OIL AS FUEL

Hokitika Guardian, 28 February 1929, Page 5

OIL AS FUEL

NEW ZEALANDER’S INVENTIO:

A HUGE SAVING

The American cables recently mad< brief reference to the invention of i New Zealander, Mr Ernest Godwarc (Invercargill), which, it was suggested was likely to effect a tremendous sav ing in the cost of transportation. Tlie “ New York Times ” of January 18th provides full particulars of tlu new idea. “Philadelphia/’ says tin article, ‘ has started the year right by setting out to be the world’s first ungassed city since motor vehicles came into general use. This in effect was the announcement made at the Engineers’'Club by J. A. Queeney, vicepresident of the Mitten Management, which owns the street transportation system, to a technical audience which included invited representatives of transit companies from other cities.. Important to the general public and health authorities everywhere as is this fact, that tlie carbon monoxide given off by all motors through their smoke exhaust tubes can be virtually eliminated, it is, in the domain of mechanics, Mr Queeney showed, merely incidental to the revelation that a way has been found to use fuel oil in any automotive engine with the same effectiveness as gasoline; and not only this, hut to switch from the one to; the other at will without adjustment of any kind.

HOW DISCOVERY CAME ABOUT.

A few years’ ago there arrived in the United States from New Zealand a mild-eyed, mild-mannered inventor, Ernest Godward, with’ a device evolved through long years of study. One day a New York friend of Thomas E. Mitten wrote to the president of the Philadelphia transit system, which Mr Mitten and its employees own jointly, telling him in outline of Mr Godward’s device and suggesting that it might possibly interest him. It did. Mr Mitten instructed Mr Queeney, his chief engineer to examine it. TWO YEARS OF RESEARCH.

The examination proved to the. beginning of two years of unremitting intensive research in the transit company’s workshops and laboratories.

Setbacks and disappointments ' were many and often left the discoverers non-plussed, but not one was found to be the fault of the generator itself.

The apparatus as finally evolved was described by Air Queeney as follows :

‘lt consists ’of an aluminium pot in which is set a nest of stationary thin curved plates radiating. from a central core. The pot is heated by the exhaust of the engine. The fuel is drawn from a standard carburettor through the inside of the pot over the surface of the warm plates where it is converted into a dry gas and whence it passes through the intake, manifold into the cylinders. ’ The gas being dry, he explained, there is no boiling of the motor and months of tests with 20 buses which were run nearly 300,000 miles over steep hilly routes failed to show any accumulation of carbon in the cylinder valves or any evidence of a wet mixture in the manifold. Moreover, it was found that an increase in horse-power up to 15 per cent could be attained. GREAT SAVING IN FUEL BILL.. Mr Queeney estimated that were the 85,000 biises at present operating in the United States to use fuel oil instead of gasoline the aggregate fuel bill alone would show a saving of something like 50,000,000 dollars a 'year, the difference in cost being about:29 per cent. . . : He further asserted that in addition to the gas generator an apparatus had been developed, in the course of tlie experiments, and , was in daily use, which acted as a check on engine efficiency ; that is any unburned gas present in the exhaust represented a definite power loss. It also measured the carbon dioxide in the exhaust gas thereby furnishing a further check on the carbon monoxide content of the exhaust gases. , What his company was interested in, the speaker explained, however was to see whether the problem of utilising fuel oil in gasolene motors really could be solved in operating their vehicles with the minimum mechanical expense.