Mod Steam2

Over the last 250 years, steam engines ushered in the American Industrial Revolution, drove the locomotives that fueled our Western Expansion, and powered ships that navigated America’s rivers and coastlines well into the 20^th Century. Steam built this country, and today, steam remains the driving force behind over 60% of our nation’s electricity production – natural gas, coal and nuclear power plants run on massive Rankine cycle steam turbines, as do our nuclear submarines and ships for the U. S. Navy.

Recent advances in steam engine technology utilizing new materials, unique designs and creative processes such as extensive heat regeneration and water lubrication have made these engines smaller, lighter, more powerful and more efficient than ever before. Today, steam engines have the potential to power cars, trucks, busses, trains and other forms of modern transportation in ways that are cleaner and less reliant on fossil fuels than current practical alternatives.

This paper is written to explore and discuss the possibilities of applying the modern Rankine cycle steam engine to the automobile and interstate truck. With the design and material improvements available today, the Rankine cycle engine cannot continue to be ignored as a mobile power source. One such engine developed by Cyclone Power Technologies[2], the Schoell cycle engine, of all the steam systems proposed, offers the most advanced form and presents the most competitive net efficiency and could be the closest to full scale production. It is not a wishful proposal: Cyclone’s Schoell cycle engine is a reality.

What is also a reality today is that far too many government mandates are imposing, in the opinion of this author, forcing flawed decisions, bad science and poor reasoning on the entire automobile industry and culture. These decisions negatively affect the type of cars being built, the fuels they use, and the total end cost to the consumer. We must indeed address problems of global warming, resource depletion and dependence on fossil fuels (often from unfriendly sources). Laws coming out of Washington and states like California, however, appear to be more like panic driven guesses and political posturing than sound and clear engineering reasoning. This paper will also address these critical issues and provide the opinions of this author about possible solutions.

Finally, this author would like to thank certain individuals who have helped make not only this paper, but more importantly, modern steam a reality. Harry Schoell, the consummate inventor and namesake for the Schoell cycle engine, is someone I’ve known for many years. Harry may have brought more to the practical development of modern steam technology than anyone in the past century; but Harry is not alone. His team of technical advisors includes some of the most respected and knowledgeable people in the field, including Robert Edwards, a former fellow engineer from Lockheed Martin, and George Nutz, whose work with steam cycles over the last 50 years is unrivaled in the field. George did much of his early work on steam at the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory, part of the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and represented MIT-IL at the Department of Transportation Clean Air / External Combustion hearings in the late 1960s. In the spirit of full disclosure, this author also serves as a technical advisor for Cyclone’s Schoell cycle engine. One must also thank the people that have fought to keep steam automobiles in the public eye, such as Tom Kimmel, the President of the Steam Automobile Club of America; Jay Leno, whose collection of antique steamers this author knows very well; and the hundreds of steam enthusiasts world wide who study, build and collect these wonderful vehicles.

This paper expresses some strong opinions about the state of the US automotive industry and the roles that antiquated thinking, politically-driven policies and fuzzy science by Governments have played not only in getting us into this mess, but also in leading us down the costly and wrong paths to get us out. While this author does not speak for the people mentioned above, these are certainly opinions that many people share. It is time for such ideas to be raised and meaningful discussion to take place. That is the ultimate goal behind this paper.

The steam powered automobile has existed since the genesis of that form of transportation. At the turn of the 20^th Century, steam was the desired power source. It was understood, used and accepted worldwide in all sizes and applications including steam engines that powered factories, ships and locomotives. If you wanted a high power output, then steam was the only possible choice.

On the contrary, the internal combustion engine (IC) was a cantankerous and unreliable power source until the various automobile manufacturers took the technology under intense development and, one by one, eliminated the problem areas such as the starter hand crank, carburetion with all of the sophistication of chicken watering troughs, lubrication by dip hope and pray, primitive ignition and low engine efficiency. The IC engine soon became the accepted prime mover for vehicles and the steamer was relegated to the background, except for a few companies and enthusiasts who refused to bow to this way of thinking and to abandon the features that only steam offered. Today that dream is still alive in the hands of many enthusiasts.

The steam-power automobile as it exists now has not benefited to any major degree from engineering improvements, technological advances, or the application of many of the new materials since World War II. Most of the recent modern steam projects have only employed Band-Aids and some detail advances in specific areas to what is still basically 19th Century technology. A few proposed steam systems that this author has witnessed border on the technically absurd. Quite frankly, these legacy steam power systems, utilizing antiquated technology and materials, will not provide the pollution controls, fuel efficiency, simplicity and compactness required to ensure commercial success today. They are best left as interesting hobby subjects.

What was necessary was a total review in all areas of Rankine cycle vehicle engineering – a clean sheet of paper with detailed concentration on advancing the work in specific problem areas. In the opinion of this author, Cyclone Power Technologies has done this to a greater extent than any other developer known or reviewed, and the developments introduced in the early prototypes of Cyclone’s Schoell cycle engine are showing a dramatic improvement over steamers of the past.

Questions that we should be asking with respect to automotive power sources are which ones are really practical, reliable, cost effective, and acceptable to the car-buying motorist? Which ones truly address the greatest environmental problems of our time, and allow our nation to wean itself off the use of traditional fossil fuels that increasing come from volatile, if not hostile, areas of the world?

With respect to the advancement of vehicle technologies, the prime goal of the responsible scientific community, in the opinion of this author, is to reduce as much as possible the CO₂ level produced by the automobile. This means in part making carbon-neutral fuels – especially homegrown bio fuels – commercially, financially and morally attractive. Basing one’s fuel supply future on unstable and often unfriendly nations is a risky business. Our scientific community must also be charged with seeing that the total energy consumed by any new fuel system being adopted is as low as is practical. The reduction of the exponential speed of climate change is the primary emphasis for all of this work.

From a practical standpoint, we also need to ask whether a new engine format can quickly be put into production, even on a limited basis. What tooling costs are involved and what training of the assembly line workers is needed? How would it affect the suppliers? What would it cost to affect even a limited conversion plan? Often, the negative mindset of risk-adverse corporate executives, or those who are basing their opinions of such new technologies on old and out-dated concepts, confuses these practical issues.

Overall, there are four primary reasons why this author believes that the modern steam engine is the right path to take for our automotive future. It is not the only one possible; but certainly will do the job very well and is a definite possibility for the near term future:

1. Steam engines are inherently cleaner and less pollution producing than any IC engine.

2. Steam engines demonstrate true fuel flexibility: they can burn virtually any liquid or gaseous fuel in the most clean manner possible without added hardware or control systems.

3. Steam engines can provide very high fuel efficiency, in city and stop-and-go conditions, and new designs can provide overall net cycle efficiencies rivaling Diesel engines.

4. Steam engines match the torque and horsepower requirements of motor vehicles perfectly.

These are all important, science-based reasons why automotive companies must revisit Rankine cycle engines as a power source for cleaner, more efficient, more fuel-flexible vehicles, with the power output needed to move the type of cars that the American public actually wants to buy.

The Rankine cycle engine is an external combustion engine, burning its fuel in a separate combustion chamber. By contrast, the internal combustion (IC) engine burns its fuel inside the cylinders. The constantly varying temperatures and pressures in the IC engine greatly influence the actual combustion process. In the Rankine cycle engine combustion is at a constant low pressure and is continuous (i.e., there are no explosions) with a long residence time for the fuel particles to burn completely in a pollution free manner.

When properly designed, the combustion system of the Rankine cycle engine with absolutely no pollution control hardware provides the very best possible pollution elimination over any fuel burning IC engine. This very clean burning condition is accomplished in several ways. The combustion air pressure in the firebox is typically less than one pound per square inch and the fuel particles have a long residence time in the burner (combustion is a continuous controlled process), insuring complete and clean combustion. There are no unburned hydrocarbons, no CO traces, and, when bio fuel oils from plants or algae are used, carbon neutral CO2 production. Furthermore, if the combustion temperature is held down below 2300°F by means of secondary air admission to the firebox, NOx is not produced. None of these features harm the overall net cycle efficiency in any manner.

The natural clean burn of the steam engine is a major cost saving over the gasoline and Diesel IC engine. The need for the computer controlled systems for engine management, valve timing, automatic transmission management, ignition and fuel injection requirements in IC engines, all vanish in the steam car. One inspection under the hood of any new IC automobile will amply illustrate just how complex and costly all this pollution control and engine management has driven matters. For the long term vehicle owner, all this hardware and electronics translates into some eye watering repair bills down the line. The steam car requires none of this hardware or electronic controls.

New Diesel engines, while very good with fuel consumption, very durable and providing high torque output, are now requiring involved, expensive and complicated exhaust converter systems to meet constantly evolving EPA pollution standards. These engines require the addition of special fluids and reactors to the exhaust stream to control the NOx, and converters and filters to handle the soot production.[3] This addition, coupled with some intrusive mandates from the EPA to insure that this fluid system always operates, have added unnecessary high cost to the new vehicles that offer Diesel alternatives to the gasoline engine. Their new common rail fuel injection systems are computer controlled, adding more cost and potential reliability problems that are already being noted. Some data this author obtained about the Cummins engines suggests that new large interstate truck Diesel engines now require such pollution control additions to meet near term government mandates at a cost of up to $25,000 per engine, plus frequent and costly maintenance. This is simply not acceptable to truck owners.[4]

It is also noted that these government agencies are now considering mandating similar requirements with marine Diesels, railroads, farm, construction and industrial engines and even down to lawnmower sized engines. It appears that any Diesel engine is going to require expensive pollution control systems. As a result, some industrial Diesel engine manufacturers have stopped supplying these engines for truck use, as the cost of efficient NOx and soot pollution control devices has driven the cost of these engines beyond what their customers will accept. Caterpillar is one manufacturer who took this path in 2008.

Talk of “flex fuel” IC engines is truly a misnomer. What these engines offer the motorist is the ability to use certain alcohol blend fuels as a replacement for pure gasoline. Not only is this hardly flexibility, but the use of alcohol in today’s IC engines comes with a whole realm of new issues besides increased fuel consumption and loss of power, including:

- The hygroscopic nature of alcohol has proved to accelerate corrosion in automotive components and to seriously dilute lubricating oil resulting in excessive piston ring and valve guide wear.

- Once a vehicle’s compression ratio is increased to take advantage of alcohols higher octane rating, it cannot again use straight gasoline or destructive detonation will take place with damaged pistons,

- The fermentating part of producing alcohol for fuel usage from cellulous material creates substantial CO₂, highly limiting the carbon-neutral benefits of burning this bio fuel in a vehicle.

These concerns and others about alcohol usage in passenger vehicles are addressed in additional detail later in this paper. Suffice it to say, however, that what the public has been conditioned to believe is fuel “flexibility” in their cars, is a fuel fallacy. What is most unfortunate is that the general motoring public is totally ignorant about the fuel chemistry of alcohol and how it must be used in an IC engine.

Bio fuels from plant sources like algae offer a better fuel selection solution. Many of these fuels can be produced without disrupting food supplies and offer a high BTU value relative to alcohol. The Diesel engine when burning these bio fuel oils also shows a neutral carbon emission condition and a high net efficiency. However, as the Diesel cycle depends on a high compression ratio for the ignition phase and a resulting high combustion temperature, the NOx generation is a very serious matter. NOx is inherent with any Diesel cycle engine and unavoidable. Soot can be and is being controlled.

Diesel engines cannot use alcohol fuel and the spark ignited IC engine cannot use these bio fuel oils. This is hardly “flexible” from most educated people’s viewpoint. What is desired is an engine than can cleanly use any liquid fuel without any compromise. The selections available for this task, however, just got very small, microscopic in fact. Only the Rankine cycle steam engine alone demonstrates all the attributes needed to employ into a mobile vehicle application.[5]

The Rankine cycle engine demonstrates fuel flexibility than no gas or Diesel IC engine can match. For instance, Cyclone’s Schoell cycle engine can use any liquid fuel or gaseous fuel that can be supplied to the fuel pump. The company has tested alcohol, gasoline, Diesel oil, kerosene, vegetable oils, used motor oil, even reclaimed oil from the recent Gulf oil spill disaster, propane and other fuels in its engines with no special added on control systems or modifications to the burner fuel delivery system or to the combustion chamber. This is simplicity personified when compared to any vehicle IC engine today, not to mention being a major cost savings and significant gain on pollution control and elimination.

In addition to fuel selection, one feature of the Rankine cycle engine regarding fuel consumption must be considered. When the steamer is used in city driving, residual heat does the main job of maintaining the steam conditions for a period of time. When just puttering along, the burner is off most of the time only coming on for brief periods to maintain steam pressure and temperature. In city traffic the Rankine cycle engine will enjoy better fuel mileage than when on the highway where the burner is on primarily all the time. With city driving the IC engine must consume fuel to keep running continuously so as to remain in operation. At these slow speeds the IC engine is showing its worst efficiency. Only at full power do they exhibit high cycle efficiency.[6]

The Rankine cycle engine does have some efficiency hurdles, including the unavoidable thermodynamic loss from the heat required to vaporize water. This means adding 947 BTU/lb just to effect the phase change from liquid to gas, then rejecting that heat to the atmosphere in the condenser where the exhaust steam is changed back again into water. This process does not itself produce power and therefore is a total loss. For the competent engineer, this means that considerable attention must be paid to minimizing any other heat, fluid flow or friction losses in the system, and also utilizing the most efficient expander possible. Various regenerative heat exchangers plus the best insulation from heat losses are of critical importance to such an engine. As will be discussed subsequently, Cyclone’s Schoell cycle has accomplished this better than any known automotive steam engine in the past.

The natural ability to turn off fuel combustion when idling or in stop-and-go traffic means that with a steam engine system, the vehicle’s essential powered auxiliaries -- the power steering pump, the power brake vacuum pump, and the air conditioning compressor, must be kept running. Normally they are run off the main IC engine even when at idle. The steam generator water feed pump, electric generator and the condenser fan and vacuum pump can be intermittent, depending on what steam generator design is used. The burner air blower and fuel pump must be kept running, this is usually by an electric motor, so it is independent already. The auxiliaries and their drives must be as efficient as possible. All this means some serious engineering expertise is demanded when designing this entire auxiliary system.

A practical solution with steam is using a separate steam driven auxiliary unit for these purposes, which has a great deal of precedent and practicality. The past history of steam cars has well illustrated the fact that some separate engine best drove the ancillary loads. This decision requires most serious thought now, as the type and operating characteristics of the steam generator have a big influence on how the auxiliaries are powered. Serious battery demand and failure is well known in previous steam cars.

Packaging all the auxiliary loads into one steam driven unit with an electric motor assist at times is one solution that is well known. This also demands some high level and skilled engineering consideration before it can be put into practice. This entire subject is one very complicated problem and requires a competent and thorough energy balance determination before the selection is made.

The spark ignited IC engine and the Diesel engine are not self-starting from rest. They require some outside power source to put them into operation, the electric starter. Both demand that when the vehicle is stopped or waiting in traffic some means of disconnecting the engine from the load is needed. Either a manual clutch or the torque converter in a vehicle with an automatic transmission is the common means of accomplishing this. The torque and horsepower output of both IC engines are at minimum when only idling, so a multi-speed transmission is mandatory. This is provided now in almost every vehicle by a costly computer controlled six, seven or now eight speed automatic transmission.

In vivid and dramatic contrast, the steam engine produces maximum starting torque when the high pressure steam is first admitted to the engine.[7] Thus the torque is highest when first starting out and it often is a surprisingly massive amount, providing rather startling acceleration. Even with the vintage steam cars of yesterday, this torque can and did amount to over 2,000 lb/ft. Cyclone’s Schoell cycle engines are also displaying this extremely high starting torque. Its 100hp “Mark V” model (currently undergoing dynamometer testing) boasts over 860 ft.lbs of torque, and the larger 330hp “Mark VI” model (currently in design stage) is calculated to generate over 2600 ft.lbs of torque. The electric vehicle motor also exhibits high starting torque; but unlike the Rankine cycle engine, is not able to maintain such output due to heat buildup and motor damage.

The result of this high starting torque is that in most steamers no transmission is required, although a two-speed transmission with a neutral position has been shown to be beneficial. As with the old White steamer’s two speed rear axle, you didn’t have to use it to get going, but under some difficult situations like deep sand or mud or a very steep hill, it proved to be one of their best ideas. Today it is most useful in congested city driving and particularly if hills are also encountered, as in San Francisco.

It also eliminates a very serious problem with steam cars using steam generators with minimum water capacity, the popularly termed “flash boiler”. When negotiating such dense traffic conditions and add in perhaps a hill, starting the car consumes a lot of steam and thus water. As the engine is going very slowly, so are the water pumps when they are driven off the main engine. The result is quite often a dry and overheated steam generator and angry motorists that you have just blocked and now with the fire is now shut off by the temperature control and no steam pressure either. You cannot start a steam car by pushing it. Thus the serious consideration for a separately driven auxiliary system and a two speed transmission with a neutral position. Pull off the road, put it in neutral and build up the water supply again. It is interesting to note that the better steam car builders finally went to a separately driven water source for their steam generators. The Series F Dobles are a good example.

Reversing the engine is accomplished by changing the valve timing 180°, and this means that no special reverse gearing is needed as the engine reverses itself. These features provide a major cost saving over any IC engine for vehicle use, as well as resulting in lighter and much less complicated drive train systems, which reduce fuel consumption and maintenance costs.

With all the benefits of Rankine cycle engines for automotive usage, why are they not being employed or even considered today? One of the reasons, which will considered further in the next section, is the prevailing viewpoint of the automotive industry that the Rankine cycle system is not a proven, practical solution. This faulty opinion has its roots in the failures of the government sponsored Clean Air Car program between 1960 and 1985 and possibly with exposure to some antique steam car.

In the firm opinion of this author, since he was deeply involved, the Clean Air Car episode tainted the steam engine for the automotive industry to such an extent that they refuse to consider it seriously today as a potential candidate. One cannot really blame them for this attitude, as only one successful and usable steam car ever emerged during that period and that one was a private construction for General Motors by the Besler Corporation. Not that it was a shining example of advanced Rankine cycle technology; but used primarily old Doble technology, yet it worked and worked very well within it’s limitations and that was all that was asked from the car. That one was actually and faultlessly driven from Emeryville to Los Angeles twice, something that not one other car constructed during this episode could manage.

As one very senior Detroit executive told this author at a dinner some years ago: “We all watched the program with great care and interest, but with that total failure, as far as we are concerned the steam car does not exist.” Industry insiders also bring up the poor fuel mileage and unreliability of the vintage steam cars; which in truth were not all that bad when compared to the gas engined vehicles of those days and the relative costs and plentitude of kerosene (used in steamers) vs. gasoline sort of balanced things out. The White steamer was well regarded for its reliability and dependability in those days.

Modern steam car projects of worth have been few and far between. In 1974, SAAB created a 9-cylinder axial steam engine, a unaflow design with a variable cut-off control that was geared to run at 3000 rpm at 90 mph. Despite being heralded by the U.S. EPA, and considered by SAAB to continue development of this engine, the project was apparently shelved in the early 1980s. In 2005, BMW announced a steam-powered auxiliary drive called the Turbosteam that used waste heat from the exhaust gases and the cooling system from the gasoline engine as its power source. In tests with a 1.8 liter, four-cylinder engine, the Tubosteamer reportedly reduced fuel consumption by 15% while generating nearly 14 additional HP. Claims that then were observed with a cautious and questioning eye. In these early reports, BMW claimed that the system needed more development, and their long-term goal was to have it in volume production within ten years. Finally, in 2008, Honda announced the development of a concept Rankine cycle co-generation unit to power a hybrid engine, taking heat from the exhaust to recharge the car’s batteries. Honda reported that low efficiency and high cost of this prototype did not yet warrant placing the system into a production vehicle. Nothing more was heard from either company.

The point that was subsequently learned via some intense back door snooping was that neither company knew enough about advanced Rankine cycle technology nor especially it’s past history to make a practical go of it. They depended on theoretical considerations and not any practical ones.

This author challenges the automotive industry to revisit the Rankine cycle engine as an alternative to IC engines, and as a more practical and readily producible alternative to electric-hybrid vehicles. In particular, the Schoell cycle engine may have all the requirements needed to make a steam powered vehicle a success today. The lack of interest by the auto industry is notable in its total silence.

Three such areas of improvement employed by Cyclone to make its Rankine cycle steam – described as a “heat-regenerative engine” in Cyclone’s patents[8] – competitive to the gasoline or Diesel engine for use in automobiles, which also address the concerns expressed previously by SAAB, BMW and Honda, are:

- Dramatically updated packaging, making the power plant lighter, more compact and less expensive to produce.

Improvements to power density means increasing substantially the push on the piston head during the power stroke, known as increased brake mean effective pressure (BMEP). With a given bore and stroke this increases the developed horsepower and torque. Otherwise, one needs to increase both to give a much larger displacement and thus a larger and heavier engine, which is undesirable. Another solution is to drastically increase the speed with which the engine operates, but this is not ideal from a wear, reliability and noise standpoint.

The historical steam car engines ran between about 400 psi and 1200 psi. To increase the BMEP, Cyclone’s Schoell cycle uses steam pressures up to 3200 psi, termed “super critical.” The use of super critical steam pressure increases the power density of the engine as regards to horsepower per pound and per cubic foot of overall size to the desired level. The desired goal is the highest practical drop in pressure between the inlet valve opening and the exhaust ports venting the exhaust steam, which the Schoell cycle is able to achieve by using these higher operating pressures and a very short steam admission timing.

Cycle net efficiency is the measure of how much work an engine can produce from a given amount of fuel. Improvements to cycle net efficiency in a steam engine can be accomplished by increasing the temperature of the steam entering the engine or expander. The highest practical inlet steam temperature vs. the lowest practical exhaust temperature is the goal. This provides a means of increasing the expansion ratio per stroke of the piston, which is desired.

The old steam car engines were restricted in terms of steam temperature, and therefore efficiency, by the need to inject special cylinder oil to lubricate the piston rings and valves. Exceed a temperature of 550ºF to 650ºF and the oil became carbonized and caused high maintenance demands in keeping the steam generator coils clean, the condenser washed out at frequent intervals and draining accumulated oil from the water tank. This abrasive carbon also caused rapid piston ring wear.

With special materials and specific points of lubrication throughout the system, Cyclone’s Schoell cycle engine is able to use its operating fluid, de-ionized water, as the lubricant for the piston rings, crankshaft bearings and other moving components of the engine. Eliminating cylinder oil is a major advance in the technology. Eliminating motor oils and using water, Cyclone’s Schoell cycle engine is able to use steam temperatures up to 1200-1400°F, the highest possible and usable working temperature today with most modern metals.

The elimination of injected oil as a lubricating agent is simply the most dramatic and major improvement in the Rankine cycle vehicle engine seen in the past ninety years. Without this innovation, the Cyclone engine would never have surpassed the efficiency of previous steam car power systems. Of course, substantial research and development was needed to accomplish this feat, but early durability demonstrations have proved that the Cyclone team has done it successfully.

The Cyclone team has also employed other features with good effect in raising the cycle net efficiency of the Schoell cycle. Paying close attention to heat losses with improved insulation and heat barriers and using high efficiency heat exchangers in the exhaust side of the engine, combustion chamber exhaust vents and around the cylinder steam exhaust ports to recuperate otherwise wasted heat back into the cycle, has proved to be very beneficial, raising overall system thermal efficiency by as much as 8%.

To date, net reproducible cycle efficiency of the Cyclone engine is above 28%, with 31.5% efficiency achieved on the company’s small two-cylinder engine, and 35% confidently predicted to be achieved on the larger 6 cylinder “Mark V” model in the immediate future, which they did accomplish.

There are serious losses when steam engines are greatly reduced in size, Heat losses and much finer operating clearances are demanded and seldom seen, one can only go so far in reducing the size of the engine itself. The larger the better is the norm. These efficiency figures already make this Rankine cycle engine competitive to the vehicle gasoline engine. The best Diesel engines show about 35-38% and that is hard to beat. However, this number is suspect as nothing was reported if the calculations included the automatic transmission losses or not. If an automatic transmission is part of the system, then the Cyclone alternative is an even match to the Diesel today, with continued improvements being seen by the Company as testing progresses and detail changes are incorporated into the designs.

The historical version of the automotive steam system has always been a collection of heavy and big components tied together by a maze of plumbing and fittings. The Schoell cycle engine was designed from the start as an integrated one-piece unit of impressive compactness. Every single component that makes up this Rankine cycle engine is packaged into one neat unit, which should easily fit where the present IC engine is located in the vehicle. The only outside connections other than gauges are the fuel line, the cable supplying electric power to the combustion and condenser cooling blowers, plus the forward-reverse lever and the output shaft. The moving parts count in Cyclone’s engine is drastically reduced when compared to any IC powered vehicle. Compared to the present automotive IC engine and automatic transmission, the complete Schoell cycle engine is simplicity personified.

In total, Cyclone’s 100hp automotive model engine, the Mark V, weighs a mere 350 lbs. dry, and is 28” in diameter and 24” high. These weight and size calculations include the system’s combustion chamber, water tank, steam generator, expander and condenser, all of which are circular in design to achieve higher heat exchange rates in the smallest possible space. In sum the entire engine.

The use of multi parallel circuits in parts of the steam generator in place of one long single tube allows the Schoell cycle to increase the heat transfer rate by increasing the flow velocity and thus the production of steam per square foot of heating surface per hour. However, the designer must take great care with the control system and water feed to each coil so that tube burnout due to water starvation or surging does not occur in any one circuit. Extended surface steam generator tubing with fins would also greatly increase the evaporation rate per square foot of heating surface and per linear foot of the tubing in the steam generator, allowing even greater reduction in size and less weight. A subject for the ongoing development of the Cyclone engine.

The control of the steam pressure and steam temperature has been a vexing problem with some earlier steam car systems. Early addition of electric controls to the Doble and other steam cars in the 1920’s only managed to add some unreliability issues. The Schoell cycle engine is able to employ simple relay logic controls fed by thermocouples and a pressure switch to control the water feed and burner operation, or the simplest of microprocessor control modules. The cost savings here with this engine are a major improvement over the highly complex computer systems now employed with the IC gasoline engine in vehicles for engine, transmission and fuel injection management. The noted cost savings over any hybrid, plug-in-electric or other such pasted on additions to the gasoline engine are going to be a major savings in the production costs over those vehicles.[9]

The best efficiency of a Rankine cycle engine occurs when there is a high expansion ratio in the cylinder. In the steam engine this expansion ratio in the cylinder is variable by a change in the valve timing called “cutoff” in steam engine parlance. Longer admission time uses more steam; but produces the highest torque. Short cutoff give the greatest expansion ratio; but at reduced torque output that is not needed when just driving down the road. In the Cyclone engine, cutoff can be either manually controlled or automatic depending on the speed of the engine. A notable feature the IC engine does not enjoy.

There are limits to this, however. An ultra short admission phase will cause a lumpy torque curve and a rough running engine at slow speeds and light loads. Increasing the number of cylinders (as with the Schoell engine) and being realistic with how short the cutoff is eliminates this effect. However, this short cutoff is gradual as the rpm increases and may be automatic and thus is not noticed by the driver. At startup and at slow speed and high effort, the cutoff needs to be lengthened to give a longer steam admission phase, high torque and smoother running by use of this variable inlet valve timing that most steam engines have. The Schoell cycle engine has incorporated all of these features.

As described later, the ideal steam engine also employs the single acting unaflow principal, where the inlet valve remains in the head of each cylinder, but the exhaust is done by ports in the cylinder wall at the bottom of the piston’s stroke, identical to the exhaust ports of common two cycle IC engines. It also assists the improved efficiency when the dead space at top dead center of the piston stroke, termed the “clearance volume,” is at an absolute minimum, thus giving a high compression ratio.[10] Once again, these are features that the Schoell cycle has accomplished and incorporated in the design.

Increased efficiency is also achieved when the residual steam left in the cylinder after the exhaust ports close is compressed to the point where the compression temperature is as high as or higher than the admission temperature. The hot incoming steam is not cooled by mixing with the colder exhaust steam. In the Schoell cycle engine, this clearance volume is compressed into a heated tube located in the combustion chamber and also can vary the compression pressure with the rpm. In the longer cutoff phase and lower rpm, it has a lower compression ratio for smother running, but it still has the re-heat ability. This is unique and very important to the Schoell cycle. However, Prof. Stumpf did describe the benefits of re-compression in his book on the unaflow engine in the 1922 edition --- the engineer’s complete and essential bible when designing such an engine.[11]

No one said designing a really top grade Rankine cycle steam engine was an easy task. So much needed research information and historical documentation is now lost to the usual private or corporate investigation. What remains is in the hands of a very tiny band of dedicated engineers and those of us who incidentally are also on Cyclone Power Technologies Board of Advisors also possess this information.

Another mechanical advance of the Schoell cycle over the historical steam car engines of the past was to stay with the single acting engine and not use the double acting. The large reduction in both weight and size, greater ease of packaging it in the vehicle, reduced thermal and flow losses, reduced inertia loads on the bearings, plus the ability to run at much higher speeds dictates that this is the best way to design a Rankine cycle engine. Carrying this one step further, the two crankshaft opposed piston design has the best possible advantages over the usual engine layout for many reasons, both mechanical and thermodynamic -- a separate subject for spirited discussion and outside the scope of this paper.

There is one additional potential issue with employing any new engine system for vehicle use: the labor time to assemble the engine. A steam engine contains a lot of plumbing to screw together and assure it is leak proof. However, every single major automotive company makes special high performance models in limited production, and is well adept at such detail work. Mercedes-Benz has their AMG division, GM makes higher performance Corvettes, Porsche has many special models of the same car, and on and on. Auto manufacturers are already used to small scale production runs of special cars. This situation is not considered to be any kind of hindrance with the Cyclone engine.

The tasks to assemble Cyclone’s engine are not involved or difficult, only different, and there is no indication to assume that producing such an engine would cost even as much as these high performance special cars. This is not seen as a problem for even limited production. This engine exhibits a notable reduction in moving parts, and careful analysis of the complete Schoell cycle engine indicates that it will be less expensive to produce than any present high performance limited production cars. Additionally, one should not forget that it completely eliminates need for the complicated and expensive automatic transmissions and all the support electronics now in universal use.

The Schoell cycle steam engine offers massive starting torque, eliminating the need for a transmission in most cases. The combustion system already eliminates carbon particle emissions and virtually all NOx, as well as the other usual pollutants seen with any fuel burning IC engine. The engine can provide true carbon neutral exhaust when burning pure bio algae and plant fuel oils, which it can do without any modifications to the combustion system or the other components. In past tests, the Schoell cycle has burned over a dozen different fuels without any engine modifications, sometimes using a mixture of different fuels – true fuel flexibility and not the usual corporate and government hype.

What has still to be proven with Cyclone’s engine is the long term durability and operational excellence. Extensive dynamometer endurance testing will answer this first question, as will lengthy operation in an actual vehicle answer the second. No other company, in the knowledge of this author, has chosen to investigate, develop and research the advanced steam power system and fund the operating prototypes as seriously as Cyclone Power Technology has done. In fact, not one competing system of similar high engineering excellence is known to exist today.

Considering all the advances in the technology that the Cyclone team has invented and demonstrated, in this author’s very firm and considered opinion, that the Schoell cycle engine is a very suitable candidate for vehicle propulsion in passenger cars, city busses, railroads and interstate trucks. The smooth and quiet operation of this engine would also make it most attractive for marine use in yachts. The small versions would make dandy outboard motors, power sources for agricultural use, or to power refrigeration, air conditioning or generators in interstate trucks or yachts. The company is also testing in the field waste heat and solar applications with good results. A wise corporate decision.

The worldwide effort to reduce climate change and recent mandates by the US government regarding the fuel and mileage standards, have had a major impact on the American automobile industry. Couple this with the ongoing financial problems the industry is currently experiencing and the subject of a rational vehicle power source is one that must be reviewed with concern and dispatch.

Under their present financial stress, the Detroit auto industry is reaching for solutions they can implement immediately and which also serve to satisfy the various government politically driven objectives. Solutions like hybrids and smaller vehicles are designs that can be brought to market with modest investment in a short time, as their basic technology already exists. More and more add-ons to the gasoline engine to reduce emissions and attempts to increase efficiency are nearing the practical limit: there is just so much one can do with that engine without risking reliability and resulting in excessively high and frequent maintenance and repair costs. With the mandates by Congress and the President calling for drastic and immediate improvement in mileage standards as the panacea, the automakers have little choice but their present course of compliance.

But what if the consumers reject the cars and Detroit cannot sell them? All this concern for the environment and cleaning up the automobile has then gone to naught.

The predominant belief among the world automotive community is that the standards and mandates implemented by Congress, the E.P.A. and the California Air Resources Board (CARB) are seen as politically driven, severely lacking in practicality and are often not realistic, achievable or cost effective. Liberal political goals often override the science and engineering and management’s known reluctance to confront government with a consolidated front is well known: they will not take an aggressive collective stand to ignore or demand modification of these mandates. Further complicating the mix is the fact that by the time some mandates are scheduled to go into use, there will be administration changes in Washington and objectives may be changed again. This is a volatile situation that makes sound engineering and development planning impossible. In the opinion of this author, the role of politics should be to suggest and encourage courses of action and goals in the field, and perhaps fund the more worthy projects, but not to mandate them. Mandating technology implies that the government agency possesses equal engineering and technical knowledge as the people developing the systems. This requirement has all too frequently been exposed as being totally lacking and replaced by political posturing and arrogance.

A good example of the government pushing technology without considering all the scientific and engineering consequences is the electric car. These vehicles are currently in the spotlight, receiving widespread publicity, considerable amounts of private and public financing, and after considerable anticipation, a few are finally in limited production at high cost to the consumer. Admittedly, there are some benefits of the electric car over today’s IC engines, for instance:

- The electric motor is able to correctly match the torque/speed load requirements needed for the automobile, which requires full and high starting torque. But; only for a very short time lest the motor burn up from overheating, a well known problem. IC gas and Diesel engines require costly and energy draining transmissions to accomplish this requirement.

- Electric cars when used in congested city conditions are “emissions-free”, at least when not considering the pollution spewing power plants needed to charge the plug-in vehicle. In reality, the production of greenhouse gasses and other pollution has only been moved many miles away, typically to coal or natural gas burning power plants. It is controlled; but at enormous cost which is passed on the consumer.

- The success of the electric car mainly depends on the new Li-ion polymer batteries for energy storage. While presently very expensive, rapid advances are being seen in mass production of these storage cells for automotive use, which hope to bring down the cost and weight of electric vehicle systems in the future. Whether they will be sufficient as a power source for the number of vehicles that people actually want to buy, however, remains to be seen.

Electric vehicle batteries have been under intense development since Thomas Edison and Henry Ford teamed up about 1912 to develop the “perfect” battery for cars. To date no one has done this to the high standard needed. Even the most cursory research will show that the many hundreds of couples that were tried out, not one fully met the need for one reason or another.

- What is most curious is that the emerging battery electric car companies seldom lack capital investment by other companies, venture capitalists or even via government grants. The TESLA Company has received such funding, while they continue to lose millions each year according to their corporate financial statements.

There has been and is considerable comment that these companies are actually venture capitalist gaming and the final intent is not to produce an electric car suitable for family city use: but to quickly get to the IPO, boost the stock, close the company and then sell off the company assets and pocket the proceeds. Such venture capitalists commonly demand controlling stock interest and several seats on the Board to accomplish this final action.

Many aspects of electric car propulsion are yet to be solved – problems that many in the media and governments are ignoring, overlooking, or outright deceiving themselves and the public at large. These issues include; but are certainly not limited to:

- The need to increase the size of the charging sources for millions of homes and business locations and other “charging stations” throughout the U.S. in order to supply power to electric vehicles. Many cities already are not allowing heavy current 220 or 440 volt systems in private homes to provide fast recharging. 220 volt single phase is one thing for clothes dryers and stoves; but upon inquiry, no way was a heavy current 440 volt, three phase supply going to be allowed in the author’s garage. So one is reduced to eight to ten hour charging times, which may not be very convenient, should the electric car be a prime city vehicle. Then one must ask if the utility companies will or will not charge more for this heavy current system in a private home.

- The environmentalists bleat that one will have solar cells mounted on his roof to recharge the battery. Oh, just what do you do when the electric car is in use all day and night falls or the sky is cloudy, go onto your roof with flashlights or an armload of candles? Seems that practical considerations go out the window with these dreamers, along with consideration of the capital investment the owners would have to provide.

- Their other fantasy is that one would have a natural gas powered fuel cell power system in his garage. Another most costly idea of little merit for any private electric car owner.

- The fire danger of using an alkali metal, cooling requirements of Li-ion batteries[12], and the serious impending issue of disposal of spent batteries and lithium recovery must be considered.

- Whether auto makers will actually be able to get sufficient supplies of lithium and other materials needed to build these battery packs en mass without dealing with volatile and fluid geopolitical issues, not to mention the costs and supply issues that are involved. One now is dealing primarily with South American nations who do not hold the United States in all that high regard, thanks to our foreign policies.

- Obtaining lithium from sea water is technically achievable, until one calculates the enormous energy consumption of that process.

- The infrastructural and environmental stresses on already maxed-out utility power plants should such vehicles be in mass production and widely used will probably become a major problem.

- Now comes one other intriguing question and potential big problem. Gasoline and Diesel oil have a road use tax applied by all governments. At present the larger use of electricity carries no such tax when an electric car is being charged. It does not take any rocket science to envision that when large numbers of battery electric cars were in use, that home charging circuit would rapidly have its own meter and a large road tax was applied to that electricity used to recharge the car battery.

With respect to this last issue, the nation’s power grids are already in trouble and many have seen brownouts and blackouts when the grids are simply overloaded in the summer. This problem is already recognized and utility companies are planning enlargement of the grid networks. However, the advances in electric car development and their increased sales are not yet actually being matched by equally rapid construction of the new transmission grids and associated power plants.[13]

Then there is the mathematics and science of the electric battery. Overall, the battery is not an efficient vehicle power source when considering the pound of fuel burned in a power plant as compared to the actual power delivered to the drive train of the electric vehicle. Total energy losses en route in this formula may be as high as 70 - 75%. Batteries carry a finite supply of power in form of chemical energy, and are subject to degradation with repeated and hard use, vibration, cold or high heat, resulting in the need to replace battery packs more often at great cost. Abuse the battery and this replacement need will be a lot sooner than the electric car makers want to admit. And what happens to all those batteries that people replace? Is this another land fill disaster waiting to happen? This infrastructure is not established to date.

No, on the surface the battery electric car is a nice city car, providing one has other vehicles for family use or for work. Nice in theory; but of very limited actual use.

Fuel cells. Similar to the electric car, but much further from being a reality, is the hydrogen fuel cell. Many futurists and environmentalists loudly champion the use of fuel cells with hydrogen as the primary fuel, and therefore, these power sources require some discussion.

Fuel cells do work. They show high conversion efficiency and are very useful in stationary applications, if you can afford one. However, the total energy consumption and cost to produce and use this source is very high. What appears to be deliberately suppressed to the public is the knowledge of the huge amount of energy it takes to make hydrogen. There is also no nationwide distribution network to supply the hydrogen, and costs of building such a system have been estimated in the billions of dollars.

The most often bandied explanation is that hydrogen can be stripped from natural gas and thus almost anyone can have such a system in his garage to recharge his car. That is until his home insurance company finds out about it and the 15,000 psi compressor that is also needed. Then, just what does one do with the leftover carbon? Or, produce hydrogen from water. Fine, electrolysis works as any grade school student can tell you from his science class. Again, the total energy consumption of this process is huge and negates any cost advantage the environmentalists dream up in their fantasy world of self-delusion. Clean exhaust with only water vapor is a nice idea; the accompanying problems are not nice at all.

Then, hydrogen has much less BTU content per cubic foot of gas, about 8,000 BTU per cubic foot, so one burns more per horsepower hour than any liquid fuel. AND, it burns with the hottest flame known, so any direct burning in an IC engine is going to take serious heat protection to valves and piston crowns. Not realistic at all, unless the investigators are only trolling for government grants..

The use of fuel cells at least gets around some of these problems; but brings along a bag full of it’s own problems one has to deal with.

There are serious storage problems with vehicle hydrogen systems, and there are operational problems and safety issues as well that need considerable investment to overcome, if ever possible. For instance, fuel cells do not like extreme heat or cold or vibration and they definitely do not like sudden heavy current loads – difficult hurdles to overcome if we are ever to place them into vehicles.

Liquid hydrogen is the form with the highest energy density per pound, but as it is in this state only when maintained at -423.7°F, one experiences boil off to prevent dangerous pressure buildup in the storage tank. Unlike propane, hydrogen at least rises upwards and does not collect on the garage floor, just waiting to accumulate next to the burning water heater pilot light. Hydrogen has a high flame speed and is very easily ignited. The home insurance companies may have some deep concerns here. Hydrogen also diffuses through some materials and metals and a high pressure leak will auto-ignite just from the friction of the gas escaping through the leak point.

Demonstration fuel cell vehicles are good publicity and show technical competence, but are not practical for everyday use for the consumer. A two million dollar Toyota, BMW or Mercedes-Benz fuel cell car certainly shows technical expertise and impresses the politicians; but they are light years away from being a fixture in anyone’s garage, if ever. Basing any new power source for the automobile is easier and far more cost effective when existing fuel distribution networks are used and some existing hardware can be converted to use. In these respects, the fuel cell is a long way from becoming a reality. Fuel cells definitely have a place as an energy source; but not in vehicles.

Another politically-driven charade on the American public was that alcohol will replace gasoline to drive our cars. When introduced during the Carter administration, alcohol was to replace the MTBE that they previously mandated which was now leaking from old tanks. Prior to this fiberglass fuel tanks were mandated to replace the old and leaking steel tanks, only in their haste and lack of adequate research, the EPA and the CARB failed to notice that MTBE diffused through the fiberglass. As a result of both these tank situations, MTBE was polluting the ground water and it was removed from the gasoline and the Carter administration mandated alcohol as the replacement. This was greatly increased during the Bush administration as payback for election funding by the alcohol producers and the farm lobby.

Politicians, armed with substantial election funds from strong agricultural lobbies and the major alcohol producers, promoted alcohol as the next great fuel source, one that could wean us off fossil fuels and reduce the emission of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere. Nothing could be further from the truth and they are still to this day pursuing this fairy tale, with the dream that E-85 will be the standard vehicle fuel, whether the motoring public wants it or not.

As corn was the primary feed stock, the government’s massive subsidies were in place to pay the farmers to grow more corn for alcohol production. In Mexico corn prices went up by a factor of four and riots were seen.

First of all, it is discouraging to see that the various Government agencies and environmentalists promote alcohol fuel as if it was the latest discovery, when in fact it was used in the very beginning of the 20^th century for automobiles. There were even pre-WW-I endurance events in Europe where alcohol was the only fuel allowed (even back then, they were having an oil crisis). It has been used in racing cars ever since those days. There is nothing new in using alcohol in an IC engine. Just as there is nothing new in using vegetable oils in the Diesel engine. Dr. Diesel proposed and did this with his very first test engines before the turn of the century using peanut oil.

For passenger vehicles, the promoted science of using alcohol is completely faulty. Fuel alcohols are very hygroscopic, absorbing water from the atmosphere. This accelerates corrosion in various automotive components and also in pipelines, the reason why alcohol has to be transported at present in trucks and not interstate pipelines. It can also be a serious source of dilution of the engine’s lubricating oil, resulting in excessive piston ring wear with direct fuel injection engines.

The vapor pressure of alcohol causes hard starting problems in cold weather. Burning alcohol in the IC engine with its changing internal pressures and temperatures also produces some dangerous byproducts that are health hazards, because of government mandated additives to the base alcohol. This is presently done to ethyl alcohol by adding formaldehyde to prevent human consumption.

E-85 will be a serious problem in older cars should it become the mandated fuel for IC engines, as alcohols cause disintegration of rubber components in older fuel systems, gaskets, hoses, etc. Unless changed to alcohol resistant materials, there is a well-known fire hazard in these older and vintage automobiles that can result in total loss of the vehicle and injury to the passengers from this fire hazard.

There is one other major disadvantage of using a high percentage of alcohol in a motor vehicle. Alcohol has some 8500 BTU per pound (while bio oils and petroleum fuels range around 19,500 BTU per pound). This translates into very poor mileage per tank of fuel when high alcohol percentage fuels are used such as E-85. Also, as alcohol has a high octane rating around 112-114, a high compression ratio may be used in an IC engine to regain the power loss. Unfortunately, this means that straight gasoline cannot again be used or destructive detonation will occur, with damaged pistons resulting.

The production of ethanol is also a cause of concern. Fermenting various cellulose materials with enzymes produces the alcohol, a process which generates large amounts of CO₂. This fact makes the carbon neutrality of using alcohol in an IC engine less than ideal, if not actually a total myth.

There is also the situation that the corn feed stock industry, as promoted by the Federal Government with massive subsidies for growing corn for alcohol production, is causing serious damage in the Gulf of Mexico. To be a profitable crop, corn requires a large amount of nitrogen fertilizer and water. The runoff from farms in the Mississippi River Valley and the central United States has polluted the seabed around the mouth of the river with massive algae growth. To the extent that the eventual die-off of the algae and its sinking to the bottom, where the decay consumes the oxygen, has caused the death of bottom dwelling species sufficient to ruin the inshore fishing industry. The fishermen have to go far out into the Gulf for their catch and this has raised the price of seafood in the market. This dead zone is now larger than the State of New Jersey. Recent learned studies and reports have shown that this algae problem far exceeds the damage done by the recent oil well disaster in the Gulf. Many people are blaming this algae problem directly on the massive corn production subsidies to the farmers in the Midwest by the Federal Government. The Government chooses to ignore this destruction and remains silent. Once again, bad science and political gain were overriding factual data and good future planning.

Alcohol is a fine fuel for racing cars and has been for over a hundred years, but it is not satisfactory in any regard for passenger cars. Despite these scientific and engineering truths, however, politicians continue to promote it as the answer. We must stand-up to these false statements, and in doing so, look to ideas that are better rooted in scientific fact. As a scientific community, we must make these facts widely and publically known. Politics must not be allowed to override basic scientific truths.

This condemnation of these politically motivated and technically inferior solutions to oil consumption and pollutions must be loud and clear. Hydrogen, battery electric, hybrids, delusional fuel mileage standards and other fallacies of all kinds are the answer only to the mentally challenged environmentalists and political hacks, anyone with an engineering background and a good knowledge of fuel chemistry knows that continued promotion of these science fiction fantasy schemes only waste time and funds. It is surprising that the company stockholders put up with this waste and political pandering.

In the opinion of this author, encouraging the wider use of the automotive Diesel engine and greatly increased availability of pure bio fuel oils from plants and algae should be the focus right now and not alcohol, or especially hydrogen or CNG. Such a combination of biodiesel with the Diesel engine will satisfy the environmental concerns, give high mileage to home produced fuels and supply the average motorist with a most satisfactory engine – an engine that is already seeing high production volume in Europe. This in spite of the high cost of the needed pollution control exhaust systems.

The answer is also not the promotion of various concocted hybrids and plug-in vehicles, like the Chevy Volt, and other science fiction solutions. The Volt hype coming out of General Motors is amusing, to say the least. OK, 40 miles on just the battery power alone and then another 160 or less miles on the gasoline engine. The gasoline engine only charges the batteries and does not power the vehicle. So now what are you supposed to do in the middle of the night in Snake Navel, Wyoming with the now tired and very cranky family clamoring for the next motel and here you are stuck on the side of the road with no help in sight or within reach of your cell phone? Furthermore, the Volt is also certainly not the responsible size of vehicle for city use: something more like the BMW Mini-E electric, VW, or the proposed Ford Focus battery electric is much more practical if you just cannot live without one. That is if these cars ever actually come to market and their high price is accepted.

When and if a satisfactory and reliable Rankine cycle engine is finally available and publicly demonstrated, it can be offered with confidence to the automobile industry as an alternate to the Diesel engine. Until that time, only the Diesel is considered to be satisfactory for the automobile, with the battery electric perhaps usable as a purely city car, but only when a drastic reduction in cost of the battery pack is seen by the market and sufficient generating and distribution capacity is in place to support it.

Experiences in this field of engineering with the early government-funded Steam Bus and Clean Air Car programs exposed the errors in the naive thinking that occurred then. Lear Motors, Dutcher Industries and William Brobeck and Associates all constructed steam powered busses for this first program, with the Brobeck bus being the most successful.[14] This program was, in the opinion of this author who participated in it, an effort to silence the environmental groups and politicians who were becoming most vocal about exhaust pollution and it was never intended to go beyond the three sample busses. It was followed by the broader Clean Air Car program – a collection of disjointed mandates, incentives and even contests backed by the Department of Energy and rooted in California’s early attempts at reducing urban pollution.

The Clean Air Car program was doomed to failure from the start. Impossibly limited development time and deliberate under-funding were a few of the prime reasons this program failed to live up to expectations. The steam bus program was marginally better. This was coupled with the fact that most of the involved development firms did not have one bit of real hands on experience with any steam car system, antique or modern. Only a few possessed even some limited knowledge, mostly wrong.

Steam systems under both these programs had to work perfectly almost right off the drawing board in order to meet expected timetables. Funding was deliberately short as the firms were expected to contribute to the effort, with the implied idea that future production profits would make up for the expenditure. This never was part of the program, although several developers had convinced themselves that it was to be the second phase of the entire program. Extra staff was usually hired to cope with the demanded and frequent progress reports, timetable expectations and predictions of near term technical success, which were routinely as reliable as a comic book; but cost the developers money to satisfy.

Other developers were really in the government grant harvesting business and not the steam car business to begin with. Set up to fail, the Clean Air Car program did not disappoint its critics in the automotive industry.

Further damaging the credibility of the steam car programs were the large number of backyard inventors and slick promoters who got into print with some of the most outlandish proposals that violated every law of engineering and thermodynamics known. The term “Steam Nuts” became almost universal thanks to this.

Past experiences with government agencies have convinced many accomplished developers that such alliances are not productive or rewarding; but actually a great hindrance and should be avoided.

The previous attempts have proven the worthlessness of such government involvement at generating any meaningful progress in the field of steam car development. All of these failures to produce a worthy and fuel efficient modern steam car have left a legacy of total rejection by the automotive companies, today a very hard barrier to overcome; but under the circumstances prevailing then, quite understandable.

There was also a rather small clause often written into the developers government contract, that said that any patent generated by the program and any previous patent you might have that also applied, now were government property. Implied was that they could do what they wanted with your patent and make it public property. Several competent would be developers the author knew, refused to participate in the program due to this clause. Who can blame them? It also caused problems for the Williams Brothers, who had a nice system under development and a good car for demonstrations that worked well.

Steam has also almost become a lost art form. The engineering for the Rankine cycle engine is different and complex and embraces many disciplines besides pure mechanical engineering. Fluid flow, aerodynamics, thermodynamics, heat flow, combustion technology, all need to be interwoven into this one area of engineering. Most of the advanced knowledge in steam is in private hands and simply not available for public or even corporate study. Furthermore, engineering schools do not really teach Rankine cycle technology any more. A cursory once over is all it gets today and only that as applied to large industrial use such as power plants. Even the once universal marine use of steam in large ships has been replaced by the Diesel engine, as has any use of steam by the railroads.

As the first section of this paper tried to convey that, as responsible scientists, engineers and car buying motorists, that we must revisit steam as a realistic automotive alternative. This means looking beyond antique technologies and failed politically charged programs to see the truth in what modern steam can offer.

The first vehicle to employ a modern steam engine, presumably and certainly hopefully the Schoell cycle engine, is critical to how this engine will be received by the motoring press and particularly the automobile enthusiasts, early adaptors and wealthy collectors, the ones who would be the first to purchase such a car, should it be followed by a limited production model or possibly a conversion kit. This one initial demonstration vehicle has the author’s complete dedication and interest.

TESLA Motors entered the automotive world with a very expensive and striking battery electric sports car with blistering acceleration and contemporary styling. It accomplished exactly what it was intended to do: attract wide spread attention and investors in the company. TESLA has now followed up with a much more practical sedan model and Daimler-Benz has made a major investment in the company, as has Panasonic. The US government also gave TESLA Motors a major funding grant, and the company has also gone out for their initial IPO stock listing. Perhaps this identical philosophy could be followed when reintroducing the Rankine cycle system in the present automotive world. Hopefully without the financial situation that attends the TESLA Company. Since the founding, the company has lost money every single year of its existence. They trust that that new four door sedan will start showing a profit; but what if it doesn’t?

Does one choose a sub-compact car like the SMART, or a more reasonable small vehicle such as the Ford Focus, or go further and demonstrate a nice GT vehicle that would be impressive when shown at car exhibits? Would a mid range family sedan be more appropriate? Cyclone’s Schoell cycle engine is quite adaptable for any first vehicle use, but the package must create a good, usable and desirable vehicle. It also must be a type of vehicle that these automotive enthusiasts can relate to and accept, not some one-off fiberglass dream fantasy that cannot be produced at a reasonable cost and fills no real and useful need.

The first public exposure to a Cyclone-powered vehicle is going to be dramatic and well publicized when shown at important car shows like the SEMA Convention. Good acceptance is absolutely necessary.

In this author’s opinion, the first public application for a Schoell cycle engine should be a GT vehicle. These are on the market as production cars right now, and many high quality production specialty vehicles are available for installation. Such vehicles certainly attract attention and press coverage, which is well needed. A converted Mazda MX-5 Miata, a reproduction 427 SC Cobra roadster, a Ford Focus, or a MINI or FIAT 500 are suggested as good host vehicles for this first automotive effort, a path the author is investigating and pursuing with high interest.

Yet the sports car may not be the most important insertion vehicle for reintroducing the Rankine cycle steam engine to the automotive market. The numerous large interstate trucks like the Peterbilt or Kenworth are now in need of a powerful new substitute engine from the present Diesels. Government mandates are already making the purchase of such an engine very costly to the truck owners. The latest fantasy pursued with vigor by the Obama administration is the concept of another harmful mandate where the fuel mileage of large trucks is to be around 35 mpg. As these truck engines are big and very powerful, such a concept only demonstrated the naïve thinking and impossible dreaming of these liberal officials.

Such a mileage gain by a Peterbilt or Kenworth interstate truck is technically impossible and most likely it will be scrapped by the new Republican House in Washington. A real potential market exists here for an enlarged Cyclone Rankine cycle engine, with excellent business prospects.

Coupled with this is the expansion and restoration of our once mighty railroad industry. This selection too is in need of a new and powerful engine to replace their Diesels. Retain the proven electric drive system found in modern railroad locomotives, only replace the huge Diesel engines with a similar horsepower Cyclone engine, or a multi engined locomotive burning bio fuel oil. A natural match if there ever was one. If our railroad system receives the upgrading and enlargement it should have, this Cyclone engine would be an excellent choice. Also, a most suitable engine for large busses, yachts and motor homes.

Cyclone’s Schoell cycle engine has many proponents. It was named by Popular Science magazine as an Invention of the Year in 2008, and has won two Tech Awards from the Society of Automotive Engineers. The company is working with Raytheon to develop military applications for its engine systems, and has signed two very interesting license agreements: one with Spanish solar giant Renovalia Energy for solar thermal power applications, and another with Phoenix Power Systems for electric generating units that produce grid-tied power from waste motor oil. The company is also presently concentrating on waste heat recovery applications for its engines – generating power from engine exhausts, industrial furnace and landfill flare heat. In the opinion of this author, these applications are excellent uses for the modern Rankine cycle engine, especially Cyclone’s compact and powerful system.

While very interesting in themselves, the development and endurance testing of larger automobile and truck versions of the Cyclone engine must not be slowed down. These must continue at once.

The vehicle adaptation of Cyclone’s Schoell cycle engine, however, is becoming an increasingly important matter and some dramatic demonstration is needed in the immediate future, when one considers the constant outpouring of often conflicting and unwise pollution and fuel economy mandates by our governments. It takes time and effort to make the automobile companies take notice. They need to become well educated to the advantages shown by the updated steam engine over the often science fiction and dream fantasy engineering approaches they now pursue.

The automotive steam engine has been dormant for far too long and the present fuel source and pollution problems do encourage that it be seriously considered once again. It does offer a solution if only the automotive companies would take the time to honestly and dispassionately investigate this power system again in light of the notable advances made in Cyclone’s Schoell cycle engine. Perhaps the proposed shiny red demonstration sports car may be the key to unlock their interest.

Of all the potential and available power sources for road vehicles, two are ideally matched to the

speed-torque-load needs of vehicles. One is the battery-powered electric motor and the second is the Rankine cycle positive displacement steam engine. All the others require a multispeed transmission and a disconnect mechanism such as a clutch or torque converter to adapt them to vehicle use.

Essential to both power sources is knowing what energy sources they use and what dictates when and how each will require additional fuel. The electric car system requires that the batteries be recharged at a relatively short distance and this process can take considerable time, while the Rankine cycle engine only wants the fuel tank refilled, identical to any IC powered vehicle.

The number of public battery recharging sites is almost non-existent at this time. The fuel sources for the Rankin cycle engine are widespread and universal, only the much wider use of pure bio fuel is yet to be seen; but as this fuel is also usable in the modern Diesel engine, it is estimated that the present lack of such fuel on a nation wide and large basis will see massive and timely improvement.

It is also acknowledged that the cost of the latest Li-ion batteries must be drastically reduced to a commercial level and also be one that does not receive any Government subsidy to even exist for vehicle use. A combination that just may not be possible. The success of eliminating these restrictions has yet to be seen. The Schoell Cyclone Rankine cycle engine does not suffer from this handicap, even limited production would be cost effective.

The Rankine cycle power plant, such as the Cyclone engine, has demonstrated advantages over any other vehicle power source, particularly when initial cost, various power levels, operational satisfaction, drastic pollution reduction from the burning of the selected fuels and maintenance demands are considered. The elimination of the large-scale use of computers is also to be noted, another major cost saving. These advantages required that the steam conditions used be carried up to a very high level, far beyond what the old vintage steam cars used in order to maximize the packing and power density and the net cycle efficiency. This approach is what Cyclone Power Technology has focused on and has succeeded in achieving in operational practice.

Listed below are those characteristics that make it so very attractive in the modern world when the source of the fuel has to be considered along with the reduction of polluting gasses are also factored in.

* Massive torque at startup and variable by operator control or automatic as the load changes. Unequalled by any IC engine of similar displacement.

* Can burn any light liquid bio fuel oils with complete and TOTALLY CLEAN combustion, something no other fuel burning engine can claim.

• When using such fuels, the Rankine cycle engine does not require any additional pollution control hardware, burner alterations or additional system modifications.

* Ability again when designed correctly, to be as compact and light weight as any aluminum IC engine of similar power output.

* Vastly fewer moving parts that operate at a slower speed than the IC engine and are known to be very quiet in operation and long lived.

* Cost effective to manufacture as nothing more complicated than a two speed transmission with

* No need for a reverse transmission as shifting the valve timing 180° provides reverse.

* VERY easy, delicate and smooth control by the driver, only the throttle needs manual attention.

* Again, when designed correctly the total net cycle efficiency to the drive shaft is now equal to the modern gasoline vehicle engine and since the loss caused by the now universal automatic transmission is eliminated, the overall net efficiency is superior.

* In town and heavy traffic driving, the burner is off most of the time, only on to maintain pressure and temperature, so this condition provides better fuel economy than any IC engine, which has to idle and run slowly and that is done at much lower efficiency than full or moderately high power when out on the open road.

* By the inherent means of how one regulates steam pressure and temperature, all the present computer controlled vehicle engine and transmission management control functions are eliminated, giving eventual lower maintenance and repair costs and greater reliability to the vehicle owner, as not one computer is needed anywhere in the powerplant system.

* The one step that the Cyclone engine incorporates of using the water working fluid for bearing and piston ring lubrication has removed the cap on efficiency and power density that plagued the old steam engine vehicle powerplant for well over a hundred years. This alone is the one major step that was desperately needed to bring the Rankine cycle out of the 19th Century thinking that prevails and into the 21st Century.

To date, 2010, only the Schoell Rankine cycle engine has demonstrated the long desired high packing density and high net cycle efficiency demanded to power the modern vehicle. No other system developer has come forward to demonstrate any rival system.

[1] Author, James D. Crank, is widely considered one of the foremost experts on automotive steam engine systems. During his long year career with Lockheed, Mr. Crank worked in senior research positions on many important projects, including: engine development and evaluation for the Ground Vehicles Department, flywheel energy storage for municipal buses and mine locomotives, primary battery systems development for the Triton II missile, battery systems for the Hubbell Space Telescope, heat shields for the Mercury and Apollo space systems, and dynamic solar and nuclear space power systems for SDI. Mr. Crank was also a Research Engineer for the Stanford Research Institute where he worked on developing explosive cladding of materials for cylinder construction in Porsche and Mercedes-Benz, among other projects.

Mr. Crank has over 50 years experience in restoration, repair and driving of various steam cars, including the total redesign of the complete crankcase assembly and cylinders for the Series E Doble steam cars (with 11 sets constructed), and the design and construction of the previous speed world record holding steam car (the Barber-Nichols car). He served as a consultant on steam car restoration to Harrah Automobile Collection, Nethercutt Collection, Jay Leno Collection, Stephen Finn Collection, and participated in the Besler General Motors steam car conversion project among others; and as a consultant to the State of California on the steam bus development and Clean Air Car programs. He is the owner, principal historian and president of Doble Steam Motors Corporation, and is currently working on a book about the history of the Doble steam car and its founding family.

[2] Information about Cyclone Power Technologies, based in Pompano Beach, FL, can be found at: www.cyclonepower.com.

[3] Soot is a result of momentary imbalance in the air/fuel ratio. Reports and experience have identified the universal use of turbo-charging with the Diesel engine and one particular transition point that is the root cause of the soot production. Open the throttle quickly and the fuel flow rate is immediately increased; but the turbocharger has not spooled up to the point where the excess air is produced. Some form of interlock is indicated. This condition causes an over rich mixture and soot is the result, the belch of black smoke when an older big truck takes off from a stop. Manufacturers are now including variable turbine inlet vane turbochargers and two stage and sequential supercharging in an effort to maintain the right air/fuel ratio at all speeds and loads with a mechanical supercharger and a turbocharger in series. Or smaller twin turbochargers that spool up faster. Plus the inevitable present panacea that all manufacturers turn to in desperation: digital electronic fuel injection management.

[4] A mandate by the Port of Oakland that all Diesel trucks that service the docks must be equipped with NOx and soot elimination exhaust systems on Jan. 1, 2010 resulted in an interesting situation. The independent truck owners and the fleet operators said that they would shut down the Port unless the Port Authority came up with a permanent solution, abandon the mandate, or provide the financing for these new exhaust systems at an interest free cost to the owners. This is yet an unresolved situation as far as it is presently known. Commerce cannot allow these ports to be totally shut down. The resolution to all of this has not been noted in the local press as yet, thanks to their usual lack of any follow-up.

[5] The Stirling cycle hot air engine and the Brayton cycle gas turbine could also satisfy this condition. The small gas turbine is ruled out due to high fuel consumption particularly at part load, a NOx problem, along with high production costs and extreme operating temperatures and speeds, if any reasonable efficiency is to be seen. The Stirling is also very expensive, is most difficult to throttle and is large for the power production a specific engine will produce. Ford tried it in vehicles and gave it up.

[6] New developments in stop-and-start technology for IC engines are in process and claim to increase fuel mileage by automatically turning off an engine when at rest, but at what added sticker cost remains to be seen, along with inevitable reliability problems and driver annoyance. Hybrids also feature such a quality, converting to electric use in city driving. That employing hybrid systems means added weight, serious cost, bulk, reliability problems and future maintenance concerns to these models are all well known. Such systems are seeing production because the technology is well known, time to introduce it in new cars is minimum and confidence in success is established. Along with being a system that rapidly can be put into production and meet the EPA and CARB pollution and fuel mileage mandates with minimal corporate investment.

[7] The electric motor also produces its greatest torque at starting, making it with respect to power curves, a good power source for automobiles. However, to generate the amount of power needed for a standard-sized passenger vehicle, SUV or truck, the battery packs required are impractically large, heavy and expensive. Only a city use vehicle is considered to be semi practical.

[8] Cyclone’s engine is currently protected by seven patents in the U.S., plus more internationally, including: US Patent No. 7,080,512 B2 Heat Regenerative Engine (2 issued), US Patent No. 7,407,382 B2 Steam Generator in a Heat Regenerative Engine, US Patent Allowance for Valve Controlled Throttle Mechanism, US Patent Allowance for Engine Reversing and Timing Control, US Patent Allowance for Centrifugal Condenser, US Patent Allowance for pre-heater coils.

9 The control system difficulties of such steam generators are not usually well understood by modern steam car developers. Tube burnout and surging are common failure modes. A most satisfactory solution is to use the Lamont style steam generator in preference to the Doble system. This use neatly side steps all the control problems of the monotube steam generator and provides a great improvement in the amount of steam produced per hour from each square foot of heating surface.

[10] One must also pay strict attention to employing only the shortest possible ports from the inlet valve to the cylinder and keeping them as straight, short and as smooth as possible. Turbulent flow is to be avoided, only the lowest possible flow losses in the porting. In the best practice, the inlet valve opens directly into the cylinder with no intercommunicating port at all. This also includes using the highest practical compression ratio and thus a minimum clearance volume.

[11] Prof. J. Stumph, “The Una-Flow Steam-Engine”, Second Edition, 1922.

[12] When receiving a heavy charge current, or a large current demand like hill climbing or accelerating, the Li-ion batteries demand a cooling system. Another added cost, reliability and weight problems that cannot be ignored.

[13] Many, accompanied by howling dissention by environmental groups, suggest increasing the number of nuclear plants, which is in the opinion of this author, a most suitable power source along with greatly expanded solar and geothermal. Many learned studies suggest that efficient hot gas closed Brayton cycle turbine generators replace the present breeder reactors and steam turbines with pebble bed reactors as the much safer nuclear heat source. These do not generate radioactive waste products like the present nuclear reactors do. It remains to be seen, however, whether the public will accept and the politicians will push for new, safer nuclear power in the future.

[14] The California Steam Bus Project was designed to demonstrate the potential of low-emission, quiet steam engines in public transit service. The three contractors noted above replaced the original diesel engines in urban buses with external combustion engines. Results found that indeed exhaust emissions were considerably lower than the 1975 California requirements for heavy-duty vehicles, but because these engines used low efficiency technologies, fuel consumption was far from optimal, often much less than half of he Diesel engines they replaced. Such problems could be corrected with the Schoell cycle.