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page_id=986
Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org (http://fuel-efficient-
vehicles.org/energy-news)
News: Run Your Car On Fumes / Vapors
updated 12/01/2014
A carburetor that
would allow a car
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Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
to travel 200
miles on a gallon
of gas caused oil
stocks to crash
when it was
announced by its
Canadian inventor
Charles Nelson
Pogue in the
1930s. But the
carburetor was Big Daddy Don Garlits, a drag racing legend,
never produced in poses Aug. 2, 2002, with a 125-miles-per-gallon
enough volume, Pogue Carburetor at Don Garlits Museum of Drag
and mysteriously, Racing, Ocala, Florida.
Pogue went photo by Bruce Ackerman, Star Banner, 2002
overnight from
impoverished
inventor to the manager of a successful factory making oil filters for the
motor industry. Ever since, suspicion has lingered that oil companies
colluded to bury Pogues invention.
see Frank and 16 year ago below.
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Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
Frank:
After my dad had sent me that copy of the Pogue Carburetor
patent, and while I was working on my plans, an old retired
gentleman with whom I was acquainted, came into my shop,
and began to tell me of his experiences. He had been a
machinist somewhere in Minnesota I think, when a French
Canadian came to the shop. The Canadian had invented a
carburetor, but was having trouble with it vapor locking. The
machinist designed a valve for him that solved the problem.
While the machinist was talking, he kept saying, Oh, what
was his name? Oh, what was his name? I finally ask him,
Was that valve shaped like a rod split in half? He looked at
me in amazement, Why, yes! How did you know? I asked
another question, Was his name Pogue? Then the old man
was really amazed that I knew. I showed him the copy of the
patent that I had, and he was really excited. He went over the
papers like an excited child.
The old machinist went on to tell me how several months or
was it several years later he had to take some paperwork up
to the main office. He had to go through the conference room
where he saw Mr. Pogue in the midst of a bunch of oil
company big wigs. He named the wigs, but I forget the
names. They were heads of Texaco, Shell, Esso, etc. Some of
them had red faces, and Mr. Pogue looked like a trapped
rabbit. Of course the machinist was very interested as to what
was going on, but he knew he wasnt supposed to be there, so
he went on his way.
Later, one of the office boys came down to the shop, and told
the machinist, Hey, you know that Pogue guy that you made
that valve for? Well, he sold that carburetor, and plans, lock
stock and barrel to the oil company guys. They had a black
man carry the whole thing down and put it into the trunk of a
Pierce Arrow, and he drove off. That had been the last he had
heard or seen of it until I showed him those patent papers.
www.blog.hasslberger.com/2007
/04/pogue_carburetor_gasoline_vapo.html
Lead was added [at that very moment] to gasoline to [stop Pogue and]
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Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
prevent anyone else from building such a device, since lead leaves heavy
deposits and clogs these types of units, rendering them ineffective due to
the inability to transfer heat to the fuel.
September 1953
A lot of them said they were inventors and wanted to buy stock, wanted
information, wanted controlling interests. I later found out most were
from oil companies.
Were you ever threatened, Mr. Pogue?
Yes, several times.
Was your workshop broken into and models stolen?
Several times.
Were you ever the victim of political pressure?
What do you think? I had pressure from both Canadian and American
politicians. One of your fellows, a big shot in Washington now, was one of
them.
In Montreal today, a tired, resigned man goes about his work, trying to
forget the past. He hopes to brush from his memory the fact that 16
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Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
years ago he panicked the Toronto Stock Exchange, threw a fright into
major oil companies, upset manufacturers of carburetors and captured
the immediate, unflagging interest of every motorist in the world.
Or so some people say. And this is the year the world may discover the
truth. For this is the year of the Pogue carburetor the year the last of
the Pogue patents run out.
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Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
Wonder no longer.
For the first time in 14 years Charles Nelson Pogue spoke to a reporter. I
am that reporter and this is his story.
In the opening months of 1936, stock exchange offices and brokers were
swamped with orders to dump all oil stock immediately. Imperial Oil of
Canada, for instance, suffered a six-point drop. Why? Well, during June
and July of the previous year, it was rumoured that a small eight-cylinder
coupe fitted with a mysterious carburetor had driven from Winnipeg,
Manitoba to Vancouver, British Columbia- a distance of 1,879.5 miles- on
14.5 gallons of gasoline for an overall average of around 130 miles per
gallon!
This was not the first time however, that the carburetor had made news.
Since Pogue had started on the invention some 17 years before (about
the send of World War I) and there had been earlier impractical models,
Pogue had created whispers throughout the North American continent.
Oil men snickered at the idea and most motorists laughed off the news of
the invention as just another illogical contraption.
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eight cylinder
coupe. The
speedometer
showed that the car
had run over 8,000
miles. I drove the
car 26.2 miles on
one pint of
gasoline. The
performance was
100 per cent in
every way.
An engineer in a
Canadian
automobile plant
was quoted as
saying: At the
time of testing we
covered 25.7 miles
on one pint of
gasoline.
In addition to these
personal
testimonials, other
articles appeared in
the daily press and automotive trade journals about better idling, faster
pickup and in one case, a test car which was kept in an unheated garage
during a cold Canadian winter offered no starting difficulties during a cold
Canadian winter offered no starting difficulties during the entire period.
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Other articles at the time said that the carburetor was too impractical for
use in the ordinary course of driving because it was dangerous. These
writings pointed out that the Pogue carburetor was liable to explode at
any time.
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Now the general manager and part owner of a dingy second floor
machine shop in Montreal which specialises in the production of oil filters
and filter elements, Pogue is anxious to see if anyone will succeed where
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Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
he did not.
Each time his story is rediscovered Pogue is swamped with mail from
all 48 states, all provinces of Canada and at least 29 foreign countries.
His fame is so widespread throughout the Dominium that a letter
addressed to Pogue, Canada and mailed in San Antonio, Texas., once
reached him in three days.
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He admitted that when news of his invention first became public, he was
approached by many people. A lot of them said they were inventors
and wanted to buy stock, wanted information, wanted controlling
interests. I later found out most were from oil companies.
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Where? The companies buy from their own suppliers to make that
double profit. What company would give this carburetor away? Change a
little bit of chrome here and there, thats all they do for competitive
purposes.
Dont you think the public would have bought your carburetor for
installation on standard cars.
I dont want to talk about it anymore.
And that was the unsatisfying end of Charles Nelson Pogues first
interview in 14 years, perhaps the last time Pogue will speak about his
invention to anyone.
One emotional moment came when he was asked if his invention was
dangerous. He leaped up, towered over his gadget-strewn desk and
waggled his forefinger: Thats nonsense. Gasoline will not explode
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He also disclosed that the first rash of publicity brought letters of inquiry
from governments of Italy and Canada and personal visits from
representatives of Nazi Germany and Communist Russia. He hinted
darkly at financial and political considerations offered to him by these
governments but, when pressed for details, refused to continue.
Taking another tack. Pogue pointed out that the United States and
Canadian patent offices hold thousands of carburetor patents which are
superior to those in use. And yet they are never investigated by the
manufacturers, according to him. In the same vein, he described the
steam automobile as the most practical vehicle ever designed and
asked why it has been discarded. He believes that if as much research
had gone into steam propulsion as into the gasoline engine, all early
objections to that form of locomotion could have been eliminated.
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Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
During the late 20s and early 30s so many fuel-saving devices were
patented and placed on the market in the United States and Canada that
the National Bureau of Standards in Washington created a special
department to handle the testing of devises. For a fee of $35, the Bureau
tested devises and informed their sponsors as to whether the claims
made for the invention could be substantiated. The average claim for
gasoline savings with this influx of gadgets was 25 per cent. Although
Pogues claim made the others seem negligible by comparison, it still
excited no undue comment until the first personal testimonials came
out of Winnipeg in 1936.
The gas-air mixture going into the the multi-cylinder engine are not
even. To give maximum gasoline mileage, any carburetor should be
adjusted down to the leanest (least gas) possible mixture. But, if this is
done, the mixture may become so lean in one or more of the cylinders
far away from the carburetor, that those cylinders wont fire at all. A
richer mixture is generally offered for everyday use to make sure that
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Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
What, then, did the Pogue carburetor do to overcome these power losses
and offer the mileage claimed?
Basically, the Pogue carburetor heated the gasoline before mixing it with
the air. With this system, the inventor claimed that the imperfect mixing
of gasoline in air ( which resulted in small unvaporised droplets of
gasoline which do not explode, which burn slowly, unevenly and increase
internal heat- all bad for performance and mileage ) was eliminated and
every possible energy unit in the gasoline was being utilised.
To provide a perfect gas-air mixture for the engine, Pogue believed that a
heating chamber was needed to thoroughly vaporise the gasoline before
it joined the air stream and entered the cylinders.
His first vaporising carburetor (1930) had a single chamber with hollow
walls which allowed hot exhaust gases to circulate through the carburetor
and warm the gasoline in the chamber. When heat ed the gasoline should
turn to vapour. But there were no great claims made for this particular
model.
Pogue admitted to little difficulty in starting the car however, for the
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Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
gasoline was not warm until the exhaust gases reached it. So the first
charge of gasoline going into the engine was far rawer than those later
when it had been heated.
But with the exception of this one minor flaw, Pogue still believes his
carburetor is completely practical.
So the mystery of the Pogue carburetor lies not in the devise itself, but in
the semi-secret story surrounding its invention, development and
eventual abandonment.
Although he will not reveal his exact age, Pogue is not yet an old man.
His face shows the strain of years and the back of his hands are latticed
with a network of fine lines and veins which are the trademark of the
man who dreams with his hands.
http://www.carbongoodguys.com/charles-nelson-pogue-vaporiser-
carburetor-1936.html
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23 Comments
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19 of 27 20-Apr-16 22:29
Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
William
August 15, 2013 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-5721)
Gents:
I have been given permission by GM to pursue both Hummer and Saturn. Saab,
Opel and Ford subsidiaries in England and Russia are open to be acquired. They
know that the combination of high mileage cars and lithium air batteries are coming
and they cannot do a damn thing about it.
Further, too many people know the truth. The dissemination of facts cannot be
stopped either. Stop bitching guys. Lets do something. Act.
I plan to develop these technologies and combine them with free energy aspects to
boot. For example, not only have my team made a Pogue fuel injectable, but they
have also managed to tie a motionless electromagnetic generator to the lithium
battery. The result: nearly 180 mpg, with no need to recharge the lithium battery for
25,000 miles. Just think of it. They have also managed to tie in shocks, and
breaking to the lithium recharge.
To close, maybe being ex-military (intelligence, Air Force) makes me a bit more
optimistic. I know we can do this, and this is indeed the time.
William C. Sharper
dream on
barry
September 6, 2013 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-5737)
how can I get one of these vapour carburettors ;is there anyone making them as a
kit you can just bolt on?
20 of 27 20-Apr-16 22:29
Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
Dave H
October 25, 2013 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-5790)
Very interesting article. I acquired the Pogue Patent in the 70s and began work.
Not only does the vehicle get good mileage but the engine idles and runs extremely
smooth. Now I am too old and too worn down to continue the work but I know it
exists.
Bruce McBurney
November 12, 2013 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-5803)
21 of 27 20-Apr-16 22:29
Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
Rogue
November 29, 2013 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-5819)
Today we have the benefit of building one of these with off the shelf items like
aluminum roof flashing for the heat exchanging coils, a used fuel injector and fuel
pump from a upick junkyard (~$10us) for the atomizer, a 12v air mattress blower
motor for the air pump, if you can manage with these, then you can figure out the
rest.
If such a contraption were mounted on a fuel injected engine upstream of the mass
airflow meter then the oxygen sensor should notice the excess fuel and shut off the
cylinder injectors proportionately. You also wont have any issues with cold starting
on a fuel injected platform if you use a radiator fan sensor switch and a relay to kick
in your Rogue Pogue that way it doesnt kick on until the exhaust gases are up to
temp. A double 12v gas valve from an old RV furnace can be used to downstream
of the blower motor and drill a hole in a brass compression cap as an orifice sized
to match the engine.
Build one, use it (like Pogue did), stay out of the limelight and no one will bother
you.
Rogue Pogue
Larry
December 8, 2013 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-5830)
22 of 27 20-Apr-16 22:29
Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
Have a 2012 honda civic will it work, and can I buy one? How much? And are they
easy to install?
I guess you did not read Bruce McBurneys comment (2nd below).
William
April 12, 2014 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-5999)
Mesdames, Gentlemen: Who owns the rights to the Pogue? I am having trouble
discerning the rightful owner.
William Sharper
jean
April 30, 2014 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-6072)
23 of 27 20-Apr-16 22:29
Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
Hi, I would like to have the EP130. Are you selling it and at what cost? Do you have
a specific website? Or do you have a hho kit that works 100% for a 2-3 l car? Can
you deliver in Canada and what are the requirements?
Regards,
Jean
Can you put a little gasoline in the bottom of a gas can, and run you car on vapors?
(see our Run Your Car On Vapors page)
ron
May 23, 2014 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-6493)
Id never read the true story before, fascinating. Growing up in the fifties I had
heard of Pogue and the 200 mile per gallon carburator but the story was that an oil
company executive invited the inventor on a fishing trip and he was never heard of
again! Amazing the information you can get on Google.
Ron Rich
ted
June 4, 2014 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-6656)
to William Sharper
Who owns the rights, the patent ran out decades ago. it is public domain. ted
woodard
24 of 27 20-Apr-16 22:29
Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
Kirk
July 14, 2014 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-6898)
The Bureau of mines says the lower flammability number for gasoline as a vapor is
3%.
And you have no idea what the lower explosive number for gasoline as a vapor
means. Would someone like to tell him? (see our page Run Your Car On Vapors)
Kent
July 26, 2014 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-6933)
All this sounds great if oil companies do not snuff anyone with a great idea? Kent
Joe
October 12, 2014 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-7344)
I have had my 350 c.i. 95 Chevy pickup running (at an idle only) with a mock-up
version of Pogues carb. It ran so smooth a glass of water barely rippled on the air
cleaner. Absolutely amazing
Joe Barbuito
25 of 27 20-Apr-16 22:29
Charles Pogue Carb. | Fuel-Efficient-Vehicles.org http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=986
great!
Mark
November 30, 2014 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-7398)
I know of someone working on a similar idea. He has the needed patents. So far all
motor vehicle people and companies are showing disinterest, or negative feedback
. He will continue to make it work. This is today 11/31/14. Not from years ago.
Mark J. Gordon
The disinterest, or negative feedback should tell you that, unfortunately, those
things have not changed. If you (and he) read our Run Your Car On Vapors page,
where others have made it work also and are sharing their successes you will both
see that is how things WILL change.
Frik
October 7, 2015 (http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-
news/?page_id=986&cpage=1#comment-7785)
this look 100% have you still got the blueprints (plans) for it
Not a blueprint, a patent. His full patent with all its drawings is all over the internet.
26 of 27 20-Apr-16 22:29
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