Random Thoughts... [Automotive Edition]

[Red_Bull]

Protip : if you've just cleaned your dashboard and want to keep it sneeze free, don't aim for the air vents, as you will get hit in the face with your own boogers.

true story

I was in a car with my girlfriend and she'd bought this new perfume which I decided to test by spraying into the air. Unfortunately the nozzle was directed at an air vent...

 

[NooDle]

Just finished a 240 km trip, and during the whole drive i was accompanied by Douglas Adams reading The Hitch-hikers Guide To The Galaxy. Thank god for mp3 stereos.

Hells yeah to this! Did a 370 km trip yesterday and was annoyed I could not listen to my audiobooks on the way.... Then again the wife and both kids (almost 2 and 3 months old) wouldn't have liked listening to an audiobook in English starting from chapter 19

I was in a car with my girlfriend and she'd bought this new perfume which I decided to test by spraying into the air. Unfortunately the nozzle was directed at an air vent...

Is the smell out by now or do you have to sell the car to a girl now?

 

[jsausley]

Trying to close a deal on a 1994 Corvette ZR1 in Admiral Blue Metallic with 28,000 miles... One of 44 produced in that color that year, and 56 produced in that color in any years. Been my dream car since I was 12 years old.

 

[Night_Hawk]

I'd do a few things for one of those. Very uncommon and underappreciated for the most part, good luck with it.

 

[argatoga]

Trying to close a deal on a 1994 Corvette ZR1 in Admiral Blue Metallic with 28,000 miles... One of 44 produced in that color that year, and 56 produced in that color in any years. Been my dream car since I was 12 years old.

Make sure the bespoke Lotus engine is in good nick, Lotus parts aren't cheap.

 

[jsausley]

This one has been owned by a Corvette collector for the past six or seven years and has been kept in an air controlled garage along with other cars from his collection, so it truly is a rare find in every way.

 

[Backdraft]

So wrong, yet ingenious.

 

[Spectre]

So wrong, yet ingenious.

So, I guess the Europeans will be buying more pickup trucks to fast-charge their electric cars if this catches on...

 

[Redliner]

A clever solution for a problem that shouldn?t exist in the first place!

 

[CrzRsn]

I had a few first sightings over the last 2 days.

Saw my first US Fiat 500, Mini Countryman, and Tesla Roadster. Couldn't get photos of any of them though.

The 500 was really small, especially parked next to a Lincoln Navigator. Also the Countryman seems to be a really useless size.

 

[_HighVoltage_]

What an idiot!

1. Why did he let it run out of electricity in the first place?...on his daughter's birthday?
2. The computer shows capacity for 72km...at the current rate of consumption, which while being pulled he has the engine off. Of course that when you turn on the engine it will consume more power.

This guy actually summarizes very well why I hate people who drive electric/hybrid vehicles. They have no understanding of physics or the workings of an engine.

 

[Spectre]

What an idiot!

1. Why did he let it run out of electricity in the first place?...on his daughter's birthday?
2. The computer shows capacity for 72km...at the current rate of consumption, which while being pulled he has the engine off. Of course that when you turn on the engine it will consume more power.

This guy actually summarizes very well why I hate people who drive electric/hybrid vehicles. They have no understanding of physics or the workings of an engine.

The battery 'gauge' on an electric cars is vague at best for many reasons. Ambient temperatures can have severe effect on battery life, as anyone who had an older cell phone could tell you.

An example is the battery in your typical car. The Everstart/Johnson Controls battery in the Crown Vic here delivers 1000 amps at 32 degrees F. But at 0F it is down to 850 amps capacity, and at 80F it's over 1200 amps. Changing the ambient temperature (which happens a lot on the road, as any motorcyclist can tell you) changes the capacity of the battery, significantly. How much it changes it is not an exact science, only an approximation. Electric motor efficiency changes with temperature as well, though to a lesser degree. Ten degrees can make a big difference in range for a BEV, whereas for something liquid fueled, it's less of an issue.

Notice all the EV review articles about people having the computer tell them they had enough range and the car cut out short. None of these EVs seem to have a 'reserve', either.

 

[EyeMWing]

None of these EVs seem to have a 'reserve', either.

Because in order to have enough range to sound plausible enough to drive sales, they need the entire battery capacity. Seriously - battery scientists (there is in fact such a thing) have been plugging away at this capacity barrier for DECADES now, and even with some pretty radical chemistries, energy density has not gone up meaningfully. The chances of a sudden breakthrough in a field with that much continuous work and well-understood theory behind it is improbable to say the least. Chemical batteries are a dead end.

 

[Spectre]

Because in order to have enough range to sound plausible enough to drive sales, they need the entire battery capacity. Seriously - battery scientists (there is in fact such a thing) have been plugging away at this capacity barrier for DECADES now, and even with some pretty radical chemistries, energy density has not gone up meaningfully. The chances of a sudden breakthrough in a field with that much continuous work and well-understood theory behind it is improbable to say the least. Chemical batteries are a dead end.

Pretty much what I've been saying all along, actually. Not only that, but governments have spent literally untold billions of dollars in an attempt to come up with the mythical superbattery for military applications (specifically: submarines) for more than a century now and we basically have bupkis to show for it. Governments have given up and gone to AIP/fuel cell or atomic/nuclear power for those vehicles simply because batteries will probably never deliver on the promises that continue to be made for them.

They could fit a reserve to these EVs by doing a software trick or three, but that would cut into their already pathetic "main" range, I agree.

 

[EyeMWing]

This brings up an interesting point. Can we have our fucking Ford Nucleon yet?

Or did Fukushima fuck that up, too?

 

[argatoga]

I like the Leaf. For a city commute it works. Though out here it is one of those things where you want another vehicle for long distance runs.

 

[Spectre]

This brings up an interesting point. Can we have our fucking Ford Nucleon yet?

Or did Fukushima fuck that up, too?

The Nucleon - indeed, any nuclear powered land vehicle, or any civilian propulsion system with 'atomic' or 'nuclear' anywhere in the description - was killed off a long time ago by ecomentalists.

 

[EyeMWing]

I like the Leaf. For a city commute it works. Though out here it is one of those things where you want another vehicle for long distance runs.

It works for a city commute - but everybody I know who lives in a city can't have one because their {apartment complex doesn't have and won't install chargers|HOA won't allow ugly cords dragged out to cars|City Council won't allow cords draped across sidewalks and all that's available is street parking|assigned parking bay is an island|apartment only comes with one parking bay, so there's nowhere to park the "I want out of this shithole for a weekend" car}

 

[Matt2000]

I've decided that my next automotive purchase should be a Suzuki SJ and a trailer, so I can quite happily beat it to death on an off road site and then fix it with a hammer and a welder. After going to an off road event with someone last week I realised what I'm missing out on.

I've also realised how stupid the DVLA can be. The registration document (V5C form) for the car has all the information about it, including the revenue weight (the combined weight of the unladen vehicle plus it's payload capacity). This weight affects what the driver can do, in my case towing.

Now my revenue weight is down as 3499kg, something that the DVLA have apparently done for years with old Land Rovers. 3.5 tons! Considering the unladen weight is 1339kg, that means they think that you can carry 2.2 tons. You can't, the chassis would fold like cardboard. The correct weight should be 2120kg. I have no idea how they have managed to get away with this for so long, but now I have to send off the form with the corrected weight if I want to tow.

If you're not bored yet I'll give a brief explanation of the law that causes this. If you passed your test after 1997 then you own a category B licence. This allows you to do either of the following:

- Tow a trailer up to 750kg, if the revenue (gross/MAM) weight of the towing vehicle is up to 3500kg
- Tow a trailer over 750kg, as long as the revenue weight of the trailer isn't more than the unladen weight of the towing vehicle and the combined revenue weights don't exceed 3500kg.

So as you see I need to get this changed. Another option would be paying ~?400 to get the B+E licence that allows me to tow anything but I think I'll pass on that.

 

[Blind_Io]

I like the Leaf. For a city commute it works. Though out here it is one of those things where you want another vehicle for long distance runs.

Because the way people drive, a nuclear powered car could never go wrong....