Two Tiny Gas Turbines 202
Turbines are in the news this morning. bobtheimpossible writes to point out a BBC article on a Swiss turbine that runs at half a million RPM and generates 100 watts. It's the size of a matchbook. And af_robot alerts us to an even more diminuitive gas turbine on a chip, developed at MIT, that generates 10 watts — plenty for portable electronics — and should run 10 times as long as a battery of comparable weight and cost. A commercial version is 3 to 5 years away.
Still Mechanical Conversion to Energy (Score:4, Insightful)
It's still a mecanical conversion of a compounds to energy, with all the inefficiencies that go with it, including disposal of waste heat. Where's these fuel cells I keep hearing about?
10 props for neat, anyway.
also, can it do this? [asciimation.co.nz]
Not the first portable gas devices! (Score:3, Insightful)
Ear plugs? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:gyroscope? (Score:5, Insightful)
The same is true of the gyroscopic motion - the reactive force is a function of the applied force and the angular momentum. If the moment of inertia of the rotor is very small, the reactant force is likewise small.
Also keep in mind that this device has a designed power output of 100 W, which is at least one, if not two, orders of magnitude greater than what you'd need for an mp3 player.
Re:6000C combustion? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:6000C combustion? (Score:4, Insightful)
But can I fly with it? (Score:3, Insightful)