Electric cars

A large part of the power required to drive a car at a reasoable speed is used to overcome aerodynamic drag. Making the vehicle lighter makes little diference, because it doesn't allow much reduction in the frontal area, which is largely determined by the passenger cabin dimensions.

Sylvia.

Yes, Clinton was partly responsible for the mess but the main Character was Reagan who began the rush to deregulation. Bush and the various congresses didn't help much either.

Laissez-Faire Capitalism is inherently unstable with built in positive feedback mechanisms and delays and operates much like a chaotic oscillator. It requires regulation and control to stabilize it. When we take off the controls it begins to swing wildly as we can plainly see now and has done so many times in the past.

The new deal controls kept it reasonably stable up to the 1980's. Several bubbles have been positive swings while what we are now seeing is the greatest negative swing since before that time.

One positive feedback mechanism is easily seen in the fact that as people lose jobs, they spend less money causing factories to lower output who then layoff people, and around it goes. There are dozens if not hundreds of such loops in the system all with associated time constants. The overall interaction is a chaotic system that runs wild if left unchecked and unregulated.

*-long-lead-time+cogeneration+519+*-*-*-10-cents-could-deliver+subsidies+*-*-*-*-most-effective-*-solutions+*-*-more-bang-*-*-*-installing-alternatives&strip=1

Those aren't good examples--they're subsidized investments. Subsidies and government also skewed things and gave us a bunch of flawed investment in ethanol.

And nuclear plants' prices have a lot of political content, not just technical; opponents arguing their cost are also devoted to making darn sure their cost is as high as possible. Because they hate nukes.

But the fastest, easiest, and best route to our energy self-sufficiency is to use less; use energy more carefully, more efficiently.

Lovin's lectures detail many ways how.

Lecture #3 covers cars.

Plenty of gains available; industry uses power roughly like a

7805 uses a +24v input.

James Arthur

I measured my car as needing 14 hp @ 70mph.

The other 7/8ths of its hulking ICE is to get me there quickly, after which it's idle, wasted, and wasteful. And heavy. And it's really not that good for acceleration, since ICEs' torque (and efficiency) are so dreadful at low RPM.

It's like making your ox cart faster by doubling the oxen-- a case of diminishing returns.

Cheers, James Arthur

Yep. Real products... tanks, weapons, aircraft, ships... not "make work". "Make work" has no multiplier from trickle down... it just pays enough to make little commies out of every leftist weenie.

...Jim Thompson

--
| James E.Thompson, P.E.                           |    mens     |
| Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC\'s and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
| Phoenix, Arizona  85048    Skype: Contacts Only  |             |
| Voice:(480)460-2350  Fax: Available upon request |  Brass Rat  |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com |    1962     |
             
 Think things are bad now?  Wait until Obama "takes care" of you.

*-long-lead-time+cogeneration+519+*-*-*-10-cents-could-deliver+subsidies+*-*-*-*-most-effective-*-solutions+*-*-more-bang-*-*-*-installing-alternatives&strip=1

There's a simple way to reduce fuel consumption: more taxes on fuel. But the pols would need guts to enact that, and they have none.

John

it just

It's time to back off the margarita pitcher, Jim.

Jim

Of course, if the units did have the pathetic MTBF of just two years, in that time you would statistically have replaced only half of them. If you have a single monolithic pack, then you just would have steadily declining capability until you did that replacement...

Charlie

Whatsamatta, Did I hit a nerve?

And read the SIG.

...Jim Thompson

-- | James E.Thompson, P.E. | mens | | Analog Innovations, Inc. | et | | Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus | | Phoenix, Arizona 85048 Skype: Contacts Only | | | Voice:(480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat | | E-mail Icon at

| 1962 | I love to cook with wine Sometimes I even put it in the food

Just put an added 50W towards making roaring noises and they will be happy.

Batteries tend to wear out from charge-discharge cycles. And some die after some time no matter what. Batteries don't show the classic uniform MTBF-type failure rate over time like, say, resistors. And the common "failure" is loss of capacity. So most likely all the cells in a big battery are going to wear out at roughly the same time, so you may as well replace them together. That's one trip to the shop instead of 80 trips.

John

g-alternatives&strip=3D1

James Arthur wrote:

My link is a condensation of Amory Lovins' thoughts. Wind was one of the items on his graduated list. (It placed better than nukes--which he listed as worst.)

I won't necessarily argue against you there. Turning food into fuel--before it is eaten--does seem quite stupid.

...and the 1958 technology that will be implemented yet again, if allowed. My link also mentions the >1 decade lag in execution.

In the relatively short article at my link,

*better efficiency* was the final choice listed (the best choice, by Dr. Lovins' conclusion).

Oh, and I hasten to add: you could use today's same engine oversizing ratios to propel a half-weight car to today's same performance, with an engine that's half today's size.

Cutting weight has many benefits.

As for aerodynamics, yes, those can be improved a lot too; Lovins details how.

Cheers, James Arthur

"Jim Thompson" wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...

With hundreds of millions for condoms, it'll at least make it safe ;)

Cheers

Good news: You don't need anywhere near 15kW. Last numbers I have seen are 120V charge at around 10A for 10 hours---so that you can use a regular garage circuit. This is 1.5-2 kW.

Bad news: the cost really adds up. The recharge as above costs around 2$ assuming nighttime energy cost of 15 cent/kWh. That's why the GM Volt ads are misleading when they imply that the car will drive 40 miles for free ('before it uses a drop of gas'). In fact, the cost per mile for the Volt car seems to be similar to that of a hybrid.

--
		Przemek Klosowski, Ph.D.

I would wager that most of us here have some form of electricity at their workplace, and that in most (but probably not all) cases it comes from the grid.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

--
"it\'s the network..."                          "The Journey is the reward"
speff@interlog.com             Info for manufacturers: http://www.trexon.com
Embedded software/hardware/analog  Info for designers:  http://www.speff.com

Not true! It's just that not voting to unionize has ... um ... consequences.

What? Those men are pillars of our community (center building)!

In recent years new nuclear plants have been in planning stages and are apparently being built, so these will come online and help fulfill future demand in perhaps a decade or so.

But I haven't checked on the status of nuke plants since last Wednesday, so it may have changed. Future needs for electric power might be met by putting solar arrays atop Al Gore's house.

James Arthur wrote in news:dKKfl.109$ snipped-for-privacy@nwrddc01.gnilink.net:

in Orlando,Fl,Orlando Utilities(OUC) is raising electric rates because consumers cut back on their electric usage,and OUC is now "losing money". So,conservation is now costing the consumers MORE money.

--
Jim Yanik
jyanik
at
kua.net