An All Direction, Wind Powered Car Driven By Turbine-Propeller Airscrew

Y. Neumeier

Introduction
What is a Paradox
From the Wikipedia: A paradox is a true statement or group of statements that leads to a contradiction or a situation which defies intuition. The term is also used for an apparent contradiction that actually expresses a non-dual truth (cf. kan, Catuskoti). Typically, the statements in question do not really imply the contradiction, the puzzling result is not really a contradiction, or the premises themselves are not all really true or cannot all be true together.

The brain teaser

The following is from http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/propulsion/ddwfttw-directly-downwind-faster-than-wind-2552725.html

By all accounts so far it was first done in the the '60s by a team of engineers from Douglas Aircraft, but even they weren't the ones who came up with the idea and as they did it to settle a bet between friends, they didn't document their exploits in a way that satisfied very many critics. AMO Smith (google him), the Supervisor of Aerodynamics Research and Chief Aerodynamics Engineer at Douglas and one of his wind tunnel engineers, Dr. Andrew Bauer discovered the idea in a paper presented by a midwestern student who was angling for a summer internship. Unfortunately, no one remembers who the student was (they didn't get the intern position) so credit for the actual invention will apparently remain nebulous for all time. Bauer believed the student was correct and AMO believed DDWFTTW to be impossible. They made a bet and Bauer assembled a small team, built and sucessfully tested the device. AMO paid off on his bet and by all acounts it was near 40 years before anyone physically tried it again.

Andrew Bauer and his car, left, a drawing from his report right

Recent accomplishments
Rick Caravallo Black built a car with which he set a recognized record for driving a wind power car directly down the wind 2.8 times the wind speed1 . The statement that a wind powered car can move directly down the wind in ground velocity much higher than the wind, (above X3 claimed by the black bird in July 2020 trials), appears to many as paradoxical as a paradox comes since the common sail car, like their close relative the sail boat can tack the wind and make velocity made true down the wind higher than the wind but cannot sail directly downward the wind with velocity higher or even equal to that of the wind. In relating to this subject, this author confirmed by personal e-mail exchange that serious professors could not grasp this possibility. One professor is from Berkley university, he was a member in a group that won the Nobel prize with Al Gore, and has been on an advisory board to the government on energy related technologies. Another one from Louisiana State University, has dedicated significant efforts in his blog to prove that such a claim would violate the laws of physics 2. This author
1 2

See the Autopia blog http://www.wired.com/autopia/2010/06/downwind-faster-than-the-wind/ http://scienceblogs.com/dotphysics/2008/12/physics-and-directly-downwind-faster-than-the-wind-dwfttwvehicles.php

find the subject fascinating and believe that the theory presented below beside proving the particular case can be used to develop some practical applications.

The vehicle
Figure 1 shows a photo of the black bird and Fig. 2 shows a schematic of the propeller driven car. In the considered car, at least one pair of the wheels is coupled via transmission that, at least for the sake of the discussion, engage the propeller to the wheels either in forward or reverse direction at any desired gear ratio. When the car travel downward with backwind the wheels drive the propeller that in turn produces force that pull the car forward. When moving upwind the propeller must act as wind turbine producing torque on the shaft that is transmitted to the wheels. It should be noted that the startup of the car with backwind down the wind also benefits greatly if initially the propeller act as turbine by changing the pitch and or using reverse gear transmission and gradually move to propeller mode. When moving with an angle to the wind the propeller may need to be turned around.

Figure 1 Blackbird Built by Rick Cavallaro

Fp

Vwind
FD

Vcar Car Body

Fw
Figure 2 Schematic of considered car

Propeller Theory
Propeller impart small increase of velocity to large volume of air. The theory presented herein uses the famous disc actuator theory with L/D correction (believed to be an original contribution). First we assume low Mach number thus, neglecting compressibility effects. Further, in reference to Fig. 3. it is assumed that a streamline that start far away at ambient pressure and velocity follows a constant total energy Bernoulli Eq. all the way just upstream the propeller where the pressure is lower than the ambient thus implying increase of kinetic energy. Upon crossing through the propeller the pressure jump, the velocity does not change since the density is considered constant. From there down the streamline follow again a constant total energy streamline thus further accelerate from the higher pressure behind the prop to the ambient pressure far downstream. It should be noted that while the pressure along the streamline goes to ambient, the downstream velocity is of course different than , we denote this velocity by

Vp

Fp

pd

pu

Figure 3 schematic of propeller flow geometry

In accordance with the above discussion we can write (1) (2) Using the two equations we get

(3) ( )

Now conservation of momentum implies that the force extract by the propeller cause the increase in the momentum, thus, (4) ( ) ( )

wherein and are the mass flow rate that cross through the propeller and the cross-sectional area respectively. Further we have, (5) Substitute (5) and (3) into (4) gives ( thus, (6) ( ) ) ( ) ( )( )

Equation 6 does not serve us further but it is expressing the fact that the velocity at the propeller is the average of the velocity at infinity and far downstream the propeller. It is important to know that all our equations and in particular Eq.6 hold true also when the velocity in infinity come from behind. It is thus clear that a propeller generates thrust also in a backwind. The force that the propeller delivers to the air equals the force the air imparts to the disc and is given by (7) ( From (6) we have (8) )

Substitute (8), (5) and (7) into (4) gives the axial velocity through the propeller disc as function of the propulsive force

(9) ( )

Note that Eq. 9 holds for both positive and negative velocities. In particular it shows that when the wind comes behind then, for the same delivered propulsive force the velocity through the propeller disc is lesser. The quantity that is most important for us is the shaft power required for a specific thrust. In ideal actuator the only power deliver to the air is at the propeller disc and is given by (10) Thus (11) ( )

Equation (11) provides the minimum shaft power that is required to produce propulsive force at given ambient velocity. In reality, however the shaft power is greater. We thus, make a first order correction to the above formula using the L/D parameter of the blades. Consider the blade segment diagram shown in Fig.4. The propeller produces propulsion force from left to right and the shaft provides tangential force to keep the propeller rotating. Note that we analyze here a segment but if all of the segments operate optimally the analysis is valid for the entire propeller. Now, (12)

Blade Rotation direction Apparent wind

Fpt
Progress direction

Vpx

Vpt

Fpx L

D
Figure 4. Blade segment velocity-force diagram

The relationship between the lift and drag of a typical profile are shown in Fig. 5 which is taken from the famous NACA report. It shows that at certain angle of attack, typically between 4-5 degrees the L/D ratio reaches a sharp maximum. This is usually the conditions for the propeller blade. Assuming maximum L/D we can write now as follows (13) ( The values of ( ) ) ( ( ) )

may be 20 or higher, refine profiles may get as high as 60. the ratio of the produced thrust to invested

Note that if the propeller rotate slowly so that power is low since ( )
( )

the positive sign indicate that the propeller generate retarding rather the ratio is the highest possible

the propelling force. When the propeller rotate fast so that

, the negative sign is indicative that an external force is required to balance the . Similar to Eq. 10 the power required is given by (14)

tangential aerodynamic force

Accordingly similar to (11) we have

(15) ( ) ( ( ) )

Figure 5 L/D of NACA airfoil 0006, taken from REPORT No. 460 ,The Characteristics of 78 Related Airfoil Sections from Tests in the Variable-Density Wind Tunnel by Eastman N. Jacobs, Kenneth E. Ward, and Robert M. Pinkerton 1933 Web link http://www.aeronautics.nasa.gov/docs/rpt460/index.htm. Before we compare (15) to (11) we will normalized all relevant quantities using a reference velocity, We will decide later on what this velocity would be. Accordingly (16)

Equation (11) is written accordingly, (17)

( Equation (15) becomes

(18) ( ) ( ( ) )

Equation (9) is written in non dimensional form (19) We note that (20) ( )

 Now noting that, see Eqs. 17,19 that (21) ( )

and using equations 18, 20 and 21 we can write (22) ( ) (

The above formula express the actual to ideal shaft power per unit thrust force. Setting
6

Ratio of actual to ideal shaft power per unit thrust

L/D=3 3 L/D=5
L/D=10

L/D=20 2 L/D=30

0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90

Figure 6: Ratio of actual to ideal shaft power per unit thrust as function of for various L/D

Figure 6 above shows the dependency of the actual to ideal shaft power per unit thrust upon the velocity angle for different L/D ratios. Figure 6 shows that for large enough L/D say, 20 the curve is flat within large range of , say 15 to 75 degrees. This is very important and, in fact this very treat is what makes the propeller tick. Consulting Fig. 4 it can be seen that in a rotating blade the angle increases along the blade from the hub toward the tip. Very near the center is small and thus, see Fig. 6, large power is required. However if we size the blade with proper tip to hub ratio we can have all the blade segments at an angle that is nearly optimal. For example 15 to 75 degrees would provide for tip to hub ratio of fourteen3 . Assuming that the lift to drag ratio is large enough, say ten and above, Eq. 22 can be manipulated to provide some interesting results. Denoting ( ) ,

Equation (22) becomes (23)

Take the derivative with respect to x (24) ( ( Setting the derivative to zero yield the following equation for x (25) ) )

Solving for x (25) For small value of we can further expand (25) in Taylor series to the first order around zero gives (26)

Substitute (26) into 23 the and eliminating high order terms of

3

in numerator

tan(75 deg)/tan(15 deg)=14.

(27) ( ) ( )

Using Equation (27) we now arrive at the important formula that provides a first order correction to the disc actuator theory (28) ( ) ( ) ( )

Vehicle performance at directly down the wind operation

Referring now to Figure 2 we can write force balance as (29) Dividing both sides by we get (30)

We further recognize that the drag on the car can be written as (31)

where is the frontal area of the car and the direction Thus,

the drag coefficient,

is the +1 or 1 according to

(32)

Now, the propeller power comes from the wheels, thus,

(33) Where is the transmission efficiency. Dividing both sides of (33) by one gets (34) is the

Pertaining to our problem it is natural to choose the wind speed as a reference. Being that apparent ambient velocity, it is given by (35)

And thus (36) We now rewrite Eq 28 in the form (37)

))

From Eq.33 (38)

The acceleration of the vehicle can be written as (39) ( )

Where sign=1 when ( and -1 otherwise. The three equations 37,38 and 39 are what we ) need to investigate the performance of the car when moving directly down the wind Figure 7 below shoes the acceleration characteristics corresponding to car speeds in the range 0.1-4. The characteristics is obtained by running the propeller force as a variable and solving Eq. 37 to obtain the shaft power, calculating then the force on the wheel using Eq. 38 and finally using the propeller force and the wheel force in Eq. 39 to calculate the acceleration. The parameters of the car are given in the caption. The characteristics indicate that from low velocity up to 3 times the wind speed there is a range of propeller operation that accelerate the car forward. At car speed of 3 times the wind velocity the positive acceleration range does barely exist and at speed of 4 all propeller force result in deceleration. Thus, for this car 3 times the wind speed is the top performance. It is worth discussing the acceleration process of the car from rest to maximum speed. Recall that we normalize everything by the wind speed. Assume now that the designer attempt to achieve as close as possible to 3XW speed. Assume now that he uses fix gear and thus design the propeller and gear to provide at this conditions non dimensional propeller force of 0.5 which provides maximum acceleration at the 3XW speed. Now, starting at rest, the wind is pushing behind and thus make the care move forward. As the car start to move forward the propeller provide small force that according to Fig.7 farther push the car forward followed by higher speed and higher force but this propeller force is never too big to cause retardation of the movement. As a result the car will smoothly and gradually increase to its maximum 3XW speed. If the car has a variable gear the acceleration can be augmented by adjusting the transmission to drive the propeller to generate force which result in maximum acceleration. Nevertheless the maximum achievable speed remain the same.

0.3

Non dimensional acceleration

0.2
0.1 0 -0.1 -0.2

Vcar/Vwind=0.1
Vcar/Vwind=0.5 Vcar/Vwind=1 Vcar/Vwind=2 Vcar/Vwind=3 Vcar/Vwind=4

-0.3 0 1 2 3 4 5

Non dimensional propeller force

Figure 7: Acceleration characteristics of a wind power car with a propeller blade lift to drag ratio ( ) , Total car drag coefficient , propeller disc area to car drag area ratio and transmission efficiency of 80%

Off wind performance

To go in an angle to the wind we have to develop the propeller equation for wind in an angle. We approach this problem assuming first, that, as far as the disc actuator theory is concerned the propeller/turbine delivers only axial forces and does not thus, affects the lateral component of the moving air. A correction to this will be given when the blade element will be considered. Equations (1) and (2) become Since the component of the velocity in the y direction does not change we can write (40)

(41) ( ) ( ) (42) ( ) ( )

Subtracting (41) from (42) gives (43) Now momentum, (44) ( where (45) We follow the same steps as before to arrive at (46) ( ) ) ( ) ( )

and (47) ( )

It follows thus that a first estimate of the propeller performance can be obtained by only considering the ambient velocity component along the propeller shaft and neglecting the lateral component. To consider the effect that a side velocity component has on a blade segment we consider Fig. 8 below showing a two opposing blades propeller from the front rotating clockwise with a side wind component Vy coming from the left with the angle describing the orientation of the a blades to the wind. When =0 degrees the Vy express itself as a radial flow along the blade which we consider to have no effect on the blade aerodynamic forces. With =90 degrees the left blade advances into the wind thus experiencing increased tangential velocity Vpt and the right blade which retard from the wind experiencing reduced tangential velocity component Vpt, see Fig.4. Assuming that each blade segment operates nominally at the maximum L/D and consulting with Fig.4, the table below describes the situation of each blade. In accordance with this table it can be seen that the lateral wind will create an

unbalance drag and lift that will result in side force in the direction of the lateral wind and a reduction of the effective L/D

Rotation D

Vy

Figure 7 Geometry of propeller blades and side wind Apparent velocity Velocity angle Angle of attack Lift drag L/D

Advancing blade Retarding blade Table I Effect of lateral wind upon the aerodynamic of the blades

To obtain a sense to the magnitude of the side force and the amount of reduction in the effective L/D we do the following analysis. Consider that the blade element operate nominally at an angle Recall Eq. 20 Lets express the side wind speed relative to , noting that the latter is an indicative of the propeller loading. High corresponds to high forces as indicated by the normalized Eq.46 (48) ( )

Thus we will write (49)

Denote the nominal wind angle as 0 we can write

(50) ( )

From Fig. 4 we see that the angle of attack increases together with . Thus, (51)

where is the nominal angle of attack for which L/D assume a maximum value, for example, for NACA airfoil 0006 shown in Fig.5 . For our discussion lets consider the variation of L/D with shown in Fig.5 and parameterize it in as a cubic polynomial (52)

with a= 0.0522; b= -1.522; c= 11.305 and in degrees The resulted L/D characteristics is shown below Looking in Fig. 5 it can be seen that for a range of of 0 to 10 degrees the lift can be expressed in term of (53)

Hence, in this range we can write (54) ( )

30

25 20

L/D

15 10

5 0 0 5 10 Angle of attack degrees 15 20

Figure 8: Typical L/D as function of with maximum L/D=25 at =5 degrees

Equations 50,51,52 and 54 can be used to solve for the average L/D and side force as function of for 0 | as a parameter. We have to remember that as per our assumptions our analysis is limited to | above this the local angle of attack becomes negative at certain rotation angle and more so the assumption behind Eq. 53 may not be valid as may get to close to stall. Figure 9 below shows calculations made for two of 75 deg and 45 degrees. The characteristics indicate that at of 75 degrees even significant side wind of 100% the magnitude of the axial velocity through the propeller hardly induce side force and hardly diminish the L/D. However, at of 45 deg a side wind of only 20% the magnitude of the propeller axial velocity induce a 50% side force and reduce the L/D to less that half of its nominal value. It was explained above, in conjunction with Fig. 6 that relatively large tip to hub ratio can be used in a propeller still providing for nearly ideal power to thrust ratio while the inner part of the propeller operate with low of say 15 deg while the outer part enjoy large of say 75 degrees. It is clear now however that side wind will have a profound effect on the inner part of the blade thus generating significant side force and low L/D from the inner part of the propeller. To account for these effect, at list approximately. We will choose

100% 90%

80% 70% 60%

50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 0% 20% 40% Vy/Vpx 60% 80% 100% Side force% beta =75 deg (L/D)/(L/D)max beta=75 deg Side force% beta=45 deg

(L/D)/(L/D)max beta=45 deg

Figure 9 Side force and L/D reduction as function of relative side wind at different angle