Has anyone ever thought about intalling a turbine into a car? I know it has been done many times as a tech showcase for a concept car but has anyone actually tried to put one in a regular car with the intent of practical use? The fiero would be perfect for this sort of thing. A small turbine could be put up front. An idea I was thinking of would be to build a series hybrid like this. A turbine up front would charge the battery or power an electric motor directly but would not power the wheels itself.

Turbines when at a constant speed are WAY more efficient that a piston engine at a constant speed. Although they are less efficient when the rpms are varying like when accelerating. Mechanically they are much more reliable and powerful than a piston engine of equivalent size. No cooling systems, no ignition timing, perfect balance. In fact they only have one moving part. They work by injecting fuel into the combustion chamber where a spark plug fires only once to start the fire so to speak. After that fuel is constantly injected so it continues to burn. More fuel, higher rpm.

Now because the piston engine is more efficient at varying speeds it makes more sense in a regular car because cars vary speeds themselves. But varying speeds has very little to no impact on the efficiency of an electric motor in comparison. Which is why the electric motor would power the wheels and the turbine would power the electric motor. Coupled with the fact that a turbine will run on anything that burns, a typical gasoline piston engine can't compete. At least until you consider cost anyway...

Turbines are very expensive right now and that is what keeps the technology just out of reach. Fortunately however, that setback will only be temporary. But think about it- turbine up front powers the batteries in the center tunnel which power the electric motor. Just brainstorming

The only one I know of was the Chrysler Turbine car from the early 60's. You're right, they do have a lot of advantages: fairly simple, burn just about anything and your idea of using one to power a generator I think would be much better than actually including it in the vehicle power train. As a US Navy gas turbine systems techincian I feel particularly qualified to discuss this. I have been on numerous ships and hovercraft powered by gas turbine engines, everything from the little Turbomach T62 up to the GE LM2500+. They are awesome power producers capable of tremendous HP in a relatively small package. The disadvantages are high cost, not very fuel efficient and they are unbelievably LOUD! I think the biggest obstacle to doing what you propose would be cost. I'm sure you could get it to work, hell, Chrysler reportedly put over a million miles on one of their cars! But short of obtaining maybe a surplus engine cheap, you could buy a whole car for the price of a new engine. It would be interesting though...

It would probably be an easy swap, there are lots of small turbine engines around, for air start units and from APU's. Mostly the problem if it is one, is that they are fairly low horsepower units like in the range of 100 to 150 HP. Output shaft speed is reasonable on most of them as they are designed to drive generators. Probably find one on Ebay.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/SUN...em3f21e25f6b&vxp=mtr

turbine

Maybe something like an older honeywell turbine could work. Something very small. And maybe the fuel efficiency could be worked out if it were possible to make it burn leaner. What I mean is a small turbine is easily capable of producing enormous amounts of power but it doesn't need to do that if its just powering a generator. In fact it would most likely never have to operate at full capacity. Unfortunately I am not a turbine technician and have actually never even worked on one haha I'm just familiar with the basic concept. I'm sure there would be a lot more engineering involved in actually building this but I don't have the skills or time to do it. I'm sure exhaust technology could be developed to keep the noise down. And I think turbines will one day become much more efficient. I mean look how much the piston engine has changed in the past 100 years. When the technology becomes readily available it can develop more easily.

what about the generated heat?

quote Originally posted by fireboss: what about the generated heat?

You beat me too it, the heat would be considerable not to mention it is unlikely to be fuel efficient by any means relative to a piston engine. The greatest attribute of the turbine engine as I heard it discussed is dependability in aircraft applications. I will not bring up the noise, expense of the precision parts and maintenance. It would teach tailgaters a lesson with a rear exhaust outlet.

My dad actually got to drive the Chrysler turbine home one day (he worked at a Chrysler dealer). I was very young, of course, but remember being in awe...
~ Paul
aka "Tha Driver"

Custom Fiberglass Parts

30 years ago some body put a small turbon in a 74? vet. used a 6 to 1 reducer to power a turbo 400. It had a 2 inch high, 3 foot wide exhaust, like a belly pan. Would leave 2 black marks for as long as you held it WOT. It would melt bumper covers on the cars behind it at traffic lights.
It was .10 sec faster that the BBC 63 vet i had at the time.

I think jay leno has a gas turbon bike !!

The problem with turbine engines is their range of power levels, and the fuel needed to idle them. A turbine engine idles at 20-30% RPM, but is producing only a tiny fraction of its max power, and it is sucking down a lot of fuel just to do it. A turbine engine needs to run at or near full RPM to be considered anywhere near efficient. On a plane this works out nicely since you can size the engine accordingly so that it is running at it's most efficient in flight. It runs at a constant speed anyway.

The only time a car needs constant power is when its moving along, most likely on a highway. it takes something like 13 HP to do 60 in a car. So you would need an engine that max power is at, lets say 17-20 HP. That is one tiny turbine engine! and it certainly wouldn't perform well in any sort of performance driving at that low of a maximum power level. This engine would be so small it could fit in one hand. And if you wanted to do 80 MPH, you'd need a bigger engine that could do maybe 40 HP, but again would loose considerable efficiency at 60 MPH. So it's a crap sandwich any way you look at it.

Chrysler did something neat with their engine. They used a method, and a uniquely designed one, to boost the efficiency of the turbine engine to acceptable levels.

Turbine engines first compress air using a turbo charger like compressor, then burn fuel in that air to expand the air, (basically heating it) then the expanded air turns a turbine, driving the compressor. Then, the remaining gasses turn a second turbine that drives the wheels independently.

The loss of efficiency is typically the expelled heat out of the second turbine (the exhaust). So what chrysler did, was use that wasted heat to Pre-heat the compressed air before the fuel was added and burnt. So some of the heat and expansion engergy that would have come from the fuel directly, comes from the exhaust of previously burnt fuel. So not as much fuel was needed to keep the engine running. This also had the effect of cooling the exhaust gasses considerably as well. the cooler that is, the less energy is wasted. Chryslers unique design was known as the rotary recouperator. Truely innovative. They were able to post MPG's somewhere around18 on the highway, but still pretty poor in city.

Now, like you mensioned, hybrid vehicles is another story. You could use a tiny turbine to charge batteries occasionally around town, spin it up to up the batteries. What's truely great about turbine engines, is that you can run them right up to full throttle from a cold start, and just leave them there. You wouldnt try that on a piston engine. The other thing of beauty, is that an engine that would power a car adequately would be quite small, it could weigh as little as 30-50 lbs too.

Having worked on many low power vehicles over the years (Human Power, Electric Cars, Solar Cars etc.). I could see an application of a turbine with a generator to provide charging power to batteries and an electric motor. Especially if you could utilize the recuperative technology similar to what Chrysler did long ago. Since you only need a relatively small amount of power to do continuous driving the turbine wouldn't need to be very large or powerful, maybe like someone else said 15 to 20 HP. The excess energy of the turbine/generator over energy used to propel the car at say 70 mph would charge the battery. The battery would then have the capability of driving the electric motors for short higher power runs to get up to speed. That coupled with regenerative braking would most likely be sufficient to provide you with a very spirited little car that would also be quite energy efficient. Kind of like replacing the engine on a GM Volt with a small turbine to gain efficiency and reduce mass.

Here ya go, give these guys a call. If they can do it to a Mini....."Documented speed trial of turbine-powered Mini-Cooper. 1/4 Mile in 10.88 seconds; 135.2 MPH"

http://marineturbine.com/projects.asp

[This message has been edited by ZCR1 (edited 03-05-2013).]

See Driver, we have more in common. A friend in high schools dad had one of these early 60s Chryslers too. It was gorgeous and was very comparable to a ICE car at the time. Heat was a non issue. He drove it for I think 3 months just like any other car. It got comparable gas mileage...but it did that with anything that burned no matter how cheap or expensive it was. Chryslers program only lent the drivers the car, and he hated to give it back. It was remarkably quite and smooth. The only drawback is a turbine engine is made to run at continuous higher rpm and dont have any low end torque. It was a grandma car off the line but transmission tech could have caught up with it sooner or later. I dont know about nowadays, but VN era jets operating from carriers used to throw their engines to max thrust just before touchdown so it was spooled up to power in case they had to go around. Even the F4s that I flew were slow to start rolling with thousands of hp as they ran up to speed and the F4 was a POWER beast. Also jets even now on carriers have to use catapults to overcome the slow starts on takeoff...without one even the most powerful jets (Harrier excepted) attempting takeoff, would just fall off the end of the deck.

Also be cool to tell people your car was powered by a freaking jet engine!

A guy brought a Batmobile to a big local car show a few years ago powered with a helicopter jet. He drove it there

Turbines are used in aircraft because they are better at aircraft things than piston engines.

-Higher HP/LB ratio: they get high power from a light weight package
-Durable: They can spend their entire service lives at max output
-Low NVH: Less fatigue from vibration means that the structure that supports them can be lighter and more airworthy
-Broad performance envelope: They lose less power at altitude and operate over a wider range of speeds than piston engines can, although this more or less applies to piston driven propellers.

Disadvantages for automotive use:
-LOUD: The high exhaust velocity and flow shear makes them extremely loud. While a muffler system can be built to make them quiet, it would be extremely bulky and not package well in a car.
-High exhaust temperature: A piston engine pushes approximately 1/3 of the fuel's energy to the output, coolant and exhaust. A turbine can only push heat to output power and exhaust, so it pushes a lot more heat to the exhaust.
-Inefficient: Turbines are the only way to push aircraft to over 500 mph, but they are VERY thirsty compared to piston engines. Add to that the inherent inefficiencies of a series hybrid system and a turbine series hybrid wouldn't be a good choice.

Now a *diesel* parallel hybrid on the other hand...
30 HP diesel engine
100 HP electric motor
Should be about the ideal powertrain configuration. All the acceleration and deceleration, climb and descent, could be handled regeneratively by the electric drive. The steady-state loads of just pushing the car through the air would be handled by the engine, as would recharging the battery.

[This message has been edited by Will (edited 03-05-2013).]

That Batmobile, WOW

Will, have you ever heard a jet in a car application (not a dragster) ? Chrylers turbines were not loud..exhaust was more like an air nozzle from an air hose and a whine. That Batmobile made more of a whine/ humm than anything else. It was quieter than most of the muscle cars there. It had no muffler...you can see the exhaust pipe coming right out the side of the engine bay. They might be louder on freeway at higher speeds, but Ive never heard one to be sure.

quote Originally posted by rogergarrison: The only drawback is a turbine engine is made to run at continuous higher rpm and dont have any low end torque. It was a grandma car off the line but transmission tech could have caught up with it sooner or later.

Actually, the problem wasn't torque. It was throttle response. The Chrysler Turbine car produced 100% torque at ZERO (T2) RPM. So sitting still the car could make full torque! But to do that, you would have to powerbrake it. It probably would have incinerated the tires, the T2 output torque was well over 400 lb-ft!

Turbines can't handle throttle changes very well. The temperature on the gas generator turbine (T1 turbine) goes up when you give it throttle because the flames start to escape the combustion chamber, and when the RPM catches up, the temperature comes back down as the flames are shrunk back down by the increased combustion chamber pressures. So for this reason, and potential compressor stall, all gas turbine engines have an RPM acceleration limit. You could dump a bunch of fuel in, but the turbine would melt and fly apart. On the other end of the spectrum, removing fuel too quickly extinguishes the flame completely, then you need to re-light.

I'm sure I will stick my 1,700 HP Jet engine on my car at some point. Nothing to do with practicality at all.

It'll fit on the Fiero. I'll make it fit.

Jet thrust to shaft driven power is so different.
In first gear, my 3.4 DOHC Fiero can achieve a peak acceleration of around 1G which is FAR faster then my jet engine can ever do.
With my Jet engine, it would accelerate around .3G from a standstill well up past 100 MPH, then slowly tapering off till terminal velocity somewhere in the upper 200's.
for comparison, In 3rd gear, my best acceleration would hit around .3G, at right around 70. Then it tapers off pretty quickly after that, especially after hitting 4th gear.

Shaft driven turbine cars follow the same pattern piston engines do, except the torque curve is a nearly straight line, highest at zero T2 RPM, tapering down as RPM's increase.

So its apples and oranges even amongst the turbine powered vehicles. Thrust sucks, but it's manditory for aircraft!

[This message has been edited by Fierobsessed (edited 03-05-2013).]

(Budget and resources aside) These little engines seam pretty efficient. If you run on just the turbines alone it gets over 31 MPG (by my calcs) and that's carrying the dead weight of the depleted hybrid battery pack.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/...gine-costs-200K.html

Idea is a couple years old, so there are likely more advanced systems in work.

EDIT: When I say engines alone, I don't mean by thrust.

[This message has been edited by ZCR1 (edited 03-05-2013).]

Sunstrand's T62 Series engines are used to power APU sets to produce electricity for aircraft. They operate at constant speed only and are not designed for variable output. I looked at the link you provided and noticed that turbine lacks both a generator and an ESU (control computer). Normal aircraft output voltages for this APU are 208 vac, operating at 400hz. Although it sounds like a cool idea it is not very practical or easy to implement. If dc motors were used you would additionally need some sort of retifier bank to even use it. If your father is Bill Gates I say go for it; otherwise I wouldn't bother.
21+ years Gas Turbine Tech

Fierobsessed haha where did you get that thing?

Ebay

Obsesses, I dont know the technicals of it so your prob right. My statement was based on riding in that Chrysler Turbine. You could floor it and it still started off like a VW bus. It gained momentum fast and faster though. Going from memory the F4 I flew had two 75,000 pnd thrust engines (dont know how that equates to HP) and from a dead stop, you could hold it back with a rope. In the air you could get 1500 mph.

[This message has been edited by rogergarrison (edited 03-05-2013).]

quote Originally posted by rogergarrison: Obsesses, I dont know the technicals of it so your prob right. My statement was based on riding in that Chrysler Turbine. You could floor it and it still started off like a VW bus. It gained momentum fast and faster though. Going from memory the F4 I flew had two 75,000 pnd thrust engines (dont know how that equates to HP) and from a dead stop, you could hold it back with a rope. In the air you could get 1500 mph.

Nah! It's all good, I'm not being critical just trying to be informative. I'm a bit jealous that you've actually seen one in person, let alone got a ride in one to be honest. I know my turbines pretty well, I think they are cool, but hardly practical for automotive use with rare exceptions.

One of those exceptions being way too awesome to handle. Like its so awesome it actually broke the awesomeness scale. "Hey what you got in that thing?" "A big block V8...what about you?" "Nothing big just a FREAKING JET ENGINE!!!"

1 pound of thrust = 2 hp

I did this years ago (note that picture is backwards...)

Picture is missing.....

[This message has been edited by Butcheroo (edited 03-05-2013).]

Hahahahahahaha that looks legit

What about using the turbine as a range extender? Use a turbine that was meant to drive a generator and it could be run at full throttle giving it the best fuel efficiency. Kind of like the EV1 series hybrid concept or the jag c-x75 turbine concept

quote Originally posted by FFIEROFRED: 1 pound of thrust = 2 hp

So if I know how to do math still, your saying that F4 makes 300,000 HP ??

quote Originally posted by FFIEROFRED: 1 pound of thrust = 2 hp

It doesn't work that way.

1 pound of thrust at 0 FPS = 0 HP

1 pound of thrust at 550 FPS = 1 HP

Is there an equation to convert thrust to horsepower?

Quoting from one of my aviation web sites:

"Turbofan/turbojet engines do not have a free turbine and do not make 'horsepower' in the conventional definition of the word since they are not actually capable of doing any work. (Unlike a spinning shaft) So a conventional jet engine only produces an accelerated mass.

With this the 'technical' formula for converting thrust to horsepower is; (speed in ft/sec) X (lbs thrust) then divide the product by 550.

In this formula you will see that a jet engine standing still, even though at full power, makes 0 Horsepower since it is not moving anything. (Only accelerating a mass) aviation Industry standard is 2.5lbs of thrust = 1 horsepower when an engine is 'static'.

IE. the PW-229 of a Viper makes 11,664 HP if it makes 29,160lbs of thrust static.

So if that Viper is moving at MACH 1 which is about 750MPH or 1,935.6ft/sec (Depending on altitude) and making 27,000lbs of thrust, (1935.6 x 27000) / 550 = 95020 HP!

You can see the faster a jet engine 'moves' an aircraft (doing work) the more horsepower it makes. So if thrust is constant with increasing airspeed, the HP goes up.

This is why Turboshaft and Turboprop engines are rated by 'power' (shp or kW) while Turbofan and Turbojet engines are rated by 'thrust' (kN or lbs) "

-Dave

I've often thought that the Allison 240 turbine from one of those little choppers would be wonderful in a Fiero. IIRC, that's some 400hp in a package not much bigger than the current drive train. Nothing a little autobody butt padding couldn't handle anyway.
I think I'd go hydraulic AWD in that case...it's much easier to deal with a turbine's constsnt output that way. A gear train driving a high pressure, low volume hydraulic system with motors in each wheel.
The only thing is, what do you do with the exhaust for street driving? You've got an 8" pipe flowing lots of gas in excess of 800°. I think that would tend to annoy the guy behind you.
The conversion would be worth it for the cool factor of the sound alone!

I think when comparing turbine and internal combustion engines you need to put them in the same context. 1. They both pump air and they both have a PTO shaft so either measure the thrust (air volume per sec and velocity from the exhaust of both engines or measure the ft•lbf per second of each PTO/crank shaft for mechanical HP. As far as torque goes a turbine is like a diesel engine on steroids.

I think on the Chryslers, they ran the exhaust TO the back and then back up to the front intake with a split at the front to send some of the exhaust back out the tailpipe. By the time it cycled thru, the exhaust air didnt feel that much hotter than a ICE car as I remember it. It def didnt start fires or melt pavement like the naysayers thought.
Heres some info that touches a bit on everyones posts:

The 1963 Turbine's engine generated 130 brake horsepower (97 kW; 132 PS) and an instant 425 pound-feet (576 N·m) of torque at stall speed, making it good for 0 to 60 mph (0 to 97 km/h) in 12 seconds at an ambient temperature of 85 °F (29 °C)—it would sprint quicker if the air was cooler and denser.

The lack of many moving parts and the lack of liquid coolant eased maintenance, while the exhaust did not contain carbon monoxide, unburned carbon, or raw hydrocarbons. Nevertheless, the turbine generated nitrogen oxides and the challenge of limiting them proved an ongoing problem throughout development.

The power turbine was connected, without a torque converter, through a gear reduction unit to an only moderately modified TorqueFlite automatic transmission. The flow of the combustion gases between the gas generator and free power turbine provided the same functionality as a torque converter but without using a conventional liquid medium. Twin rotating recuperators transferred exhaust heat to the inlet air, greatly improving fuel economy. Varying stator blades prevented excessive top end speeds, and provided engine braking on deceleration.

Throttle lag and exhaust gas temperatures at idle plagued early models; Chrysler was able to remedy or mitigate these to some degree. Acceleration lag, however, remained a problem, and fuel consumption was excessive. Acceleration was outstanding provided the turbine was spun up (by applying power) prior to releasing the brakes. Otherwise it was mediocre. The Turbine Car also featured a fully stainless steel exhaust system, the exits of which were flat in cross section. This was intended to spread the exhaust gases thinly and thus cool them further, in order to allow the vehicle to stand in traffic without risking damage to following traffic. The combustor, or burner, was somewhat primitive by the standards of modern turbojet engines. A single reverse-flow canister featuring a more-or-less standard spark plug for ignition was employed. Had the engine been further developed, annular combustion chambers along with a second power turbine might have improved power and economy even more. The transmission had "idle" instead of "neutral".[5]

The turbine car had some operational and aesthetic drawbacks. The car sounded like a giant vacuum cleaner, which was unexpected to consumers who were more familiar with the sound of a large American V8.

[This message has been edited by rogergarrison (edited 03-06-2013).]

The exhaust from the chrysler turbine car was actually only 140 degrees- much cooler than a piston engine thanks to its use of regenerators. Development actually continued on the project up until 1980 where they were designing the 7th generation turbine engine where the issues like throttle lag were almost completely eliminated. Unfortunately as many of you will remember it was at this point that chrysler went belly up.

Fuel consumption was still a problem however so the more practical use of an automotive turbine would be in a series hybrid where the turbine could run at full throttle constantly to charge the batteries when needed kind of like in the volt. The turbine would never actually power the wheels directly. And at this high constant rpm is where the turbine is more fuel efficient than an equivalent piston engine.

And no engine has very good acceleration from a standstill. When you want to go fast in a piston car you build up the rpms first. The same applies here. No car is very fast if you start from idle short of some sports cars.

[This message has been edited by RilesOfSmiles (edited 03-06-2013).]

Looks like Capstone already built one. Its called the CMT-380. Its a series hybrid supercar powered by 2 electric motors driving the rear wheels that are powered by a C30 microturbine genset. The turbine does not power the wheels it only powers the electric motors. Does 0-60 in 3.9 seconds and has an electronically limited top speed of 150 mph. It can go 80 miles on battery power alone but with the turbine it can go 500 miles on a single tank of fuel! Given time this technology could easily trickle down into regular cars.

CMT-380

This, ladies and gentlemen, is the future.

Unless you want all or nothing, connecting a turbine to the wheels isn't a great idea. Turbines hate changing speed. One thing everyone complained about on the Chrysler Turbine was how slow to respond it was. Even the later versions didn't do much better. With a CVT, you could overcome a lot of that.

Thats actually a really great idea. The turbine could just run at its most efficient rpm and the transmission could do the changing. And it would eliminate the need for a hybrid system completely and would be more efficient. And with turbines being so powerful they could put out some truly insane performance figures with a CVT.