Re: Stirling engines


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Posted by John K (24.79.130.122) on April 25, 2002 at 20:14:28:

In Reply to: Re: Stirling engines posted by Scott Ellis on April 22, 2002 at 10:23:26:

I've been very fascinated myself recently, with Stirling engines. This is funny really, because for most of my life I've had very little interest in engines, overall.

You've all heard of the invention made by Dean Kamen, previously known as Ginger or 'IT' right ? And then this year it was revealed to be a 'self balancing scooter' called the Segway....

Well Kamen has been talking about using a Stirling engine together with this electric scooter. His plan is to use the Stirling to regenerate the batteries,thus giving it much greater range. However there seems to be another dimension to it as well. The Stirling could also be used as a portable power unit, so it could generate electricity in your house as well ( and you could sell excess electricity back to the 'electric grid'). As well, he is talking about using Stirling engines in 3rd World countries, and purifying water with it , using the excess heat which it produces. Because Stirlings operate on heat (well heat differentials), such fuels as cow dung, and solar energy could be used in these countries to operate the Stirling, both for generating electricity, and for purifying water.

Kamen has recently talked about bringing these Stirlings to the market in the next few years. He has increasingly been publishing patents relating to his engine's development. One of his recent ones deals with the manufacturing process of the engine;essentially being able to mass produce these engines.

There are a number of aspects of Stirlings which I'm interested in. For instance I'm intrigued by the fact that you are able to use heat energy from so many different sources : solar, biomatter, excess heat from your hot water tank etc

I also wonder, could the excess heat produced by one Stirling engine be used to 'fuel' another' Stirling ( could you couple these engines together?)

I've come across websites where they talk about using Stirlings together with solid oxide fuel cells. These fuel cells are apparently quite efficient, but also produce a fair amount of heat ( which is good for a Stirling). On one site it was claimed that you might be able to reach efficiency levels of 80%, by coupling this type of fuel cell, together with a Stirling engine.

Sorry for rambling on, but as you can see this topic's caught my interest !

John K


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