It is my thought that during the 20th century catalytic converters made up about 1 or 2 pct of the value of a vehicle during the 20th century. (recycle value 125, vehicle new 10k or 20k) Noting that the margins on producing autos is published at 2 or 3 pct creating a catalytic converter at a third the cost would noticeably raise automakers profit margins as well as benefit their share values. Further, the creation of very cheap catalytic converters would permit persons at the developing world, some of whom use 2 wheeled vehicles, to produce much less pollution.
First visualize a well known physics illustration, a container with apertures down the side that is full of water. The water spouts out lightly near the top, with a similar stream at the base, highest pressure near the base. That is due to gravity on water. Now a nongravity pressure version of this at a tube of moving gas would have the longer streams at the top, with the minimal streams far from the tube. I think that a well researched thing called a hilsch vortex tube could be used at the higher pressure streams to concentrate warm as well as cool gas flows. Importantly the multiaperture structure permits the overall back pressure to be at a range harmless to fuel mileage.
At this application these vortex tubes are rather teeny. I think microprinted hilsch vortex tubes could be used to divide the exhaust into warmer n cooler portions, where the warmer gases would be used to rapidly warm active start areas of the catalytic converter to active temperature. (I have read that warmup time on catalytic converters strongly affects the pollutionality of commutes) It is imaginable that the cooling gas from a hilsch tube might be used to cool a portion of the preconverter gas stream to actually condense moisture. The less water vapor that reaches the catalytic converter the higher the mole fraction of active material contacting catalyst, thus being converted to preferred output with less material.
So, will it actually work? I think 3d miniprinting the numerous minihilshvortexes as well as miniducts to macroducts could actually make the thing fairly cheap. Remember it has zero moving parts. Also, the sandwich theorem of calculus suggests that there is actually a gas engine it would work with, (engine with exhaust temperature of 100 average temperature units, catalytic converter works better at 120, where 0 to 2 pct backpressure removes 90 pct of pollution at 120) all the way to a nonworking version, so that suggests there are engines between these values.
Noting the commercial viability of hybrid vehicles, this may be improved with electronic tuning at the complexity of having moving parts. It is possible that backpressure is permissible during times similar to the electric portions of as hybrid vehicles function.
I am personally most supportive of using this as a a zero moving parts approach to reducing the cost as well as physical volume of catalytic converters so that developing worlders can have minimal emissions vehicles.-- beanangel, Dec 02 2011 ranque hilsch vortex tube http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vortex_tube [beanangel, Dec 02 2011] physics illustration of container of water with aperatures https://wiki.brown.....10+Torricelli+Tank [beanangel, Dec 02 2011] catalytic converter material Wobbly_20catalytic_...peratures_20rapidly [beanangel, Dec 02 2011] Phew. I though I was going to have to read the whole idea, but then I spotted this somewhere towards the beginning:
//a container with apertures down the side that is full of water. The water spouts out lightly near the top, with a similar stream at the base, highest pressure near the center.//
If I may borrow a quote from my late granduncle Patton (his last - spoken to the hangman): just hold on a seco.
If I take a container and fill it with water, the pressure is greatest at the bottom. If I punch a row of holes in the side, the streams from the bottomest holes will be more forceful than those from the middle which, ipso ileum incatur, will be more forceful than those from near the top.-- MaxwellBuchanan, Dec 02 2011 [mb] much appreciated I also thought what you thought, even writing that version, then misread the reference material
aside from that what do you think of the hilsch vortex tube warms catalyst, condenses water to create greater efficiency even at a variety of pressure effects-- beanangel, Dec 02 2011 I am fully confident that, with suitable development, and adequate funding, such a device may (or may not).-- MaxwellBuchanan, Dec 02 2011 ...Very impressive, beanangel! This idea is, in fact, acceptably coherent (at least from a grammar standpoint.) You're punctuating in more-or-less the right places, you're actually capitalizing in the correct areas- this is genuinely readable! You do need to go a bit easier on those poor parentheses, but all-in-all this is actually decent.
You've still got a ways to go, mind, but the coherence is no longer the primary obstacle to reading your idea.
As for the idea itself, it's a bit too late in my time zone to go about researching Hilsch vortex tubes, but you're not citing pharmacological studies made in South Africa and you're not being creepily misandristic, so I'm actually pretty hopeful for it.
Good job! (And if this was misread, let me make it clear that this anno is completely nonsarcastic.)-- Hive_Mind, Dec 05 2011 //Patton (his last - spoken to the hangman)// Ah, the infamous Patton pending.
I can resolve the whole hole issue issue. It is the distance of the spurt that is greatest for a middle hole; horizontal distance is proportional to the distance from the top times the square root of the distance from the bottom.-- spidermother, Dec 05 2011 //Ah, the infamous Patton pending. // It was more suspending Patton, alas. If only he had kept his receipt from the funicular railway, he could have proven his innocence and gone on to thwart the infamous Second Uprising. Easy to be wise after the event; less so after the hanging.-- MaxwellBuchanan, Dec 05 2011 random, halfbakery