PNGinc News Release

Release Date: September 3, 1999

High Power Turbine Tackles the Cost Issue

Radical New Concept in Turbine Technology Lowers Cost-to-Manufacture

Phoenix Navigation & Guidance Inc. decided that the engineers were wrong about turbines...

Munising, MI -- The Engine of the Next Century is now being developed in a remote laboratory in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Free from urban pressures and the constraints of conventional auto industry thinking, Phoenix Navigation & Guidance Inc.’s Ken Rieli "threw out the book" and is conquering new territory with his low-cost turbine engine replacement for gas and diesel piston engines.

Boasting five million miles between overhauls and zero-net-gain on greenhouse gas emissions, the toughest design hurdle for the Phoenix Turbine team was to keep manufacturing costs down. Knowing that traditional turbine engines are expensive to produce, the company first eliminated the need for exotic materials in the design by incorporating radical new concepts in turbine technology. 

Throughout the design process, Rieli focused relentlessly on the cost factor, insisting that his turbine match piston and diesel engines in cost to manufacture. His goal: to replace gas/diesel piston engines in all modes of motive power with a superior, affordable engine.

Significantly lower maintenance costs also place high on wish lists for 21^st century engine improvements. The Phoenix Turbine is a vehicle owner’s dream, and a service mechanic’s worst nightmare. Virtually the only part which may need replacement after millions of miles of travel is a simple bearing set! Fewer oil changes, no carburetor problems, mysterious knocking or engine replacements. — Beat that, Detroit!

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