Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 7:19 — 3.4MB)

Today’s Totally Cool Tech: The Free Piston Electrical Generator for HybridCars (via Technology Review )

In conventional internal combustion engines, multiple pistons are connected via rods to a crankshaft that, via the transmission, drives the wheels. Free-piston engines do away with the crankshaft: the pistons aren’t connected to anything. Instead, two opposing pistons just shuttle back and forth inside a chamber. To generate electricity, the pistons could be equipped with rows of magnets that shuttle past metal coils to create an electrical current.

Email:  tctpodcast@gmail.com

Try GotoMyPC free for 30 days! For this special offer, visit www.gotomypc.com/techpodcasts