GM (Hy Wire) Concept car Runs on Sea water

Now this has to be the coolest concept car todate. On the video he says it runs on salt water but I think he means hydrogen. Check out the viedo, you can remove the body in minutes and change it to a Pick Up or convertable or so the viedo claims.

www.youtube.com...

That's a very cool car, not only is it good for the environment with
it's Hydrogen powerplant, but all the cool technology incorporated
into it.

I can definately see this becomeing the next big thing in cars,
not only because of the cooolness and convenience facotr, but
more specifically I mean specifically being able to sit in either
seat and be able to drive, car companies could save alot of money
by having that, rather than having to make cars with drivers
control on the left side for one group, and on the left side for
another group.

I'd definately buy one of these if they were being sold.



One thing I'm a bit curious about though, how much is
5million quid in American dollars?

Originally posted by iori_komei
One thing I'm a bit curious about though, how much is
5million quid in American dollars?

5,000,000.00 GBP = 9,749,138.99 USD

www.xe.com...

I can only wonder what the cost of seawater will be in twenty years.

Why seawater?

Does seawater have more hydrogen?

Is it only because seawater is more abundant?


[edit on 2006/11/28 by GradyPhilpott]

Yea I saw that in popular science a couple years back its a cool idea but what worries me is if the hidrogen fuel tank was punctured wouldent there be a big BOOM?

Cool car.

Thats a huge misconception about hydrogen, one that the oil companies love hearing.

No, you wouldnt get a big boom by puncturing a hydrogen tank, you can shoot the things and not even get a flame... the stuff wont even escape fast enough to pop the tank, it will only seep out.

Hydrogen dissipates really quickly into our air, and, without an oxygen to hydrogen mix in the tank, you cannot combust it in the tank either.
Not to mention it's not even gasseous hydrogen cars will be using. Only gasseous hydrogen can be ignited, the denser versions are non-combustible.

You have more of a chance of blowing up your gasoline driven car like you see in hollywood movies, than you are of getting a tiny flame out of a hydrogen car.

Eventually, when everyone has switched to hydrogen, we will be asking ourselves how we were insane enough to be driving with a tank of gasoline attached to our cars.

[edit on 28-11-2006 by johnsky]

Originally posted by GradyPhilpott

5,000,000.00 GBP = 9,749,138.99 USD

WOW at that price only the very rich will be able to afford one.

Thanks for converting the figure, I wondered what it was in US dollars. I too wondered why Saltwater. Perhaps it is to conserve fresh water? Imagine how much would be used to make hydrogen each day, that is a lot of water salt or fresh.

I wonder if after they extract the hydrogen if any liquid remains that can be returned to the area it was removed from?

There is also one thing I dislike about the car even though it has some very cool features and that is the suicide doors for the rear passengers.



[edit on 11/29/2006 by shots]

Why is GM messing around with concept cars, when there are alternative energy cars already out there?
THey need to stop fooling around with concepts and start adding hybrids to their fleet.

Originally posted by Nygdan
Why is GM messing around with concept cars, when there are alternative energy cars already out there?

THey need to stop fooling around with concepts and start adding hybrids to their fleet.

In order to build them you have to make a concept car that works first. As for alternate engery sources isn't hydrogen considered one of them?

Also GM is showing some new Hybrids in 2008

[edit on 11/29/2006 by shots]

but there are literally hundreds of hydrogen concept cars already that do work, many of them equal to their gasoline counterparts.

I think this whole "concept" phase is just a way of making the public believe they are concerned with the environment, when in fact they will continue with gasoline for as long as they possibly can.

Originally posted by shots

Originally posted by Nygdan
Why is GM messing around with concept cars, when there are alternative energy cars already out there?

THey need to stop fooling around with concepts and start adding hybrids to their fleet.

In order to build them you have to make a concept car that works first.

These things have been around for a heckuva long time now.

As for alternate engery sources isn't hydrogen considered one of them?

The thing is, they're wasting everyone's time. If they were at all concerned with reducing emissions, or conservation, or anything like that, they'd be converting their fleet over to hybrids, and making them available to the public. As it is, the american car manufacturers have been completely blown away by the japanese manufacturers on this.

Originally posted by GradyPhilpott

I can only wonder what the cost of seawater will be in twenty years.

Why seawater?

Does seawater have more hydrogen?

Is it only because seawater is more abundant?


[edit on 2006/11/28 by GradyPhilpott]

The only reason that they would use seawater is because there is more of it. Something that they didn't mention or maybe even think about is if they extract the hydrogen from seawater, they also produce chlorine gas and caustic acid as a byproduct.

Well I looked all over my pc but I cant find the video I wanted to share. Theres a guy in the Phillipines who has been making water powered conversions to cars for over 10 years. It probably costs less than $200 bucks. He said they run better on salt water, the saltier - the better.

Anyways heres a funny quote:

Some folks at Shell Oil Co. wrote "Fuel Economy of the Gasoline Engine" (ISBN 0-470-99132-1); it was published by John Wiley & Sons, New York, in 1977. On page 42 Shell Oil quotes the President of General Motors, he, in 1929, predicted 80 MPG by 1939. Between pages 221 and 223 Shell writes of their achievements: 49.73 MPG around 1939; 149.95 MPG with a 1947 Studebaker in 1949; 244.35 MPG with a 1959 Fiat 600 in 1968; 376.59 MPG with a 1959 Opel in 1973. The Library of Congress (LOC), in September 1990, did not have a copy of this book. It was missing from the files. I bought my copy from Maryland Book Exchange around 1980 after a professor informed me that it was used as an engineering text at the University of West Virginia.

I would think that all the impurities in sea water would build up layers of these impurities inside the system over time decreasing its efficiency or even leading to failure.

I may be wrong. Just seems like filling it with water you have at your house would be easier and have less impurities than sea water.

Very cool car and it looks like it would be easy to mass produce this kind of vehicle.

With ability to change its body then you would not need a lot of different models. It would be easy to make custom bodies too.

The salt in the sea water could be providing some of the charge, you know like those toy digital clocks that run off potatos.

I didn't watch the youtube thing, so thats my speculation.

The only thing is the power tends to bleed off real quick with a salt water type of concoction. I've done my own little experiments.

But I don't think they're doing what I'm doing....