We don't have "jaywalking" laws in the UK. The whole idea that you can be arrested for crossing the street in the wrong place is as laughable as it is Kafka-esque.
I think that they have - for the moment - reached a practical physical limit, yes.
Until you have worked out a way of somehow shifting more energy without going to ridiculous voltages or currents, you won't be able to speed up battery charging. People in the US already complain about UK mains plugs being big and bulky, and they can handle twice the power of a US mains plug. What do you think they're going to say about having to use a 415V 3-phase plug with a cable as thick as your wrist to plug in a car?
What if I set up a couple of nice solar panels to charge my car? Or a wind turbine?
A large (stands on its own mast, 3m-4m rotor disc) "domestic" wind turbine produces around 5kW, when it's going well. So, after seven hours of strong winds, you'll have charged your battery to the equivalent of a gallon of fuel.
Now, the Peugeot ePartner MPV has a 27kWh battery that takes nine hours to charge off normal 240V single-phase mains and has a range of 60 miles. A diesel Peugeot Partner would do that kind of distance on a gallon and a half...
It's more of a legal requirement for taking other people out hunting in the UK. If you get yourself into trouble, tough shit. If you get other people into trouble then there are certain repercussions.
That far out there aren't really any cosmic rays to worry about. Quite a lot of the cubesats currently flying are using ARM7 processors, and commercial off-the-shelf UHF transceivers for their comms.
The Arabic countries led by the Muslims were the most advanced scientists and engineers in the world, until they let the religious crazies take over. Just sayin', America...
I went to the pub, and there was an Englishman, an Irishman, a Scotsman, a Rabbi, an Imam and a Priest, two blind lesbians, three Russians, a Chinese, a Frenchman, an Italian-Columbian, a Polish maths professor and two students, and a taxi driver from Liverpool,
I didn't go in, it was bloody *rammed* in there, you'd never get served.
If you are on a fixed salary, you get paid no matter how hard you work (assuming you don't do so little you get fired). If you get paid a $1 salary and your actual income is from stock in the company that you run, then your earnings are directly tied to how hard you work to make the company earn money. Or, to put it another way, you're not earning money unless *everyone* is earning money. It's actually a bit big-S Socialist;-)
I can kind of see both sides of the argument, though. If you set the initial barrier to entry too high, then fewer and fewer people will bother at all. It's quite a subtle and difficult balancing act, and I'm not sure the RSGB has it right. I'm damn sure the ARRL hasn't...
As for knowing what's in an "ATU", I'm stumped. I'm looking up that acronym and trying to find some British and ham relevant result.
"Antenna Tuning Unit". It's the same on your side of the pond, but not a VHF thing, more for HF;-)
As for the Taits, I've found them to be pretty good. Disclaimer - I work for a Motorola dealer but operate two very large MPT1327 networks, which are all Tait radios, repeaters and SCUs. The Motorola stuff can't touch it. I think the best example is comparing the power draw of a a GM340 and a Tait TM8200 running at 25W - the Tait will be pulling about 3A for the Motorola's 10A...
The whole problem is that the ARRL and to a lesser extent the RSGB are pushing the whole emcomm thing above all else - so you end up with idiots in high-vis jackets getting in the way of the emergency services as they wave their obsolete ex-PMR radios around trying to look important. These twats haven't got a clue how any of their radios work, or how to build an aerial, or what's actually inside an ATU. They just buy shiny boxes from suppliers and sit and talk into them. There's no self-training, there's no experimenting, there's no development - and woe betide anyone who happens to want to use the same 1MHz chunk of band as them, when they fire up one of their "exercises".
Be part of the chemo that is curing amateur radio. Friends don't let friends do emcomm. Get involved with projects like this satellite, and any time you see someone with a high-vis jacket who isn't digging a hole in the road slap them about the head with a Tait Orca reprogrammed for Raynet frequencies.
After 50-odd years of people taping new releases off the radio, they've finally got their heads around the idea that releasing them for sale at the same time means that people will buy singles while they still like them. Now they just need to realise that people don't really buy singles any more...
"The problem with socialism is eventually you run out of other people's money" - Thatcher.
Which is a remarkable thing for her to say, really. Especially when the Conservatives managed to run the country out of other people's money in 1987, once they'd run out of other people's property to sell...
CFLs use more power in my cabin: Implausible. Would need more details on your experimental design.
It's a biggish - but remote - house, and it would cost more to get mains power hooked up again (it had mains before, doesn't now) than it would be worth. I don't know why the CFLs make the generator use more fuel, but the current draw is approximately the same so at worst you'd expect them to be no different to incandescents. I've never tried looking at the current waveform on a 'scope - perhaps there's some mysterious thing going on that really loads the genny. It does definitely sit with the governor open a bit further though.
You failed it instantly when you started whining on about the "right wing". I'm probably one of the more left-wing people around here;-)
RFI - try using any kind of short-wave radio within about half a mile of CFLs. You can't. From the far end of the field I can not only tell whether a CFL is on, but *which one* is on, depending on which part of the 7MHz band gets wiped out. Define "lots". Even by the most naive calculation (the one that says a.5 power factor means the utility has to provide twice as much power), you're still somewhat ahead using CFLs.
I'd say about twice as much. Why? Because at my place up north we use a diesel generator. If we use 100W "equivalent" CFLs in place of normal 100W incandescents, the generator uses just about twice as much diesel, all other things being equal.
Yes, but when you include the amount of mercury put out by the power plant in order to keep that incandescent lit, CFLs actually prevent mercury from entering the environment.
I didn't know that hydro-electric power stations put out mercury. Where does it come from?
Okay, you might just be one of those people who think CFLs are dim, and try to replace a 60W incandescent with a 100W-equivalent CFL.
Wait, so I should replace my 100W incandescent lamps with 60W-equivalent CFLs? Okay, but what if I actually want to see what I'm doing? I don't have any 60W bulbs to begin with. They're all 100W.
Oh well, I don't expect you'll do much more than skim-read it and start ranting about the political right again.
You should also keep in mind that the vast majority of animals on the planet are fed with soy and corn.
No, the vast majority of livestock in the United States is fed on soy and corn. Not so much in the rest of the world. Here's a hint - nearly all of the world's farmland is *not* rolling Iowa cornfields...
Cheaper only if you ignore the cost of electricity.
They're even more "cost effective" if you don't ignore the externalities, like damage to the environment.
And they last longer than incandescent bulbs too, usually 10x as long.
I've found that cheap (less than £5 each) CFLs typically last a couple of months. Until I bought high-quality Philips ones (about £11 each) I was constantly replacing them.
So, I've replaced an incandescent bulb at 100W with two 30W CFLs, to get not quite the same amount of light, with a sickly greenish colour cast. It's impossible to read in this dim flickery light. Since it takes five minutes to "warm up", they have to be left on constantly. So, although it's drawing a little less current, over the course of a day in terms of kW/h it's actually rather worse than the incandescent it replaced. Oh, and since they're physically much larger than the equivalent incandescent lamp, they don't fit any light fittings. They're not suitable for a lot of fittings because they overheat.
CFLs have a long way to go before they replace incandescents. They use ecologically nasty chemicals, and they use more electricity than incandescents (their power factor is awful; lots of energy is wasted at the substation correcting for this) and they generate massive amounts of RF interference. Tell me *one single thing* that's good about them.
Not really. Much of the world's farms are hill farms, where you've got steep terrain with very little soil cover. Tough grasses and heathers do well on this, and sheep and cows can graze it. If you can work out how to grow crops in a sustainable manner, then I'd like you to come and show me.
Furthermore, there is nothing sustainable about "veganic permaculture". You're growing stuff, and eating it. You're taking nutrients from the soil, and not replacing them - unless you only ever pee and shit on your vegetable patch. The only really successful way to fertilise your arable crops without resorting to petrochemical-derived fertilisers is to feed lots of forage to herbivores - ideall ruminants, and then plough the resulting manure into the ground once you've burnt off the straw and let it rot down a bit. Cows are walking compost generators that also happen to taste nice.
there is no global scientific conspiracy to force you back into the dark ages and to live like vegan hippies
Well, without the massive amounts of petrochemicals that are used to make fertilisers, there won't be any vegans. Ecologically speaking we can't afford to keep burning oil or pouring it into the ground. Once the oil's gone, it's going to be a mixture of livestock and arable farming, and we'll be all the better for it.
Absolutely! Sustainable agriculture is a must in eliminating poverty.
Livestock farming is an essential part of sustainable agriculture. Arable farming uses a ridiculous amount of petrochemical-based fertilisers. Once the oil is gone, the vegans will starve.
They don't cook the same as battery hen eggs. Especially if you beat the eggs, for whatever reason you get a far more stable foam. Making a soufflé with eggs from battery hens is a recipe (hah!) for disaster.
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We don't have "jaywalking" laws in the UK. The whole idea that you can be arrested for crossing the street in the wrong place is as laughable as it is Kafka-esque.
I think that they have - for the moment - reached a practical physical limit, yes.
Until you have worked out a way of somehow shifting more energy without going to ridiculous voltages or currents, you won't be able to speed up battery charging. People in the US already complain about UK mains plugs being big and bulky, and they can handle twice the power of a US mains plug. What do you think they're going to say about having to use a 415V 3-phase plug with a cable as thick as your wrist to plug in a car?
What if I set up a couple of nice solar panels to charge my car? Or a wind turbine?
A large (stands on its own mast, 3m-4m rotor disc) "domestic" wind turbine produces around 5kW, when it's going well. So, after seven hours of strong winds, you'll have charged your battery to the equivalent of a gallon of fuel.
Now, the Peugeot ePartner MPV has a 27kWh battery that takes nine hours to charge off normal 240V single-phase mains and has a range of 60 miles. A diesel Peugeot Partner would do that kind of distance on a gallon and a half...
Make them pee in a cup, make the results public.
It's more of a legal requirement for taking other people out hunting in the UK. If you get yourself into trouble, tough shit. If you get other people into trouble then there are certain repercussions.
No, Peter Jones. Why do you ask?
That far out there aren't really any cosmic rays to worry about. Quite a lot of the cubesats currently flying are using ARM7 processors, and commercial off-the-shelf UHF transceivers for their comms.
The Arabic countries led by the Muslims were the most advanced scientists and engineers in the world, until they let the religious crazies take over. Just sayin', America...
I went to the pub, and there was an Englishman, an Irishman, a Scotsman, a Rabbi, an Imam and a Priest, two blind lesbians, three Russians, a Chinese, a Frenchman, an Italian-Columbian, a Polish maths professor and two students, and a taxi driver from Liverpool,
I didn't go in, it was bloody *rammed* in there, you'd never get served.
If you are on a fixed salary, you get paid no matter how hard you work (assuming you don't do so little you get fired). If you get paid a $1 salary and your actual income is from stock in the company that you run, then your earnings are directly tied to how hard you work to make the company earn money. Or, to put it another way, you're not earning money unless *everyone* is earning money. It's actually a bit big-S Socialist ;-)
I can kind of see both sides of the argument, though. If you set the initial barrier to entry too high, then fewer and fewer people will bother at all. It's quite a subtle and difficult balancing act, and I'm not sure the RSGB has it right. I'm damn sure the ARRL hasn't...
As for knowing what's in an "ATU", I'm stumped. I'm looking up that acronym and trying to find some British and ham relevant result.
"Antenna Tuning Unit". It's the same on your side of the pond, but not a VHF thing, more for HF ;-)
As for the Taits, I've found them to be pretty good. Disclaimer - I work for a Motorola dealer but operate two very large MPT1327 networks, which are all Tait radios, repeaters and SCUs. The Motorola stuff can't touch it. I think the best example is comparing the power draw of a a GM340 and a Tait TM8200 running at 25W - the Tait will be pulling about 3A for the Motorola's 10A...
The whole problem is that the ARRL and to a lesser extent the RSGB are pushing the whole emcomm thing above all else - so you end up with idiots in high-vis jackets getting in the way of the emergency services as they wave their obsolete ex-PMR radios around trying to look important. These twats haven't got a clue how any of their radios work, or how to build an aerial, or what's actually inside an ATU. They just buy shiny boxes from suppliers and sit and talk into them. There's no self-training, there's no experimenting, there's no development - and woe betide anyone who happens to want to use the same 1MHz chunk of band as them, when they fire up one of their "exercises".
Be part of the chemo that is curing amateur radio. Friends don't let friends do emcomm. Get involved with projects like this satellite, and any time you see someone with a high-vis jacket who isn't digging a hole in the road slap them about the head with a Tait Orca reprogrammed for Raynet frequencies.
73s de MM0YEQ
After 50-odd years of people taping new releases off the radio, they've finally got their heads around the idea that releasing them for sale at the same time means that people will buy singles while they still like them. Now they just need to realise that people don't really buy singles any more...
"The problem with socialism is eventually you run out of other people's money" - Thatcher.
Which is a remarkable thing for her to say, really. Especially when the Conservatives managed to run the country out of other people's money in 1987, once they'd run out of other people's property to sell...
CFLs use more power in my cabin: Implausible. Would need more details on your experimental design.
It's a biggish - but remote - house, and it would cost more to get mains power hooked up again (it had mains before, doesn't now) than it would be worth. I don't know why the CFLs make the generator use more fuel, but the current draw is approximately the same so at worst you'd expect them to be no different to incandescents. I've never tried looking at the current waveform on a 'scope - perhaps there's some mysterious thing going on that really loads the genny. It does definitely sit with the governor open a bit further though.
You failed it instantly when you started whining on about the "right wing". I'm probably one of the more left-wing people around here ;-)
RFI - try using any kind of short-wave radio within about half a mile of CFLs. You can't. From the far end of the field I can not only tell whether a CFL is on, but *which one* is on, depending on which part of the 7MHz band gets wiped out.
.5 power factor means the utility has to provide twice as much power), you're still somewhat ahead using CFLs.
Define "lots". Even by the most naive calculation (the one that says a
I'd say about twice as much. Why? Because at my place up north we use a diesel generator. If we use 100W "equivalent" CFLs in place of normal 100W incandescents, the generator uses just about twice as much diesel, all other things being equal.
Yes, but when you include the amount of mercury put out by the power plant in order to keep that incandescent lit, CFLs actually prevent mercury from entering the environment.
I didn't know that hydro-electric power stations put out mercury. Where does it come from?
Okay, you might just be one of those people who think CFLs are dim, and try to replace a 60W incandescent with a 100W-equivalent CFL.
Wait, so I should replace my 100W incandescent lamps with 60W-equivalent CFLs? Okay, but what if I actually want to see what I'm doing? I don't have any 60W bulbs to begin with. They're all 100W.
Oh well, I don't expect you'll do much more than skim-read it and start ranting about the political right again.
You should also keep in mind that the vast majority of animals on the planet are fed with soy and corn.
No, the vast majority of livestock in the United States is fed on soy and corn. Not so much in the rest of the world. Here's a hint - nearly all of the world's farmland is *not* rolling Iowa cornfields...
Cheaper only if you ignore the cost of electricity.
They're even more "cost effective" if you don't ignore the externalities, like damage to the environment.
And they last longer than incandescent bulbs too, usually 10x as long.
I've found that cheap (less than £5 each) CFLs typically last a couple of months. Until I bought high-quality Philips ones (about £11 each) I was constantly replacing them.
So, I've replaced an incandescent bulb at 100W with two 30W CFLs, to get not quite the same amount of light, with a sickly greenish colour cast. It's impossible to read in this dim flickery light. Since it takes five minutes to "warm up", they have to be left on constantly. So, although it's drawing a little less current, over the course of a day in terms of kW/h it's actually rather worse than the incandescent it replaced. Oh, and since they're physically much larger than the equivalent incandescent lamp, they don't fit any light fittings. They're not suitable for a lot of fittings because they overheat.
CFLs have a long way to go before they replace incandescents. They use ecologically nasty chemicals, and they use more electricity than incandescents (their power factor is awful; lots of energy is wasted at the substation correcting for this) and they generate massive amounts of RF interference. Tell me *one single thing* that's good about them.
Not really. Much of the world's farms are hill farms, where you've got steep terrain with very little soil cover. Tough grasses and heathers do well on this, and sheep and cows can graze it. If you can work out how to grow crops in a sustainable manner, then I'd like you to come and show me.
Furthermore, there is nothing sustainable about "veganic permaculture". You're growing stuff, and eating it. You're taking nutrients from the soil, and not replacing them - unless you only ever pee and shit on your vegetable patch. The only really successful way to fertilise your arable crops without resorting to petrochemical-derived fertilisers is to feed lots of forage to herbivores - ideall ruminants, and then plough the resulting manure into the ground once you've burnt off the straw and let it rot down a bit. Cows are walking compost generators that also happen to taste nice.
... because otherwise your proteins wouldn't work properly. I guess it's just another misunderstood buzzword now.
there is no global scientific conspiracy to force you back into the dark ages and to live like vegan hippies
Well, without the massive amounts of petrochemicals that are used to make fertilisers, there won't be any vegans. Ecologically speaking we can't afford to keep burning oil or pouring it into the ground. Once the oil's gone, it's going to be a mixture of livestock and arable farming, and we'll be all the better for it.
Absolutely! Sustainable agriculture is a must in eliminating poverty.
Livestock farming is an essential part of sustainable agriculture. Arable farming uses a ridiculous amount of petrochemical-based fertilisers. Once the oil is gone, the vegans will starve.
They don't cook the same as battery hen eggs. Especially if you beat the eggs, for whatever reason you get a far more stable foam. Making a soufflé with eggs from battery hens is a recipe (hah!) for disaster.
Or, "aim at bright light. Pull trigger."
You're going to hit *something*...