A proposal for "lifter" (electrohydrodynamic) propulsion for current aircraft.

On 4 Feb 2006 14:00:39 -0800, "Robert Clark"
wrote:


http://au.geocities.com/psyberplasmic/ccX-6.html


These is much research among amateurs on using electrohydrodynamic
(EHD) propulsion for aircraft, referred to as "lifters":

The Lifters Experiments home page by Jean-Louis Naudin.
http://jnaudin.free.fr/lifters/main.htm

In general, one lead from a power supply is connected to wires at the
top of the lifter. The other lead is connected to metal foil at the
bottom. You have insulators separating the wires from the foil. Then
the air between the wires and foil serves as a dielectric for a
capacitor. The
asymmetric geometry of the two sides of the capacitor, the wires
compared to the flat metal foil, causes a flow of ions from one to the
other.

This page describes an easily made example:

How to build a Lifter v2.0 demonstrator.
http://jlnlabs.imars.com/lifters/tutorialfr/indexen.htm

Among professional researchers, most research has gone only into using
EHD for reducing drag on aircraft, not for the main propulsion method:

Aerodynamic flow acceleration using paraelectric and peristaltic
electrohydrodynamic (EHD) effects of a One Atmosphere Uniform
Glow Discharge Plasma (OAUGDP™)
J. Reece Roth
PHYSICS OF PLASMAS, VOLUME 10, NUMBER 5 MAY 2003
http://plasma.ee.utk.edu/~plasma/publi/pop_2003.pdf [full text]

However, Leik Myrabo has investigated using EHD propulsion as a low
speed adjunct for laser propelled craft:

6-GHz Microwave Power-Beaming Demonstration with 6-kV Rectenna and
Ion-Breeze Thruster.
T. Cummings,* J. Janssen,* J. Karnesky,* D. Laks,* M. Santillo,* B.
Strause,* L. N. Myrabo,* A. Alden,¶ P. Bouliane,¶ and M. Zhang¶
*Department of Mechanical, Aerospace and Nuclear Engineering,
RensselaerPolytechnic Institute, Troy, New York 12180
¶Communications Research Centre, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
AIP Conference Proceedings -- March 30, 2004 -- Volume 702, Issue 1,
pp. 430-444
http://proceedings.aip.org/getabs/se...000 430000001
[abstract]

Experimental investigation of 2-D ion mobility endoatmospheric drive
(IMED).
U. Filiba, L. N. Myrabo, and H. T. Nagamatsu (Rensselaer Polytechnic
Inst., Troy, NY)
AIAA-2001-3667
AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE Joint Propulsion Conference and Exhibit, 37th, Salt
Lake City, UT, July 8-11, 2001
http://www.aiaa.org/content.cfm?page...aper&gID=21851
[abstract]

The main problem with using EHD for propulsion is its low efficiency.
No one has yet found a power supply and battery light enough to be
lifted by the EHD thrust generated by that power supply. The lifters
produced by amateurs are connected by wires to the generator on the
ground. And the EHD propulsion demonstrated by Myrabo et.al. beamed the
energy to the lifters.
The best that has been done so far has been about 1 gram lifted per
watt of power used. This was for a lifter weighing about 100 grams and
carrying a 100 gram payload, produced by Blaze Labs:

Spiral Hexagonal Lifter Module - 02/02/03.
http://www.blazelabs.com/l-c-hexspiral.asp

However, it is known that the thrust of the lifter is linearly
proportional to the density of the air used. See the equations he

Air velocity in operating lifter.
http://sudy_zhenja.tripod.com/lifter_theory/faq.html#6b

Then you can generate more thrust by using compressed air. The
suggestion then is to used the compression produced by turbojets (i.e.
by their turbine compressors) to generate this compressed air. The most
powerful jet engine in use today is the GE90. It's maximum tested
thrust over 120,000 lbs. At this thrust, it is operating at 100,000
horsepower or 75 megawatts. Some specifications of this engine are
given he

General Electric GE90-115B high bypass turbofan.
http://www.turbokart.com/about_ge90.htm

It operates at a compression ratio of about 40 to 1. However, this is
how the *pressure* is increased. From the similarity to a centrifuge, I
gather that turbine compressors also cause an increase in density. But
there is also a great increase in temperature due to this compression.
So the increase in density does not have to be at the same ratio of 40
to 1.
From the descriptions of such large turbojet engines I gather some of
the air is used for cooling, so likely the density increase will still
remain large. I'll show you can get a large increase in thrust using
EHD with these turbojets even if the density increase is not as great
as 40 to 1.
On the specification page for the GE90 above, the air mass flow of the
engine is given as approx. 3000 lbs/sec., around 1500 kg/sec. Using a
density of air of 1.25 kg/m^3, this would be 1200 m^3/sec or 1,200,000
liters/sec if this air were at standard density. Let's assume initially
the density is increased by a factor of 40. Then the actual volume flow
rate is 1,200,000/40 = 30,000 liters/sec.
I mentioned the most efficient lifter so far has been the Spiral
Hexagonal Lifter by Blaze Labs. Specifications on this lifter are given
he

Experiment 14 (21/03/03)- 100g payload lifter.
http://www.blazelabs.com/e-exp14.asp

The air flow for this lifter is given as 1.75 liters/sec. Then the
30,000 liters/sec air flow produced by the GE90 could be directed to
30,000/1.75 = 17,143 lifters. These lifters produce .2 kg lifting
capacity, .44 lbs. thrust, at standard air density. So 17,143 of them
would produce 17,143*.2kg*40 = 137,144 kg =301,716.8 lbs of thrust at
40 times standard air density, nearly three times the thrust of the
usual GE90.
(I should say there is an assumption he since the thrust for the
lifters is proportional to air density I deduce that they will still be
able to move 1.75 liters/sec volume even if the air is at higher
density. This would be consistent with the thrust being increased
proportionally to the density.)
What is the weight of these lifters? The 17,143 of them would amount
to only 17,143*.1 kg = 1714 kg. How much power would they draw? These
lifters take about 200 watts, so the total would be 3,428,600 watts.
This is a small proportion of the 75 megawatts of power equivalent
generated by the GE90 engine. Note that turbines such as those in the
GE90 naturally are used to generate electrical power.
I said above the thrust that could be generated could be large even if
the increase in density is not at 40 to 1. Suppose the density is only
increased 10 to 1. Then the air volume flow rate from the GE90 would
1,200,000/10 = 120,000 liters/sec. This could be delivered to
120,000/1.75 = 68,571 lifters. Then these would produce 68,571*.2
kg*10 = 137,142 kg = 301,712 lbs thrust, the same as the case when the
density increase was 40 to 1. However, the disadvantage is these would
weigh 6857 kg, and more importantly the energy required would be
68,571*200 = 13,714,200 watts. We see we're getting up to a
significant portion of the available energy generated by the GE90. This
receives even greater importance when you consider that upwards of 60%
to 65% of a turbojets power goes just to run the fan, turbines and
compressors, and that even a good turbine electrical power generator
may only operate at 50% efficiency.
Another important question in regards to the lifters is how much
thrust they produce when the air stream is presented to them at speed.
Some scientists argue the thrust will be reduced. However, some
experiments done at up to 50 m/s, 180 km/hr, show the thrust remains
the same:

Corona wheel.
http://membres.lycos.fr/plasmapropul...le_coronas.htm

H Bondar et al 1986 J. Phys. D: Appl. Phys. 19 1657-1663
Effect of neutral fluid velocity on direct conversion from electrical
to fluid
kinetic energy in an electro-fluid-dynamics (EFD) device.
http://www.iop.org/EJ/abstract/0022-3727/19/9/011 [abstract]

Rather surprisingly experiments on this question have not been done at
higher speeds, say in the range up to Mach 1, where airliners fly at,
since EHD is expected to be used to reduce drag on such airliners. Such
experiments at these higher speeds could answer questions on the
viability of this method.
Note that the air to the lifters is not coming directly from the
outside air stream, but rather from the jet engine. But the engine
would be delivering the air at high speed as well. However, even if
thrust by the lifters is reduced at high air speed we may be able to
alleviate this condition. We could direct the air from the jet engine
through pipes of widening diameter before being delivered to the
lifters. By Bernoulli's principle, the velocity would be decreased
while the pressure increased. At subsonic speeds this in itself would
only give us a small increase in density. But we could also use these
pipes to lower the temperature, which would increase the density.
The question of whether the speed of the air would reduce the lifter
thrust also raises the question of whether the thrust coming already
from the jet engine would add to the thrust from the lifters or be
replaced by it. If there is no decrease in thrust from the lifters at
speed then we would not have to decrease the speed of the air coming
from the jet engine and could deliver it directly to the lifters. Then
the thrust due to the jet engine should add to the lifters thrust and
we should in fact get a thrust of about 400,000 lbs.
What would be the size of these 17,143 lifters added to an aircraft?
The page by Blaze Labs on their Spiral Hexagonal Lifter shows that you
can stack the lifters to take up less horizontal space. The horizontal
dimension of the hexagonal shape is about 2 meters across. Blaze Labs
found that the optimal vertical spacing between stacked lifters would
fit 10 of them in 50 vertical centimeters, .5 m. So the volume of these
10 stacked lifters is about 2*2*.5 = 2 m^3. So the total volume would
be about (17,143/10)*2 = 3429 m^3, or about the volume of a 15m*15m*15m
cube, significantly less than the size of the jumbo jets carrying two
of the GE90's.
In addition to their use for large aircraft, the lifter plus turbojet
combo might be used for miniature unmanned aerial vehicles, MAV's.
These can only stay in the air now for minutes:

Miniature Aerial vehicles Research.
http://www.defense-update.com/featur.../mav-darpa.htm

It is known that turbine engines can supply power for longer periods
than batteries. With the addition of the lifters, the periods the MAV's
can stay aloft would be increased several times.
You would need microturbines as the power source. The commercially
available Nanojet T32 Kolibri weighs only 185 grams and produces 1.5 kg
= 3.3 lbs. of thrust.

lambert-microturbines. [in German]
http://www.lambert-modellturbinen.de...riebwerke.html

However, its compression ratio is only 2.2 to 1. We saw that the
greater efficiency for the lifter/turbojet combo occurs at the higher
compression ratios. Several universities are working on microturbines,
so likely there are currently existing microturbines at higher thrusts
and compression ratios.
Still it might be interesting among amateurs to use the Nanojet T32 as
a proof of principle for the concept.



Bob Clark
--

Christopher

Christopher wrote:

On 4 Feb 2006 14:00:39 -0800, "Robert Clark"
wrote:


http://au.geocities.com/psyberplasmic/ccX-6.html


"Throughout this exercise in building a hydrodynamic craft the fluid has
not been called 'air' for the simple reason that this craft can sail in
air, water, or even the fluid of space (often referred to as 'the ether
or the fine structure or the quanta sea'). By varying the frequency,
power, and voltage levels on an electro-dynamic craft, so-called
'anti-gravity', invisibility, and light-speed translation from point to
point are now conceivable. Gravity has frequency... but that is another
discussion all unto itself. Another discussion will detail the process
for generating and storing extremely high voltage power in the form of
plasmoids... (or self-containing plasmas), voltage transforming
capacitors, and the rudiments of wireless broadcast of electricity to
users around the entire planet... through the use of overlapping VLF
standing wave power broadcast network.

Time permitting, this author will later release his papers on the order
and origin of electron 'shells' and planetary orbits as functions of
convergent and divergent vortexial wave forms in 'fluid space'. As a
clue to those who would be interested in such a discussion, the reason
that electron shell orbital radii do not apparently follow a
progressively greater dimension outward from the nucleus is that they
are the sum of two opposed progressions...; one toward the nucleus (as a
space-reflected, inertial wave form) and one away from the nucleus (as
an energy-centre reflected inertial wave form). These papers will
discuss the application of resonating magnetic fields to use the
magnetic fields of the Earth and any other rotating magnetic body as not
only sources of energy, but also new means of propulsion."

Neat article; it slowly sucks you in (probably via ionic charging) and
then flies you right over to cloud-cuckoo-land, wafted through the ether
on a stream of gibberish.
I'll still stick with my system that uses powerful windlass wheels to
pull itself along lines of latitude or longitude to its destination.

Pat

"Christopher" wrote in message
...
On 4 Feb 2006 14:00:39 -0800, "Robert Clark"
wrote:


http://au.geocities.com/psyberplasmic/ccX-6.html



(from website)
It can be accomplished by optimizing the ramjet process over the entire
leading surface of the mass to be moved -if there is a medium through which
to move
(un quote)

but can you get a significant boost in performance? I define significant as
being over 10%

On Sun, 5 Feb 2006 13:11:29 -0600, "Tater Schuld"
wrote:


"Christopher" wrote in message
.. .
On 4 Feb 2006 14:00:39 -0800, "Robert Clark"
wrote:


http://au.geocities.com/psyberplasmic/ccX-6.html



(from website)
It can be accomplished by optimizing the ramjet process over the entire
leading surface of the mass to be moved -if there is a medium through which
to move
(un quote)

but can you get a significant boost in performance? I define significant as
being over 10%

I have absolutely no idea, I just happened to come across the site
during a Google search for electrohydrodynamic. And thought it looked
quite an interesting concept considering the topic of the thread.



--

Christopher