Ford to swap out spark plugs for lasers, windshields for googly eyes
By Joseph L. Flatley 
posted July 17th 2009 2:23PM
posted July 17th 2009 2:23PM
Ah, yes... the future. Remember that? That magical land of flying cars, wearable chariots and Robot Apocalypse? Well, none of that has come to pass (yet!) but if researchers at Liverpool University have their way (and all indications are that they will) the next Ford you purchase will use a laser beam ignition system instead of spark plugs. According to The Telegraph (UK), lasers can be split into multiple beams and aimed at multiple ignition points, making the new system much more reliable. In addition, the engine's cold weather performance is improved -- and as the article points out, "this is the time when around 80 per cent of the exhaust emissions are produced and the engine is at is least efficient." And if that weren't enough, the laser system produces more stable combustion, using less fuel in the process. Consumers can expect to see this technology hit showrooms "within the next few years."
[Via Auto Blog]
[Via Auto Blog]
Yo dawg, we herd you like drive-by's lasers, so we put lasers on your car, so you can drive while yo laser helps yo drive
I meant to ask how much power will this consume in comparison to a typical starter.
It will depend on the flux capacitors ....
It's not a starter, spark plugs take vary large amounts of power from the ignition coils. I can't imagine lasers using THAT much more power
Still a ford though. You can dip a dog turd in gold but it's still a dog turd.....
no it would be golden dog turd - it'll be golden, and you might even be able to sell the gold too!
Aren't there artist that wrap turds in gold then sell them for millions to museums of modern art? I though I saw a newsitem about that.
The fine people at Engadget's sister-site Autoblog would like to have a word with you on modern Fords and how they're actually far, far better than your moronic preconceived notions allow you to believe. Do some research.
Union made auto=turd. I'll not be giving my money to them thanks.
well you probably have had bad luck, Ford is making quality vehicles.
their cars might have random problems, but their trucks are built to LAST.
@d889: I though that was Duralast?
d889: That's pretty sad to hear considering the Toyota Tundra is rated to be more reliable than the Ford F150.
Anyway, Ford has improved but they are still not as good as the foreign competitors. The only reason they are doing the best now is because of our patriotism to buy domestic and the mislead public that thinks that Ford didn't take any government money. Fords are still ugly and going in a horribly wrong direction with the new Fusion and F150.
"That's pretty sad to hear considering the Toyota Tundra is rated to be more reliable than the Ford F150."
For every survey you show me that says the Tundra is more reliable than the F150, I'll show you two that show the opposite.
"Anyway, Ford has improved but they are still not as good as the foreign competitors."
You mean like the reliable VW, Audi, BMW, Suzuki, Mitsubishi, Isuzu, Fiat, etc. Ford is better than every one of them. It's only with Honda and Toyota where it starts being debatable.
Fire the laser!!!
Preparation A through G was an utter failure, so we are going to go with Preparation H! FIYA THA LAZAAAAA O_o
The laser technically does not have to be anywhere near where the the fuel ignites. Making less dirt get on the lens. The laser could be reflected into those regions though.
Shouldn't you be directing your 'roid rage or prepubescent tantrums, or whatever your problem is, at the source site?
Audi happens to be my favorite but Mercedes does have some nice products of it's own.
I believe that the " " used to enclose the sentence imply some sort of direct quotation used from a different article... as in not written by Engadget but copied from somewhere else... but I don't know for sure. Sounds like something I learned in high school or something...
Engadget... I believe you're missing the inline quotation line number along with the writer's last name at the end.
OK, back to trolling :)
Listen up nay sayers. Look up wdp paintball guns, they use lasers to detect when a paintball is loaded and it works through broken wet paint. That's right, it works when the lens is dirty, I know this is something that's new to most of you nerds out there, but the lens does not have to be spotless like what you are used to.
"DVD or bluray laser output at the most would be my guess, although I'm no combustion expert, "
LOL Well if you think it would be the same output as those no wonder you have doubts. If they had an ignition source that ran on that little power that would be hugely more efficient than spark plugs and ignition coils, they are going to use more than that though.
Yeah some people don't really know what their talking about when it comes to cars. To add some more info to the topic, spark plugs need around 100,000 volts to jump the gape on the plugs. While it jumps the gap the spark has to be hot enough to ignite the gasoline, which is somewhere around 500 degrees F so this laser has to be around the same temperature as the spark plugs. What they really need to do to make this thing more efficient is to inject the gasoline during the compression stroke across the lasers. Make it more like a diesel without all the crazy compression of a diesel.
There are lasers that can burn on contact that operate off of a single AA battery. It's not the amount of power pouring into the laser that determines it's ability to cause combustion. Especially at at close range, but it's wavelength. Red lasers would need the most power. Green would require less, blue even less, but ultraviolet laser, and they do exist would require extremely small amounts of input power to cause a combustible gas mixture to ignite. The real trick being the proper oxygen to fuel mixture. If cleaner fuels like alcohol any variant, or natural gas the system could burn without causing serious carbon build up on the lenses in the combustion chamber. But you paintball gun reference is correct! I'm not replying to shout you down, but to help strengthen your point.
Naysayers need to step back and stop picking only the parts that fit their agenda. There is more available with present technologies than is being reported.
This is one of the biggest examples of how far Engadget has slipped... and why Slash and GDGT will be much more factual and informative.
This is a pretty major step in technology that could potential increase horsepower and create a more effecient vehicle... but lets engadget it all up.
Will it also have a disco ball?
That is the most profound thing I've seen on this site all year.
Society thanks your left hand for its contribution.
When the Brits learn how to make an automotive gasket that doesn't leak like a sieve then they can put lasers in my car.
that car looks just like the new 2010 mazda3 :)
We need more smiling cars.
Spark plugs are easy, you clean and gap them every few months and they'll work great. They are also cheap 2.50 to 8 dollars depending on how easily you are manipulated by marketing gimmicks. Lasers though... replacing a laser is probably going to be harder, more expensive etc.
Ford needs to get Dr.Evil out of their engineering department and go back to making simple reliable vehicles. I hate all this newfangled crap even automatic transmissions are a pain because of their failure rate. Whoever thought of putting a computer in a car for any purpose other than to display porn was a moron, they could at least include an obd-II reader with them, an lcd that displays the error codes would be nice, rather than a light that goes off to inform you that your car is broken somehow somewhere and you need to take it in for repairs. Why aren't we allowed to fix our own cars anymore?
I couldn't help myself...I'll admit it, I cried. Rene's post is just so...so deep.
:'-)
Ah yes - An answer to the question no-one asked.
Maybe they'll make a retrofit kit, so I can spend a few hundred $s installing a system that improves my mileage by some paltry fraction, ultimately saving me a few pennies at the pump. Or maybe a drop-in hybrid-electric powertrain to replace that craptastic Ford motor altogether?
I'm glad yet more money has been spent improving the inherently inferior internal combustion engine. Had that money been poured into battery research, maybe AVs would have a chance in this market. They are, after all, intrinsically superior in every way. But no - we watch the bumbling mongoloidal domestic automakers take two bandy-legged steps forward and one step back, and we call it "progress."
Tesla has been around 5 years(?) and their $50k Model S has a 160 mi range. GM's Volt is slated at $40k with a 40mi range. That's LESS range than their EV1 got 10 years ago! And that used Lead-acid batteries! Come on!
can blog commenters receive pulitzers? if so ... bravo my friend ... bravo
Here's the real problem with this post. While the info in it is feasible the manner in which it is delivered is such as to infer it to be outlandish and unreasonable. Thus promoting an environment of ridicule and effectively rendering it as disinformation.
Shame on you again Engadget.
silly Ford, lasers are for dolphin.
And we'll call them Shark Plugs.
KACHOW!
Engadget fails to express how Ford is relevant in all of this. As if they just pulled Ford out of the air. Reading the article explains this, but seriously Engadget? Arent you supposed to be providing a decent (and accurate) overview of the article?
It's great that Ford is making the ignition more reliable, of all things. I can't really remember when I last had an ignition fail - oh wait, I got it, that was on a 1972 Cadillac DeVille I had in 1997. When the DeVille died, I got a 1980 Ford Fairmont. Which, at 20 years of age, had plenty of issues, but never an ignition problem.
Sounds like a solution in search of a problem.
Friggin Awesome!