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What If the Next Presidential Limo Was a Tesla?
cartechboy writes "The presidential limo is known as "The Beast," and it's getting to be about that time where it's replaced. Currently The Beast is a General Motors creation with a Cadillac badge, but what if the next presidential limo was a Tesla? Stick with me here. The Beast is a massive vehicle, which means there would be plenty of room in the structure to have a long battery pack a la Model S. Plus, it could use the upcoming Model X's all-wheel-drive system. Tesla's air suspension would keep it from encountering high-centering issues. There could even be a charging port on both the front and back so a battery truck could hook up while driving, like in-flight refueling. Obviously the battery pack would need to have extra protection so it wouldn't have any issues with road debris, but that's a minor issue. Tesla is an American company, and that's a requirement for The Beast. So is it that far fetched to think the next presidential limo could be a Tesla?"
be required to buy it through a dealer though...
Does it make any practical difference? Is there any point to this post?
and what if it was paid for by using bitcoin...
now i think this post has all the magic words to make it a successful slashertisment.
Heh... you mean like a History channel special?
What if the next Presidential Limo was... a space alien?!
If there was WWIII then el gran fromage would be powerless and unprotected where he was the moment it hit.
If there was the right, wrong time of solar storm, then el heffe might be getting an unintended suntan while waiting for combustion engine vehicles.
There might be a security issue.
And he doesn't own stock in Tesla, so he isn't going to be buying one.
Everyone wants to provide the presidential vehicles. Does Tesla provide as many jobs as GM?
The votes those employees provide are probably the most important factor when deciding who gets to provide the presidential ride.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Would you depend on this vehicle if your life was at stake. Tesla can certainly bring it, but the internal combustion engine has over a century of demonstrated reliability.
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Prisencolinensinainciusol. Ol Rait!
The lack of range would be a huge security hazard. It will have poor range to begin with when you consider the lack of aerodynamics and weight of the armor. You can't beat the energy storage capacity of petroleum.
...would get banned from New Jersey.
It'll get "stuck" trying to get out of NYC.
The Presidents limo is in a heavily disguised armour. It weighs multiple tonnes.
An electric design just can't make the range or extended get away speed required with the protection needed.
Of course the one true maker of presidential limousines is ford....
For the Presidential Limo, concerns such as proven technology, speed of fuelling, and total range would be considered tantamount.
The Presidential Limo is not only chosen for actual use, but for a wide array of unlikely scenarios involving the safety of the President.
and is built on a GM truck frame.
I have a hard time imagining this level of protection working for an electric vehicle.
You mean more than it already does loaded with armor?
Yeah, I think Teslas are designed to be light and aerodynamic. "The Beast" is neither.
It already weighs a LOT due to all the thick armor plating. In fact some places have issues with allowing it because it exceeds the design tolerances for the pavement. The added weight of battery packs wouldn't really be that significant, especially if they can save weight on the engine or other parts.
How small can they make nuclear reactors these days? Tesla could make the President's new "Beast" something like the Tumbler from the new Batman movies, with an extra 1000 HP thrown in for good measure.
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Just imaging the President on a presidential bike. True, nowadays he would most likely be shot by some idiot for stupid reasons or by a terrorist loaded with a lot of hate. However, future might be just so if we could learn to tolerate each other. I know, this is not going to happen soon ;-)
There are plenty of high-power electric drive systems. Trains and busses have been using them for decades. Walmart recently demoed a turbine-powered hybrid 18 wheeler with 100% electric drive power. The reason Tesla doesn't have an 800 HP electric drive is not that they don't exist, it's that they're big and expensive, just like 800 HP hydrocarbon engines.
If they do so, there will be an interesting question: do they have to pay the $1.43-a-mile EV tax when they drive on roads in other countries? Or maybe "not polluting" is worth a fine only in America?
lucm, indeed.
While I have no doubt that you could build a fully electric vehicle that would meet the specs required for the President's limo, I think the biggest hurdle will be charging it. The Beast is one of the only vehicles in the world that drives in countries all over the world without being registered, or modified in accordance with the local market. I've seen the Beast myself here in Canberra, Australia a couple of times. It is kind of a novelty seeing a left-hand drive vehicle with US license plates cruising around on the 'wrong' side of the road in Australia. :)
But I digress. Countries all use different shaped plugs, different voltages etc. and the charging infrastructure in some places the president might visit is not always reliable. Yes you can ensure that US embassies and the presidential plane/other vehicles have the right systems in place. But you never know what might happen ... one day they might be stuck somewhere with insufficient range and no charging options. Gasoline OTOH, you can find almost anywhere, and can carry a spare supply of it quite easily compared to lugging around some kind of backup battery. I think for that reason it'll be a while before you see a vehicle built for this purpose be fully electric. Maybe a hybrid would work. But I think all-electric vehicles need to become more widespread globally and another decade or two of track record behind them before they would fit the bill for this need.
You obviously never collected comics. Geeks who did are fond of "what if?..." special issues because the exploration of the possibility of something weird is fun.
You remember what fun was like, right?
Don't worry - I'll get off your lawn now.
Would the electric car still work? Could you easily find a place to charge up in that event? A car for the president has some different considerations than me in Suburbia who works from home 3 days a week and doesn't drive much. (For the record I'm a Chevy Volt owner)
"The problem with socialism is eventually you run out of other people's money" - Thatcher.
It is a tank made look like a car. It reminds of of this hammer I bought where all I changed was the head and the handle.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Tesla's drive system is not quite up there yet. But I wouldn't be surprised if the next one was a hybrid, just to show hybridness off.
Perhaps, but if it goes much past just having the Hybrid insignia glued to the side, I'd be surprised. The presidential Limo is about two things. First, to protect the president from all manor of threats while going down the road (Which means armor, speed and agility). Second, maintain the illusion of being "normal" in appearance. Gas mileage or being "green" would have to be an illusion at best and unless the hybrid configuration added to the armor, speed or agility you can forget it.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Would the electric car still work? Could you easily find a place to charge up in that event? A car for the president has some different considerations than me in Suburbia who works from home 3 days a week and doesn't drive much. (For the record I'm a Chevy Volt owner)
I drove 5-ton dump trucks in the military, most of systems were redundant including air-pressure brakes and the like. Your Honda, unless it's 30+ years old, will not survive the EMP either.
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I feel the reason that the car will not be electric is that most Military vehicles can run on just about any fossil fuel available in case of emergencies or low fuel.
I'm here for the experience, not the Hyperbole.
I know, right!
They should remove the armour plating from all the tanks too. People aren't that important.
I wonder if Elon Musk would donate a Tesla as the presidential car. One the one hand, it could be great advertising. On the other hand, the thing might catch fire on the highway.
Can't kill him with bullets? Kill him with fire instead!
I was going to post that the range would be teh suck, and disqualify a tesla, but a stretch version with 2-3x the batteries, and high-performance regenerative breaking might actually make it a better choice. Yes, it takes a shitload of energy to get the 10 ton vehicle moving, but this is mostly an in town car - lots of stop and go. You get a percentage of that kinetic energy back every time you brake. Even with an enhanced fuel tank of 30+ gallons, the Caddy probably doesn't have even a 200 mile range in town (best guess is that it gets 8mpg in the best scenario, on Diesel). An electric vehicle would be more limited by aerodynamics and heat losses, so it might actually be range-competitive except at highway cruising speeds.
Now, there still may be a scenario (extended evacuation distance) which the batteries just couldn't handle, but for normal to moderately-extreme conditions a battery pack car very well could out-perform the ICE version.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
It weighs that much and gets that bad of milage because its as close to being an Abrams tank as you can get while still looking like a limo. I don't think the president has much of a say in the vehicles they use to transport him, and "The Beast" exists mostly because of Kennedy and various other attempts on American presidents. Besides, there are far more effective ways for the president to "Lead" us into a greener future. (Maybe cutting back on those vacations that are half a planet worth of jet fuel away for one.)
I've decided to Diversify my Holdings. I've divided my cash between my left and right pockets, instead of all in one.
The Presidential limo is "too big to fail" and would need continual infusions [of power] just to keep going...
Now what DOES work well for Tesla is the blank check they'll get for making it. However, it will end up having a whole lot of redesign involved. Even if you tripled the battery pack's size, is it a linear gain for a vehicle that's somewhere around triple the weight of their existing models? Methinks not. The "in-flight refueling" truck situation has its own can of worms - you'd need a mobile charging unit capable of giving it enough juice to justify the trip in just a few minutes...I'm pretty sure that despite thirty years of work regarding power generation, we're still stuck with bolts of lightning and plutonium from Libyan nationalists to generate 1.21 gigawatts...neither of which are exactly 'portable', and all of THEM will have to be powered with something, so either you're simply offshoring the oil combustion, or "it's turtles all the way down".
Meanwhile, you'd need not just one of these things, but a dozen - remember that Tesla would have to build the decoy units, too...which means you'd also need a dozen refueling trucks. If you ditch all of that, then you'll have a fairly short range you'll be able to go, which will defeat most of the purpose of getting the limo replaced.
And after all of that...exactly what does that net Tesla? Are they looking to make alternatives to the Ford F150 or similar (justifying the work done on making a Tesla engine that can move that kind of weight)? Would it be a foot-in-door to get military contracts (justifying the R&D on an armored Tesla)? Could the charge-en-route tech be adapted for AAA tow trucks? ...Or would Uncle Sam simply pay for all the R&D because the tech needed for this project to work is so vastly different than Tesla's existing designs that monetizing them independently of the limo contract will prove impractical?
Buy a Mercedes off the Alabama production line.
Oh, you meant corporate citizenship? F*ck the workers. Buy a GM from a Mexican line.
Have gnu, will travel.
It would be more fitting, cheaper, and in line with the common man.
Circle the wagons and fire inward. Entropy increases without bounds.
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What if the next presidential limo was 3000 mics of LSD, Donald Sutherland reading "The Cat In the Hat" and a disco ball?
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
The 2009 Limo was built on the Medium duty Kodiac truck chassis.
GM shut down the Medium truck division in 2009.
What would they build it on?
At 7 tons it's more than even the 3500 series truck is rated for.
If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur. --Red Adair
Does it make any practical difference? Is there any point to this post?
Yes. Practically the poster and various commentators enjoy the hypothetical. In addition, if there were actually a chance of this happening, it would make a practical difference in the security status of the president of the United States.
More like "vacations that are a full plane load worth of secret service agents and other assorted aides away" -- if the Prez flew commercial it wouldn't be such a big deal.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
I hope my just submitted "what if" about unicorns ruling the universe will make the front page as well. Given what they are posting these days I think I have a 50/50 chance of making it.
I can't wait for the headline "Presidential Tesla catches fire while stopped on the highway"
Whatever happened to the fires?
Why bother? Just run the diesel engine you already have on biodiesel.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
The Presidential limo has been a (completely custom) Cadillac since Clinton took office. Bush 1 was the last president who used a Lincoln, which was originally Reagan's, who used 3 different cars (2 Lincolns and a Cadillac).
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I love all the uneducated comments about "it can't work because ... electricity."
There are very large/heavy/fast electric vehicles already. With a vehicle this large and one-off, you could do some pretty cool stuff:
two (or more?) redundant electric motors for front vs rear drive ... haha)
inductive charging (just park next to a transformer somewhere
regenerative breaking for increased range in urban areas
extreme high efficiency solar cells for maintaining charge/powering internal devices
gas/diesel backup power plant
Also, with advances in materials, it's possible that armor isn't nearly as heavy for *better* protection.
The real limiting factor will be finding all of the components made exclusively in the US.
There probably isn't a supply of bio-diesel in the capitol, so they'd have to chopper in the fuel. There is already an ample supply of Jet-A to fuel our hypothetical bio-diesel choppers due to the squadron of giant Marine One Sikorskys the president uses to fly to and from either of his 747s.
So yeah, a bio-diesel car could work among all those turbines, and it'll give the greentards another fine token to hang their hat on.
But since Washington D.C. already has an ample supply of electricity from its notoriously dirty 100+ year old coal burning power station, using a battery powered limo is probably the better choice. Then they can forgo the whole bio-diesel chopper supply thing and nothing says you love the "environment" quite like a genuine coal-powered car.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
and won't go far if it needs too.
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"The Beast" exists mostly because of Kennedy and various other attempts on American presidents
That's true, but there's some middle ground between riding completely open-air in a convertible, and riding around in a quasi-tank. All you need to stop JFK-style attacks is an enclosed vehicle that can stop bullets, like the Popemobile.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
You don't need much armour plating if the driver is sitting in an office hundreds or thousands of kilometers away and the drones are fighting in space or at least at the top of very high mountains.
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that would be extraordinarily ineffective, to have a paper machete. what, you give everything paper cuts? Heck, my papier mache armor could block that!
The Queen's official car is a 1958 Rolls-Royce, but as of a few months ago the Crown Prince uses a Tesla Model S.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
I'm sure Chris and his appointees at the port authority would love to have the GWB shut down for a day so that the presidential motorcade could get across
Given that the american presidential limo is more or less 500 meters long, how about putting solar panels on its roof?
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Does it make any practical difference? Is there any point to this post?
Yes. Practically the poster and various commentators enjoy the hypothetical. In addition, if there were actually a chance of this happening, it would make a practical difference in the security status of the president of the United States.
This.(**)
And also, note that many of the comments are technical in nature, regarding recharging, weight, etc.(*)
(*) News for nerds.
(**) Stuff that matters.
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
If it's 100% electric drive, then it's a turbo-electric drive train, not a hybrid drive train. In order to be a hybrid, you need two or more types of motor directly providing motive force.
Fun is a buzzword.
Well, the simple fact is that until the energy density problem is solved, electric vehicles, no matter who the manufacturer, will be a massive compromise with ICE vehicles.
You get to choose between power (acceleration, not speed) and range, when compared to ICEs. And that isn't even bringing up the problem of refueling (which is less of a problem since there are multiple 'Beasts' as backup).
The USSS won't be jumping on "we can get away from a trap, bomb, shootout, blockade, whatever, but can't make it to our safe destination" anytime soon.
Give the technology a few more decades, and maybe then it will compete. But given how ICEs have improved in the last decade, maybe not.
while(1) attack(People.Sandy);
Chief Minister of Gibraltar has a Tesla. Swapped his Jaguar for it.
What if the next presidential limo was an post Tesla-sale Apple iCar? Would it still be able to play FLAC?
Cloudiot: A person who does not see offsite storage as a way to lose control over access to his or her own data.
There's a number of reasons why we don't have electric tanks, and those are the reasons the next 'Beast' will not be electric:
Weight
Time to recharge
Life of charge
Massive engine needed to move armored vehicle
Massive batteries needed to power the massive engine
Ken
What if the Presidential limo burst into flames and the Secret Service agents started shooting Elon Musk?
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If my memory's correct, one of the issue was that the car needed to have a certain minimal acceleration that couldn't be delivered by an electric engine, with all the weight it would have to pull. If I'm right, and the requirements didn't change, well...
and what if it was paid for by using bitcoin...
now i think this post has all the magic words to make it a successful slashertisment.
Not all of the magic words. "What if the next presidential limo was a 3D-printed Tesla paid for with bitcoin?" Now we're getting there.
Solar panels on the roof of the White House? Jimmy Carter AND Barack Obama both put them on the roof, they were taken down when calmer heads prevailed and the symbolism was no longer needed after Carter left office.
Ken
You SO do. You went there so fast...airbody nose you're talking about you.
Cloudiot: A person who does not see offsite storage as a way to lose control over access to his or her own data.
Bullets? What about IEDs? Or RPGs?
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
Taking a Tesla and adding all of the weight from making it bullet and bomb proof would probably severly limit the range it could go, even if additional battery backs were added. If they want to go green, or at least greener, propane powered would make more sense, or better yet, hydrogen powered. Of course the energy required to produce enough hydrogen to use as a fuel would probably be greater than the energy used via conventional fuel (not much economy of scale for 1 vehicle).
Much more appropriate.
Tesla can certainly bring it, but the internal combustion engine has over a century of demonstrated reliability.
Keeping in mind that electric cars have been around longer than gasoline cars, and than electric motors are used in the powertrain of every modern locomotive in the united states (and are the prime movers for almost any industrial plant)...not really, actually.
Car engines need a lot of maintenance due to all their sensors, electromechanical and mechanical valves, mazes of hoses and wiring (all of which has to deal with high temperatures), dependence on multiple fluid types (the fuel, the coolant, the lubricant) and need for so much cooling (gasoline engines waste 3/4 of their fuel on heat.) One of the reasons Tesla is getting away with not having dealers is that the cars are so much simpler drivetrain-wise. I imagine the only fluids that need changing are the brake fluid and probably the gearbox oil.
An electric car for the presidential limo would be brilliant, particularly since it typically doesn't need to travel very far most of the time, and an electric vehicle provides massive torque for handling the heft of all that chassis and armor. Adapting an electric drivetrain, in part because of how simple it is and how flexible one can be with component locations, would actually make it far easier on the coach builder. Tesla already has a dual-motor AWD drivetrain, so they've definitely got the oomph (although I suspect the dual-motor drivetrain motors are individually smaller.)
Please help metamoderate.
To back up the parent post, let's say in a single day a sudden coup brings down the government of a development country the president is currently visiting. In i's place is an extremist government that's extremely hostile to the US made up of a lot of recently former terrorists who would love nothing more than hold the US president hostage (or worse). The president is nowhere near Air Force One, and The Beast has to drive 800 miles across hostile territory to reach a SEAL extraction team in a friendly country. The route has to go through very rural areas where Secret Service agents have to do things like hold up gas stations, spending only five minutes pumping before moving on. And where gas stations are sparse, forget even about electric fast-charging stations, the agents have to sneak up to parked cars and steal gas quickly with specialized pump-driven siphons, relying on the fact that gasoline can easily transferred from one car to another quickly. Far faster than any kind of scheme with jumper cables. In this nightmare scenario, you want something ridiculously ubiquitous and instantly replenishable.
An electric Beast would be an absolutely terrible idea. Stateside an electric Beast would actually be a neat PR bit to show the Oval Office cares about green technology. But the fact that electric car advocate geeks will take issue with the above scenario and will make endless excuses for their technology and will dismiss very legitimate practical concerns with electric says a lot about how detached from reality the electric car movement really is right now. Screaming "FUD" really doesn't make anything better.
Well, presidential limos generally have to be built to withstand a pretty powerful explosion going off underneath the car. Think IED mines.
This would be kinda dicey given this is exactly the location of greatest vulnerability of the Tesla with all that battery + stored energy also located along the bottom of the car. Even a moderate explosion could set off a nasty fire forcing the Prez to abandon his protection.
No, I do not think this is a very good idea. Much better to base it on a conventional design.
The beast is pretty much a tank. Heavily armored with a lot of communications gear.
I dont think its viable at this point to make it electric and still give it the range it requires.
I am not sure what kind of engine it has, but it has to be something powerful.
You see kids, the internal combustion engine is the absolute pinnacle of automobile power technology.
So put away your chemistry sets and your CAD applications. There's nowhere to go from here.
You got bigger problems then. Even actual tanks are disabled/destroyed by those. Heck, an armor penetrating bullet or bullets will do.
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...I'd love to see the new President being driven slowly through New Jersey in his Tesla, mooning Gov. Christie.
The use of a true hybrid drive train (and not the nonsensical "serial hybrid") only makes sense in a tractor trailer because you need high sustained power output, and a hybrid helps keep weight and cost down by not requiring the use of an additional huge generator tied to the powerful engine. Hybrid race cars make sense for the same reason. Consumer vehicles have no such sustained power requirement, and thus do not make sense.
Reading the article, it seems it's a "series hybrid"... aka, not-a-hybrid. It's just simple turbo-electric.
A presidential car would never, ever under normal circumstances be allowed to run close to empty. It must be able to drive the President around all day and still have the range for any emergency that might occur at the worst possible moment and where boarding a helicopter or plane to get out of there is unsafe or unavailable, the nearest safe haven far, far away and getting out to swap cars totally out of the question. Yes, it weighs 20000 pounds and gets 8 MPG but one gallon is about 6 pounds. My guess is that it has a 50-100 gallon gas tank, 300-600 pounds for a 400-800 mile range is still less than half of the Model S's 1200 pound battery pack and I'm sure they always keep the tank over half full. By comparison the Tesla would have to drag around literally tons of batteries. Long, single haul emergency drives is pretty much the worst possible case for an electric.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
The article states we could do it now but the fact that the Beast is so heavy, due to its armor and other features, for batteries to be an effective power source. Keep inventing and when heavy battery power vehicles can match the performance of heavy IC vehicles then we can switch. Now is just not the time.
There's talk here about charging stations vs. using local fuel. Well convoy that shows up along with the president brings its' own fuel. They don't trust the local gas in foreign countries because there's no guarantee as to the quality or any foreign additives. I believe the engine in The Beast is a diesel which gives it such torque to move this "tank but looks like a limo" down the street with sufficient speed and acceleration to get away from trouble.
How much battery would you need to accelerate what could be 5tons away from trouble? The model-S "performance" Telsa has 425ftlbs of torque. This is less than most mid size trucks and my 4yr old BMW diesel sedan. There's quite a few off the shelf pickup truck diesels (Cummings, Duramax, Powerstroke) that can put out 700ftlbs or more of torque and you could easily put in more than enough fuel for the president to drive to/from wherever he needed to go (50 gal?)
The Beast goes everywhere. They load it onto the plane and drive the President around in it when he makes any official visit to a country. So it's not just "on American soil" you need to worry about.
I strongly suspect it's the most-widely-travelled wheeled vehicle on earth actually :)
And that's saying something, considering the current Beast does 0-60 mph / 0-100 km/h in 14 or 15 seconds (due to its weight). It's not exactly the best performing thing on the road, that's for sure ;)
The Pope would ditch his Ford Focus for a recumbent bicycle.
But then, the Prez would trade in Air Force One for a Gossamer Albatross.
Checkmate, choirboy.
Wouldn't the presidential car need to be EMP proof as part of basic security certification?
As Truman famously said, The Buck Stops Here. The president is the head of the executive branch and the commander in chief of the armed forces. He absolutely has authority over his personal security. My opinion? Take a queue from the Queen and take public transit. Or from the Pope and walk. Even heads of states who have boots on the ground in Afghanistan fly commercial. Nothing supports a culture of fear more than a leader who doesn't have enough faith in his people to travel among them.
"Because Science" is one step from "Because old book". Try "Because of my experiment testing my falsifiable assertion".
that he is going to get himself fired
Personally, the moment you talk about 'in-flight' refueling, I'm thinking what you need to do is make a strong hybrid - battery assist, but also with an engine, most likely diesel*, perhaps even a turbine like what's in the M1(updated and smaller, of course).
This gives you monster power when you need it, and increased efficiency which also increases the range. Between the armor and the battery weight, many things that would normally stop a vehicle won't stop the presidential one.
*less likely to explode if attacked by something like an IED, RPG, and such.
I don't read AC A human right
Considering each one costs $300k I think there would be better environmental pay back just buying 5 random commuters with badly polluting cars a new Tesla.
There's a number of reasons why we don't have electric tanks, and those are the reasons the next 'Beast' will not be electric:
Weight Time to recharge Life of charge Massive engine needed to move armored vehicle Massive batteries needed to power the massive engine
But, but ... actually working doesn't matter.
It's electric! {funky seventies jive plays ... }
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_locomotive
It's a pity Tesla's wireless transmission of electricity didn't work, otherwise all vehicles would be electric.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
Ding ding ding, we have a winner. One of the things I hated about bush was his constant vacationing, and frankly obama has not been any better. I long for a president that actually takes the job seriously like clinton did. I want my prez to be like a startup, working his/her ass off. I had one vacation in 4 years at the startup I was at. Most holidays and weekends were at the plant too.
A small 220v diesel generator would top that puppy off quick. And seriously, how often does it go more than a few miles in a ceremonial trip?
http://www.dailybreeze.com/gen...
Try 80,000lbs.
One engine driving 2 wheels (maybe one- does the Beast have positrac?) through a transmission and axle
vs
4 motors each applyting power directly to each wheel working in concert to maximize traction and acceleration.
I'll take option two if acceleration is needed.
Ummm... what about the massive explosive potential of a battery big enough to power a beast that heavy?
O.K. O.K. so, it probably won't explode with deadly force, but imagine the news footage if somebody managed to get it to ignite.
Would you really want that tempting a target? Yes, yes, gasoline is also explosive, but it is all too common.
Having the POTUS' ride carrying a rare, if not unique, flammability potential feels, arrogant.
Having the POTUS' ride carrying a rare, if not unique, flammability potential feels, arrogant.
Perfect fit then.
It may not go very far very often, but it absolutely must be capable of going far for those few times when it's essential. I wouldn't be surprised if there are contingency plans to use the current presidential limo to escape every major metro area that the President could find himself in, and the car itself is designed to survive antitank weapons.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
I'm fairly sure that the primary fuel for the current car is diesel, not gasoline, though I wouldn't be surprised if it's a multifuel engine capable of running on both. Diesel is a lot less volatile than gasoline and diesel engines are more efficient in larger displacements than gasoline engines.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Wireless transmission of electricity works just fine. That is how radios work if you weren't aware of that feature, and how crystal radio sets get their power. Some rather innovative people living near high voltage power lines (the big stuff that carries electrical power from one major metro area to another) have even set up coils and "receivers" to tap into that power.... much to the bane of power companies who hunt those guys down and try to shut them down too (as they do draw power from the towers).
The largest problem with wireless power distribution on a large scale is that it plays havoc with communications frequencies. You also get no free lunch with the idea as power still is required in order to transmit the electricity in the first place, often with a substantial loss in power. On the whole, physical distribution lines are much more effective and efficient, which is why I guess Tesla "failed".
What's the point of pointless what-ifs? It will not be a Tesla, or a Taurus or a Leaf or whatever. It'll probably be a Tahoe or another limo.
And by the way, there will be more than one of them. They always send at least two identical vehicles, and keep spares on stand by.
Sig for hire.
Been there, done that and Reagan ripped the solar panels off the roof to "send a message" that imported oil was a better idea than supporting local industry.
After years of people in the same party following that lead the photovoltaic market pioneered in the USA was hampered so much that the Chinese now own that entire industry. Something to be proud of?
What if the next presidential limo was 3000 mics of LSD, Donald Sutherland reading "The Cat In the Hat" and a disco ball?
Then clearly the world would be a better place.
My book about LSD and Self-Discovery
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Make it a hybrid.
On it's normal trips (like 99.9999% of all trips) it could run 100% electric.
Whenever there's a shooting, switch to internal combustion.
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Yeah pure battery won't work well. Hybrid+battery/capacitor would be better. Electric motor tech is fine for heavy stuff - diesel electric locomotives are really heavy.
Depending on the engine/turbine you could even have multi-fuel support - gas, petrol diesel, vegetable oil. This gives you more options in crisis scenarios.
Why does the next beast have to be a beast? Why can't the POTUS just drive around in a regular car like everyone else? Assassination? Fuck him he'll be replaced easily, that is the strength of the democracy. I say give the next POTUS a standard Tesla S and get over the crazy security theatre that treats the President like a king. He (she one day) is supposed to be a public servant not a rock star. It's time to start acting like a servant and less like a deity.
Nixon did that. [Turned out they were flying AF-1 along behind him, just in case he needed a fast return trip.]
Might as well fly on a military transport. Saves buying dedicated aircraft. And the President gets nice photo-ops in a military-style flight-suit, walking down the loading ramp of a C-130.
Which might solve the problem of the next Presidential limo. Just use a few off-the-shelf APCs. Problem solved.
Science is all about firing a drunk pig out of a cannon just to see what happens.
Probably still be required to buy it through a dealer though...
Can someone explain why that is the way it is?
It is a joke relevant to some of the political hijinks that car dealerships have been pulling lately to subvert Tesla. There are several states that now require any car sales to go through a dealer, specifically to prevent direct sales by Tesla.
I won't join Slashcott. OTOH, If Beta goes live, I just won't be back until it's fixed. Sorry Dice.
It's a truck. A Chevy/Isuzu truck with a Caddy DTS body more or less stuffed on it except not really since the body is a one off armored body made to look like a DTS
Even better! It comes equipped with Morgan Freeman reading a telephone book. That tops Donald Sutherland reading "The Cat in the Hat".
"Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
...so I put an alien anal probe in your butt.
"Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
Would an escape require more than 280 miles? And a typical Presidential entourage is like 30 cars.
Diesel-electric hybrids (like how a locomotive works) are actually just starting to show up in heavy equipment like articulated wheel loaders. There are some huge advantages. The electric motors are quieter which means the operators can work closer to existing population and work more hours of the day. The combustion engine only ever runs at peak efficiency to generate electricity. Fuel savings is around 30% compared to mechanical drive. Packaging is much easier due to flexibility of routing cables instead of moving shafts.
An all electric beast is probably a ways off, but a diesel electric hybrid with even a trivial all-electric low speed cruising range before firing up the diesel is probably an interesting possibility.
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I know, right!
They should remove the armour plating from all the tanks too. People aren't that important.
Count how many tanks there are and how many people in the world.
Which one is the scarcest resource?
"I think this line is mostly filler"
No sane airline would *allow* the President to fly commercially. It would be like painting a red target across its metaphorical face and daring terrorists to attack them, in return for less money and staggeringly-higher security expenses than it would otherwise have if normal people bought the tickets. And when the inevitable attack *did* happen, they'd get hit by lawsuits from everyone who ended up being "collateral damage". The amount of money they'd have to charge to guarantee that the service would be revenue-neutral for them (taking into account things like attacks) would probably be four times the amount we currently pay for the Secret Service and military to handle the logistics.
"The Beast is a massive vehicle, which means there would be plenty of room in the structure to have a long battery pack a la Model S... Obviously the battery pack would need to have extra protection so it wouldn't have any issues with road debris, but that's a minor issue."
lolol. Have you ever watched a show about the limo? There's TONS (literally) of extra stuff in there. It is NOT just a long car with thick windows.
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Time to refuel a gas powered car: 10 minutes.
Time to recharge a Telsa: 1 hr and 6 minutes.
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
Although Elon is not fond of hybrids, I reckon he'd make an exception for this case. There's plenty of room in the "frunk" for a gas turbine/generator and a large fuel supply.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve your problem, you're not using enough of it. --AC
Bush had a mini White House set up at the ranch in Texas. Aside from brush clearing photo ops, he was basically at work, just away from the DC crazy. He even hosted foreign dignitaries there. A lot of infrastructure was put in place at the ranch and could stay there until Bush left office.
What OP is talking about is the jet-setting of Obama and his wife around the world, filling many international flights of AF1 and attending cargo planes, extravagant hotels at an obscene cost. While a president can never truly be on vacation, these are more like real vacations than Bush usually took.
is if it burst into flames with the president in it..... then I might throw a party. Otherwise, this just associates Tesla with a mass murderer who condones torture and doesn't think it needs to be prosecuted aggressively.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
A dhrystone?! Yeah, whathever floats your point...
Ezekiel 23:20
They haven't just started showing up in heavy equipment but have been trickling down to smaller heavy equipment for a while. Going back to the 70s there were the 240 short ton trucks that were diesel electrics that were working in mines. These types of trucks are still in use and even the new ultra class of haul trucks are basically all diesel electrics.
Time to offend someone
I am afraid I'll disagree. While it may have cost less to fly bush to crawford, I don't agree he was working (well for us anyway). I live in TX so probably more aware of his activities in crawford. Mainly he worked his ranch, drove his ATV's around with friends, rode mountain bikes with people like armstrong and generally had a good time. He did host a couple of dignitaries one of which was putin if I remember right. I think these two provided/provide less than adequate effort to their job. Frankly I think part of the job description of prez should be no more than 2wks of vacation/yr. You want more time off, find another job. Need a break, they can always hang in the facilities in DC for weekends/short breaks. Obama plays bball, bush could have ridden around the whitehouse lawn on his bike. These people are the most powerful in the world. Take the job if your ready to man up, not use it for your ego.
So he rode bikes, while Obama goes golfing constantly. The rest of the time he was working. A president can't ever really go on vacation, but Bush had the facilities to do his job there.
That's what Camp David is for, and why it's generally not counted as vacation time. The president can work in a more relaxed atmosphere away from the DC crazy, maybe take a quiet stroll, go horse riding, whatever. Bush just preferred home. Obama actually goes on real vacations, not having a vacation home (he likes to stay at the homes of rich Democrat donors).
I want a diesel electric school bus.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
If my memory's correct, one of the issue was that the car needed to have a certain minimal acceleration that couldn't be delivered by an electric engine, with all the weight it would have to pull. If I'm right, and the requirements didn't change, well...
Except, especially with all wheel drive and two to four motors, such is no longer true - as Tesla has proven with motors that aren't particularly large in a car that's considerably heavy compared to its gas counterparts.
The correct statement would have been " the car needed to have a certain minimal acceleration that couldn't be delivered (by GM) by an electric engine (as GM has no interest in doing anything that leads credence to the viability of any electric vehicles." The same would apply to other automakers - but more especially to the EV1 destroying, battery technology suppressing GM.
Considering the size of the vehicle (figure mega-Suburban, extended, if you don't recognize the truck platform mentioned), plenty of battery power could be put into it, and four larger motors (than the ONE motor in the Model S) could also fit - as would Subaru's concept 3 motor (two rear, one front) design. As a matter of fact, with all wheels independently driven via computer, there's also the increase in traction to consider for quick (from stop or slow speed) acceleration.
StarTrekPhase2 - The Five Year Mission Continues!
Obama can run it off of PV cells on the roof. Maybe he got some in the Solyndra liquidation.
Ultracaps. A GF will replace my electric car battery nicely. This is off the shelf stuff. Energy to mass and energy to volume is little weak but it can discharge and recharge instantly. Powers the auto missile defense lasers too. Think of a beuwulf of those.
I guess we will just have to agree to disagree. I feel both bush and obama have a poor work ethic. Bush sr was much better as was clinton. I think the fundamental problem in politics now is that the prize/reward is the job and the work is the campaign. This is true for almost all politicians now, more so as the position elevates.
There are more tank operators than presidents.
So someone takes this, layers it with ablative armor, and suddenly you have a long-range, well-armored vehicle. What's the problem?
--Dude, he's the 1st black POTUS. You have NO IDEA what kind of stress he's under. Think you can do a better job? Then feel free, go ahead and run for office. I would rather have him be able to de-stress and be able to think with a clear(er) head.
/ not a fanboi, just being realistic - POTUS is a job I would never want. Turns your hair gray.
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== WolfriderV6 == I'm willing to admit that *I just might* be wrong... Are you??