GM's Electric Lemon

too

I'd think 8 years would be optimistic, at least. AIUI, they are limiting the charge between 25% and 75%, so that may be what saves them. Or they could be just putting off the inevitable (you can die today or die tomorrow, your choice).

Ah, the one's I'm familiar with were "permanently lubed". Some even deleted the plugs so zerks couldn't even be refitted.

Typical. GM had plugs that mechanics would skip, too.

Unsprung weight isn't a good thing. Electric drive doesn't make getting power to the wheels any easier.

That's the bottom line. I highly doubt that battery technology will ever compete with fossil fuels for energy density.

Too high of an ESR? ;-)

Nah, problems with the CHARGE!

GM better start worrying, as we all know (from "The Bloviator"), charge is NOT conserved. ...Jim Thompson

I used to call caps "condensers". I use to say "cps" and "kc" for frequency, too.

The problem with a steam condenser is that it's big and heavy. If you dump the steam and don't condense it, like steam trains, you have to keep refilling with water, and the junk in the water cruds up your boiler. Steamships have condensers because they have all the ocean as a heat sink, and welcome the weight low in the hull as ballast.

The 32,000 HP turbine on a LASH ship wasn't much bigger than a beer barrel. The condenser was as big as a nice house.

John

Plus you lose the heat of vaporization of all that water, which destroys the thermodynamic efficiency.

More expensive than a beer barrel though!

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

But there are ways to do something about that, and they are done.

In an open cycle steam engine? I don't thinks so. If you have an actual example, do tell!

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

The big steamships squeezed every joule they could out of the fuel. The condensers ran at serious vacuum. The small, relatively cheap HP turbine made 90% of the power, and its waste steam drove the monstrous LP turbine. The fuel was blasted into a water-wall boiler, the stack gas drove a superheater, then the preheat economizer. Low-level steam drove water feed pumps, domestic water distillers, heaters, all sorts of stuff. Water chemistry was a project in itself.

The problem is that it was so complex, you needed a lot of smart, expensive people to run it 24/7. Direct-drive diesels are much simpler.

John

You were discussing both closed cycle and open cycle. Most of the heat scavanging is done in closed cycle engines. I'll bet that some of them can be applied to open cycle systems. I have enough hobbies for now.

You've already signed up for enough recreational impossibilities, you say? Me too. :(

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

At least i am in good company.

Prozit.