Heat Engine Theory Heat engine are the devices transforming the heat supply or thermal energy trough

the liquid that are called working fluid into mechanical work. It does this by bringing a working substance from a lower state temperature to a high state temperature. A heat source generates thermal energy that brings the working substance to the high temperature state. From the Figure 1, the working substance generates work in the working body of the engine while transferring heat to the colder sink until it reaches a low temperature state. During this process some of the thermal energy is converted into work by exploiting the properties of the working substance. The working substance can be any system with a non-zero heat capacity, but it usually is a gas or liquid.

Figure 1 In general an engine converts energy to mechanical work. Heat engines distinguish themselves from other types of engines by the fact that their efficiency is fundamentally limited by Carnots. Although this efficiency limitation can be a drawback, an advantage of heat engines is that most forms of energy can be easily converted to heat by processes like exothermic reactions , absorption of light or energetic particles, friction, dissipation and resistance. Since the heat source that supplies thermal energy to the engine can thus be powered by virtually any kind of energy, heat engines are very in universal usage and have a wide range of applicability.

Figure 2 From figure 2, the direction of heat and work interaction is indicated by the subscript in and out. Therefore, all the described quantities are always positive. The net work output of Figure 2 is simply the different between total output of the plant and total work input.

The net work can also be determined from the heat transfer data alone. The component of the power plant above (heat engine) involves the mass flow in and out, and therefore they can be assuming as open system. The equation can be stated as:

Next, the thermal efficiency are the fraction of the heat input that is converted to net work output is the measurement of the performance of the engine. For the heat engine, the desired amount output is the net work output and the required input is the amount of heat supplied to the working fluid. Then, the thermal efficiency of the heat engine can be express as

Improvement of the devices As we know, the wheelbarrow is a small hand-propelled vehicle, usually with just one wheel designed to be pushed and guided by a single person using two handles to the rear. The wheelbarrow main use is in construction that are used to transfer or travel the heavy load or things into certain place in short time. But there are disadvantage of the present wheelbarrow that is the limited space and load to put into the wheelbarrow. Also, when the load increase, so does the force need to lift and moved the wheelbarrow. From the Figure 3, we can see that the load and the human effort (force) that are needed in order to move the wheelbarrow.

Figure 3 Next, to decrease the force needed to move the wheelbarrow, our group decided to increase the number of the tires from one into three or four in order to decrease the force to lift the wheelbarrow before moving. We also, increase the size of the load section in order to travel extra load. As we implement all the improvement, to move such heavy and bigger wheelbarrow, we need devices that are having more power. In order to implement the thermodynamic principle into this machine, we decided to put the heat engine that is used in small vehicle such as bicycle into this machine. As we can see from the Figure 2, the output of the piston system is the mechanical work that moves the machine or rotating machine. For example, Figure 4 is the process of the steam engine that used the heat engine principle. The heat input that are used to

heat the water then turn into steam in order to move the piston to produce the mechanical work output, thus, rotating the wheel of the vehicle.

Figure 4

Discussion Heat engines are a compromise between the crisp ideals discussed in thermodynamic textbooks and the clanking, hissing realities of irreversible processes. This compromise produces wonderful machines, such as the automobile engine and the household refrigerator. In designing real devices, the goal is not to approach thermodynamic ideals by reducing irreversibility but to balance cost, efficiency, size, power, reliability, simplicity, and other factors important to the needs of particular applications. Simplicity is the most striking feature of a natural engine, a reciprocating heat engine with no moving parts. As we will see, the basic operating cycle of the natural engine is so straightforward it can be applied to a wide variety of systems with working media that range from air to paramagnetic disks. Although the natural engine is new in concept, the underlying thermodynamic principles and processes are shared with conventional engines, such as the Stirling and Rankine engines. In principle, any idealized thermodynamic heat engine cycle is functionally reversible in the sense that it can be made to operate in either of two modes: prime mover or heat pump. Heat

flows from high to low temperatures, and the engine converts a portion of that heat to work. In a heat pump, the flows of heat and work are reversed; that is, work done on the engine causes it to pump heat from low to high temperatures. Few practical engines are functionally reversible. The internal combustion engine is a prime mover only; the household refrigerator is a heat pump only: neither engine is ever operated in both modes. One of the most important features of a heat engine is that many fuel sources can be used to operate them. They can use renewable energy sources as solar energy. For example, some Stirling engines that are being used in the United States are using solar energy, or when there is not enough energy available, they can use methane instead. Another advantage of using a heat engine is its silent operation. In comparison to Internal Combustion Engines (ICE), heat engines are almost noiseless, since combustion does not need to take place inside the engine and compression ratios are generally less than that of ICEs. Below, some of the advantages and disadvantages of heat engines are listed. Advantages:

sources.

Disadvantages: y available and has almost a constant temperature.

be ineffective.

of power, is generally large.