I miss Jobst

Ron Ruff wrote:

Chalo wrote:

Tax and administrative policy that results in the broad adoption of
400cc, 1200lb cars is categorically better than that which results in
the popularity of 7000 pound, 6+ liter cars. *I think we should ban
huge personal cars, just to make the roads more tolerable and safer
for small, efficient vehicles.

200cc, and 600lb would be sufficient for a tandem 2 seater. Or even
better, make it electric.

How about 50cc and 130 lbs for a single seater?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peel_P50

I used the size of the Citroën 2CV as an example because it was a
common car in its place and time, satisfactory enough for a lot of
people to spend their own money on it.

Electric propulsion makes microcars a lot heavier. They can still be
more efficient than internal combustion, but heavy batteries mean they
need a heavier frame, stronger wheels and suspension, more powerful
motor, etc., etc. And after beefing everything up, you might need
some more batteries!

Chalo

On Sat, 21 May 2011 22:35:37 -0700 (PDT), Ron Ruff
wrote:

On May 21, 7:51*pm, john B. wrote:
The fact is that something could be done about both emissions and
energy use, but no one wants to do it. Extreme examples could be, for
all autos to be limited to less then 100 H.P., home air conditioners
totally banned, No more snow blowers or power lawn mowers, grass
blowers, lawn edgers, etc. (exercise IS good :-). Revert to wind power
for shipping, and so on.

All perfectly feasible, after all it is just reverting to a life that
your parents or grand parents knew.

Severe lack of imagination. We have much better technology... that is
the huge difference. Does a good life require gluttonous energy use?


I'd have to say that it does. At least every where I've been it does.
One of the problems every developing nation faces is the traffic
problem. In 20 years the use of autos can go from a few rich folk to
practically everyone. Singapore has some of the most draconian laws in
the world regarding auto use. You need a special permit to purchase
one, vehicles 10 years old are required to be scrapped; all vehicles
required to be equipped with a device that pays fees for road use
automatically, and so on. The cost of acquiring an auto is said to be
the highest in the world. The results? Traffic congestion.

As for "new Technology" it seems to be mainly in the fields of
discovering something new to sell the masses. Probably 30 years ago,
maybe longer, I read a pretty good analysis of an electric automobile,
based on the then current technology. The author started with the
premise that the smallest auto acceptable to the U.S. Public was the
VW Bug, and based his design on that criterion. As I remember the car
would do 60 MPH and had a range of something like 200 miles. In other
words a pretty good little car for the city.

Anyway, after describing the car and pricing out components he arrived
at a small car that was cheaper then an equivalent gasoline car and as
functional as a VW Bug. And then he wrote... "However, what happens
when a million people come home at 5 P.M. and plug their electric car
into the charger."

As I remember it would have required something like triple the
existing (as of the date of the article) electrical power to be
available in the L.A. Basin at 17:00 hours.

That is the trouble with most of the new technology. The technology is
very nice but the infrastructure or other dependencies come unglued.
The U.S. built, if I recollect, the first nuclear powered freighter.
Nobody else did and the original ship is no longer sailing.

On Sat, 21 May 2011 22:32:33 -0500, Tºm Shermªn™ °_°
" wrote:

On 5/21/2011 8:56 PM, john B. wrote:
On Sat, 21 May 2011 08:21:00 -0500, Tºm Shermªn™ °_°
" wrote:

On 5/21/2011 7:21 AM, john B. wrote:
On Fri, 20 May 2011 18:59:55 -0500, Tºm Shermªn™ °_°
" wrote:

On 5/20/2011 7:12 AM, john B. wrote:
[...]
While the Maine explosion, in which 266 died, was shocking it was
hardly as catastrophic as the Johnstown flood, some ten years earlier,
in which more then 2200 people died. The WTC disaster is, I suspect,
the greatest disaster which has occurred ion U.S. soil.[...]

Greater than the genocide of the American Indian?

I have to say that I was wrong about the WTC's place in the U.S.
Disaster listing. A hurricane in Texas carried off something like
20,000 people (and I'd never even heard of it).

I'm not too embarrassed by the genocide of the American Indian. after
all, they were not adverse to slaughter the white man given a chance
and had they not been essentially a stone age culture they might well
have been more successful. After all even the U.S. Army considered
them first class light cavalry.

Certainly this does not justify genocide but the practice has been
going on for centuries, starting, some theories has it, with
prehistoric man.

Fortunately ethnic cleansing and/or genocide has become socially
unacceptable, except for the Nakba, and as Mr. Atzmon would say, the
Tide Has Turned:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iplwg842mk8&feature=related.


As someone said in a slightly different context, "speak for your self,
John".

Obviously genocide is not socially unacceptable... in some societies
it appears quite acceptable. In fact the Africans seem to be quite

All of them? Sheesh!

enthusiastic about the subject and I suspect that most of the peoples
in the Middle East would happily embrace it, given half a chance.

The only people in the Middle East interested in ethnic
cleansing/genocide are the Zionists. Muslim Arabs and Jews coexisted
with no problems for over 1250 years, until Zionism reared its ugly head.


I'm not sure that the words "with no problems" is really applicable.
There is considerable proof in the Koran that Muhammad initially
accepted the Jews as "people of the book" but they soon fell from
grace as they didn't accept Muhammad as a prophet. I think that the
final solution was to make them pay a special tax, but otherwise let
them alone.

The genocide is a different thing although it is a highly political
problem with a tremendous amount of propaganda being generated by both
sides. Frankly I refuse to discuss the matter as both sides has told
so many lies that I wonder if the truth will ever be known. But I
suppose, as someone said, :"history is written by the victors".

On 5/22/2011 6:57 AM, john B. wrote:
On Sat, 21 May 2011 22:32:33 -0500, Tºm Shermªn™ °_°
" wrote:

On 5/21/2011 8:56 PM, john B. wrote:
On Sat, 21 May 2011 08:21:00 -0500, Tºm Shermªn™ °_°
" wrote:

On 5/21/2011 7:21 AM, john B. wrote:
On Fri, 20 May 2011 18:59:55 -0500, Tºm Shermªn™ °_°
" wrote:

On 5/20/2011 7:12 AM, john B. wrote:
[...]
While the Maine explosion, in which 266 died, was shocking it was
hardly as catastrophic as the Johnstown flood, some ten years earlier,
in which more then 2200 people died. The WTC disaster is, I suspect,
the greatest disaster which has occurred ion U.S. soil.[...]

Greater than the genocide of the American Indian?

I have to say that I was wrong about the WTC's place in the U.S.
Disaster listing. A hurricane in Texas carried off something like
20,000 people (and I'd never even heard of it).

I'm not too embarrassed by the genocide of the American Indian. after
all, they were not adverse to slaughter the white man given a chance
and had they not been essentially a stone age culture they might well
have been more successful. After all even the U.S. Army considered
them first class light cavalry.

Certainly this does not justify genocide but the practice has been
going on for centuries, starting, some theories has it, with
prehistoric man.

Fortunately ethnic cleansing and/or genocide has become socially
unacceptable, except for the Nakba, and as Mr. Atzmon would say, the
Tide Has Turned:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iplwg842mk8&feature=related.


As someone said in a slightly different context, "speak for your self,
John".

Obviously genocide is not socially unacceptable... in some societies
it appears quite acceptable. In fact the Africans seem to be quite

All of them? Sheesh!

enthusiastic about the subject and I suspect that most of the peoples
in the Middle East would happily embrace it, given half a chance.

The only people in the Middle East interested in ethnic
cleansing/genocide are the Zionists. Muslim Arabs and Jews coexisted
with no problems for over 1250 years, until Zionism reared its ugly head.


I'm not sure that the words "with no problems" is really applicable.
There is considerable proof in the Koran that Muhammad initially
accepted the Jews as "people of the book" but they soon fell from
grace as they didn't accept Muhammad as a prophet. I think that the
final solution was to make them pay a special tax, but otherwise let
them alone.

The genocide is a different thing although it is a highly political
problem with a tremendous amount of propaganda being generated by both
sides. Frankly I refuse to discuss the matter as both sides has told
so many lies that I wonder if the truth will ever be known. But I
suppose, as someone said, :"history is written by the victors".

There is a well known song about it: "There's No Business Like Shoah
Business".

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

john B. wrote:

Anyway, after describing the car and pricing out components he arrived
at a small car that was cheaper then an equivalent gasoline car and as
functional as a VW Bug. And then he wrote... "However, what happens
when a million people come home at 5 P.M. and plug their electric car
into the charger."

As I remember it would have required something like triple the
existing (as of the date of the article) electrical power to be
available in the L.A. Basin at 17:00 hours.

There are already load leveling systems in place for industry. To
make the grid work better for electric cars would require only smart
metering at the point of charging. The cars would be charged as
capacity was available, and their battery packs could help catch peak
loads as necessary.

That is the trouble with most of the new technology. The technology is
very nice but the infrastructure or other dependencies come unglued.
The U.S. built, if I recollect, the first nuclear powered freighter.
Nobody else did and the original ship is no longer sailing.

First:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenin_(nuclear_icebreaker)

Still operating:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sevmorput
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamal_(icebreaker)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NS_50_Years_Since_Victory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taymyr_(nuclear_icebreaker)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaygach...ear_icebreaker)

Chalo

On 5/22/2011 12:27 AM, Ron Ruff wrote:
On May 21, 2:08 pm, wrote:
Tax and administrative policy that results in the broad adoption of
400cc, 1200lb cars is categorically better than that which results in
the popularity of 7000 pound, 6+ liter cars. I think we should ban
huge personal cars, just to make the roads more tolerable and safer
for small, efficient vehicles.

200cc, and 600lb would be sufficient for a tandem 2 seater. Or even
better, make it electric.

See http://www.go-one.us/models/go-one-evolution.

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

On May 22, 1:02*am, Chalo wrote:
Ron Ruff wrote:

Chalo wrote:

Tax and administrative policy that results in the broad adoption of
400cc, 1200lb cars is categorically better than that which results in
the popularity of 7000 pound, 6+ liter cars. *I think we should ban
huge personal cars, just to make the roads more tolerable and safer
for small, efficient vehicles.

200cc, and 600lb would be sufficient for a tandem 2 seater. Or even
better, make it electric.

How about 50cc and 130 lbs for a single seater?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peel_P50

I used the size of the Citroën 2CV as an example because it was a
common car in its place and time, satisfactory enough for a lot of
people to spend their own money on it.

Electric propulsion makes microcars a lot heavier. *They can still be
more efficient than internal combustion, but heavy batteries mean they
need a heavier frame, stronger wheels and suspension, more powerful
motor, etc., etc. *And after beefing everything up, you might need
some more batteries!

Chalo

If you haven't seen this website, it's very interesting. Microcar
Museum http://microcarmuseum.com/tour/fiat-multipla.html

Actually, battery power doesn't make a car heavy if you design for
modest range and speed... and such a car can be made very simple. Just
an overgrown alternator and some batteries... doesn't even need gears.
Not to mention the advantage of silence and no pollution. Lithium Iron
Phosphate batteries http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium...sphate_battery
have an energy density of 100 Wh/kg. So for instance if you average
say 2500W for two hours, this is only 50kg of batteries. Not very
heavy compared to the payload.

On May 22, 5:18*am, john B. wrote:
I'd have to say that it does. At least every where I've been it does.
One of the problems every developing nation faces is the traffic
problem. In 20 years the use of autos can go from a few rich folk to
practically everyone. Singapore has some of the most draconian laws in
the world regarding auto use. You need a special permit to purchase
one, vehicles 10 years old are required to be scrapped; all vehicles
required to be equipped with a device that pays fees for road use
automatically, and so on. The cost of acquiring an auto is said to be
the highest in the world. The results? Traffic congestion.

Would they be better off if everyone in Singapore had a 6000lb SUV to
drive to work?

Congestion is the result of a rapid increase in vehicles that exceeds
the capacity of the existing roads. It is difficult and expensive to
build more roads, so congestion is the natural result.

What I'm proposing is a move to much smaller and more efficient
vehicles, so our congestion would drop accordingly. Nearly everyone in
the US is already is driving a huge vehicle with one passenger. There
is incredible room for improvement.

As for "new Technology" it seems to be mainly in the fields of
discovering something new to sell the masses. Probably 30 years ago,
maybe longer, I read a pretty good analysis of an electric automobile,
based on the then current technology. The author started with the
premise that the smallest auto acceptable to the U.S. Public was the
VW Bug, and based his design on that criterion. As I remember the car
would do 60 MPH and had a range of something like 200 miles. In other
words a pretty good little car for the city.

IMO a "good little city car" would be something ~600lb or less with a
50mph top speed and range of 50 miles or so...

Anyway, after describing the car and pricing out components he arrived
at a small car that was cheaper then an equivalent gasoline car and as
functional as a VW Bug. And then he wrote... "However, what happens
when a million people come home at 5 P.M. and plug their electric car
into the charger."

Wow... like that is an unsolvable problem. Since typical battery packs
today only take a couple hours to fully charge, why would everyone
need to plug in at the same time? Have you heard of the "smart grid"?
How about variable rates depending on the time of day? Put it on a
timer so it automatically charges at midnight... or whenever the draw
is at low demand.

That is the trouble with most of the new technology. The technology is
very nice but the infrastructure or other dependencies come unglued.

In reality we already have far more energy generating capacity, and
roads and parking spaces than we need.

You mentioned AC earlier. I happen to live in an area that is great
for solar heating since it is sunny in winter... yet I doubt more than
1% of new construction pays any attention to where the sun is located.
In addition it doesn't get hot enough in summer for anyone to *need*
AC at all, but all of the new fancy houses have it and use it... for
the same reason. The house designed to take the best advantage of
winter sun, also eliminates AC requirements, but no one cares. It is
as simple as having most of your windows on the south side of the
house with a slight overhang. Lots of sun in winter, but none in the
summer. But here the best view of the mountains is to the west, so
they cover the entire west wall of their abodes with glass. It gets
hotter than hell in the afternoon.

If you lived in a place that really is hot in the summer, then you can
do something similar along with good insulation and thermal mass to
minimize AC use. You don't have to get rid of AC and you don't have to
suffer. You just need to behave as though energy use matters... and
design intelligently.

Chalo wrote:
Ron Ruff wrote:
But... would it be a "good" thing to reduce fuel consumption
(greenhouse gases, oil imports) and traffic congestion? It's easy
enough to do if there is a will to make it happen. Tax fuel to a
higher degree. Make a class of small car (weight and size restricted)
and design the infrastructure to accomodate them. Restrict larger
vehicle use in urban areas (ie certain lanes and certain roads). This
would necessarily make using a larger vehicle more expensive and less
convenient.

I think you could simplify the system to just two criteria. Make
registration fees proportional to the cube of the weight of the
vehicle (which approximates wear and tear on roadways and other
infrastructure), times the gross weight of the vehicle divided by its
payload. The first term rewards smaller vehicles; the second term
rewards vehicles that are well designed for their purpose.

Chalo


Some people just prefer light good-handling cars (which just
happen to be inherently more efficient). Sadly, not enough
to interest any manufacturer at any reasonable price/ volume.

Where's the replacement for a Sunbeam tiger? Or Corvair
Corsa? Or Nova with a 283? Heck even a Dart or Falcon?

Fortunately, classic designs won't run out in my lifetime
but ya gotta wonder about 2+ tons of electronic crap posing
in plastic as an automobile. My living room oorners better.

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

On May 22, 11:22*am, Chalo wrote:


There are already load leveling systems in place for industry. *To
make the grid work better for electric cars would require only smart
metering at the point of charging. *The cars would be charged as
capacity was available, and their battery packs could help catch peak
loads as necessary.

Related: About a week ago, I did a bike ride with an alternative
energy aficionado. I asked about the payback period for things like
solar electric installations, windmills, etc. She went into some
detail about the "running the meter backwards" scheme, pointing out
that the big electrical utility here naturally doesn't allow anything
so simple. They sell kw-hr to you at retail price, but pay you for kw-
hr at less than wholesale price.

Furthermore (IIRC) their rules make it impossible to get a net credit
during any month. It seems to be set up to make it entirely possible
that you'll end up donating electricity to the power company, at least
if your installation is not tiny.

She said that some alternate energy fans are therefore very interested
in plug-in electric cars. They figure that they'll set the system so
recharging the car is priority #1. In effect, they'll be getting more
than retail value for that amount of electricity; they'll actually be
getting the value of the amount of gasoline saved, which is much
higher.

- Frank Krygowski