Man builds alchol powered motorcycle
Cecily Long
Issue date: 2/25/08 Section: News
|
According to Chuck Graztle an agriculture education major, there's a gas alternative that Americans can be using right now with all the garbage we create. Alcohol.
Graztle used this idea and converted his motorcycle so that it could run off alcohol. "We're in trouble," said Graztle referring to America and its high independence of gasoline. He believes that if the technology is out there to use something else other than gasoline, we should.
An ancient form of fuel energy, alcohol was once gasoline's biggest competitor.
According to Graztle people used alcohol gas a lot during the depression because it was cheaper to make and anyone could make it.
"They used alcohol to run the model T, stoves, even curly irons," said Graztle. "That was the early fuel, an ancient technology."
Graztle started his project for an Agriculture class, and it took him three months to build an engine that would run off alcohol. Now Graztle uses both alcohol and gasoline to run his bike.
"Hopefully soon I'll be able to make my own alcohol fuel," said Graztle "you can it out of any trash or wood, and it doesn't take that much to convert an engine so that it can run off alcohol.
But with the way cars are being made with plastic materials, there's no way they could run off alcohol fuel, because it would burn right through it.
It would take a mileage surplus motor to run on alcohol fuel and the fuel must be 160 proof alcohols.
Graztle said that the process of making the alcohol isn't fast, but believes that if you're running the steel 24 hours a day, it doesn't matter, and it would still be cheaper than gasoline.
Graztle believes that one day gasoline prices will go so high, it won't be affordable, "I can see some disaster, not just a war, but a natural disaster, that will make gas prices go sky high."
RSS Feed
Be the first to comment on this story