Fuel Heating With a Twist
Stumbled upon this really neat fuel heater, it just has quite a few twists :)
[url]http://www.dieselveg.com/injection_pipe_heating.htm[/url]
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Stumbled upon this really neat fuel heater, it just has quite a few twists :)
[url]http://www.dieselveg.com/injection_pipe_heating.htm[/url]
Comments
Fuel Heating With a Twist
induction heating is neat, but it still takes 15 amps of power to run. even at 100% efficiency that is only 216watts of heat. considering it converts dc to ac i doubt its anywhere near 100% efficent. none the less lets assume its 100% efficient. and that 15 amps must come from the charging system. alternators are roughly 50%-75% efficient. so that 215 watts all the sudden turns into 350-400 watts of parasitic load.
you could get more heat into the fuel by encasing the injection lines in heater hose and plumbing boiling hot coolant through them. the coolant heat is 100% free, which means its better then 100% efficient, because that heat would otherwise be wasted. now its being put to use which is awalys better than wasting it.
better idea is to plumb steel fuel line through the oil pan in a dozen loops. this would heat the fuel to 200 degrees AND cool the oil. thats doing 2 things at once, which is better than using an induction heater or coolant.
the one very positive feature of this heater is that it works when the engine is cold. heck the engine don't even need to be running. you can heat the fuel before even starting the engine in the morning. but thats only really important to northern users, and then only in the winter.
Fuel Heating With a Twist
Its the idea of induction heating that i like. It provides some other advantages from the one you listed eg.
1. Simpler to install 2. No messy fluids to work with 3. Better control of fuel temp. I'am sure there of a few more
I could see this design being tweaked a bit to suit "MPG" enviroment than as a biodiesel fuel warmer. The power consumption is its biggest problem but i think that could be reduced with a few mods. :)
Fuel Heating With a Twist
I'd have to agree with the cryptic one. The induction heater is using [i]additional[/i] energy instead of [i]excess[/i] or what would be wasted energy to heat the fuel. The induction heater would never attain the effeciency of a heater that uses waste energy. Better temperature control isn't hard to fix with a temp sensor setup. [url=http://www.mpgresearch.com/viewtopic.php?t=1548]See here[/url] for a design I came up with for my car.
It probably would be easier to install though.
Fuel Heating With a Twist
[quote="the cryptic one"]
better idea is to plumb steel fuel line through the oil pan in a dozen loops. this would heat the fuel to 200 degrees AND cool the oil. thats doing 2 things at once, which is better than using an induction heater or coolant.
the one very positive feature of this heater is that it works when the engine is cold. heck the engine don't even need to be running. you can heat the fuel before even starting the engine in the morning. but thats only really important to northern users, and then only in the winter.[/quote]
Heating fuel for cold start would be very useful to me, E85 doesn't like to start in the winter very well.