> > But what is most important to me is that there are viable options 
> > OTHER than stirlings for turning heat into energy that are NOT 
> > developed due to the continued "promise" of stirlings.
> 
> I intend to attempt a niche Stirling investigation sometime 
> in the next year. If I am successful, and it just might 
> happen, you will hear more about it :-)


Actually, I think this is part of the problem: "If I am successful... You
will hear about it" 

The problem is that we DON'T hear about all the Unsuccessful stirling
projects. Documenting failure is important. I do it, for example, with my
server:
http://www.massmind.org/techref/servfail.htm and people hit that web page
all the time, referred from Google, searching for one of the error messages
that I have documented. 

If all the stirling failures and eCar battery failures and community
designed programmer failures were documented, people would move on and try
some of the things that haven't failed a million times already.

Just my humble opinion, of course, and I would LOVE nothing more than for
Russell or anyone to prove me wrong and develop an efficient, long lasting,
low cost of operation stirling engine.

In the mean time... 

there are viable options OTHER than stirlings for turning heat into energy
that are NOT developed due to the continued "promise" of stirlings. And some
of them are dirt cheap or will within the means of the average home
machinist. For example:

http://techref.massmind.org/techref/member/plp-actcom-f00/sun-turbo-1.htm
Possible quite efficient, long lasting, not terribly expensive.

http://techref.massmind.org/techref/idea/mc-heat-inject.htm Not efficient
but cheap as all heck.

http://www.flashsteam.com/ Not efficient, expensive, but probably long
lasting. If he would use solar, the efficiency doesn't matter so much.

http://www.redrok.com/engine.htm Lots of information on many alternatives.
Not many completed projects.

http://www.fieldlines.com/story/2003/6/26/10248/0825 Lots of crazy ideas
just waiting to be tried.

And in keeping with "money where mouth is" I am interested in providing
partial financial support for the attempted development of any of the above
or other reasonable heat engine ideas OTHER than stirling. In return I get
non-exclusive publishing rights. You just have to document what you do and
the outcome. Pictures, simple text descriptions, measurements of the result.

It doesn't have to actually work, in fact, failure is GREAT because it shows
what not to do in the future.

---
James.
 

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