Tesla's Ambient Heat Engine Theory - Right or Wrong ?

[Tom Booth]

Concepts like the Carnot cycle are stated in terms of processes that are not present in Nature. However we do know that any real system cannot exceed the efficiency of the Carnot thermodynamic cycle. My advice... give up now on understanding thermodynamics unless you are prepared to think in the abstract terms that the laws are expressed in. If you refuse to do that then by all means continue to waste your time on speculation over devices that would be able to break these laws.

And how do we know this ?

We might ask the question, if someone were to build a "Carnot Engine" exactly according to Carnot's engineering specifications; Could a Carnot Engine Run ?

Could it run at all ?

The answer, sadly, is NO. It couldn't run, it could not perform one iota of useful work. In order to demonstrate the operation of a Carnot Engine, if one were actually built, it would have to be DRIVEN by a motor.

Let's take a look at Carnot's Theorem:

"Carnot's theorem is a formal statement of this fact: 'No engine operating between two heat reservoirs can be more efficient than a Carnot engine operating between the same reservoirs.'"

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnot_heat_engine

But is this really a "Fact"?

I think not. A fact would be something that could be demonstrated. The fact is, in a side by side comparison, ANY engine operating between two heat reservoirs would be demonstrated to be more efficient than a Carnot engine operating between the same reservoirs, if it ran at all, since the Carnot Engine would remain totally inoperative, or would in fact have NEGATIVE efficiency, since it would be necessary do drive it with a motor. It would CONSUME power without PRODUCING any.

So what's the problem?

The problem with the Carnot Engine is that it is based on the fallacy that Heat is a FLUID substance that provides motive power just like water going over a water wheel.

In other words, Carnot believed that Heat was just like water.

That is, if you have a wheel with a bucket attached to the circumference and the bucket is at the top of the wheel, you can get the wheel to turn simply by filling the bucket with water. That is, you can get energy out of such an arrangement due to the mere PRESENCE of the water in the bucket. You get energy by simply letting the wheel convey the water from a high level to a low level.

Carnot imagined too that you could get energy from heat by means of a heat engine simply due to the PRESENCE of heat if the heat were conveyed from a "high level" to a "low level" by the engine.

This is a complete and utter fallacy. The Carnot Engine simply does not work because it is based on a conceptual misunderstanding of the nature of heat.

Carnot's engine cannot possibly be an efficient engine at producing useful work because it doesn't produce any work. NONE. It is supposed to be frictionless, so it doesn't even do the work of overcoming friction. All it does is take in heat from a heat source and dump it ALL into a heat sink. ALL OF IT!, every last drop. None whatsoever is converted into useful work. Carnot did not believe that any such CONVERSION of heat was necessary or even possible. His hypothetical engine is based upon a fallacy.

If heat is understood to be a form of energy that can be converted into other forms of energy then it becomes clear that there is, in actuality, no necessity that heat be transported THROUGH a heat engine to be dumped into a heat sink.

You might just as well heat up a block of steel on a stove and then put it in an ice box. This will produce the same amount of usable energy output as a Carnot Engine, that is, none whatsoever.

You can't get useable energy by simply transporting heat and dumping it into a heat sink the way you can get useable energy from water by simply putting it into a bucket at one level and letting it out at a lower level.

That is all a Carnot Engine does. It takes in heat and dumps it out again but doesn't convert any of it into useful work because heat doesn't work that way.

Heat is kinetic energy.

Think of baseball.

The pitcher throws the ball. It has kinetic energy. The batter has to swing and hit the ball.

If we were to play baseball according to the Carnot Theory, the pitcher would have to CARRY the ball to the plate and the batter would have to gently put the bat up against the ball and the two together would have to walk the bat and the ball out into the field so as to ensure that there would be no kinetic energy transferred between the ball and the bat. In other words, it would take a lot of work INPUT by the pitcher and the batter but nobody would ever be able to hit a home run.

For a heat engine to actually operate with maximum efficiency (Hit a home run) the heat (or hot expanding gas) has to HIT the piston like a bat hitting a ball so that all the kinetic energy is transmitted to the piston without any loss of energy to the sink (the catcher). The exact opposite of the Carnot theory which required that ALL the heat be dumped into the sink (a strike out).

[Tom Booth]

As I said before the Carnot cycle is expressed in terms of processes that do not exist in nature (isentropic expansion and compression, or no increase in entropy and isothermal heat addition and rejection). Because all real cycles do result in increased entropy and some heat is lost, this cycle represents the limit on efficiency of a real process. It doesn't matter at all that you cannot actually build a real Carnot engine. if you are unable to accept such abstractions as useful in characterizing real machines then by all means call it BS. Just don't expect to come to any useful conclusions on thermodynamics without learning the basics.

In the Carnot cycle we've been talking about isothermal and adiabatic expansion and contraction. If you want to get into "entropy", that's another winner.

The problem with thermodynamics is it is more a philosophical outlook than a science. Arguing heat engines with a thermodynamacist is like arguing science with a theologian. It is a game with a moveable goal post.

Take the definition of "System" or "System Boundary" for example, in connection with "Entropy".

Suppose I take a glass of water and dissolve a couple cups of sugar in it until the water is completely saturated. The excess sugar just sits on the bottom.

Is this now a state of "order" or "disorder" ?

Seems like order to me. Solid sugar on the bottom and sugar solution on top. To produce a state of "disorder" I would have to add heat and stir the water to dissolve the rest of the sugar. Now there is maximum disorder, chaos.

But if I let this solution sit and leave it to its own devices, what happens. A state of order re-asserts itself. The sugar comes out of solution and forms a most striking orderly arrangement.

The "System" is a glass of water and sugar. It seems to exhibit "negative entropy" which goes against thermodynamics, so what does the thermodynamacist do ? Redefine the system boundary. He will say something like - if you include the room the glass is sitting in then the "total entropy"  will increase. and so it goes with any and all arguments. There is just no way to win because the rules of the game can be changed on a whim. If a Thermodynamacist is loosing an argument about the "second law" he just moves the goal post. Redefines the system boundary until he gets the results he wants or the argument devolves into imponderables and unanswerable questions such as the ultimate nature of the universe.

According to the concept or "Law" of entropy, energy disperses or tends toward equalization or "disorder". But is this really disorder or just a different form of order ?

If it were your job at the end of a lecture to clear all the folding chairs from the auditorium floor and stack them up in the corner you might think it strange if you came back in the morning to find that the chairs had spontaneously rearranged themselves and were back out on the auditorium floor "evenly dispersed".

My point is simply this. Order and disorder or a state of "entropy" is nothing more than an INTERPRETATION.

Which is more orderly, the chairs stacked in a corner or the chairs arranged or evenly distributed ? I would say that the even distribution is more orderly and therefore in most cases Thermodynamics has it all backwards, but then again it is all a matter of interpretation and opinion. A philosophy, not a science.

[epwpixieq-1]

It may be of interest to some of the participants in this thread.

A Bulgarian engineer, has invented a low temperature difference engine, based on freon gas expansion, and it can work with water having temperature as low as 12 Degree Celsius. It has been announced several days ago, on one of the the State wide ( National ) TVs. He already has obtained Bulgarian patent  and is speaking an European one. The engineer has developed the engine in the time span of 40 years, and has already constructed 15 of them and has an apprentice with whom are building a commercial version of the device.

http://www.vbox7.com/play:b188f7b607

[DaS Energy]

The concept has been acheived by frigeration physics and CO2. The first fridge had a bioler with water and Ammonia. The Ammonia heat conerted to hot gas blocked a plate with tiny hole. This caused the hot gas to lose so much energy passing through the whole the gas became cold. Unloke Freon CO2 has all the energy needed tp drive a turbine use heating of minus ten degrees Celsius.
A turbine requires one litre per second at 9 bar force to produce 720 watts.  Heat must be scavenged up to 80*C after which unity cuts in with the turbine generator outputting more Kw than required to heat the water through which the cold CO2 passes  to become hot CO2.
Breakdown 320KW is required to raise 1 litre of water 30*C to 100*C in one second. This in turn produces CO2 of 9,000 bar or 720 KW.

[saintsnick]

I'm picking this conversation back up 1 year later.  I have the solution to this topic. Tesla was right, if there was a cold sink source you could extract energy. I didn't read this work of his. I don't know his method of energy extraction here, but it doesn't matter. If you have a heat differential or ANY differential at all, you can extract energy from it with 'some' process or another.  But all the comments on this thread so far have been about the possibility of a machine that might extract energy or might create a differential.  Here is a PROVEN method to create a thermal and pressure differential, a method not mentioned here, a method that is Endothermic, that Absorbs energy from the surrounding environment, that Creates a Cold Sink AND a vacuum or negative pressure, a method that can and Has been built into a machine that IS self sustaining once started, a machine that then extracts the potential difference in the form of mechanical energy and converts it to electrical energy for use.  Enter the inventions of Victor Schauberger. Enter the water vortex.  A water vortex, once initiated by natural or man made causes, will create a vacuum in the center of the Double Helix, a vacuum so strong, the water is rarified and cooled as it expands.  This cooling is a secondary process to the initial motion of the water, Tesla's mentioned energy transformation through the wall of the imaginary cylinder, an energy transformation from inertial to thermal occurring in the water, and if you can add more heat to the vortex through a heat exchanging system, made to absorb thermal energy from the surround, the process will become self sustaining and become a runaway process, with the limit of friction, and can provide an output via a turbine.  I don't have any reference here, but look up Schaubergers work.  Quite a bit of history there, from sono-luminescence, to vortex pipe delivery systems, to chemical and nuclear processes via atomic pressurization, to a home energy power unit, to heating and cooling devices, to WWII flying ship propulsion. Good stuff.  Schauberger, like Tesla, was one of the greatest minds of the 20th century.