Dothan man improves gas mileage with hydrogen fuel cell

Most people have come to the stark realization they’ll have to pay more at the pump.

One Dothan man, however, wants to get his money’s worth.

Richard Garrard, 35, says he is getting between 32 and 35 miles per gallon ... in a Jeep Cherokee.

So what’s his secret? Hydrogen fuel cells.

“We have to do something,” Garrard said. “I hate going to the gas station, just like the next person. I thought, ‘Man, there’s got to be something.’ A family member of mine gave me wind of this a little over a year ago, and I’ve been messing around in my garage trying to come up with the best system I could do on the vehicle.”

After about eight months of tinkering, he developed a system that uses a hydrogen fuel cell to increase a vehicle’s gas mileage.

The cell is located under the hood, near the engine. When the car starts, the cell ignites, separating the oxygen and hydrogen from ordinary water, sending the gas through a tube that leads to the car’s air intake.

Garrard said the process is similar to “souping up” a car and increasing horsepower, and one gallon of water can produce 1,833 gallons of hydrogen.

“The gases go through a tube, go right through the air box and mix with the air,” he said. “The only problem I’ve run into is the engine saying it’s getting too much oxygen. I came up with a spacer for the O2 sensor, and that solved that problem. It’s free energy for pennies on the dollar.”

According to him, there are no more safety risks running his hydrogen cell than if he were driving without it.

“It’s a Brown’s gas, which is a little different than normal hydrogen,” Garrard said. “At the house, I’ve run tests, I’ve lit up the hydrogen and done tests I probably shouldn’t have done, just seeing how much hydrogen (I could use) and the effects of an explosion. The water isn’t going to catch fire, just the few cubic inches of hydrogen in there. I think there’s more danger having a full tank of gas in the back than there is with what I’ve got in the front.”

Garrard acknowledges the skeptics, who include even his own wife.

“It’s too simple, that’s why there’s a lot of skeptics,” he said. “She’s still kind of leery about putting it on her new car. She’s only got 25,000 miles on it, so she says, ‘Oh, let’s keep using yours.’ People say it don’t work, but if you look at the Web sites for Ford, Chevrolet, etc., they’re trying to come up with hydrogen technology. A lot of them are trying to come up with a full hydrogen (vehicle), which is really hard to do. You’ve got to have the amperage and power to produce enough to run a vehicle. But as far as a supplemental source, it can be done now.”

He warns to be weary of expensive kits sold online, since the system is relatively inexpensive to make and put on.

He hopes to sell his product in the future, but won’t do so until he’s tested it further.

“Most of those kits are scams, charging 300 or 400 dollars to get a minimum effect. I could build a kit, total package, install and everything, for around 150 dollars,” Garrard said. “I’d like to get a better system, investigate it, do more safety precautions on it. Right now, it’s experimental for me and my friends, but we’re enjoying it, and I wish I could give it to everybody.”

While he can’t give the system to everyone, he said anyone can duplicate his success.

“There’s a fine balance, because it runs off energy, runs off the alternator. The bigger the cell, the more you produce, the more voltage and amperage you’ll use, the more heat. It’s a fine balance,” Garrard said. “I tried not to advertise it a whole lot while I was doing all this, but it’s time now to let the people know it can be done, and if gas prices keep staying high like they are, there’s alternatives out there. We can do it. Anybody can do it. I can do it, you can do it, we’ve just got to want to do it.”