Hydrogen fuel cells
 

Has anyone fitted a hydrogen fuel cell (HHO) to their car or is this just a scam....?

As I understand it, hydrogen fuel cells generate electricity which then power the car via electric motors. It's still in the development stages (ie the manufacturers are running prototypes or limited trials) but it's not a conversion - it's build to do this in the first place.

There are some hydrogen powered cars that burn hydrogen as a fuel in place of petrol, but hydrogen is dangerous stuff, and needs special tanks - and if I remember correctly from my chemistry a long time ago, the atoms are small enough that they can leak out of metal fuel tanks through the metal itself. Again, not a conversion that can be done to a standard car.

Thanks for the reply.

However companies and individuals are selling them as an aftermarket product which produces about 2 liters per minute upwards and is connected to the air intake of a car and apparently produces more effective combustion of the petrol improving fuel economy by up to 30%

I know that in California you can by hydrogen powered cars which are made by Honda.

Here is one of the links I have been looking at:-

http://www.marchlabs.com/default.asp

Interesting stuff - still not sure how the Hydrogen is stored.

Are the Hondas available to consumers or are they still available only as pilot schemes?

As I understand it the hydrogen is not stored but is sucked into the engine through the air intake - only produces hydrogen when engine running. 2-4l per minute is not a huge amount.

Re Honda - they are leasing out 200 FCX Clarity's in California.

Here is a link:-

http://automobiles.honda.com/fcx-clarity/

Cool stuff!!!

Now I'm very confused - if the hydrogen isn't stored, then it must be produced on the fly - in which case, energy (electicity?) must be used to produce the hydrogen, either by breaking down water, or by breaking down methane.

OK, when fuel prices sky rocketed last year and these HHO units claimed to create massive 'FREE' energy, don't you think EVERY car manufacturer would have installed them so big full size trucks would be efficeint?

You need to watch Modern Marvels episode of Failed inventions. These bogus things belong on the list with snake oil. but if you really think it will work, spend your money then let us all know how you just lightened your wallet

I made the water for fuel system put it on a 95 dodge neon b4 the system was active got 32 mpg on highway installed used an instant MPG monitor that plugged into the data link port got 62 mpg in highway.

So it works then?

I wonder why everyone isn't fitting them as an aftermarket product?

because it will take some working on to get it to work. it took us a few tries to get it working well trial and error.

There's no way. you can't beat physics... and I should know I teach Physics and my brother has a Phd in Physics from U Cal Berk.

I've actually seen and drove one of these 'miracle' cars. they did NOT have any improvement in fuel milage. the ONLY people that make these claims are the ones that scam uneducated or are embarassed that they got screwed.

I can claim that my minivan gets 99mpg because the overhead console display told me that several times.

I built one of these, You just need a jam jar with a good sealing lid. a one way valve, some surgical tubing (or similar...model aircraft silicon tube works well), some copper or aluminium rods, water and bicarb of soda.

The principal is pass an electric current through the water and hydrogen is created via electrolysis. The separate hydrogen and oxygen atoms are then drawn into the combustion chamber via the inlet manifold where they combust (well the hydrogen does anyway) to release energy and the atoms recombine to form water once again.

( you can actually increase the amount of available oxygen further by the addition of a popular model aircraft fuel additive. However for those of you who know which one I am talking about, it does create trace amounts of nitric acid. However due to the oily nature of diesel this is not a problem. If using in a petrol then the addition of an upper cylinder lubricant helps. This is off topic but interesting if you wish to play)

You do need to make a decent bracket to mount whatever container you choose to use and ensure you insulate the rods from one another WELL otherwise your battery will short out big time and cause a fire. You could use a regulator to bring down the 12V to 6V and make it a bit safer but then the rate of hydrogen production will be reduced as well.

Personally I never tested the MPG gains it was just an interesting experiment for my kids. However just to comment on the note about physics above Whilst I may not be a physics teacher I am an engineer. Whilst you cannot deny the physical nature of moving a vehicle i.e. the forces that the engine needs to overcome there is a direct correlation between the energy yield (calorific content) of the fuel and the amount needed to do work.

If for example 10ml of fuel has a calorific yield of say 1000joules upon combustion and can move a car say 100 metres

then it follows that 10ml of fuel that has a calorific yield of 2000joules upon combustion will move the car twice the distance.

As such your fuel economy is doubled.

Now clearly I am just using thumb suck figures but you get the idea.

Hydrogen fuel cell technology is still in the developmental stages. It's a clean chemical process which produces electricity, and in turn powers an electric motor.

Injecting hydrogen into an internal combustion engine is not fuel cell technology.

As I said we put it on a 95 dodge neon I used this that gave instant MPG not using the over head

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ScanG...motiveQ5fTools

works like a charm will go to any car or truck and show u are u press the gas what U get at that TPS and speed and so on. I made my own not using the same design as what was posted used all metal for the inner workings and not plastic due to the heat I made.

It will displace some of the air mixture going into teh intake and displace that with what 14.7 to 1 is so the total burning process the car uses less fuel because of the amount of air and fuel mix is different. No one is beating physics it being used U dont run the car totally on browns gas its adding to it understand? If u wanna get down to the nitty gritty ask some questions.

I have bitten the bullet and am going to fit one to my 1999 3.3l Grand Voyager.

I have one question though - do I need a Maf/Map enhancer to adjust the mixture - is it even possible on this car?

Once fitted I plan on doing a fixed journey with the unit on and then off and will post results

try it it with out one first then see what U get. oh guess what my son got a boys life last month and oooo it had future prototype cars in there green cars so to speak.
one had this style of system on it more refined but same basic idea.

I've been looking into this also. There are some great HHO kits out there. I have been following this guys videos and he seems to have done a lot of trial and error with the technology. #35) HHO Under Acceleration - YouTube
The way gas prices are going I want to fit one to my wife's 05 Pacifica. If I go ahead with it I'll let you all know how it goes.

For a Chrysler u will need the EFFIE to dial down the o2 sensors because the HHO makes O2 and the PCM will adj anything the HHO makes back to 14.7 to 1 fuel mix.

Yes, if you don't mind me putting up links, this is a company that I may purchase the electronics from HHO hydrogen Electronics and pwm mind you I am still in the research stage. Any input on this would be great or if anyone has used a product that really worked for them, I would love to hear it. You definitely need to modify your sensors or HHO will really screw up your mileage and leave
you frustrated if you don't know what your doing.

I have a dry cell on my 96 neon I see the fuel adaptive s work when i switch it on then after a few min the computer just puts them back to where they were to start with this is why I need to get the EFFIE installed not having time to mess with it just yet.
Here is a site that sells them and also provides u with the info on how that stuff works.
Dual Digital EFIE - $79.00 : FuelSaver-MPG Inc. This is more then likely what u need unless u have 4 o2 sensors then there is a duel EFFIE they have

HHO works. your taking water and electrolysing it to make O2 and H2

now when I say it works I mean it "makes" O2 and H2

does it do what you think it will do? yes. your engine will burn H2 just fine.

Will it improve your fuel economy? not a chance. at least not by any extent that you can measure it (2 decimal places)

Your using an extremely inefficient engine to turn an extremely inefficient alternator to run an extremely inefficient electrolyser to make a miniscule amount of H2 to feed back into and burn in your Extremely inefficient engine.

The only way you MIGHT get a net gain is to run the HHO generator on its own battery pack SEPARATE from the car.

Now your trading Cheap Electricity at home to run the HHO. in theory this could work.

but now you have another problem. my 2000 voyager is a 3.3 liter engine. so it "pumps" 3.3L if gas every 2 revolutions if I recall correctly.

at "cruise" I am turning 1600 rpm (I drive slow) so every minute my "air pump" (which is what an engine really is) pumps 2640 liters of "GAS" (air" through itself.

even the "BEST" made HHO gensets have trouble making 1 Liter a minute.

and of that 1 Liter a minute only 20% of that is H2 by volume. so your making 0.2 Liter of H2 per minute and feeding that into an engine that is moving 2640 liters a minute.

I think at this point you can easily deduce your engine is not even going to "FLINCH" at that. its less than a "gnat" on your windscreen.

to be effective you would need at least 20 of these HHO gensets and a battery pack that would exceed the mass capacity of your chassis.

an EMPTY big rig might be able to make use of such a setup. Think giant BLADDER in the trailer. you generate HHO as you drive down the highway and then "USE" the stored HHO when you have to "accelerate" to offset your gasoline requirements. but man would that be complex :-) kind of an HHO Hybrid.

So yes they work. but the gains are so tiny you will not have the means to measure them and then ONLY if you do NOT power it from your car's alternator at which point you will very likely LOSE fuel economy.

since as with ALL energy transfer it takes more energy to make the H2 than you can get from the H2 and since your CAR Is making the energy it has to be lossy.

Yes I have built a pretty robust HHO rig (just for fun) twin deep cycle batteries ran it for about 20 minutes before depleting the batteries. Zero measured improvement in fuel economy. It was fun to do but won't improve your fuel economy.

U will need the EFFIE to have the O2 sensor fooled to the PCM because teh amount of o2 being produced by the HHO system the PCM will just bring it back to 14.7 to 1 air mix that's why it did not work
My HOO rig makes 2L per min using a flow gauge the mount of energy the HOO system is only 15 amps and the 3.3L idea is not correct if u pumped 3.3L of gas every 2 revs u would be out of gas in less then 4 min the 3.3 is the amount of space that from BDC of a piston to TCD the volume of air the engine can compress not fuel.

no you do not need the EFFIE. 14.7 to 1 is what your SUPPOSED to run.

if your running less than 14.7 to 1 (for whatever reason) than any improvement you see is a result of running LEAN not of adding the H2

if you can safetly run lean GREAT do it but don't proclaim that as proof your H2 did it.

I find it hard to believe your getting 2 LPM out of 15 amps. besides using that in a car I would be curious to know how you did that as I have other needs for making H2 and .4 LPM of H2 is AMAZING

I think you need to reread my post.

let me quote myself again

"I am turning 1600 rpm (I drive slow) so every minute my "air pump" (which is what an engine really is) pumps 2640 liters of "GAS" (air" through itself."

I never said it was pumping 2640L of Gasoline.

I guess the question is how much H2 do you need to provide say 10% of your car's horsepower? what "volume" is that amount of H2 ? (I honestly do not know)

I would guess an awful lot. H2 is a VERY LOW DENSITY fuel in gaseous form

now I do know its possible to fit enough H2 in a V8 engine to "RUN" the engine. I have seen an engine run off straight H2 out of a hose from an H2 tank.

but the amount of H2 I saw them pumping was on the order of around 10-12 liters a minute AT LEAST.

which means you would need to generate at least 80 LPM of HHO to get the same results.

this tells me you need about 8 LPM to replace 10% of your car's power production IE to see a 10% reduction in gasoline usage. (obviously smaller more efficient engines would need a lot less)

my geo cruises at 2100 rpm (and thats an XFI with 3.79:1 tranny and over sized tires so I am effectively running 3.52 to 1 ratio.

and I am still pumping 1000 LPM through the engine. so I would need what? roughly 4-5 LPM of HHO to supplement gas by 10%.

that is a lot of gas.

remember 80% of your HHO by volume is 02 only 20% of H2

your computer does not need to be tricked. if you inject o2 into the engine your car will simply "suck less air" to compensate.

if it add fuel your power goes up and you will naturally back off the gas pedal doing the exact same thing.

if your "leaning out" with an EFFIE than "THAT" is why your seeing gains and you should be asking yourself what damage (if any) your doing to your engine.

easy test. kill the HHO but leave the EFFIE going. I bet you see the same gains.

"no you do not need the EFFIE. 14.7 to 1 is what your SUPPOSED to run." This is what the PCM tries to get to but never will fully

For comparison Natural Gas has about 1000 BTU / ft3 & Propan about 2500 BTU / ft3.
28.32 Liters to 1 cubic foot. So, if 1 cu.ft. of HHO equals 2000 BTU's (est), then 1 liter would produce 70 btu's There is your 80 per L here is your video of 1.5L per min

Best hho dry cell design Test Videos

Yes the computer has to be tricked U said it yourself a mass amount of the chemical being produced is o2 so if an increase on volume of o2 is being burnt the upstream o2 sensor will read there is more o2 in the system is it will add more fuel to get the 14.7 back down to where it wants to be. SO with that said the EFFIE is installed and in turn trim down the O2 sensor return from the HHO to get it back to what it would be with out HHO.
I have first hand watch this work on my chrysler I have a DRB3 I installed a toggle switch to turn it on and off at as I want.
On the scanner the normal reading for my neon long term fuel adaptive is +4.9% fuel trim I turn on the HHO and it drops down to -1.4 then after 5 min of running it will get back up to +4.9 with short term adding +10-+15 % U can also feel the performance change when u turn it on then off the computer has to ADJ it to where it wants to be once the system is on and turns off.


"our computer does not need to be tricked. if you inject o2 into the engine your car will simply "suck less air" to compensate."

This is not true The volume of air that is going into a Speed density car system is always fixed it does not change. The throttle body will allow only X amount to enter the intake based off what U step on the throttle the PCM controls fuel only not air.

The PCM is designed to have a range of +30 to - 30% fuel trim anything past those and u get the fuel system rich/lean codes.

I just lost 30 minutes of typing. I am not typing it all over again.

suffice it to say here is the basics. your making 0.03296 grams of hydrogen per minute.

per unit mass hydrogen has about 3 times the energy as gasoline.

at 60mph I burn 1 gallon of gas in 25 minutes (25mpg) so in grams that is 110.18 grams per minute of gasoline.

you need 36.728 grams of hydrogen to equal the energy I am getting with gasoline.

so to offset your fuel by just 10% you would need to make 3.6728 grams of hydrogen a minute.

your making 1/111th that much hydrogen. your not even making enough hydrogen to offset your gasoline usage by 1%

you would need "TEN" of those generators and 150 AMPS of power to come even close to making a real DENT.

that "IS" interesting though. 6 deep cycle batteries could in theory run your genset times 10 for 30 minutes. that is enough to cover the "acceleration" time and some of the "cruising" time for my commute and 10% of my gasoline is a lot more expensive than the electricity to charge that small battery array.

but man the maintenance involved.

so when your running TEN of your 2 LPM generators then you might have something.

switch to a smaller engine and you can use 5 of your gen sets and 75 amps of power. Much more feasible.

I am sorry MY BAD I goofed up the math.

you would need ONE HUNDRED AND ELEVEN of your HHO Generators to make 10% of your fuel needs. ie to reduce your gasoline usage by 10%

wow yeah that is not going to work.

this is the straight up BTU math. am I missing something?

U do what u want its your car the proof is in the pudding that's all I can say.
I will have date for a months worth and upload it.

There is no u do what you want etc.. I simply listed the math. irrefutable math without a very good explanation. you need 36 grams of hydrogen to run your car for 1 minute at average fuel economy. its that simple. your making .03926 grams per minute.

this is a fact. not an opinion.

if you want to show "proof" here is what I would consider proof. not solid proof but enough to get me curious.

on video on level ground with the cruise control set uninterupted video.

2 gauges live in real time.

Instant fuel Economy or GPH for the gasoline side (injectors) and Air Fuel Ratio Actual (not from the onboard ECU)

do that and turn your HHO rig on and off so we can see the effect it has in real time.

Data means nothing. I can type up a months data in minutes.

you have shown no pudding. when I can get in the car turn the key and see the effect THAT is pudding :-) hehe

I WOULD LOVE for this to work. I really would. but not ONE SINGLE person has been able to build an example that survives independent testing. ie give it to someone else to try.

not one single example. to me this means its an extraordinary claim and therefore requires extraordinary proof.

the math just does not add up. now THEIR ARE other factors at play besides the "pure math"

I do believe their IS something to HHO helping the engine burn fuel better especially this nasty Ethanol laced fuel (at which point the HHO would not be improving Fuel Economy but RESTORING LOST fuel economy due to Ethanol) which would make me a very happy critter! I lose a LOT of money every year to ethanol.

and I have solid repeatable reproducible data to back up my E10 losses in excess of 20% and approaching 30% on some vehicles!

my previous voyager was hit hard by E10. I have 70,000 miles at 28mpg and when we switched to E10 I had to HYPER MILE the crap of that van to get 20-21mpg.

put some E0 in it and its 28mpg again without even trying hard. that is what? 28-29% drop in fuel economy (if I did that math right) talk about an OUCH (I drive 40,000 miles a year so it hurt and hurt FAST)

so if HHO can help with that you can bet I want to be all over like stink on .... you get the idea.

ok once I get the time I will make that video for ya I don't have cruise control on the neon but do have a scan gauge that shows instant MPG RPM TPS volts and MPG I will rig the switch to be inside so I can turn it on and off at will.

RPM should be a decent stand in for cruise. ie if someone lets off the gas the RPM should drop etc..

I am assuming this car otherwise functions properly? ie if your going for fuel economy you should already be getter better fuel economy than the EPA estimates. :-)

Look forward to the video.

man I hate that you can not edit posts here you have to just make a new post.

the one issue is air fuel ratio. that's important. if your mileage is largely from "leaning out" then you don't need the HHO to do that.

problem is you can't use the A/F from the ECU since your TRICKING that.

A/F? and it wont be leaking out the system it will be adjusting it back down to normal operating mix when using the HHO

yes air fuel ratio. since your going to mess with the O2 sensor your going to mess with the A/F ratio. so what the ECU reports won't be accurate since your "altering" the O2 data.

ie if your "end result" is a lean burn then "THAT" is where your gains are coming from.

if you "lean out" the gasoline but the A/F out the tail pipe indicates 14.7 to 1 then that means the "difference" between ECU altered reporting and the actual out the tailpipe is the hydrogen IE its working.

but if the gases out the tailpipe indicate lean then its not the hydrogen. your just running lean which will increase your cylinder temps maybe damage things etc.. etc.. either way it will be the lean burn giving you the savings not the hydrogen.

it wont damage anything U cant mess with the air amount only fuel

lean burn can most definitely "damage" things. start getting some detonation and knocking going and you will learn quickly the potential for damage that exists if its not managed carefully.

not saying this will happen but its "on the tablet" so to speak and needs to be considered depending on how hard you push the lean burn.

what are your quantification in this matter? What training and or schooling do u have?

I have a HHO system and plan to fit it to my voyager. It was originally fitted to my last car a Mercedes E230. I used a Lambda spacer and had the map sensor adjustable to lower the fuel intake. To correct the rich/lean problem. The dry cell that I used took a while to set up to give off the right amount of Hydrogen. It ran at 40 amps Max. You will never be able to run a car purely on Hydrogen because it's highly volatile and to compress the gas may make your car a Hydrogen Bomb. The Hydrogen gas bonds it's self to the unburned fuel in the compression chambers and gives it a more even burn and uses all the the unspent fuel therefore creating a bigger bang and more efficient. By using all the fuel you in effect need to use less fuel from your tank. You need to fool the cars ecu because when you make Hydrogen, the by-product is oxygen. If the Lambda sensor picks up the excess oxygen, it adds more fuel thus defeating the object of saving fuel.

Diesels run better on Hydrogen than petrol as they waste more fuel than petrols.

When running a car on Hydrogen, I found that the car ran smoother and had more response.

I managed to go from 30mpg to 55mpg on my 2.3ltr petrol Merc.

The emissions when tested were running cleaner than a Fiat 500.

when you burn hydrogen the product is water not oxygen?

when you add more oxygen and it adds more fuel you will get more power and now need "less throttle" which should balance things out rather nicely.

in reality your adding such a miniscule quantity of oxygen its just not going to notice it. your not even increasing the O2 content by 1/4 of 1% probably a lot less.

the idea that it helps the car burn the gasoline better IS interesting. I could see that being an issue on carbbed cars and maybe even TBI's I am surprised its needed on an MPFI style rig though.

Be sure to report back your results please!

When you produce the Hydrogen, you do get a bit of water but most of it is Hydrogen and Oxygen as water is made from 2 parts Hydrogen and 1 part Oxygen.

Before I made my dry cell I spent months researching into this as I thought it was a scam. Most of the places that sell you HHO kits tell you that you can save fuel and give you the impression that you will be running on Hydrogen or water alone. The time I spend on looking into this must have made my family go mad.

I'm not a scientist so can't tell you the amount of Hydrogen or Oxygen produced. I just kept on experimenting with how much catalyst I added until the car ran smoothly, turning down the amount of fuel with the map sensor and watching how much amps the system was pulling.

Everywhere I looked when researching, stated that more Oxygen was produced and that the cars computer would act on this. I tried this by running the car without the map adjuster and the spacer and found that the car smelt richer and I could watch the fuel gauge move. When replacing the map and spacer, it was noticeable how much better the car was running and the gauge didn't move as fast. The exhaust tailpipe used to be black but within a couple of months of running a dry cell, it was clean.

I understand that I would be very hard to run a carb car on Hydrogen as you don't have a computer to run the fueling.

I don't know if you have made one to try but don't spend on plans or Buying one. I can send you plans.

I did find that in winter, the car seemed to 'smoke' on cold mornings but that was because of the steam/water produced being warmer than the air outside.

yes 2 parts hydrogen 1 part oxygen. but this is deceptive.

by VOLUME its 20% hydrogen 80% oxygen. ie not as much hydrogen as people thing. (many think its 66% hydrogen 33% oxygen)

what you get is H2 and O2 the H readily combines with itself ot make H2 and the O combines with ambient O to make O2

actually a carb car would be EASIER. no computer to putz with and it does not care if you add more O2

Adding more O2 does not make the computer add more fuel.

more O2 in the tail pipe can make the computer add more O2

but the amount of O2 you add is equal in "combo" quantity to the amount of H2 you add.

when you burn it the result is water. ie there is no extra O2 in the tail pipe because its "combined" with the H2. the o2 sensor (which is the only thing that will tell the computer to add more fuel) does not "see" water. so it does not care.

ie you should "NOT" need to putz with the computer to make h2 injection work.

if you truly do have more O2 for whatever reason and this does cause the O2 sensor to report such to the ECU what will happen is you will get more fuel.

this means you will get more power (remember 14.7 to 1 will be maintained)

you will "surge" and do what comes naturally. you will lift your foot of the gas.

ie you will naturally take care of the additional power.

its not "enrichment" since the system will maintain 14.7 to 1 and H2 is just a fuel not unlike gasoline as far as the engine is concerned.

some people say but wait. H2 does not produce the same "byproducts" as Gasoline when burned and this will cause the ECU to see an imbalance and "richen" the mixture.

this seems logical only until you once again realize what the sensor is called.

O2 sensor. o2 is all it measures. it does not measure carbon byproducts or exhaust gases. it ONLY measures O2. that is it. that is all it can see.

so unless burning hydrogen makes a bunch of excess O2 (and it does not) this is simply not a problem.

basically IF you can make enough H2 you COULD see an improvement in fuel economy since your engine will more than happily burn the H2 without argument.

I question whether you can see a gain using the alternator. YOU CAN with a battery pack but again I calculate the gain will be so tiny you will have trouble measuring it.

am I missing anything?