rexresearch.com
Ronald J. PEARSON
Gas Wave Turbine
http://pearsonianspace.com
Ron Pearson
Mr Ron Pearson B,Sc.Eng.(Hons)*C.Eng.M.I.Mech.E was a lecturer for
18 years at Bath University in Thermodynamics and Fluid Mechanics.
He has also previously worked as a Consultant at the Defence
Advance Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in the USA. lecturer for
18 years at Bath University in Thermodynamics and Fluid .
Aside from being an extremely proficient Engineer with a long list
of patents to his name, Ron Pearson was also the inventor of the
Gas Wave Turbine. A notable success to this is that it ran the
very first time it was started having been built from theory.
His more recent work during his retirement has been to develop a
new theory on the creation of the Universe and a full theory of
Quantum Gravity both of which have been scrutinised by physicists
and, as of yet, found to be without any flaws with the the logic
he has used.
Over his life Ron has also spent many hours researching ways to
produce clean environmentally friendly renewable energy from Ocean
farming of floating seaweed. His has several new patents for
technology in this field and still hopes one day to bring his
ideas to market after some final testing.
Ron Pearson
Ron feels his expertise could help physics and cosmology, now that
they openly admit to being stuck. Eminent quantum physicist Sir
Roger Penrose1 has said on his website that, “Physics is wrong
from string theory to quantum mechanics”. Another physicist, Lee
Smolin2 said in 2007 that no physicist of his generation has
produced anything of value since 1980.
Ron has been quite outspoken about this and the reasons for this,
since 1984.
“What has happened is that quantum theory is so contrary to our
expectations that common-sense has been actively discouraged. In
consequence errors in logic abound that needs only common sense
for their rectification. So the aim of this series is to put back
expertise that has been lost. Only a little common sense without
any maths at all is needed to put things right!”
This will help gain a deeper understanding of basic mechanics that
will be of value to engineers as well as other scientists and
philosophers. Indeed, a bonus is that the course leads toward
solutions for Dark Energy and Quantum Gravity.
Ron has the required expertise to solve these flaws
The following record should show to the reader that Ron has the
required expertise to show where these flaws are in physics and to
put them right. This means showing he has the required
understanding of mechanics and physics.
His father was a maths and science teacher whose hobby was model
engineering. His workshop provided a wonderful training ground for
gaining practical skills. So whilst an undergraduate and by the
age of 20 Ron had invented what he thought was the world’s first
gas turbine (GT). Then just before graduation using his father’s
lathe and other tools, he had almost completed his first model. It
was actually a ‘Gas Wave Turbine’ (GWT) operating on an entirely
different principle from Whittle’s jet propulsion engine that was
soon to emerge. The GWT used intense pressure waves to produce air
compression with rarefaction waves applied for expansion. So only
a single rotor was involved. The model GWT, which actually worked,
had a rotor of 2.5 inches blade tip diameter and is shown on the
left
After graduation the model impressed physicists at the National
Gas Turbine Establishment near Leicester so that he was taken on
as scientific officer working on gas turbine blade cooling and
axial compressors. However, wishing to develop the GWT Ron left to
be funded by the diesel engine firm Ruston and Hornsby of Lincoln.
There he designed and had built a larger engine having a 9 inch
diameter rotor as shown in the next photo. The complete engine
ready for its first trial is shown above.
To everyone’s’ amazement, after spinning it up to starting speed
of 3,000 rpm and pressing the ignition button, the engine started
at the very first try and accelerated rapidly to its full speed of
18,000 rpm. It was unheard of for an engine operating on an
entirely new principle to operate trouble-free from the very first
go! The engine ran for over 400 hours developing 45 horse power.
A sudden downturn in Ruston’s diesel engine sales unfortunately
led to funding being cut from further development.
Ron was offered a lectureship at Liverpool University and soon
after transferred to the University of Bath. There he
carried out various programs of research.
A chance return to industry appeared by way of a letter arriving
from the USA in 1981. Apparently the gas wave turbine had been
re-invented and work on their development had been proceeding for
several years. A number of teams were involved headed mostly by
physicists. However no GWT that had been built so far would work
at all so he was invited to the Naval Post Grad in Monterey where
he was asked to act as a Consultant there and at DARPA where the
Pentagon had funding requested for an even bigger starting engine.
They wanted to use a GWT for powering a missile, but even there
they had failed to get one to start!
The design had been too primitive and it had no hope of ever
achieving self-sustained operation.
The result was the proposal from Pratt and Whitney, the
aero-engine manufacturers, for a joint development program with
Canada. Ron was asked to be Technical Director of a new company,
dedicated to achieving a commercially viable engine.
Unfortunately the funding for the project was cut and the Canadian
Tax Credit Scheme that it had relied on was cancelled by the
government.
The reason had nothing to do with the GWT project. This Tax Credit
scheme had been designed to promote high-risk new technology.
Unfortunately entrepreneurs on other projects funded by the scheme
had been able to exploit a loophole. They used it to divert the
funds allocated to private use. The Canadian Minister involved
said he never realised how many crooks existed in his country.
It was now 1986 and Ron decided to go into early retirement where
he could continue his own studies and research. He had been
studying books on physics and cosmology, for many years – as a
hobby. As result he had become aware of a number of flaws in some
of the theories and he also found these only required the logic of
common sense for their rectification. However with the total of
all the flaws found, it seemed it could have thrown those
disciplines onto a completely false track.
So now with time to spare he diverted to a study of physics in an
attempt to correct that false logic.
Unfortunately times seem to have changed. Nowadays the
cross-fertilisation between disciplines, which used to be
encouraged, no longer seems to be appreciated. Indeed, he soon
found it is totally disallowed. So despite favourable peer review
and publication in scientific journals, it proved impossible to
communicate the information.
Consequently this is why a Spot the Flaw competition is being
initiated and promoted.
More detail about the GWT engine for the engineers
Since this kind of engine could still find a commercial
application engineers might like more detail.
The engine had a self-cooling feature due to alternating hot and
cool flows. Consequently although gases over 1,000oC were
admitted, the rotor was only made from ‘fortiweld’: a material not
much more expensive than mild steel.
To show how the GWT works a simplified wave-space-time diagram is
shown next. It is a development on the mean rotor diameter. The
inlet stator is on the left showing the three atmospheric air
inlet ports LA (bottom) and opposite these are two exhaust ports
LO. Hot gas at 4.5 atmospheres pressure enters at the inlet stator
port HGi and compressed air is delivered from the opposite port on
the right HAo. This air passes through a combustion chamber to be
returned to HGi. Other ports and ducts are provided that allow the
rotor to produce shaft power in the manner of a turbine and also
permit a wide operating speed range to be achieved without using
any adjustable port edges. The main compression waves are the
inclined solid lines. Expansion waves are in dashed lines and
contact surfaces between hot gas and cooler air are in chain
dotted lines. The rotor cell, shown at the top, is idealised to
match the wave diagram. Waves relate to the leading wall. Each
wave is represented by two lines. The first is the ‘wave foot’
where it starts and the second is the ‘wave head’.
Note how compression waves sometimes merge to produce a ‘shock
wave’. Note how expansion waves diverge i.e. spread out. The
actual blades had a helix angle of 37 degrees at mean diameter,
measured from the axial direction, bending to an outlet angle of
50 degrees. The stator porting was shifted through an appropriate
angle to suit.
Where the American teams failed mostly was in not taking account
of the width of rotor cells and not cancelling waves carried over
from one cycle to the next. Also their designs meant that
operation was confined to a very narrow speed range.
In the design shown these requirements were met by providing the
driving nozzles that produced shaft power from the energy needed
to eliminate carry-over waves. The duct PAo tapped compressed air
delivered by partial opening of the cell outlets as they
transferred to the high pressure duct HAo leading to the
combustor. This arrangement was one feature that allowed a wide
speed range to be achieved. Another was the low pressure hot gas
inlet nozzle MGi fed from the gas outlet duct MGo. Note the finite
width of walls separating ducts at different pressures. These
widths, a fraction of the cell pitch, have to be carefully chosen.
The next stage, if development had continued, would have used the
GWT to drive a centrifugal compressor of 3:1 pressure ratio so
that with the 5:1 of the GWT an overall pressure ratio of 15:1
would have been provided. This promised good fuel economy. The
power output would have been provided by a single stage gas
turbine connecting with the GWT outlet duct.
Advantages of such a combination are instant response to throttle
and a better part load performance than straight gas turbines.
They also promise to be much cheaper since gas turbines for high
pressure ratio need very large numbers of very small blades.
References
1. Penrose, R.:
http://discovermagazine.com/2009/sep/06-discover-interview-roger-penrose-says-physics-is-wrong-string-theory-quantum-mechanics
2. Smolin, Lee: The Trouble with Physics; Allen Lane Penguin
(2007).
3. Pearson, R.D.: PRESSURE EXCHANGERS AND PRESSURE EXCHANGE
ENGINES. pp.903-936; The Thermodynamics and Gas Dynamics of
Internal Combustion Engines Volume II. Edited by J.H.
Horlock and D.E. Winterbone: Clarendon Press: Oxford: 1986.
PATENTS
CA975643
Pulse Combustion Installations
[ PDF
]
EP0034915
Improvements in Radially Inward Flow Turbines
[ PDF ]
US2904242
Pressure Exchangers
[ PDF
]
US2904243
Pressure Exchangers
[ PDF ]
US2904244
Pressure Exchangers
[ PDF
]
US2904245
Pressure Exchangers
[ PDF ]
US2904246
Pressure Exchangers
[ PDF ]