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Magic Capacitor on car.

Recently ,there is a popular products appear in Asian market, like
Japan, Taiwan and Hong Kong.
Its a small box which has 2 leads ( some capacitor inside the box).
It claim it makes the car runs more smooth,save gas and improving
electric.
These small box has a few version which focus on different rpm,
like low rpm (about 2000-4000rpm)mid rpm(about 4000-6000rpm),
,high rpm(about 6000-9000rpm), and full range (about 2000-9000rpm)
All to do is connect its 2 leads to car battery terminal.

Simply said that it just connect some capacitors (parallel connect 3
cap,
totaly about 1000uF - 2000uF)
between the battery terminal for improving the car performance.
Many people around here makes their own DIY project on this idea
and find it work very well on cars.I also did this DIY and find a good
result
on some cars.(At first ,this small box was not convincible to me )


My questions are:
1-The manufacturer advertisment called this small box as an "electronic
rectifier".
Obviously this small box is supposed to be capacitor filter rather
than a rectiflier.
Some people said its a filter for noise/spark but its not
convinciable to me.
After studing some automobile circuit diagram, I would say its a
resonance
circuit with the ignition coil but it still not yet confirmed.


Any idea about this small box?
 
J

John Popelish

Jan 1, 1970
0
Recently ,there is a popular products appear in Asian market, like
Japan, Taiwan and Hong Kong.
Its a small box which has 2 leads ( some capacitor inside the box).
It claim it makes the car runs more smooth,save gas and improving
electric.
These small box has a few version which focus on different rpm,
like low rpm (about 2000-4000rpm)mid rpm(about 4000-6000rpm),
,high rpm(about 6000-9000rpm), and full range (about 2000-9000rpm)
All to do is connect its 2 leads to car battery terminal.

Simply said that it just connect some capacitors (parallel connect 3
cap,
totaly about 1000uF - 2000uF)
between the battery terminal for improving the car performance.
Many people around here makes their own DIY project on this idea
and find it work very well on cars.I also did this DIY and find a good
result
on some cars.(At first ,this small box was not convincible to me )

My questions are:
1-The manufacturer advertisment called this small box as an "electronic
rectifier".
Obviously this small box is supposed to be capacitor filter rather
than a rectiflier.
Some people said its a filter for noise/spark but its not
convinciable to me.
After studing some automobile circuit diagram, I would say its a
resonance
circuit with the ignition coil but it still not yet confirmed.

Any idea about this small box?

I have no idea what is in the box, but the question I ask myself is,
if such a small and low cost device actually improves the operation or
efficiency of an automobile, why didn't the manufacturer include in
the original design?

I seriously doubt that you can measure any positive effect caused by
installing such a device.
 
K

Ken Smith

Jan 1, 1970
0
John Popelish said:
I have no idea what is in the box, but the question I ask myself is,
if such a small and low cost device actually improves the operation or
efficiency of an automobile, why didn't the manufacturer include in
the original design?

Think back to days gone by. If you "flooded" your car and it would not
start, you pressed the gas pedal all the way to the floor and cranked it
over. It would usually start. This was because there was this extra
little part on the carb. It forced the choke off when the pedal was all
the way down. It was usually a sort of a bolt screwed into part of the
linkage with a jam-nut to lock it in place after it was adjusted.

On the 1960 Ford custom, there was no such part. They had deleted it from
the design. The threaded hole was there and everything. It was just a
little part that cost no more than $1 to include. They left it out and
saved $1 times (how many) cars.

If the motor mount in most cars breaks, nothing too awful happens. On
many this is because the metal of the motor mounts is made such that if
the rubber lets go, the metal its before anything else interesting
happens.

On some GM cars, if the motor mount breaks, the next time you press hard
on the gas, the engine lifts up, snaps off the boost for the breaks, bends
the trans. linkage jaming it in 2nd gear. The result is you are off like
a shot until a solid object stops you or you can get the key turned off.

Earlier GM cars didn't have this problem because a little extra bit of
metal was in there.

I'm sure a near endless list in the vein could be created.

Do I think this little device you hook to the battery is anything but a
scam? No.
 
T

Tim Wescott

Jan 1, 1970
0
Ken said:
Think back to days gone by. If you "flooded" your car and it would not
start, you pressed the gas pedal all the way to the floor and cranked it
over. It would usually start. This was because there was this extra
little part on the carb. It forced the choke off when the pedal was all
the way down. It was usually a sort of a bolt screwed into part of the
linkage with a jam-nut to lock it in place after it was adjusted.

On the 1960 Ford custom, there was no such part. They had deleted it from
the design. The threaded hole was there and everything. It was just a
little part that cost no more than $1 to include. They left it out and
saved $1 times (how many) cars.

If the motor mount in most cars breaks, nothing too awful happens. On
many this is because the metal of the motor mounts is made such that if
the rubber lets go, the metal its before anything else interesting
happens.

On some GM cars, if the motor mount breaks, the next time you press hard
on the gas, the engine lifts up, snaps off the boost for the breaks, bends
the trans. linkage jaming it in 2nd gear. The result is you are off like
a shot until a solid object stops you or you can get the key turned off.

Earlier GM cars didn't have this problem because a little extra bit of
metal was in there.

I'm sure a near endless list in the vein could be created.

Do I think this little device you hook to the battery is anything but a
scam? No.
Did GM un-fix that? I had that problem in a 1964 Buick when I was 16 (I
thought it was just driving too fast, it took running into the _second_
tree before I realized that it was the car and not me). The fix at the
time was to put in new motor mounts because the old ones had been
subject to a safety recall.

But yes, a car maker is going to multiply the cost of anything by 100000
or so to decide how much it's worth.
 
K

Ken Smith

Jan 1, 1970
0
Tim Wescott said:
Did GM un-fix that? I had that problem in a 1964 Buick when I was 16 (I

I believe that later versions didn't have the problem because they reduced
the clearances to make metal hit again. They also eventually, without
admitting there was anything wrong with the old one, change the stearing
box design that was killing people. Someone at GM discovered that dead
people may vote but they don't buy new cars.
But yes, a car maker is going to multiply the cost of anything by 100000
or so to decide how much it's worth.

if ((100000 * x) > LawyerCost) then FixProblem();
else Advertize();
 
Not only my experience,I work in automobile/electronic field and this box
is not convinciable to me at first.
Besides the effect of this small box,
What I'm asking now is the theory behind of these cap.,
how come they suggest to connecte a cap to the battery?

What I found out from automobile circuit is that the coil positive terminal
is connect to the battery positive, the negative of the coil is connect to a
switching circuit which switching the coil to ground.
If connect a cap across the battery, what is the circuit becomes?
I just thinking about this and please reply with ONLY technical commects.




John Popelish ¼g¤J¡G
 
J

John Popelish

Jan 1, 1970
0
Not only my experience,I work in automobile/electronic field and this box
is not convinciable to me at first.
Besides the effect of this small box,
What I'm asking now is the theory behind of these cap.,
how come they suggest to connecte a cap to the battery?

What I found out from automobile circuit is that the coil positive terminal
is connect to the battery positive, the negative of the coil is connect to a
switching circuit which switching the coil to ground.
If connect a cap across the battery, what is the circuit becomes?
I just thinking about this and please reply with ONLY technical commects.

A battery is essentially a voltage source in series with a small
resistance. In an automobile, this is paralleled by all the operating
loads and the charging system. The charging system includes active
regulation that increases the charging current as the voltage falls,
and decreases it as the voltage rises. It takes a bit of time for the
regulation to work, so this part looks most like a voltage source in
series with an inductance.

When the ignition switching circuit (points or electronic switch)
opens, there is a small rise in battery system voltage that the switch
has to deal with, in addition to the average voltage. At first
glance, one might think that this small ripple voltage might make the
switch's job harder to do, But the ignition coil produces a couple
hundreds of volts at that same instant, so the fraction of a volt of
rise in the battery system is extremely insignificant. Paralleling
the battery with a capacitor would slightly reduce the instantaneous
ripple voltage at the battery but I see no way this could functionally
alter the operation of the ignition system.

I suggest you perform an experiment. Connect a large capacitor to
your battery, except that you add a series switch (so that the
capacitor can be connected or disconnected very easily). Parallel the
switch with a resistor of say, 1k ohms, to precharge the cap to
battery voltage so the switch contacts to not weld. That will
effective isolate the cap when the switch is open, as far as any
voltage stiffening goes.

You (the driver) go out of sight of the car, and have a friend toss a
coin and position the switch based on the toss (say, heads = close the
switch). Then they write down the value of the toss and close the
hood and call you out. You take the car for a test ride and decide if
you think the switch is closed or open and record your result.

Repeat this test at least a dozen times. Then compare your judgments
with your friends record or switch positions. If there is a good
correlation (say, 90% matches) between your judgments and his record,
we might have a real effect to unravel. (Or your friend is
inadvertently communicating his actions to you. This is, after all,
only a single blind test.) I won't hold my breath.
 
what we/they found is the acceleration and torque is smoother and
didn't focus on gas/milage for the time being.
some claim that the 0-100km acceraration is even faster which measured
by a GForce meter.
If this cap is working on the principle of "lower impedance than the
battery",
Why the capacitors in the car Hi Fi, car ECU and other car instrument
can't do this similar job?
(They all already have some filter cap on their power line which connect
to the battery as well)
There is the information from a local auto magazine,one of the cap
combination
they use is 4700/1000/470uF in parallel,and I think this cap is common
in the power line of such existing car instrument.
Then why necessary to hook an extra cap on the battery terminal?

Regards.


Ben Bradley ¼g¤J¡G
Not only my experience,I work in automobile/electronic field and this box
is not convinciable to me at first.
Besides the effect of this small box,
What I'm asking now is the theory behind of these cap.,
how come they suggest to connecte a cap to the battery?

It's harmless and seems plausible to someone who knows little about
electronics.
A car isn't going to show the exact same gas milage [is this called
kilometerage outside the USA?] twice unless it is driven twice over a
closed course in carefully controlled conditions. Stopping at red
lights, going through green lights, different acceleration profiles,
slowing to avoid hitting a turning vehicle and such will all affect
gas usage. So if an average driver measures gas milage twice in a row,
half the time it will be higher the second time, and half the time it
will be lower the second time. So of those who install the device,
half will "measure an improvement in gas milage" and they may well
tell others about it. Those whose gas milage went down may feel duped,
and so be less likely to tell others about it.
What I found out from automobile circuit is that the coil positive terminal
is connect to the battery positive, the negative of the coil is connect to a
switching circuit which switching the coil to ground.
If connect a cap across the battery, what is the circuit becomes?
I just thinking about this and please reply with ONLY technical commects.

Oh, well then disregard my statements above...

Since the battery already has a quite low impedance (the battery
itself can be modelled as a nonlinear but very high-capacitance
capacitor), perhaps even at higher frequencies where the capacitive
reactance is lower, the capacitor does virtually nothing to affect the
car's electrical system in any way.
To calculate the precise effect of this device, I would weigh it,
and from measurements of gas milage vs. weight added to the car, I
would calculate how much this device reduces gas milage by being added
to the car.
 
B

Ben Bradley

Jan 1, 1970
0
Not only my experience,I work in automobile/electronic field and this box
is not convinciable to me at first.
Besides the effect of this small box,
What I'm asking now is the theory behind of these cap.,
how come they suggest to connecte a cap to the battery?

It's harmless and seems plausible to someone who knows little about
electronics.
A car isn't going to show the exact same gas milage [is this called
kilometerage outside the USA?] twice unless it is driven twice over a
closed course in carefully controlled conditions. Stopping at red
lights, going through green lights, different acceleration profiles,
slowing to avoid hitting a turning vehicle and such will all affect
gas usage. So if an average driver measures gas milage twice in a row,
half the time it will be higher the second time, and half the time it
will be lower the second time. So of those who install the device,
half will "measure an improvement in gas milage" and they may well
tell others about it. Those whose gas milage went down may feel duped,
and so be less likely to tell others about it.
What I found out from automobile circuit is that the coil positive terminal
is connect to the battery positive, the negative of the coil is connect to a
switching circuit which switching the coil to ground.
If connect a cap across the battery, what is the circuit becomes?
I just thinking about this and please reply with ONLY technical commects.

Oh, well then disregard my statements above...

Since the battery already has a quite low impedance (the battery
itself can be modelled as a nonlinear but very high-capacitance
capacitor), perhaps even at higher frequencies where the capacitive
reactance is lower, the capacitor does virtually nothing to affect the
car's electrical system in any way.
To calculate the precise effect of this device, I would weigh it,
and from measurements of gas milage vs. weight added to the car, I
would calculate how much this device reduces gas milage by being added
to the car.
 
M

Marlboro

Jan 1, 1970
0
Not only my experience,I work in automobile/electronic field and this box
is not convinciable to me at first.
Besides the effect of this small box,
What I'm asking now is the theory behind of these cap.,
how come they suggest to connecte a cap to the battery?

What I found out from automobile circuit is that the coil positive terminal
is connect to the battery positive, the negative of the coil is connect to a
switching circuit which switching the coil to ground.
If connect a cap across the battery, what is the circuit becomes?
I just thinking about this and please reply with ONLY technical commects.




John Popelish 寫入:

Have you ever heard a bypass capacitor? I though these caps are for
ignition circuit bypass, nothing else.
 
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