Water-Powered ICE Is Here!!! | The Revolutionary 6-Stroke Engine

[@johnbrereton5229]

Samuel Griffin patented his 6 stroke engine design the 'Griffin Simplex' in 1886 as well as other related patents. These engines were used to power generators as they were too heavy for a mobile use. However, they soon built up a reputation as reliable and dependable engines working long hours without missing a beat. Unfortunately Samuel Giffins business went bankrupt in 1923. Two working examples remain at the Bath at Work Museum in Bath England.

[@driverjamescopeland]

This is actually the Crower 6-stroke, named after famed cam and valvetrain tech Bruce Crower. The injection systems and valve controls to acheive this cycle were not available in the 1860s. The engine showed great promise... but didn't see much in the way of success, due to inherent nature of water (freezing, corrosion, etc.). In stationary applications where freezing temperatures aren't a considerable factor, and weight/space isn't an issue... it's a great option.

[@andrewday3206]

I spoke with Crower. They stopped developing the 6 stroke when Bruce’s health had problems.

[@driverjamescopeland]

@andrewday3206 - I thought he had sold the rights prior to his passing... as it was rumored a German company and Ford were revisiting the cycle back in the late '90s/'00s. Ford abandoned their smaller industrial engine lineup. I haven't seen or heard of anything out of Germany either. The specific power density is actually lower, requiring a larger engine to produce the same amount of power. The benefit comes in the form of efficiency and duty cycle... as more energy of the original combustion event is captured, and the 6th stroke aids supremely well in cooling. The biggest problem came in the form of accelerated erosion of the ring lands and grooves. Much the same as with any other water injection system... tiny droplets of water turning to steam at such high pressures cause microscopic fractures in the surface as carbon is removed from the base metal.

[@andrewday3206]

@@driverjamescopeland They may have sold the rights I am unaware of that. I had gotten in touch with them asking for assistance in using an engine as a reciprocating reformer converting hydrocarbons into H2 and CO2. Two questions Why is the specific power density lower? Seeing burning fuel produces H2O and CO2 why doesn’t that have the same effect on the metals? Your response has my interested it was thoughtful Thank You

[@driverjamescopeland]

@andrewday3206 - the lower engine volume-specific power density is due to the energy source. For the sake of comparison, we'll use Bruce's eureka engine as an example. While the injected water helped to both extract more usable power from the origin combustion event... it still didn't change the fact that all your power was result of that single event, now distributed over a 50% longer cycle. Power is always limited by the amount of air/fuel the engine injests during the intake phase. While it did get more power per pound of fuel burned... it effectively reduced the intake phase by 33%. Picture it this way... a 10 cubic inch engine in 4-stroke configuration, ingests 10ci of combustible mixture for 25% of the overall cycle. A 10 cubic 6-stroke only ingests for 16.6% of the cycle... which is 9% less. The 6-stroke was also inherently more limited in it's RPM, due to precise injection timing, and diesel injectors not being particularly suited to water. All said and done, the 6-stroke proved to be about 20% less power dense compared to a typical road-going 4-stroke of the same size. As for the water causing additional wear... it's not the H²O, so much as its state. When produced in standard combustion the water is already in a vapor state. In the 6-stroke, it is injected in a liquid state... which even with stratified injection, contains droplets. These droplets often end up vaporizing at the ring lands of TDC (top dead center) displacing the far more viscous oil... not only leaving these nearly microscopic areas without lubrication, but creating pressure waves in a non-ideal location. The result while from different causes, was much the same as when cavitation erodes the edges of a boat prop. Where the engine really held promise, was industrial applications where high duty cycles typically dictate lower engine speed, larger flywheels, and considerably larger cooling systems to acheive sustained torque. The 6-stroke addressed all of these while offering two other advantages... lower cylinder count, and better fuel-specific efficiency. Bruce was basically achieving modern diesel efficiency with gasoline 30 years ago. Also, with two power strokes per cycle, and a longer relative duration of torque output... you could acheive continuous reliable torque with only three cylinders instead of 6. Even with today's material technology, primarily advanced ceramics... I doubt we could produce a injector that can reliably overcome the challenges of water. Quite the sad case, as it would make for an outstanding stationary power unit. The block would also need provisions for the ring lands... also possibly ceramic... but that's insanely expensive, low tolerance to thermal shock, and takes the potential for catastrophic failure to a whole new level.

[@driverjamescopeland]

@andrewday3206 - as for your idea for a reformer... I'm curious as to why you essentially wanted to liberate the hydrogen from the hydrocarbon chain, just to have two gasses, with the carbon already oxidized and stable? I'm sure you have a purpose... I just can't quite grasp what would justify the losses.

[@ArnoldsDesign]

This is ingenious. Basically it's an ICE/steam engine hybrid. Using residual heat from the power stroke to create steam is a good idea. It is heat energy that otherwise would've been wasted through the radiator.

[@JasonMunley-z2z]

Thank you for understanding the concept. The water used to cool the engine should be used for work instead of drained into the universe as heat.

[@MattyIce2214]

Then no hot water for heater core during winter

[@JasonMunley-z2z]

@@MattyIce2214 true.

[@danw6014]

Steam would actually have to come into the cylinder under pressure for this to work.

[@ArnoldsDesign]

@@danw6014 It would get injected as atomized water under high pressure, and then flash vaporize. Water expands at a 1600:1 ratio.

[@maninthemiddleground2316]

Would have loved if this video provided sample power and torque numbers for comparison. Also, I think this “6-stroke” engine can actually benefit from a camless design aka freevalve using solenoids to push the valves instead. This will result in even better efficiency and more finely tuned timing.

[@m.anejante1687]

Is alawys the same nonsense repeated by ignorants just to attract more ignorants. What's proposed is nonsense and makes the engine a lot less efficient.

[@mikeb3172]

It gives 33% more power at the same RPM (crankshaft turns 33% more). Torque is difficult to guess. The steam expansion stroke may be more powerful than the gas/petrol stroke.

[@m.anejante1687]

@@mikeb3172 No, is all BS... Goes against the rules of physics.

[@forkbeard606]

Water injection in the 4 stroke IC engine was developed in aircraft engines in the 1930s as well as in the gas turbine engine for jet planes. Although the 6 stroke may offer higher thermal efficiency it comes at the cost of lost additional crankshaft power to power the last two strokes. The question becomes whether the power gain from that scavenging cycle is offset as a gain by the power used to complete the last two cycles.

[@Rose-f2t]

@@canadianoddy8504 Wow, with narrow minded people like you we would still be living in a cave

[@mikeskidmore6754]

It does not matter. If you need more power just use a larger displacement engine. This concept is like getting some extra power out of the gasoline already burned.

[@Rose-f2t]

Aircraft engines used water injection only during takeoff for the first 5 minutes. At takeoff airplanes are the heaviest and applying 100% power caused the exhaust valves to overheat, so water was injected. There was a gain in power but it was not used at cruise, since at cruise the power is set back to about 60%. Water injection was used in most airliners and military airplane engines until the mid 1950s. By then jet engines took over the airliner industry.

[@adoreslaurel]

Also, if in a car, quite a sizeable water tank would need space to fit it, which means additional weight.

[@mikeskidmore6754]

@@adoreslaurel I have a 7 gallon water tank on my 6 wheel drive truck with a 265 HP 3208 Cat .. 89 gallon fuel tank . 7 gallons lasts most long says .. I carry to 5 gallon gas cans with extra water in them

[@YodaWhat]

This 6-stroke engine is interesting mainly for stationary applications, where both the injected water and the combustion water can be reclaimed and recycled using a *large radiator* to cool and condense the hot gases. That eliminates the need to continually supply new purified water from elsewhere. Radiator air temperature will still be easily hot enough for making domestic hot water, and for heating buildings, which will be great for reducing or eliminating power draw from the electric grid if the combustion fuel is still available... preferably natural gas or propane, for clean burning. Off-grid would also be possible.

[@scootpegune609]

I can see this working well for a generator or anything stationary. In a vehicle you've got too many variables, freezing temps being one of many.

[@bernieshort6311]

Excellent point as the water would have to be prevented from freezing especially when the vehicle was not in use.

[@bobirving6052]

This is already solved. Many current vehicles use water injection in the engine. The military figures it out in wwII to use water/meth. Almost every vehicle driving is water objected and winter is not a problem. It’s called windshield washer fluid “injection”. 😂

[@v4skunk739]

@@bernieshort6311 Anti freeze says hi.

[@fstanl3636]

@@v4skunk739I don't think they will like antifreeze being burned like that...

[@TheWhateverContent]

Also, cylinder wash down.

[@noanyobiseniss7462]

A nice side effect is the valves will not retain carbon.

[@DarkAttack14]

I can attest to this. I ran straight water and water methanol in a chevy 1.8 ecotec motor, the valves often got extremely dirty even with port injection because chevys EGR strategy was to hold the intake valve open during some of the exhaust stroke causing flow reversion. The only benefit was no EGR valve to fail whatsoever!. The downside is the valves get dirtier than a normal port injected vehicle. Running water methanol for a month was enough that my valves looked like they were freshly put in! Bright and shiny

[@jackjones9467]

My thought was a 3-valve head, instead of a double lobe cam. 2 valves for fuel intake exhaust, 1 for water exhaust. That way you could separate straight steam exhaust to keep away from things such as a catalytic converter, as mentioned by someone in the comments, and O2 sensors and the like that may be damaged, and could possibly be recondensed as in some steam engines.

[@guloguloguy]

WHY NOT ADD (INJECT) WATER, DURING THE NORMAL INTAKE STROKE, AND MAKE THIS A "DIESEL ENGINE",.... AND, ADD A SUPER-CHARGER!!!!!!

[@jamest.5001]

Use the exhaust to distill the water! Use a replacable stainless steel evaporator and a condensor chamber then store the water in a pre injection tank. The evaporator evsporating water at about 2,x tfe usesge rate, when the preinjection tank is full. A valve opens/closes to keep the evaporator from burning up. It being only about 22,,gauge stainless steel about 1pint to ,,1qt. For smaller engines , on larger engines it can be mounted on the back of the cat converter. Using some of its heat basically ab1 gph tiny stream into a hot chamber between 20& 80% full of water, after a certain number of hours and loss of efficientcy the boiler/evaporator can be change or cleaned removing water deposits! Remove and soak in CLR or something!

[@tristanjones7735]

I have always thought about running a boiler off the exhaust as a form of energy recovery. The problem is that your exhaust needs to be somewhat unrestricted, but have maximal surfacee area for heat transfer.

[@jtdiomond1]

@@tristanjones7735 If you're somewhere that's warm enough to not need antifreeze, and engine design that can run warm enough to turn water to steam could probably run off the engine coolant, running post steamed water through the regular cooling system.

[@andreasaunders197]

😢 It's not well known, but the combustion of a fuel yields a weight of water equal to the weight of fuel burned. Since water weighs about 8.4 lbs/gal and liquid fuels weigh around 6 lbs/ gal, you'd have to provide extra if you need equal weights for this engine. The British navy experimented with condensing water from motor lifeboat exhaust during WW ll, along with their Army (from truck exhaust) during the African desert campaign. They had problems filtering out contaminants such as oil and tetraethyl lead to make it safe for drinking. Perhaps todays filtration technology would make this idea more practical.

[@manga12]

perhaps however as someone that has read up about steam engines, I tell you that when you heat water it does weird things to the chemistry, and its not just corrosion but also scaling you have to worry about, and trying to condense the water out of the exaust would be good yes but thats additional weight the engine has to carry.

[@shawns0762]

I have patents for this, Bruce Crower made a running engine with this basic concept. The main problem is that conventional valves will oxidize over time. I have patents that eliminate conventional valves and replaces them with a rotating shaft with angled ports in it. As the shaft turnes it opens and closes intake and exhaust ports. This also allows the intake to open at 0° TDC and close at 0° BDC which is a must for this concept

[@mikeb3172]

1) The gas/petrol stroke needs around 10-15deg before TDC. 2) Valves covered in carbon (from the standard power stroke) don't oxidise.

[@shawns0762]

All conventional valves need time to ramp up, in other words the intake valve is open a little when the piston is moving up. This would inevitably lead to oxidation above the valve face. The same would be true on the exhaust side, there would be a loss of steam pressure

[@rpsoren]

What is your patent numbers, I'd be very interested in looking at your design. Thank you.

[@shawns0762]

@@rpsoren it's a provisional patent from a few years ago. I already made a straight six model with rotating parts. The "port shaft" would be twice the diameter of the piston bore. The concept has an engine with compression ignition and no conventional cooling system. It would have 2 electronically controlled injectors per cylinder, one for fuel, one for water. When the engine reaches operating temperature the computer would alternate the firing of the water and fuel injectors.

[@harrymusgrave2131]

Maybe? How to keep the water from freezing when the engine is not running. The engine has industrial uses. Ships, stationary, trucks, and farm.

[@patrickday4206]

Alcohol just like your windshield wiper fluid

[@brianolliver5506]

I thought of this 40 years ago, however my idea to take maximum utility of the waste heat was to stay at 4 cycle and gate the exhaust heat into another cylinder of suitable size to take advantage of the expansion of water which is 240 volumes, on a common crank.

[@sagaronline265]

my gudness

[@benjones4365]

Have a look at the 5 stroke engine.

[@celestewilson5377]

This engine is an attempt to capture energy left over in the exhaust of a conventional 4 stroke engine. This energy is contained in the exhaust as heat and pressure. However, by opening the exhaust valve at the end of the combustion power downstroke, the energies of the remaining pressure of the exhaust gasses, and the thermal energy of the hot exhaust gasses, are lost. The only captured thermal energy is that of the piston and cylinder walls, which are at a lower temperature than the exhaust gasses. Perhaps a better approach would be to build a conventional 4 stroke engine with liquid cooling jacket filled with a low boiling point substance (Freon?) , also equipped with an exhaust heat exchanger which uses the 4 stroke exhaust heat to help boil the Freon. The Freon "steam" would drive some sort of piston engine or turbine engine to provide mechanical power. I was fortunate a few years ago to get a tour of a combined thermal cycle electric power plant. It used a Rolls-Royce aircraft gas turbine driving an electric generator. The hot gas turbine exhaust heated a (water) boiler which drove a steam turbine driving another electric generator. The gas turbine was fired by natural gas. The natural gas had to be compressed to 900psi to get it into the turbine combustor section. This implies that the compressor section of the turbine was operating at a compression ratio of 60:1 . !!!!! The plant operators claimed an overall plant efficiency of 60%. Electrical output/BTU Natural gas input. Another KZbin video showed an engine concept where two 4 stroke cylinders have their exhausts alternately routed to a third, larger "expansion" cylinder. This is a very old concept, obviously derived from multiple-expansion steam engines. Possibly this "expansion-cylinder" concept could benefit from water injection as the exhaust(s) from the primary cylinders pass into the shared larger expansion cylinder. This configuration does not let any exhaust heat or pressure escape.

[@christmassnow3465]

I've read somewhere (Don't have the link) that the water vapor from the burning gasoline is extracted before the outflowing combustion products leave the exhaust. (The result of the combustion is carbon dioxide and water). It is possible to condense the vapor and store the water for use.

[@lcl7wrkr]

My great-uncle Leonard Dyer worked on this concept and even got a patent for it through his brother Frank, my grandfather...one thing i didnt hear mentioned is the difficulty keeping this engine lubricated during the flash from water to steam. Otto Lutz came up with something he called "Schutzol 39" in the 1940's but it was meant to prevent corrosion in his MW50 methanol/water injection system he developed during the war. But this was not intended as a lubricant, also apparently it was emulsifying just fine in water.

[@greggc8088]

Harley would love to have it on one of their motorcycles. 😂😂

[@Runedragonx]

This could be viable as a hydrogen engine, all the exhaust should be pure water vapor, so send the exhaust through a condenser to a storage tank where it can be used for the secondary (steam) power stroke, and have that secondary exhaust go back to the hydrolytic cell where it can be made into more fuel. You wouldn't need to refill on water as often, but the problem remains, hydrolysis requires expensive materials that *_will_* degrade rapidly. How often would one need to replace their cathodes and anodes?

[@m.anejante1687]

Clearly you have read some ignorant speaking about stuff he does'nt understand and you repeat his nonsense to keep promoting ignorance. When naming anodes and cathodes you are clearly speaking about electrolysis, not hydrolisis, that has nothing to do with it. If you were at any time to take a physics book and read it, to try and learn instead of make an effort to keep ignorant, you would knew that electrolisis is a very loooooong and sloooow process, and is absolutely incompatible for use in any kind of engine/motor to make hydrogen as a source of fuel. Engines ALREADY work with hydrogen, and ALREADY produce water that gets expelled from the exhaust (watch the back of the cars on any stop and you will see them dripping) The problem is, hydrogen provides more disadvantages and difficulties than solutions, so it's needed mixed with some other stuff (carbon, nitrogen, sulfur) to stabilize it, handle it and use it safely. Also, is easier and faster to get in this way. That's why they say: Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt.

[@jeffreyrousay221]

​@@m.anejante1687comment sections should be about the exchange of ideas and learning, not berating people who ask questions.

[@AtlasReburdened]

​@@m.anejante1687The irony here is unreal. You let your eagerness to show his foolishness make a fool of you. 1st: electrolysis as he proposed isn't invalid because it's "looooong and slooooow", whatever tf that means. It's invalid because it uses more energy than you get from burning the hydrogen again, and so adding it represents system losses instead of gains. You can make it as fast as you want, but you can't make it break unity. 2nd: hydrogen isn't mixed with *cooling gasses* to "stabilize" it. It's mixed with them for the obvious reason that it combusts at temperatures that can do damage. Either straight up melting poorly cooled metal, or even in well cooled metal, rasing the surface temperature to the point that unspent hydrogen can diffuse into the metal and cause hydrogen embrittlement. If you had bothered to study anything you attempted to lecture this fellow on instead of just stretching your feeble knowledge in the hope that no one would notice, you would know all of this. Now climb down from that confidence peak on the Dunning-kruger chart, and actually study something instead of spouting your half baked psuedoknowledge dribble.

[@m.anejante1687]

​@@AtlasReburdened That's the problem, see.... I DID bothered to study and also made a thesis related on the matter. Once you study, you learn electrolisis is LOOOONG AND SLOW because you need HUGE ammounts of current to split TINY ammounts of water in HUGE ammounts of time, while the engine oxidizes HUGE ammounts of hydrogen in TINY ammounts of time and you can't sustain a production rate to equal consumption, not even to get close. And no, it does not uses more energy than you get from burning it, it uses the same. So, since you don't even know the first law of thermodynamics, please stop proving yourself a fool and never again speak about who studied,. because, clearly is you who didn't. And also no, is not mixed with other stuff because of burning temp... Since In an internal combustion engine efficiency benefits from heat, so more heat obtained from the fuel, more efficient the engine. Actually is mixed with other stuff, because THAT'S HOW WE COULD GET IT FROM UNDERGROUND SINCE THE BEGINNING YOU M0R0N!!!! If we could get pure hydrogen we would have used it that way from the beginning and we would have used other or better materials and or less fuel YOU M0R0N!!!.

[@christianhjelmstrom224]

one sulution to make such engine, actually, more efficient and take advantage of the extra 2 strokes, a second exaust valve, dedicated to the exaustion of the steam should be present. The idea is simple: you can't reuse exaustion gas from the combustion, so you need to expel it. However, such thing doesn't apply to steam, because you can reuse it indefinetly, by condensing that steam into water. While the combustion exaust valve would lead the gas into the exaust pipe, the secont, would lead the steam into the radiator, that would condense the water and store it in a water tank (like those wich radiators use) and so on, in a closed cycle. My Idea would correct a major flaw in such design wich is the water, after the 6th stroke, going to the exaust pipe, instead of circulating, requiring an large water tank work. With my idea, the 5th and 6th stroke would actually increase efficiency, by not riquiring an extra large (and heavy) water tank and using components already present in any liquid cooled engine (such as a Radiator) to reuse the water, instead of wasting it.

[@antonnym214]

the water doesn't have to be lost. After ejection, the steam can be piped back to the water tank, where it will condense. HOWEVER. This is not a simple design, in practice. I think if an engineer is smart, he can design something complicated that works. If he's even smarter, he can design something simple that works better. I would like to see an engine with fewer moving parts, not more.

[@thamesmud]

It would probably be better to think or this as a compound engine. Turbo compound aircraft engines like the Wright R 3350 took energy from the exhaust and geared it to the shaft. Napier took this concept to its logical conclusion with the Nomad 2 which gave a thermal efficiency of about 40% It ran with an overall compression ratio of about 27:1 and a manifold pressure of 89psi above atmospheric. The engine was a simple piston ported 2 stroke but the turbocharger was effectively a gas turbine and the engine pushed a lot of technical boundries for 1954. With modern common rail fuel injection and computer control the system the turbo compound deserves another go round but the Net Zero loones have killed IC development stone dead.

[@rientsdijkstra4266]

This is a good example of the trickyness of computing with percentages: 50% is, and at the same time is NOT (!)) 15% than 35% (depending on the definition of %) ... It is literally 15% higher because "percents" are the things we reckon with (percent-points we would say in Dutch), however the real difference is much bigger than 15%, because 15% "percent-points" is actually 15/35 = 42.875% of 35%. So an increase the efficienty from 35% to 50% leads to a nearly 43% (!!) higher output from the engine. Or, if we for instance assume that the efficienty directly translates to range on the same amount of fuel, and we also assume that a certain amount of fuel gives a range of 100 miles with the standard engine with 35% efficiency, then the engine with 50% efficiency would give a range of 100 * (50/35) = nearly 143 miles, which is an increase of nearly 43%...

[@GerbenWulff]

A couple of ideas and notes. First of all, I think many people seem to think that the steam expansion is why you get the boost in efficiency. But I think the main point is that you can use the water to absorb heat and thus improve engine cooling, which allows for more efficiency in the first four strokes. Whatever energy you can extract from the steam expansion is just bonus. The video mentions a claim of an efficiency increase from the usual 30% to 50%, which would mean 67% more power, while the 6-stroke cycle would of course take 50% more time. But there are already engine designs that - under specific conditions - can achieve more than 30% efficiency, so it still may not be worth it unless there are other benefits. One additional benefit of improved cooling may be lower NOx emissions. The changes to the engine compared to the 4-stroke engine, are mainly about the timing, which changes to enable 6 strokes instead of 4. We can nowadays manage this electronically and I think it should be possible to create a design that can switch between 4 and 6 stroke operation. That can be done based on load and engine temperature. One engine design that might benefit from the ability to switch is Mazda's SkyActive-X engines. It uses compression ignition, but only in specific conditions. Engine temperature is a critical factor in this technology. If we can cool the engine using 6-stroke mode, we might be able to broaden the range of where it can operate in compression ignition mode. So, we might be able to alternate 4-stroke and 6-stroke cycles and still achieve near 50% engine efficiency with reduced water consumption. About the use of a condensor to reduce water consumption: maybe, but you'd need to add a particle filter.

[@m.anejante1687]

Adding one more crankshaft turn makes the engine way less efficient and unless you burn some fule on those new "2 strokes" you will just make things worse. Inventing cr4p out of your hat is not physics, nor chemical knowledge, is just harrypottery. Go and study some actual science, you will learn a lot and stop making up so much nonsense.

[@icedout7606]

a particle filter for the water is smaller than a traditional cooling system, so you still save space and weight

[@GerbenWulff]

@@icedout7606 Yes, but a filter has a resistance which reduces the system efficiency.

[@icedout7606]

engines already have an oil filter, fuel filter, and air filter. and the oil filter exists alongside a pump in a closed loop oil system. a water filter in a closed loop water system would be comparable, meaning it doesnt add much resistance @@GerbenWulff

[@jamescarter8311]

The steam is not just a bonus. It's crucial for efficiency because you're converting heat energy that would normally be wasted into usable energy. It the same reason turbos work.

[@krisdabaliguy6850]

I feel like if you were to make a hybrid out of this, it would be great in maybe a Prius. Gen is used to charge the batteries and power wheels. The benefits of it being in a hybrid is that you are able to have the batteries heat the tank the water is stored in

[@hillbilly4christ638]

Remember that guy Glum from Gulliver’s travels? It will never work! Look, someone will attempt to develop this idea, go looking for money, the money gets gobbled up and the project ends with investors empty handed.

[@philmed7675]

These engines would be awsome for backup power generation. The combination of a gasoline and steam engine, brilliant. These engines most likely could subsitute gasoline for natural gas/propane/alcohol or even hydrogen. I would guess the engine wouldn't require a cooling system. If so, you could use the cooling system as a way to distill and purify water for reintroduction in to the fuel system. So you lose a little power output. The trade off's are reasonable.

[@chrishoff402]

I'm reminded of the Saudi Prince quoted during one oil crisis that the price of a barrel of oil was cheaper than a barrel of water. Throw in the purification process for the water used in an engine of this type over regular tap water and its probably cheaper to just use a plain old gasoline powered 4 stroke engine.

[@gene1554]

Could you use a 3rd valve for the second power stroke, removing the need for a water injector., making the quality of the water a bit less critical?

[@darylSKYTZOwillis]

That could work well with a straight six cylinder engine ensuring that at least one cylinder per rotation would be in power stroke.

[@LukaSvet-bg5sk]

and why would you want that

[@darylSKYTZOwillis]

@@LukaSvet-bg5sk I don’t really remember as I haven’t watched the video in so long. Why not have a straight 8 with 2 cylinders firing at once, or an I-8 with 4 cylinders super charging the other 4? I’m sure talking hypothetically about doing the same thing brings about many complex hair brained ways of doing something simple in a more difficult way with more parts to break or wear out?

[@truethought369]

Years ago, I raped copper brake pipe around the exhaust manifold on a petrol engine. I fitted a micro switch at the 3/4 travel of the throttle linkage. This allowed a fine water jet to spray into the carburettor. The engine has to be at running temperature, before allowing water in. This needs to be refined, but explains why engines run better in damp weather. This is because, the compression improves! I think the 6 stroke engine, has a future. Interesting.

[@sammyd7857]

No just adding water vapour to the intake air has a future. Not this bullshit engine. The combustion chamber and piston will not get to 300 plus degrees. If that was the case the rings would not last long.

[@DTS1wastaken]

raped?

[@kevinfoster1213]

The spray of H20 (mist) as explained by my dad was a power boost for a short period of time. And at higher rpm. I felt the reason for this was a breakdown of the water atom and the release of oxygen into the combustion chamber. Maybe?

[@joejoejoejoejoejoe4391]

An ideal single expansion, non condensing steam engine will be about 11% efficient, so of the small amount of heat taken by turning the water into steam, less than 11% will be turned into power, so you're using 2 more strokes, and that friction for very little. You'd be better off just using the Atkinson cycle.

[@bernieshort6311]

Another excellent point as well.

[@YodaWhat]

@joejoejoejoejoejoe4391 - In your 11% figure, are you counting on preheated, pressurized water, or what? Does it include normal efficiency losses in a boiler, burning its own fuel? The full suite of details matters! An optimized version of this engine could be supplying supercritical steam made hot for free with exhaust heat.

[@tormado]

Very cool from an engineering standpoint. I do think that it's going to be extremely tough to make something like this power-dense enough to make any sense. I have to wonder about onboard processes for purifying or distilling water.

[@Eduardo_Espinoza]

I've seen lawnmowers being cleaned with water straight in the carburetor back in the day.

[@spacesergeant101]

If this can completely replace the cooling system for an engine, and thus be variable to maintain an ideal temperature, then this would be a likely next step in engine design.

[@joeclark7888]

It is a very interesting idea for sure.As the other commenter pointed out,will the steam cycle pay for the extra 2 strokes with something left-over? That is the question.

[@John-qc6of]

Mix water and diesel or petrol and water under a vacuum so that the emulsion does not seperate when stored. Adjust the engine timing, compression etc. A fuel water mix of 10 to 30% can work like a fuel/steam engine as the ignited portion of the mixture vaporizes the water and the steam gass/ volume is much more than just the ignite gass volume and the power output increases dramatically. The thing is to design a motor that can take this mixture but a standard diesel engine works fine with about 10% water mixed in. The water must be degassed in a vacuum chamber to remove the air so that it will stay mixed with the diesel. It does not seperate out when mixed like this even for a very long time and no emulsifing chemicals required.

[@YodaWhat]

Interesting point about _degassed water!_

[@jameshatton4211]

It maybe more thermally efficient, but in modern petrol motors using turbo chargers; some of the magnetic heat energy is used to boost the performance of the motor by driving the exhaust turbo wheel faster using some of the heat energy from the exhaust? It's pretty cool in that all its doing is firing the fuel injector on 1 cycle and firing the water injector on the other cycle? So this would reduce turbo performance if utilising a turbo charger creating lag with less performance? The Germans in war had massive radial and turbo prop planes that were so high performance they could easily outrun ally attacks? It was discovered that the Germans were using huge million volt capacitors and a delayed spark concept to the spark plug to create basically lighting bolts through the water vapour within the fuel combustion cycle? They used a method of pre-injecting the atomised water in front of the turbocharger having a 2 stage effect of cooling the intake temperature allowing for higher boost before engine detonation (pre-ignition event - cylinder temperature increases with increased boost which actually tightens the tolerance brethren piston rings and cylinder wall increasing compression even higher than just the turbocharger until the chamber becomes too hot and energy dense when the vaporised fuel enters the combustion chamber it ignites before the spark plug sparks = pre-ignition) and this is hugely destructive to engine internal components. If the air is cooler it mitigates the pre-ignition triggering event by just cooling the intake charge that it's conduction of coolness is enough to drop the cylinder temperature enough to stop this from happening? The super high voltage prevents flame out of the ignition process with huge voltage lightning storm occurring right at the ignition point! This micro lightning bolt causes the dissociation of water into gaseous hydrogen and gaseous oxygen which contribute more energy into the combustion cycle resulting in the motor reaching multiple factors higher boost pressure than the engine can handle without water injection? They developed and improved these turbo systems with bigger and bigger voltages and much bigger coils and capacitors and were able to reach a peak of 200psi of boost pressure running mixture of 50:50 water and fuel! The draw back was that the additional weight in liquid fuel and liquid water which meant reducing the fuel tank size and adding a water tank. The other draw back was that within dog fights the planes performance would just keep getting better and better as they kept consuming more water and more fuel, this required the pilot to continuously adjust his thresholds with entire planes controls as it would fly different from take off to landing (that's if pilots had enough in the tank to get home after battle?) Pilots had to also change battle strategies to leverage the fast return from battle performance, increased efficiency in fuel and water supply and delivery systems and basically run more sorties than they previously did and overlap pilot teams to keep pressure on the ally's? The engines equipped with water injection and big ignition systems when pulled down for inspection still look brand new inside on a 100000 miles? So this system I can see this being somewhat similar to the WRC anti lag systems where they don't fire the spark plug on 1 cylinder per rotation meaning 1 unburned combustion cycle per cylinder goes out the exhaust valve and then the unburned gas is ignited by additional spark plug just prior to the turbo (post cylinder combidtion) to bring the performance of the turbo charger up only in the RPM before boost pressure peaks to speed the turbo up and reduce lag. It's similar but not the same as it is interfering with the injection process not the ignition to achieve a non-combusting cylinder per cycle. Obviously to me the biggest issue is going to be trying to make this work well on more than 1 cylinder?

[@kennymichaud5366]

How’s does the engine do in cold weather when it’s freezing outside? Does the exhaust gas freeze?

[@linuxman0]

It's about time! someone figured this out. I wonder why the ENTIRE exhaust stroke can't be re-compressed (too much pressure??) and then have the water injected into the whole of the exhaust gas volume. This would probably work wonders for the diesel engine; only then, it would inject DEF, which is mostly water anyway.

[@armedfarm3429]

Brilliant LMAO God some people just don't get it. Fuel makes motors run, the world needs fuel. Inject the exhaust with water LOL. In a diesel yet. You can't even make this up, the fact that you actually think it might do something. It's like corn gas. It takes more BTUs of diesel to grow a gallon of BTU's from ethanol. Ya , brilliant science isn't it?

[@icedout7606]

making an engine more fuel efficient doesnt mean it doesnt need any fuel@@armedfarm3429

[@cjc1103]

Requires dimineralized water which is used for other applications like carpet steam cleaners, and is about $20/gallon. Sure if widely used price will come down, but the inconvenience of filling a separate water tank, and high cost will doom it as a auto engine. May be practical for some industrial applications.

[@jamesjoiner5766]

Distilled water ?

[@noanyobiseniss7462]

Funny, I can buy distilled water for a dollar at the super market, so with scale...

[@sleepyrasta420]

Have fun trying to start it on a cold winter morning

[@chrisgermann6658]

Would be an interesting concept to trial with Diesel to gain more efficiency. That's if it's even possible.

[@dieselfrk13]

You can already do a similar thing with water/methanol mix kinda common

[@jandoerlidoe3412]

How about using ceramic engine parts (Cylinder, piston valves ) that are stainless , allow much higher working temperatures than steel can withstand, the higher the temperature the more potent the steam that is produced....

[@cadespencer6320]

ceramic is delicate though

[@robertdavis100]

won't the 2 power strokes have different power outputs?

[@volentimeh]

Quite a lot different, but that won't harm anything mechanically, the compression and power strokes are already placing radically opposing forces on the mechanics of the engine, the "water" stroke is mild in comparison.

[@thamesmud]

A couple of issues with this would be: 1) Poor specific power output as the bmep of the steam stroke would be low. 2)Water contamination of the oil and potentiomal hydraulic locks. Steam engines have cylinder drains to cope with this. 3) If the steam in the exhaust condenses it will is likely wash out combustion pollutants and concentrate them. This might be used to control soot like a DPF but the water needs to be dealt with. Old oil engines often used water filled exhaust pits but in those days you could just dump it down the drain.

[@icedout7606]

2. if you inject too much water it will become wet steam and condense. the solution is to find the ideal volume of water to be supplied so that it sufficiently cools the engine, but is still in low quantity enough that it becomes superheated dry steam, which wont condense in the cylinder 3. water reclamation and filtering from the exhaust system

[@thamesmud]

@@icedout7606 Or just not bother and make a turbo compounded two stroke.

[@briansture4353]

Nothing will ever replace the coil and magnet for simplicity. Magnetic power is too simple for words.

[@davidbrayshaw3529]

No, but they're only one part of the equation. Faraday, Sturgeon, Tesla... they're a long time dead.

[@ujification3504]

You missed out the 3 stroke ??. Are one going to be whit out any power stroke?. after water vapor gets out?

[@kevinavillain4616]

How do you prevent the water from getting into the crankcase oil. Products of combustion chamber bypass the rings on a regular basis.

[@reedsilvesan2197]

The power gains come from the water injection. Water injection adds app25% more torque to a 4 stroke engine without any other unnecessary clutter. I know, because I've used it on my OTR semi's for about 10 years now.

[@richardmuller867]

Big Brother KZbin. Stop deleting my answers to people.

[@terenceiutzi4003]

My dad had it on his model A Ford, but he had to mix 20 percent ethanol to keep it from overheating.

[@sirnikkel6746]

Hear me out. What if you had 3 valves: 1 for the air/gas mixture intake, 1 for the gas stroke exhaust and the other for the steam stroke exhaust. This way you don't have to deal with water in the catalytic converter and you can route the steam directly to a simple filter and a condenser to recycle it.

[@IO-zz2xy]

Early VW beetles used to have a port that could be used for water injection. Regards from South Africa

[@cripticdestiny]

first thing came to my mind is that a vehicle with this engine will have to carry an almost equal amount of water and fuel in two different tanks. means much more weight penalty and space needed to accomodate that water tank. which immediately eliminates motorbikes and small cars from being benefitted by this engine. even buses or trucks are out of the question. what CAN benefit from this are massive locomotives, stationary electrical generators and cargo ships with onboard reverse osmosis devices.

[@forkbeard606]

Not necessarily. The amount of water needed is only enough to produce a phase change. Water goes to steam at 16 times the volume of water.

[@marcelboisvert5277]

In the 1920tees and early 30tees McCormick burned gasoline and had a smaller tank with water and didn't have to be distilled! The had a water Carb and as it was working you turned water on ! And gain a fair amount of power when plowing. In 1925 1530 McCormick had for shure.!!! I'm pretty sure John deer Model.D allso Did . All the Old Guys said how amazing the power would get so much better. And those were all 4 Stroke Engines

[@someguydino6770]

Whoa; this engine utilizes an electronic control unit; that's so radical! FINALLY ; here is the six stroke engine fully working as a 3D computer aided design model! Why are there all of these dastardly conspiracies to keep all of these ground breaking technologies from us?

[@candidobizzotto2038]

I guess there is no effort to hide, but there is an enormous and paid effort to drive your opinion to the other and convenient technologies such: wind, solar, ammonia, hydrogen, etc. I SEE NO EMPHASIS to show the Brazilian alcohol cane fuel program, FULLY DEVELOPED and 100% renewable since 1980. Now, we have 25% mixture of alcohol in gas and ~100% of the fleet is fully fuel flexible. Instead, we talk just about what is hype in developed countries.

[@davidbrayshaw3529]

Big Pharma!!!, oh, sorry, Big Oil!!!. They're hiding it from us because...?

[@fullsend2908]

only requirement is distilled water. if its not crud will build up on every hot surface the water vaporizes off of

[@CSGATI]

How about washing off lubrication? How about a second motor 2-stroke heated by all the combined exhaust?

[@bobmuir8232]

It’s too bad we haven’t been capitalizing on this potential power and economy improved!! how much water do you end up getting in the oil I wonder? Would it be possible to take the first exhaust gases compress them in another engine or another cylinder on the same engine and then inject water and get a power stroke?

[@jameshathaway5117]

That second exhaust stroke would play hell on a catalytic converter...

[@mygreatbigfoot1679]

Shouldn’t it need a different exhaust and valve system for the steam?

[@wolfschindler8921]

I had ERL water injection in my GTO twin turbo 35 years ago.

[@davenoejoe]

A simpler way would be build into the exhaust pipe maybe after the catalytic converter a steam turbine to run alternator and accessories

[@roberthirst860]

Great idea to improve efficiency, instead of dumping waste heat in an external cooling system do the cooling internally. Unfortunately it gets to minus 30 degrees here. Also steam engines use a lot of water.

[@HaroldParks-bd7ng]

With many years doing engine R&D and simulations I could spend an hour listing the problems, but the big one is low specific power output and the water. With the modern turbo car engine at 120 bhp per liter why this?

[@wrathofpaulii]

what happens to the water in the engine when your car sits overnight in the winter? you'll need to use special fluid.

[@jamescarter8311]

Seems like, although you're recapturing some of the heat energy with water, running cooler would have a negative impact on the first power stroke. I guess it works though since Porsche is doing it.

[@AllenBarclayAllen]

And is that water injection at above 212 boiling point high pressure ? ?

[@alecbruyns4490]

How well would this work in temperatures 20 or 30 degrees below freezing?

[@alext8828]

I like it. It makes a lot of sense. I have to think about that water contamination issue some more. It seems ridiculous that such a good idea is shelved because of a water purity problem. What did the Germans do when they used water injection in the planes during WW2? Maybe they didn't care about wrecking the engines at that time. Ceramic filters come to mind. I say make it work. It's worth the effort. How much gas can it save. I bet it can save a lot.

[@sleepyrasta420]

All very well until it's winter and you go to start your vehicle in the morning but the water has frozen and turned to ice

[@ft-shareinternational2146]

You right, I didn't think that far. :(

[@DarkAttack14]

That is a non problem, I used to spray a ton of water methanol and straight water, it does not hang around in the cylinder

[@dennis-nz5im]

Need to have the second exhaust stroke in a separate valve water will also cool the catalyst bed, thus it needs a second valve, and if it ran 16-18 to 1 compression, it could use water to keep it from detonation

[@CountSaintGermain215]

I was just thinking that if the water were super heated inside the cylinder that this improvement in the steam engine as opposed to a boiler, yeah this could work well. But the atomization of the water precisely the right time and degree is tricky

[@unphazd5137]

I wonder how the steam exhaust would affect the turbo

[@mikewaxx]

they're implying that it condenses the water from out of the exhaust stream. How? run the exhaust through some kind of radiator? then somehow purify it again?

[@NBC_NCO]

It sounds nice. In a multi cylinder application where you can alternate 1st power stroke on one piston at the same time another is on its second power stroke. The single cylinder engine is a failure.

[@Anhedonis]

I always wondered why they didn’t try this in a wankel. All that heat is concentrated in the expansion, er, lobe, and the surface area to volume is high, so it sounds like it would be a good match.

[@williampeterson265]

How about using reverse osmosis on board to supply the water.?

[@colonelferringeyes9714]

And yeah oil and water make a really lovely combination when they get together don't they James....

[@kurtminges647]

So did we sweep the Achates engine under the rug,,, been around a hundred years and it's better cheaper lighter cooler more efficient,, you could feed it with micromist

[@paas624]

Wonder if moulicula water is used how it perform?

[@terryenyart5838]

Seen several designers apply 6 strokes to gasoline & diesel engines with minimal increases in efficiencies, but I have serious doubts if its anything other than a pipe dream. Hard to beat convention fuels. Long live gasoline & diesel fuel!!

[@johntuffy5721]

Too bad fossil fuels are destroying our planet

[@theerapons]

YES, it has a great potential.

[@Zen_Ft5e]

I wonder if you could use alcohol instead of water. Likely get a more powerful 2nd power stroke, is completely pure and easily sourced.

[@GOTTHEDAWGINME]

The water would make the engine cool down and heat up repeatedly making the metal dilate and shrink down a couple times in a second, so I suppose structural rigidity is a huge challenge as well

[@myMotoring]

it's basically petrol-steam hybrid.

[@pauloconnell7668]

Freezing temperatures would be a serious problem as antifreeze would be a contaminant.

[@christopherstaples6758]

@6:30 dump it into a condenser to recollect water or reuse for cooling a tubo down , nothing really new water injections been a thing for quite some time as a way to quickly pre cool inlet, the 6 stoke just makes use of the steam energy

[@tuguybear930]

Why not have a separate piston/cylinder for the water injection phase.

[@sbkenn1]

What does high temperature cycling in the parts affect longevity ?

[@philoso377]

Nice video and presentation. However residual heat spans from the cylinder to the exhaust system. If not inject to the cylinder can be injected at the turbo rotor inlet. If any corrosion there the maintenance cost can be reduced significantly.

[@mikedearing6352]

Seems like it'd be a great generator motor

[@buckminsterfullerene2294]

I think you are missing the point here the heat is already there, so using that heat to expand water to create steam is extremely efficient in fact it’s been around for 200 years and it’s still used today in steam turbines because it’s the most efficient 2:08 energy producing system.

[@happydays8171]

High school friend would win truck pull at fair (stock class, must be legal to drive on street), by bolting a hay bailer flywheel between flywheel and trans. Once he got that up to desired rpm, nothing could stop it. Why not have this engine spin at 7k rpm and power a generator that supplies power to a vehicle's wheels via electric motor, like a train? Excess electricity would be stored in a battery and not wasted. The engine would maintain it's most efficient rpm. Once the flywheel got spinning it would use less fuel to maintain the rpm because of the gyro wheel's stored inertia.

[@RDCST]

Porsche has another 6 stroke engine that work a bit different mixing 2 and 4 stroke engines concepts.

[@richardsidler]

ICE jumped the shark in the 1970’s IMHO.

[@DavidJohnson-yg8qm]

I'm thinking the efficiency is the important aspect here. A more efficient engine will return bettermpg in a motor vehicle. It's a pity they weren't available 20 years ago and developed further

[@RicardoCruz-by7lv]

An Columbus' egg idea, for sure... since all ists drawbecks be surpassed.

[@braddofner]

I want a ICE car that turns the wheels with an electric motor and uses this engine for power production. Basically a HV generator.