Talk:Stirling engine
From Academic Kids
I wonder if Stirling technology could be an answer to solar energy production, at least on a small scale. Since a direct solar -> electrcity solar cell is pretty inefficient (maybe 20% now, was only 10% for a long time), I wonder if a better approach might be to use a solar collector to heat water in a closed system, apply it to a stirling engine that then turns a generator. Since the solar collector itself is about 80% or more efficient, and the stirling engine is 50%, and the generator perhaps 85%, the overall losses are much less. Anyone think this idea has merit? I'm not sure how big a Stirling engine needs to be to be useful here, but I can envisage a (trans)portable power supply unit that would be self-contained and be great for e.g. the African or Australian bush. Graham 10:13, 5 Aug 2004 (UTC)
- Check out www.stirlingenergy.com to see someone who is doing essentially what you've just suggested. Interesting stuff. Don't know how competative it is. --Flatline 18:04, 2005 Jun 1 (UTC)
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Regenerator is essential component of a Stirling Engine
From countless references including this history (http://www.sesusa.org/history.1816.htm) of the Stirling Engine:
- "The Rev'd Robert Stirling applied for the first of his patents for this engine and the 'Economiser' in 1816, a few months after being appointed as a minister in the Church of Scotland at age 25. Others such as Sir. George Caley had devised air engines previous to this time (c. 1807) and other devices called air engines were known as early as 1699. The 'Economiser', or regenerator, has come to be recognized as a most important portion of the patent of 1816. These innovations were even more remarkable in light of the fact that they preceeded the birth of thermodynamics and the writing of M. Sadi Carnot by some 40 years!"
Many variants of hot air engines existed before the Stirling Engine. They are not all Stirling Engines.
Paul Beardsell 21:21, 5 Aug 2004 (UTC)
External links inflation
Some authors seem to have a misunderstanding about our linking policy. The Wikipedia is not a web directory. It would be most helpfull, if someone knowledgeable in the field would expend some time distilling the links to the most important ones only. --Pjacobi 10:46, 2005 Jan 16 (UTC)
Can you supply a link to the linking policy, please? Paul Beardsell 11:07, 16 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Sorry, it seems I was overly bold in my previous comment. Besides the sparse mentioning in Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not, I wasn't able to find a written policy. So in contrast to the German Wikipedia, which seems to be more formalistic in this area, the handling here relies on precedent on discussion. --Pjacobi 22:39, 2005 Jan 16 (UTC)
But I agree you with you: There should be a policy. If in the "external links" section we just cut'n'paste everything returned by Google then we might as well just have one link which will always be up to date: Google search for "stirling engine" (http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22stirling+engine%22&btnG=Google+Search). Paul Beardsell 23:06, 16 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Now I've found some bits and pieces:
- Wikipedia:External links very terse
- Wikipedia:External links/temp a proposed policy, but process seems to stopped
- non binding advice from meta: m:When should I link externally
Pjacobi 23:48, 2005 Jan 16 (UTC)
Cycle description
I'm a little unhappy with the description of the Stirling cycle in the opening paragraph - if some mechanical engineering type doesn't fix this, I may be fored to be bold. I'll have to see the "thermodynamics" article and the Carnot articles and see if there's a discussion of other thermodynamic cycles that could be referenced here. I took out the "hot air engine" link because it linked back to this article. I've tried to put back in some of the disadvantages in earlier version of the article, sinmce they are important. There were a couple of odd-looking sentences that I zapped. And I agree, way too many external links...someone with hihg speed Net connection should do some pruning. --Wtshymanski 17:05, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)
Thermoacoustics
One of the most exciting stirling applications (in my opinion, anyway) is thermoacoustics. The lack of moving parts and the potential for miniaturization are both pretty important...why no links or other mention on this site?--Joel 20:41, 9 May 2005 (UTC)
- Be bold and put in what you think is appropriate. --Wtshymanski 21:20, 9 May 2005 (UTC)
Problems
- While the "engine out" emissions of the engine are quite low, further catalytic cleanup of NOx (oxides of nitrogen) is made challenging because of the lean (excess oxygen) nature of the exhaust.
This isn't a problem of the engine itself but the heat source. Except for vacuum engine (others ?), the engine is closed. For example, how can NOx be generated for dish-stirling engines (solar source) ? I'm not native english speaker then can somebody correct ?
