LiquidPiston 40-BHP Rotary Engine Delivers 75% Thermal Efficiency (2024)

FAQs

How efficient is a LiquidPiston engine? ›

LiquidPiston's engines are up to 10x smaller and lighter than traditional diesel engines and increase efficiency by 30% thanks to the company's patented thermodynamic cycle.

As shown in the literature [1–7], currently, the thermal efficien- cy of piston-type heat engines with an internal heat supply has reached its limit (50–60%). Achieving a higher thermal efficiency is not possible due to the large amount of heat loss in a running engine.

LiquidPiston's engines are in development and are not currently available for purchase. However, LiquidPiston has test kits available for development / manufacturing partners, and is seeking commercialization partnerships.

The gas turbine is most efficient at maximum power output in the same way reciprocating engines are most efficient at maximum load. The difference is that at lower rotational speed the pressure of the compressed air drops and thus thermal and fuel efficiency drop dramatically.

Wärtsilä 31 – the most efficient engine in the world.

The efficiency will be 30%.

efficiency =WQH=1−TCTH. These temperatures are of course in degrees Kelvin, so for example the efficiency of a Carnot engine having a hot reservoir of boiling water and a cold reservoir ice cold water will be 1−(273/373)=0.27, just over a quarter of the heat energy is transformed into useful work.

Heat engines often operate at around 30% to 50% efficiency, due to practical limitations. It is impossible for heat engines to achieve 100% thermal efficiency () according to the Second law of thermodynamics.

Alec Shkolnik - President and CEO - LiquidPiston, Inc.

It has fewer moving parts and allows for burning diesel, biofuels, gasoline, and green options like hydrogen. The ability to optimize the engine for different fuels is one of the main reasons why LiquidPiston has gained so much traction within the industry.

Is LiquidPiston engine legit? ›

LiquidPiston utilizes its patented engine technology and has completely revolutionized the combustion engine. There really isn't any other way to state it, because they took the current combustion engine, and have made it better in nearly every way. It is smaller, produces more horsepower, and is more fuel-efficient.

Rotary engines could be called a spinoff of a popular engine type. They were strong but inefficient, lightweight but heavily polluting and more of all unsafe.

Wankel rotary engines have been developed to run on pretty much every fuel you can imagine from alcohol to diesel through to gasoline, kerosene, natural gas and even hydrogen.

What types of fuels can the LiquidPiston engine run on? LiquidPiston is compatibile with a range of fuels including Diesel, gasoline, jet fuel, propane, and even hydrogen.

A Carnot engine can be 100% efficient if its sink is at.

Generally speaking, the faster the engine speed, the more fuel the engine is using. Between 1,300 and 1,500 RPM is the most fuel-efficient engine speed, or what some would call the “sweet spot.”

One of the most efficient heat engines ever built is a coal-fired steam turbine in the Ohio River valley, operating between 18700C and 4300C.

He agrees that the IO-360-L2A is the closest to the definition of most reliable. There is one bright spot. Lycoming's roller tappets-available on many Lycoming engines for new aircraft and for replacement engines in legacy airplanes-appear to be doing well.

Rotary compressors generally make more air per kW. This, plus their 100 percent duty cycle, means you can often use a smaller hp rotary machine in place of a piston type. But if you don't need clean, dry air and only need the compressor occasionally, a piston may be more cost effective long term.

Unlike Piston engines, Rotaries are almost immune to catastrophic failure. In a piston motor, you can have a piston seize and cause all kinds of damage, but in a Rotary motor, while the engine will lose power, it will continue to produce a limited amount of power until it finally dies.

Can heat engine efficiency be 100%? ›

No, a heat engine can't be 100 % efficient.

A frictionless heat engine can be 100% efficient only if its exhaust temperature is 0k as the efficiency is given by η=1−T2T1.

When expressed as a percentage, the thermal efficiency must be between 0% and 100%. Efficiency must be less than 100% because there are inefficiencies such as friction and heat loss that convert the energy into alternative forms.

A heat engine with a thermal efficiency of 40% does 100 J of work per cycle. How much heat (in J) is exhausted to the cold reservoir per cycle? During a cyclic process, a heat engine absorbs 500 J of heat from a hot reservoir, does work and ejects an amount of heat 300 J into the surroundings (cold reservoir).

How Do You Calculate Efficiency? Efficiency can be expressed as a ratio by using the following formula: Output ÷ Input. Output, or work output, is the total amount of useful work completed without accounting for any waste and spoilage. You can also express efficiency as a percentage by multiplying the ratio by 100.

Hence, the efficiency of the heat engine can be increased by decreasing the temperature of the cold sink or increasing the temperature of the hot source.

Since temperatures are given for the hot and cold reservoirs of this heat engine,EffC=1−TcTh E f f C = 1 − T c T h can be used to calculate the Carnot (maximum theoretical) efficiency.

Heat engines are often 30% to 50% efficient, and the piston is the maximum output engine that runs at 50% efficiency, while a coal-fired power plant runs at the efficiency of approximately 33%. According to the second law of thermodynamics, it is impossible for any heat engine to achieve 100% efficiency.

LiquidPiston's rotary engines are the first disruption to engine technology in over a century. These engines are not Wankel engines; they are uniquely configured to adopt the company's patented thermodynamic cycle and its associated efficiency and low-noise benefits.

An air-standard analysis predicts an ideal thermodynamic efficiency of 74% at an 18:1 compression ratio. Liquid Piston is married to the High Efficiency Hybrid Cycle—e.g. to the thermodynamics, not to a particular engine. Our engine architecture has evolved substantially over time, since 2007.

Where is LiquidPiston headquarters? ›

Where is LiquidPiston 's headquarters? LiquidPiston is located in Bloomfield, Connecticut, United States .

Flat-top Pistons

As simple as it sounds, a flat-top piston has a flat top. Flat-top pistons have the smallest amount of surface space; this enables them to create the most force. This type of piston is ideal for creating efficient combustion.

Steel pistons are significantly stronger than aluminum and they offer potential combustion and thermodynamic advantages that favor fuel consumption and reduced emissions levels. Improved ring land wear characteristics and piston cooling are two of the major advantages attributed to steel pistons.

Invented by Raphial Morgado, the MYT™ engine (Massive Yet Tiny) is an internal combustion engine that uses biofuels. The new design features multiple firings in one cycle, producing enormous torque in a small area.

Reliability remains one of the rotary engine's weak points. Apex seals, which seal the rotor's tips against the chamber wall, tend to wear out, and rotary engines often need a rebuild between 80,000 and 100,000 miles.

For a turbocharged rotary, Prather recommends 91-octane fuel or higher. “For turbo use,” he adds, “it's imperative to be aware of your timing and keep that lower for use with boost.” “Racing fuels in general are more refined than pump gas and will tend to burn cleaner, with less soot residue.”

The 787B was a wonderful piece of engineering on wheels, but not the reason for the ban. Rotary engines were banned as cars began to share engine regulations with Formula One beginning in 1992. That meant an atmospheric 3.5-liter internal combustion engine with traditional pistons.

Why do rotary engines get poor gas mileage? ›

Added to the fact that sealing off the different chambers of the engine is difficult, and that oil is being injected directly into the combustion chamber, it becomes obvious why the rotary engine gets abhorrent gas mileage.

Due to the long and uniquely-shaped combustion chamber, thermal efficiency of the engine was relatively lower compared to piston-cylinder counterparts. This also often led to unburnt fuel leaving the exhaust (hence the tendency of rotary engines to backfire, which is obviously as awesome as it is inefficient).

Both hydrogen internal combustion engines and hydrogen fuel cells can power vehicles using hydrogen, a zero-carbon fuel. Hydrogen engines burn hydrogen in an internal combustion engine, in just the same way gasoline is used in an engine.

Given the temperatures reached, over 60% efficiency can be achieved with chemical rockets.

An additional advantage of rotary engines is higher engine efficiency compared to piston engines. For instance, a single-rotor rotary engine delivers power for 75% of each revolution of the output shaft. A single-cylinder piston engine delivers power for only 25% of each revolution of the crankshaft.

CI engines can run at higher compression ratios since they are based on the autoignition principle and are not limited by the premixed fuel–air combustion knock in SI engines. CI engines achieve higher efficiencies than SI engines, peaking at around 45% (

“If you have a lightweight rod and a lightweight piston, the crank can spin that easier. It's not having to lug that up and down, and the engine is going to accelerate a lot quicker,” explains Turner.

Due to the long and uniquely-shaped combustion chamber, thermal efficiency of the engine was relatively lower compared to piston-cylinder counterparts. This also often led to unburnt fuel leaving the exhaust (hence the tendency of rotary engines to backfire, which is obviously as awesome as it is inefficient).

The most efficient rocket engine is the aerospike rocket engine produced by ARCA Space Corporation. In only one stage, the aerospike rocket engine can boost a rocket from the ground into space.

The biggest disadvantage of liquid fuels is that the need for pumps, piping and separate storage for the fuel and oxidant means that extra mass has to be carried by the launch vehicle.

What is the highest efficiency rocket fuel? ›

In combination with an oxidizer such as liquid oxygen, liquid hydrogen yields the highest specific impulse, or efficiency in relation to the amount of propellant consumed, of any known rocket propellant.

Maximum compression speed results

At maximum compression level, ZIPX is the fastest format, followed by RAR, ARC, and 7Z, ZPAQ being the slowest. Using moderate compression settings, RAR and ARC emerge as the fastest formats.

Compression ignition engines compress air to a high pressure, heating the air to the ignition temperature of the fuel, which then is injected. The high compression ratio used for compression ignition engines results in a higher efficiency than is possible with spark ignition engines.

Solution: The best fuel for CI engines is straight-chain paraffin, while aromatics are the worst. Aromatics are the best fuel for SI engines, whereas paraffin is the worst.