum tanks, and having the aluminum react with water giving off aluminum oxide, and hydrogen as a byproduct.

For alluminum-gallium metels, researchers have discovered that the a few percentage of the metal surface became alluminum oxide. This is because of the oxidation that occured at the surface of the metal leaving hydrogen behind. This applies to many alluminum alloys.

Technically, it really is the leftover hydrogen that does any combustion in those cars. However, with those cars, the tank needs to be changed at regular intervals because of the amount of metal deposits of alluminum-oxide inside the tank and to replinish the fresh alluminum to take advantage of the hydrogen from putting water into it.

"Engineers aren't English Majors." - Consolemaster

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

That makes sense.

[HAL 9000 96]

Sounds very interesting. I gather that you'd want distilled water to avoid oxidation reactions in the 'tank' that would yield engine-choking Aluminum oxide salts... unless of course, that is part of an electric transport chain that would in itself become conductive to a large degree of useful electrons...

On top of the H2 combustion part... and I suppose the water that is catalyzed would be reformed after the H2 combusts to react with atmospheric O2 to yield H2O again. Interesting motor.

[GaryC 7]

Sounds very interesting. I gather that you'd want distilled water to avoid oxidation reactions in the 'tank' that would yield engine-choking Aluminum oxide salts... unless of course, that is part of an electric transport chain that would in itself become conductive to a large degree of useful electrons...

On top of the H2 combustion part... and I suppose the water that is catalyzed would be reformed after the H2 combusts to react with atmospheric O2 to yield H2O again. Interesting motor.

The video says it runs on any kind of water, salt water,tap water "even tea".

BTW Troll. This story is coming out of Japan. I don't know if your story is the same. I would normally be very skeptical of things like this but it keeps popping up from unrelated sources. For it to work it has to depend on something other than the energy from the molecular bonds of hydrogen and oxygen. Otherwise it would violate the conservation of energy law.

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

BTW Troll. This story is coming out of Japan. I don't know if your story is the same.

The one I posted is also out of Japan (Osaka is in Japan) so maybe they are the same.

[GaryC 7]

BTW Troll. This story is coming out of Japan. I don't know if your story is the same.

The one I posted is also out of Japan (Osaka is in Japan) so maybe they are the same.

I am not a molecular chemist so until I see a car run on water I will hope but stay skeptical. You have to wonder if there are other things in this that must be renewed along with the water?

[HAL 9000 96]

Indeed, very interesting. I am sure it involves more electrochemistry than utilization of molecular physics in water... even though there is enough energy in H2O's bonds to power pretty much anything. You could circumvent that nasty little problem of balancing energies by catalyzing the water molecule itself and being able to conduct the energy into the motor... problem is that yes, if its strictly electrochemical then you'll need to recharge/clean the catalytic components to maintain efficiency.

[mawilson 2,133]

Wikipedia claims it's a hoax.

The water-fuelled car purports to create or extract energy from water itself, as the basis

of a perpetual motion machine. Water-fuelled cars have been mentioned in history books,

newspaper and popular science magazines, and urban legends since the 1800s. Many

accounts describe engines that run on water, frequently claiming suppression by government

or private interests to explain delays in production.[1] There are currently no commercially

available products based on these technologies, and several have been shown in court to

have been fraudulently used to solicit investment funds.[2] [3]

...

The burning of conventional fuels such as petrol (gasoline), wood, and coal converts

the fuel into substances with less energy (see enthalpy of formation). Energy is released.

In the case of most fossil fuels, combustion can be represented with the following

chemical equation:

CH4 + 2 O2 → 2 H2O + CO2

Water is a waste product.

Spontaneous chemical processes do not create energy, they release it by converting

unstable bonds into more stable bonds and/or by increasing entropy. Water is such an

abundant chemical compound in part because it has very stable bonds that resist most

reactions. In order for water to participate in a reaction that produces energy, high energy

compounds must be added. For example, it is possible to generate the combustible fuel

acetylene by adding calcium carbide to water. However, the calcium carbide, a high energy

material, is the 'fuel,' not water.

It is theoretically possible to extract energy from water by nuclear fusion, but fusion power

plants of any scale remain impractical, much less on an automotive platform.

[Teacher Mark 53]

Will it run on pi$$ and flop sweat? I have plenty of both available.

It does look very promising.

[rclouse 0]

A car that runs on water? Isn't that called a "boat"?

[I luv my chappara 0]

hahah i like that car car=boat

no need to buy boat,,, 2 in 1