High speed steam car!

[Lone Cat]

I'm not gonna believe this but look!



http://www.wired.com/2009/07/british-steam-car/

Ok it is tested in 2009 but what's the point of making steam car that claims 'to squeeze out every drops of fuel and water to maximum' if it burns Natural Gas? (And plenty of generic combustion vehicles had been geared to burn CNG can been seen today). why not coal? or pulverized coal?

ok i saw this first on Discovery HD meow~.

[RulerofRails]

Try this link for more info: http://www.steamcar.net/lsr-history.html.

Its impressive what they achieved even if they were using LNG and twin turbines. They did a great job of making steam in a compact package, but still the car weighed 3 tons. There is a video of it running towards the end of the page I linked to.

[Lone Cat]

Since natural gas usually found on top of oil well. for me it is considered petroleum product though it exists independently and not extracted through crude oil distillation.
If digitalized coal stoker is made (and cleaner 'firebox' is made lighter). It may free us from petroleum dependency.

In Thailand. CNG service stations is monopolized by PTT (semi - Government corporate registered in stock market, Ministry of Treasury owns 50 something % of its total shares.) refuelling NGV takes time (about 2-3 minutes. My father owns a CNG-powered pickup truck and I sometimes drive it) and requires a right amount of the gas VERY OWN pressure to refuel the vehicle efficiently (And only service stations in or around Bangkok and along the NG pipelines can tap this efficiency, service stations outside the pipeline had to depend on CNG supply vehicle (and this supply depletes considerably fast!), If you come to Thailand after the 2009, you'll see a convoy growing out of any PTT CNG service station, these vehicles are queued up for refuelling services!). While NGV is economical (and clean) fuel choice for any internal combustion engine. PTT handles NGV Business poorly. so this is why CNG powered vehicles doesn't appeal me... regardless of which type of engine it uses (Internal combustion or..... the experimental.. steam!)

[RulerofRails]

Interesting. My bad to say it uses LNG (liquefied natural gas). The article says liquefied petroleum gas (also known as propane). LNG can come from other sources like coal deposits, but liquefied petroleum gas obviously comes from petroleum. If they use CNG for cars in Thailand, it is possible that it could come from coal deposits as CNG is basically far less compressed than LNG or LPG (CNG is only compressed, they are compressed even more to become liquid).

"Natural gas can be "associated" (found in oil fields), or "non-associated" (isolated in natural gas fields), and is also found in coal beds (as coalbed methane). . . .

Natural gas extracted from oil wells is called casinghead gas or associated gas. The natural gas industry is extracting an increasing quantity of gas from challenging resource types: sour gas, tight gas, shale gas, and coalbed methane." --- Wikipedia.

So while this steam car was using liquefied petroleum gas, what you are talking about (CNG) could possibly come from other sources. The likelihood is that it does come from a petroleum-linked source though. If price rises it will encourage development of more obscure sources of natural gas.

PS. What is the relative cost of CNG at the service station compared to normal fuel?

[Lone Cat]

In this case. this vehicle uses LPG. obiviously a refinery product... still not appealing me.
Here in Thailand the NGV Price per unit (Thailand uses Metric measurement system just like Continental Europe, the automotives however.. runs on the left lane like British commonwealth and Japan) is nearly one-third (1/3) of a road diesel fuel. about one - fourth of Gasohols, and almost one - fifth of pure gasoline! Generic NGV http://gasprice.kapook.com/

It's cheap! but NGVs depleted its CNG fuel faster than any petroleum vehicles could do.