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Coffee House => Coffee House Boards => CH / Science and Technology => Topic started by: gizz72 on August 13, 2004, 05:03:07 AM
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Greetings,
As usual the crude oil prices are affecting all of us. I was thinking maybe it's about time we could use alternative means of fuel rather than gas fuel. Hopefully, cheaper as well but, the alternatives i'm about to writeup isn't cheap. Here goes...
* Water - Abundant alternative energy source. Down side electrolysis process is, i believe, too expensive. Most of the Oil companies will go after you since this technology will ruin their business. Here's one website -->> http://www.jimloy.com/pseudo/car-h2o.htm
* Sun - Fairly abundant. Down side you'll need a BIG battery to store those solar energy. Although hybid cars are STILL in the works and also too expensive. The other downside is acid waste dumps from old and used batteries will just ruin our environment.
* Electric - Endless cycle of energy converting from another form of energy. It'll just complicates things for your car. I'm not sure about the railroad industry, that's faster but flying is still safer, I believe.
* Wind - Hehe! Unless you live in a hurricane alley. Not likely. I seen to recall a Disney Flick that had barque ships with wheels running of endless green fields. Fantasy, really.
* Magnetism - If we can only find a way to levitate a piece of steel without submerging it in -700 degree F liquid nitrogen?? or counter the gravity on earth, without leaving the earth's orbit, we might be riding in to the spaceage of jetsons. Still to expensive.
* Lasers - I've seen one on the discovery channel once about a saucer disc that 'float' using pulse of laser. Very very expensive to build personal pulse lasters. If such a thing happens, we could be into the buck roger's era.
* Nuke - Too dangerous. Think of the radiation suit fashion industry would take advantage of this. Many riots too from demonstrations and all those anti-nuke issues...
Overall, we're still dependent on middle east oil, which is slowly depleting fast. Unless the energy crisis is resolve, we could endup, more likely, the MADMAX era. Part 1: Fighting for a drop of fuel. Part 2: Fighting for water. Part 3: Fighting just to survive.
Back to stoneage.. :-(
Regards,
Gizz
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@Gizz-
I mostly agree with your assessment of where the technologies you listed are deficient.
But, really, nuclear power on a large scale, designed with safety first, is a fairly clean, safe, and modern way of generating electricity. It's really a shame that the early horrendous accidents, along with the high cost of building nuclear plants, has stagnated the development of this source of electricity.
A plentiful, clean source of electricity could do wonders for clearing up pollution and raising sustainability. Nuclear is the closest thing we've got.
Overall, we're still dependent on middle east oil, which is slowly depleting fast. Unless the energy crisis is resolve, we could endup, more likely, the MADMAX era. Part 1: Fighting for a drop of fuel. Part 2: Fighting for water. Part 3: Fighting just to survive.
Well, there's no doubt we're too dependent on fossil fuels. But, I just don't see it all ending in MadMax style. It's not like one day the wells stop, and that's it. They slow over time, and people will struggle to get the deeper and harder to obtain oils. They will struggle to refine worse grades of oil. And you know what? That'll gradually raise the price of oil. We're not heading for a wall of "running out" of crude. We're heading for a years long, if not decades long price ramp-up as oil gets harder and harder to obtain.
Eventually the price will exceed the cost of other options, and as that happens, systems will be changed over to save costs. Honestly, the high gas prices the US is experiencing right now is probably a good thing, in that the prices are moving more toward the reality of the situation. (The truth of it is, that the US prices are now more in line with world prices...)
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Greetings,
>US prices are now more in line with world prices...)
Yup just refining 'dirty' fuel really is expensive nowadays. I'm not surprise why the US is the driving force of today's world economy.
Here in our country, we have small portions that has fossil fuel. If you recally the spratly islands, beleive to bore some fossil fuel enough to raise a small army. No doubt China and Taiwan wants a piece of it.
Alternativitly, we're looking ways to use coconut oil as alternative fuel source. Cheaper and clean too.
<:lol: joking no offense :lol:>
Just don't make me ride on a nuclear car that said 'made in taiwan'.
regards,
Gizz
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As always ...
There's BioDiesel.
Give the third world the contract to grow the Rape seed necessary for the process, curing two problems with one solution !!
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Water, re: hydrolysis implies electric.
Sun and wind imply electric.
Electric is the way. Electric is a common currency (oh, pun alert).
Hydrolysis may play a part in electric storage.
The thing about electricity is that you can make it anywhere out of all sorts of things and move it about for almost nothing.
As for cost, hybrids are not more expensive than other vehicles that seem to sell just fine.
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The_Editor wrote:
As always ...
There's BioDiesel.
Give the third world the contract to grow the Rape seed necessary for the process, curing two problems with one solution !!
Then we wouldn't have room to grow food, silly! :-)
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What drives my car? The Force on a very bad morning....
Anyway, We've reached the point where the fuel cell is becoming a viable alternative and a source of clean energy. The only problem is that separating hydrogen and oxygen requires more energy than is returned by burning hydrogen.
However, a British company has proposed using solar energy to separate the hydrogen and oxygen from water and reckon they're looking at 10% efficiency within the next few years.
I would miss the characteristics of driving an internal combustion engine, especially a high revving one as electric power has a constant power / torque curve. But that's progress I guess... Although if they make an electric or fuel cell engine that sounds like a Ferrari 640 grand prix engine then I'd be converted in an instant.
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Don't worry. I'm sure that someone will construct a car with a hyrdogen-driven combustion engine. :-D
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@Whabang
A hydrogen powered combustion engine is likely to be less powerful than it's gasoline powered equivilent, plus there's secondary pollution from lubricants and fine particles of metallics from wear in the engine... Plus the four stroke combustion engine isn't the most efficient device ever invented.
BUT
A properly tuned gasoline engine sounds absolutely fantastic, especially if it comprises of more than four cylinders (preferably twelve).
You've sold me on the concept of a hydrogen burning engine! I can do twelve to the gallon safe in the knowledge that most of what comes out of the tailpipe is nitrogen and water vapour, whilst enjoying the aural delights of a V12!
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Less powerful? I dunno; hydrogen/oxygen makes a quite explosive combination.
Mind you, many forklifts run on ethane.
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gizz72 wrote:
* Water - Abundant alternative energy source. Down side electrolysis process is, i believe, too expensive. Most of the Oil companies will go after you since this technology will ruin their business.
Like I keep telling people, you can't get energy from water (unless you invent a controllable means of nuclear fusion). The site you linked explains exactly why. You can get energy from moving water though, but not much, relatively.
Sun, Wind: too limited.
Electric, Magnetism, Lasers: All need energy, to give energy.
We only have two real options: vastly decrease our energy usage now, so we have more left to develop new technologies; or learn how to sharpen flint now.
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We need cold fusion! (Pun intended)
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IIRC the efficuiency comparison between a hydrogen gas engine and gasoline is something like 75%.
Remember that hydrogen is less dense than gasoline and therefore less volume of fuel is going to be injected into the cylinder unless it's under considerable pressure which results in significant temperature / storage issues.
However, an engine designed around the properties of hydrogen as opposed to being a fudged gasoline burning design may claw back some efficiency.
We do need a cheaper and cleaner source of energy to provide power for electrolysis (where H2O is separated into constituent elements). Diesel/Coal/Gas plants simply cause the same pollution elsewhere, wave/wind plants aren't efficient enough and there are long term issues with nuclear waste and radioactivity for nuclear plants to be trusted.
Fusion is a different matter though, but the technology is in it's infancy.
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KennyR wrote:
We only have two real options: vastly decrease our energy usage now, so we have more left to develop new technologies; or learn how to sharpen flint now.
I belve what happen to US gas price is doing just fine. This may be a turning point to make people stop dreamming about alternative energy cars. There always had been alternative energy cars before gas burnning cars. What make people go for the gas burnning cars is a long history behind it.
I'm keeping an eye on the new electric car company http://www.universalelectricvehicle.com/ . I know at this point it cost too high. I beleve the company is trying to sell fleets of electric cars to company. The only two draw back is one: storge of electric and two: prices. The big 3 cars company in US knows they will not make much money in the long run with electric cars. They make most of the money on cars repair and parts. I'm sure they make money on patents for aftermarket as well. In electric there is very little parts to transfer energy to the wheel. So there is not much to repair the electric cars. When you brought your DVD player, What was the last time you had to get a new one cause your old one got broken?
I'll stop from there, I was about to type a 235 pages about what make people get into gas cars in the first place when there are alternative energy cars. :lol:
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Super heated water (Steam)
Use Methanol to achieve intial temp. Then self generating with super condensors. (electric heaters)
No ??
Oh well ...Back to the drawing board.
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Greetings,
We all go back to our roots. A bike is always effiecient means of transportation. Most of the people in China uses it during the hieght of Communism. Till scooters came and 'Choked' them. :lol: What can I say. Progress?
Regards,
Gizz
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Wasn't Ford Working on a Hydrogen Fueled Car? I saw it on Tommorows World a few years ago, they said it's be ready in about 20 years :-) How about alcohol for a fuel (for cars)
Robert
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:pint:
Hum,
perhaps you would then need a brewing licence?
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Robert17 wrote:
Wasn't Ford Working on a Hydrogen Fueled Car? I saw it on Tommorows World a few years ago, they said it's be ready in about 20 years :-) How about alcohol for a fuel (for cars)
Robert
Hydrogen has storage problems that need to be overcome, imagine filling up at a petrol station where the pump is a hundred below zero. Not the place where you'd like to have a spill. A hydrogen powered vehicle is more likely to be fuel cell powered as opposed to internal combustion.
Alcohol is a great fuel. It burns much cleaner than gasoline, is less environmentally damaging in event of a spill - hell you can even drink the stuff!
Actually, I'm about 70% certain that the Germans used liquid oxygen and alcohol to fuel their V2 missiles during the final months of WW2... Anyone care to put me straight on that?
(cue Blob).
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Hum,
yeah,
alcohol 44% , lox 56% ...
though i do remember that they also used the monopropellant, Hydrogen peroxide with a catalyst to decompose it to power the turbine...
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`A Simple blaster` - Robbie the Robot
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Nice one Blob!
I think that Hydrogen Peroxide was also used in the Me 163 interceptor. It used two different fuels that were extremely volatile when mixed, which resulted in spectacular performance (for 1944).
However the pilot had to be extremely careful upon landing as the vapours from seemingly empty tanks could be coerced into igniting on a rough touchdown - kind of a bummer when the Me 163 had no undercarriage and was only equipped with a metal skid. The Hydrogen Peroxide fuel was also extremely corrosive and popular legend has it there were reports of pilots surviving a rough landing only to be partially dissolved in their seats.
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Rice, corn, and potatoes.
I have two fine legs, and I'm not ashamed to use them. Usually I use them to walk, for medium distances I bicycle, for the odd long trip (ie. less than once per week) I will break down and use public transit.
While we're at it: my room is lit by two 9 W CF bulbs and I usually limit myself to a single 9 W reading lamp. My usual form of entertainment is the radio and moderately energy efficient laptop computer, not an electricity guzzling television. The house is kept cool by opening or closing the blinds at the right time of day, and through the judicious (ie. infrequent) use of fans, not an electricty guzzling air conditioner. There is still a lot I can do, but it's not a shabby start.
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@macto
Cool...
Low impact living is the way to go.
anone hear about Nuna II , the fastest solar-powered car on Earth; with top speeds of 170 km/h, (thanks to leading-edge technologies from ESA), and is currently on tour in Sweden and Norway.
(http://www.esa.int/images/icon_NunaII.jpg)
Travelling 3010 km in 31 hours and five minutes, Nuna II won the World Solar Challenge in Australia in October 2003. The car was built and driven by students from Delft University in The Netherlands.
Link: (flash) (http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/VideoTalk/SEM5P2W4QWD_0.html)
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Petrol :P
Ah bugger iamapredictableasshole
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@ gizz72,
Not what, Who. Only Me.
Chris
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Hum,
I'm surprised that no one else has mentioned the nut that holds the wheel...
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@ blobrana,
"I'm surprised that no one else has mentioned the nut that holds the wheel..."
Umm, Thank you, Thank you very much.
Chris
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What drives your car?
Petrol. 98 octane unleaded. 2.4 litre engine & a Garret T3 with T60 compressor and an intercooler. Not exactly enviromentally friendly, but lot's of fun :-D
Only drive this car around 5000km per year, so my conscience is clean though...
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5.4L Triton V8
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OK.. 2.0L turbo AWD.
Chris
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Hehe!
2.5 Litre, 24 valve Milano V6. And it sounds lurvely!
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My method of personal transport runs on carbohydrates. Mostly curries and pasta.
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KennyR wrote:
My method of personal transport runs on carbohydrates. Mostly curries and pasta.
I should imagine that the emissions resulting from that fuel is even worse to the environment than T-Bone's V8.
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:lol:
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okay, we got this:
(http://www.ecn.nl/nwsbrf/images/0028a.jpg)
but what about this?
(http://www.seastead.org/comment-src/paper/images/container_ship.med.jpg)
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but what about this?
Thats a boat.
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Can I have an intelligent answer to this for a change?
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Well perhaps if you want an intelligent answer you should ask an intelligent question. What exactly are you asking? As far as I see my answer was a perfectly adaquate response to your question. A stupid answer would have been "wibble".
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:lol:
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Speelgoedmannetje wrote:
Can I have an intelligent answer to this for a change?
No sails, so what does it run on?
steam ? some kind of biofuel? nuclear?
It´s better than airplane transport but what are you getting at? :-?
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Dan wrote:
Speelgoedmannetje wrote:
Can I have an intelligent answer to this for a change?
No sails, so what does it run on?
steam ? some kind of biofuel? nuclear?
It´s better than airplane transport but what are you getting at? :-?
I bet that boat's a hell of a lot more efficient than most cars!
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T_Bone wrote:
Dan wrote:
Speelgoedmannetje wrote:
Can I have an intelligent answer to this for a change?
No sails, so what does it run on?
steam ? some kind of biofuel? nuclear?
It´s better than airplane transport but what are you getting at? :-?
I bet that boat's a hell of a lot more efficient than most cars!
At last we got T-Bone for an intelligent response :-)
I also think that boat is a hell of a lot more efficient than most cars (especially American ones), BUT... it still consumes a hell of a lot more energy than can produced by any durable energy resource methinks, plus, except from biogas, all durable energy resources deliver electricity and I can't imagine any electricity-driven motor that is powerfull enough for such a ship.
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Greetings,
Hmmm, what about those trailers inside the tanker. Goodness, that could take alot of electricity to haul all of those crates! Imagine, the inside of those trailers are a bunch of Amiga's waiting to be delivered to us. Imagine how long it would take to deliver them all on our door steps if electricity is needed? A month or more i believe. Mega watts of power is needed too. I'd say nuclear for the ship and BIO-Diesel for truck haulers. I remember the saying, HAULERS are the lifeblood of the city.
Regards,
Gizz
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We are...
there's also anohter saying ... Goes like this...
If your've got it...... A TRUCK brought it !!
and to those little stickers people put in their rear windows about how good their brakes are ...
NO My brakes aint as good as yours... Get the Hint (Hit those brakes and I'll remind you !! )
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whabang wrote:
Don't worry. I'm sure that someone will construct a car with a hyrdogen-driven combustion engine. :-D
Not necessary - we already did:
We at Ford developed the hydrogen internal combustion engine (ICE) as an interim solution to generate already today an demand for hydrogen fuel and to build up an supply net.
We presented this technique to German Federal Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder on 13th of July 2004 and are currently testing it in a Ford Focus C-Max Prototype:
http://www.ford.com/en/innovation/engineFuelTechnology/hydrogenInternalCombustion.htm
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Greetings,
@Dandy
That's is awsome. :-)
By any chance, how much is a gallon of Hydrogen fuel cell in the market today?
Regards,
Gizz
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Speelgoedmannetje wrote:
.....I can't imagine any electricity-driven motor that is powerfull enough for such a ship.
i saw a show about various alternative energy cars and someone drove their electric car (http://www.acpropulsion.com/SEMAtrip2003.htm) to Las Vegas. without refueling.
time to get stock in Li-Ion batteries.
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gizz72 wrote:
...
By any chance, how much is a gallon of Hydrogen fuel cell in the market today?
Regards,
Gizz
Hi gizz,
I'm not sure if I got your question fully.
I could find out how many liters a gallon is.
A fuel cell is a device to produce electrical power from hydrogene without emissions aside from clean water and heat. Normally there are many (~100) fuel cells packed together to one device.
But I certainly can't tell you "how much a gallon of Hydrogen fuel cell is in the market today"...
:-? :-o :-? :-o :-?
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Greetings Dandy,
how much a gallon of Hydrogen fuel cell is in the market today
Oops,:oops: hehe sorry.. :-D
-Rephrase-
What I mean was how much would a Hydrogen Fuel cell costs to local consumers once it's released? I hope it's not as expensive as crude?
Regards,
Gizz
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gizz72 wrote:
Greetings Dandy,
how much a gallon of Hydrogen fuel cell is in the market today
Oops,:oops: hehe sorry.. :-D
-Rephrase-
What I mean was how much would a Hydrogen Fuel cell costs to local consumers once it's released? I hope it's not as expensive as crude?
Regards,
Gizz
I imagine if it were cheaper, we'd be using it now. It's hard to beat gasoline for cheap power.
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gizz72 wrote:
Greetings Dandy,
how much a gallon of Hydrogen fuel cell is in the market today
Oops,:oops: hehe sorry.. :-D
:-D
You're welcome...
:-D
gizz72 wrote:
-Rephrase-
What I mean was how much would a Hydrogen Fuel cell costs to local consumers once it's released? I hope it's not as expensive as crude?
Regards,
Gizz
I really can't tell you - all I can say is that the prototype Ford Mondeo with Fuel Cell Technologie did cost about five million US-$ two years ago...
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Greetings,
dandy wrote:
I really can't tell you - all I can say is that the prototype Ford Mondeo with Fuel Cell Technologie did cost about five million US-$ two years ago...
:bump: Ouch!
Thanks ;-)
Regards,
Gizz
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gizz72 wrote:
Greetings,
dandy wrote:
I really can't tell you - all I can say is that the prototype Ford Mondeo with Fuel Cell Technologie did cost about five million US-$ two years ago...
:bump: Ouch!
Thanks ;-)
Regards,
Gizz
I think that's why our top management is oviously considering the hydrogene internal combustion engine as an interims solution.
An internal combustion engine does not need that much modification to be capable to be run with hydrogene and therefor is much chaeper than the fuel cell/electric engine
solution.
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T_Bone wrote:
I imagine if it were cheaper, we'd be using it now. It's hard to beat gasoline for cheap power.
Diesel.
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FluffyMcDeath wrote:
T_Bone wrote:
I imagine if it were cheaper, we'd be using it now. It's hard to beat gasoline for cheap power.
Diesel.
Hey, I'd love to go all diesel, but the treehuggers would complain about the additional NOx.
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NOx is no problem - get a catalytic converter. The particulates are a problem, however. Nothing like 40 nanometre soot particles to ruin your lungs.
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KennyR wrote:
NOx is no problem - get a catalytic converter. The particulates are a problem, however. Nothing like 40 nanometre soot particles to ruin your lungs.
"...smells like... victory." :-)
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T_Bone wrote:
KennyR wrote:
NOx is no problem - get a catalytic converter. The particulates are a problem, however. Nothing like 40 nanometre soot particles to ruin your lungs.
"...smells like... victory." :-)
hum, no, he only mentioned lungs
dunno what happens if this NOx gets in your blood via your skin or so...
(it's hard or even impossible to predict what happens to human and nature when you put unnatural amounts of a certain substance in the environment)
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hum,
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Speelgoedmannetje wrote:
.....I can't imagine any electricity-driven motor that is powerfull enough for such a ship.
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i came across American Superconductor Corporation, an electricity solutions company, that today announced that its prototype 5-megawatt (MW) High Temperature Superconductor (HTS) ship propulsion motor has been demonstrated successfully at full load, under steady state operational conditions.
Story here (http://www.amsuper.com/products/motorsGenerators/shipPropulsion.html).
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What drives your car?
Milk.
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Has anyone driven in one of they Sinclair C5 cars? I think thats what they're called.
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CU_AMiGA wrote:
Has anyone driven in one of they Sinclair C5 cars? I think thats what they're called.
Nope, but I rode something similar a few months back where you were in a recumbent position and steered with handlebars under your ass.
Frankly I felt exposed being that low to the ground and the handling was skittish compared to a normal bike. I wouldn't want to be on the inside lane of the highway next to a dirty great truck in a C5...
What electric cars need to do is excite before they're taken seriously. The Honda Insight and Toyota Prius are a success because they're seen as cool and fashionble, but the average Joe wants an electric car that burns rubber. Way back when Chrysler entered a turbine-electric car called the Patriot which stored kinetic energy in a carbon flywheel in the Le Mans 24 hour race. GM also built a few Impact sports cars and showed a promotional video of one outrunning a Nissan 300ZX to 60mph.
Although I drive a gas-guzzler, I try and mitigate this by biking to work as often as I can and biking to friends houses. However, now the weather is turning colder and wetter I'd rather be in a warm, comfy car than freezing my chumleys off on the saddle.
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CU_AMiGA wrote:
Has anyone driven in one of they Sinclair C5 cars? I think thats what they're called.
I raced one eons ago.. not exactly speedy, it was a standard C5 , about 25mph if my memory isn`t corrupt.
IIRC, it used an electric motor designed for a washing machine, and I think the C5 was built by Hoover for Sinclair.
There was a switch/sensor on the handlebars that cut the power to the motor when cornering. Guess it was a crude safety feature to stop it turning over at full speed (some hope..25mph and a low center of gravity!! :lol: )
Anyway, I found out that instead of smoothly turning into corners and going slow, that you could "see-saw" the handlebars and the motor wouldn`t cut out as much, still never got it on 2 wheels though
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I've always wanted to ride one of them damn things! :-D