ElectricMotorcycleForum.com
General Category => General Discussion => Topic started by: Richard230 on July 25, 2024, 07:54:00 PM
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Kawasaki is in the process of developing a hydrogen-powered motorcycle. So far they have given it a tail section that holds the H2 fuel tanks that only its mother could love. I think I will stick to electric as a Zero-emission motorcycle. But I give Kawasaki credit for trying a different type of gas bike: https://www.motorcycle.com/bikes/news/kawasaki-hydrogen-prototype-makes-public-debut-44605393
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A perfect representation of why hydrogen is a bad idea for motorcycles. Similarly to hybrids, there's just not enough space for it. Electric motorcycles can get away with small batteries because you can charge them at so many places include home and work, you can't do that with hydrogen. For example here in the UK there's like 4-7 refuelling stations which means that depending on the range of the vehicle there are parts of the country where it would be literally unusable. I'd be interested to know how much range they're actually getting from that bike, I would assume that because they're trying to make it look good it's probably quite low to keep the tanks as small as possible.
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Imagine what would happen if it flew off a bend and cartwheeled into a tree at 120mph... quite a spectacular explosion I would think :)
It is a daft idea of course. Not sure why they have pursued it with the full scientific knowledge of the efficiency (or lack thereof) of the hydrogen energy lifecycle... makes no sense at all. Even synthetic hydrocarbons make loads more sense, and they're not that sensible to begin with.
Cas :)
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I imagine it's more of a politics, brand image, investors thing rather than creating a decent viable product. Kawasaki are dipping their toes into all the alternative energy options, electric, hybrid, and now this crap, but their electric and hybrid models are half-arsed and not selling. They're more than capable of making a competitive electric bike (and consequently a better, but still dumb, hybrid) but for some reason they don't.
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Their pure BEV A1 offering seems "ok". I wonder at the execs at these companies going, "hm look at Zero, how do they do it?" and then, I dunno, just staring off into space or something and thinking about what to have for lunch. How are these fools employed?
Cas :)
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Their pure BEV A1 offering seems "ok". I wonder at the execs at these companies going, "hm look at Zero, how do they do it?" and then, I dunno, just staring off into space or something and thinking about what to have for lunch. How are these fools employed?
Cas :)
Listen, we made a bike and nobody bought it, clearly EVs are bad.
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Bit like BMW and their CE-04 and 02, cleverly pricing them at exactly twice what the market is prepared to pay for them, and then claiming that there isn't a market for BEV motorcycles...
Cas :)
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In BMWs case I'm far more willing to believe they're using them to gain experience on BEV bikes while they wait for solid state. I do actually know someone who owns and loves a CE04
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Yahh ahhm.. NO ~~ !!!
You are not just going to pull up and plug in your cutsie little refill hose and fill it like a scuba tank.
Hydrogen is so stupidly, obnoxiously, insanely explosive, that's just asking for a problem!
You'll need to ground the shit out of the bike to fill it, ground it to the pumping station, the people pumping the gas, NO YOU ARE NOT GOING TO BE ABLE TO unless you are specifically trained to work with the stuff!
The absolute tiniest leak WILL combust. That was one of the main ways we'd find hydrogen leaks at the power plant, is look for darkened paint, from the flames burning it around the leak area, you can't see them unless it's very dark out at night as they are almost invisible. Even at 15 psi, a pinhole leak, it WILL autocombust on contact with the air pretty much, the friction of pissing out that tiny little hole is enough to ignite it.
Let me hold a cigarette lighter up to your leathers, sooner or later they WILL catch on fire, probably sooner rather than later you WILL feel the heat of that fire! Now lets go on the road with squidward and his hydro gixxer, in his gixxy uniform, complete with wife beater t shirt and flip flops,and see how long before he feels that pinhole leak/flame.
So now, it's a long day, you forgot to turn the main valve off, hydrogen is slowly leaking out of your bike and heading straight for the roof of your garage and gathering up there, waiting for the slightest spark or friction to set it off. A light switch, your garage door spring rubbing. All it takes is 10 percent of it in air to go boom. All it takes is 8 to 10 percent of air in pure H2 to go boom!
How much is that hydrgen going to cost? a LOT! and people bitch about the price of E bikes? oh and unlike E bikes I don't see you charging at home either. Bringing a 50 CuFt tank of it home to huff into your bike would be pretty suicidal IMO.
I don't think it's going to be very viable for a long long while.
Aaron
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMB2VR0087w
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You know something fantasticly petty that I hate about H2?
When they show it burning blue in visualisations.
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Their pure BEV A1 offering seems "ok". I wonder at the execs at these companies going, "hm look at Zero, how do they do it?" and then, I dunno, just staring off into space or something and thinking about what to have for lunch. How are these fools employed?
Cas :)
Listen, we made a bike and nobody bought it, clearly EVs are bad.
That’s going to be the result, and I fear that other OEMs will draw that same conclusion for both hybrid and electric motorbikes. Just imagine if Kawi had made a hybrid ZX-14R successor instead of the Ninja 7, with an eye to set new records for both 0-60 and literbike MPG and you can still creep around your cul-de-sac in the early hours without a sound. It might have been expensive, but everyone would have been talking about it.
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Their pure BEV A1 offering seems "ok". I wonder at the execs at these companies going, "hm look at Zero, how do they do it?" and then, I dunno, just staring off into space or something and thinking about what to have for lunch. How are these fools employed?
Cas :)
Listen, we made a bike and nobody bought it, clearly EVs are bad.
That’s going to be the result, and I fear that other OEMs will draw that same conclusion for both hybrid and electric motorbikes. Just imagine if Kawi had made a hybrid ZX-14R successor instead of the Ninja 7, with an eye to set new records for both 0-60 and literbike MPG and you can still creep around your cul-de-sac in the early hours without a sound. It might have been expensive, but everyone would have been talking about it.
IIRC 0-60 times are limited more by tyres than anything else these days, there's only so much you can do with street legal rubber and even race tyres only get you so far beyond that.
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Yup, at the point you are both spinning the tyre and doing a wheely, that's it. That's the fastest you can go forward on the geometry you've got.
I'd love a CE-04. I notice that 2nd hand they are almost exactly half the price of new - their exact real value IMO. If I didn't already have the SR/F I'd be sorely tempted though I have to be realistic and say the SR/F is ultimately more useful in more scenarios.
Cas :)
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The reason I said that is that the Ninja 7 has an unusually long wheelbase, which should make a big boy version quicker in a straight line with a given level of tire technology.
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The Japanese government is pushing H2 as their zero emissions fuel. That is why Toyota and Kawasaki are rolling out H2 vehicles. The government is funding all phases of H2 from production to distribution. I agree that it's a scary fuel to be working with.
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Here is the latest California Hydrogen Highway news. We will be ready to refill the Kawasaki H2 bike. BTW, if you read the article you will find that the proponents of H2 admit that electric power is more useful for personal vehicle applications.
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Translation, another boondoggle, worthless project that will never finish on time, will probably go 10x over budget, stuffing the pockets of their union cronies who will have the contracts awarded to them to make this nightmare come true.
There are already plenty of sources of commercial hydrogen out there, it's used extensively in the power industry just to name one, so why go through the problems of having to reinvent that wheel of making it? Oh so you can say it's green, at 500x the cost. Why not make green hydrocarbon fuels then? yes it CAN be done, I mean if you are lying about origins about the battery material, and hydrogen material, why not just make synthetic hydrocarbon fuel for your ICE's and not have to worry at all about inventing all this new stuff?
As for transport on your vehicle, probably use the same stuff they use for the compressed gas vehicles, the spun bottles etc. Hydrogen needs special materials for seals though, since it's so small, it leaks very easily.
Aaron
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It is a silly fuel, best left for use in aircraft. Except I for one would be bloody terrified of travelling in such a device. It amazes me how people think that hydrogen is "just another gas wot burns" without realising just how insanely, complicatedly, dangerously explosive and escapey it is compared to any other gas.
Cas :)
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I have a hydrogen BBQ. Yes back in the days they sold them, it's a gas bbq that runs off hydrogen. The meat comes out very moist with it. I don't use it anymore TBH I love my smoker much better but they did make them at one point. You don't need to be afraid of it, just respect it, like you do with electricity and you'll be fine.
People would say the same kind of thing to me working in a power plant, "arent you afraid of the high voltage"? At half a million volts, trust me, if you screw up, you'll never know it.
Aaron
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It is a silly fuel, best left for use in aircraft. Except I for one would be bloody terrified of travelling in such a device. It amazes me how people think that hydrogen is "just another gas wot burns" without realising just how insanely, complicatedly, dangerously explosive and escapey it is compared to any other gas.
Cas :)
I beg to differ.
Explosion characteristics of hydrogen are similar to other combustible gases (see table).
Hydrogen is extensively used in non-transport applications for more than a century and proper safety procedures are already in place. I do not see any higher risk compared to gasoline.
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I beg to differ further :)
Hydrogen is most definitely used in non-transport applications by highly trained professionals in extremely safety conscious environments. It isn't manhandled sloppily by a billion people every single day and shoved into their cranky, ill-maintained deathtraps absentmindedly while they figure out what they want for dinner later. And it really is much more dangerous than, eg. methane, because it does indeed escape far more easily, making it tend to be more likely to explode simply because it is unexpectedly there. It leaks in vast quantities from the tiniest leaks that methane can't even escape out of. A simple leak can catch fire just from its escaping friction, burning with an invisible but incredibly hot flame.
Cas :)
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Whenever I have to work on the hydrogen system, I bring a IR camera with me to take a quick peek, and also the peeling / blackened paint is a giveaway there is a leak.
In the open Id not worry too much cas, it's velocity is something to be appreciated how quickly it wants to float up and away and dissipate, but yah, I can see some shit for brains smoking a cigarette while plugging the h2 nozzle in and POP !!
That balloon thing, we did that once in the welding shop, back in the day, we'd use bottled H2 and a huge manifold to charge up the generators when the bulk system was down for whatever reason, and we got the idea to do an oxy / hydrogen balloon with about 40 feet of cotton string,some lighter fluid and let it float over the river in the middle of the night.
NOBODY was expecting such a sharp hard report when that flame finally hit that balloon as it was over the wide open river. Then the echo's off the banks, and all the buildings and houses along the river.... then all the lights turning on and people coming outside to see WTF just blew up, and us, standing there with our assholes so tight, you couldn't pull a banjo string thru with a bulldozer, trying to pretend to be just like everyone else, going derp, what was that?? Then the blue lights start showing up...let's just say it was an interesting night.
Seriously though it's no more dangerous than gasoline, in fact would probably be safer, because people would hopefully be a bit more careful around it, and being much lighter than air, is going to float up and away thru the tiniest cracks, where gas fumes, or methane is going to want to stay on the ground, puddle and hang around.
The comment about Hydrogen being handled by highly trained personnel in the most safety conscious environments. that made me laugh. You ever watch the simpsons when they are busing on power plant operators, ie being asleep at the panel, the dog saves them from a melt down etc type of stuff. If people had ANY clue how close to home so much of that hits they'd shit themselves 8)
Ever see the clown over fill a hydrogen tank and lift the safety at 2500 PSI? that shit sounded like the space shuttle taking off not only the pressure flow but the spontaneous detonation upon contact with the air as it came out the safety valve. I stood about 100 feet back and just watched until it all settled down. People asked me, why didn't you run? To where? Where am I going to hide if 10K Ft3 of hydrogen goes up? naah, if Im gonna die, I want to watch it coming.
Aaron
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The worst part about hydrogen isn't its flammability or even its propensity to even escape through seemingly solid objects. Unlike any hydrocarbon product, hydrogen can physically and chemically destroy most metals through the various methods of hydrogen embrittlement. It literally diffuses through most commonly used metals and causes them crumble..
The good thing about it from a safety perspective is as Specter points out, while most flammables are heavier than air and pool at ground level, hydrogen floats away and dissapates. Lucky for us most of human type stuff is done at ground level. I'm also getting the impression that everyone who has done the hydrogen and oxygen in a balloon with a string thing is surprised at how sharp and loud the report is when that thing goes off.
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they are expecting a boom, like any 4th of july firecracker, they were not expecting a supersonic shockwave to hit them, which is what happens when you set off a stoich mix of hydrogen/oxygen hence the loud sharp crack.
acetylene is a fun one too if you can't get hydrogen, but please boys and girls, be stupid careful if you are doing this, you can easily kill yourself and if someone does call the cops, if they want to, they can be dicks and get you with manufacture of an explosive device. still, its a cheap way to have some 4th of fun and have fireworks louder than your neighbors :D
Aaron