I don't see it quite that way. I'm sure Novell wouldn't be short-sighted enough to release the stuff under the GPL. That may well disarm those patents. However, another licensing scheme could be used which would allow the IP to retain it's teeth when needed. IANAL, but I bet someone can find some fairly bullet-proof wording that would allow use of the IP in F/OSS projects without restriction, yet still retain it's usefullness for cross-licensing with the closed source folk.
I'm not a lawyer either, but I presume that GPL would be the right license for this, actually. If a closed source project wants to use Novell's patent, they can license the patent. Otherwise, they can lift the patented stuff from the GPL project, and they have to GPL their work. If they don't, Novell gets to sue them for violating the GPL, and for infringing on their patent. So they get two chances to rough 'em up, where before they only got one.
Furthermore, just because Novell releases some code under the GPL doesn't mean they can't take that same code and do something else with it. They own it, they can do whatever they want with it. However, when other people contribute to the project and add stuff, Novell can't take *their* work and close it up. But they still have their original code, patented and so forth, that they can do whatever they want with.
Furthermore, even *after* people have added to Novell's patented code in a GPL context, Novell can still license the patent within the code to any company/individual they desire in any closed source fashion they want. However, the people who have added code to the GPL project still retain rights to their code, so even after Novell licenses the patent to someone, they still need to either GPL their code, negotiate with the other affected developers, or get the snapshot from Novell from before anybody outside Novell had added to it.
Furthermore, by releasing their patented code under the GPL, Novell also gains the benefit of many eyes looking at the code. So when someone else comes up with some stupid patent for which Novell's now GPL-code contains/is prior art, it can be quickly assimilated in a case against the USPTO to pull the stupid new patent off the shelves. THEN Novell can be informed, and if needed they can sue the company for infringing their patent, if they desire. They can't go after them for GPL violation (assuming clean-roomness), but they can still use the patent to go after them if needed in pursuit of their goal of defending open source products they care about. Something like "You patented *this file format* for the purpose of suing OpenOffice.org. We don't just have prior art on the matter, we also have it patented. Our good buddies that have been using our patented code for years brought it to our attention and the USPTO's attention, and your patent got pulled. Now we're gonig to sue you into oblivion for making this move to threaten our buddies, and let the world take note that we're not taking shit anymore."
The patent application has to provide a complete working solution, with software this'd be a complete and visible solution (i.e., you see the source and compile it, but you can't copy it); moreover, it should be a solution that becomes open source (probably under a BSD license) once the patent expires
You're seeking compromise when we should be seeking the original intent of the law.:)
A standard device patent requires plans, drawings, notes, anything you've got. You must provide documentation to back up any claims you make about your invention. During the period of the patent, anybody can build your device from the plans, but nobody can produce it commercially. Only *you* can decide who will produce it commercially. But anybody can build the device, study it, and learn about it. I could even design a new device based on your device, and I wouldn't be able to commercially produce my own patented device without a license for your patent, because I built on it.
If software is to be patented, why can't we have the same rules? The whole point is that society benefits from the patent itself. We give you an opportunity to make some money from your invention, and in exchange we get the invention. The purpose of patent is to secure the technology for society, not to make money for you.
When the patent expires, your invention becomes public domain. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. It's public domain. Not BSD-licensed open source, not GPL, not CPL, none of that shit. Public domain. Just like when your copyright expires and you failed to renew it.
And that's the whole point of both patent and copyright. The ultimate goal of IP law is to bring the IP into the public domain, and to do so in a fashion that encourages private organizations and individuals to create IP.
i'm still trying to figure out what possesses people to work so much. QUIT YOUR JOB. i mean, are you married? have kids? because if it's just you, just stop working so hard (think office space, it worked for me). if you have kids, and can't take such risks (because eventually you do get laid off and unemployment wasn't available to me), take job with better hours even if it means a slightly lower* standard of living. parents are more important than new things. *no amount of money can properly replace my time. seriously, stop working so hard. you're making the rest of us look lazy. but even worse, no amount of money can bring back lost time -- money (and the drugs you buy with it) only help you not think about how important time is and how you've wasted it
As sweet as this all is, you should try living at/below the poverty line sometime. Especially with three kids.... Free time is a luxury you can afford only after you've earned money for foood.
I'm well aware of this, and not arguing the fact. I'm just puzzled as to why such a complex, untested system is seen as a sufficient replacement for a simple, well-tested system.
The main advantage that I can see is the ability to upgrade the system for dirt cheap. With POTS, every time they've wanted to upgrade the system (upgrading to fiber being the most recent that I am aware of) it's been a $billions dollar investment, and small towns have always suffered. OTOH, if you're using VOIP over a cable connection, upgrading the system is just a matter of replacing a box on your end and the VOIP provider doing software upgrades on their end. Cheap by comparison, which means the technology can evolve much faster and incorporate many more uses. The IP network itself is well-proven and as solid as POTS. So solid, in fact, that many POTS providers are *already* passing some of their traffic over the IP network.
If the reduced cost is worth the inconvenience, then I guess that counts as a reason. Personally, I'd get a POTS phone line for phone service and a separate data connection for Internet service--but then again, I live in Japan where they already have fiber to the home in major cities, so maybe that's not an option for you. (I also don't subscribe to the "cheaper is better" theory, so that may by itself put me in the minority.)
Having had POTS, cable internet, and a cellphone all at the same time, I think I can say that the most reliable performance I've had is from the cable internet. Outages were few and far between, and usually associated with the last time I had paid the bill. POTS (in Bellevue, WA, not exactly rural America) was fairly unreliable. Calls would frequently not go through and had to be dialed several times. Also frequent (especially bad on holidays) was the "no line available" noise. And this doesn't count the fact that at least once every couple of months I"d pick up the phone and *not* get a dial tone. And don't get me started on Verizon's shittier-than-shit smeg-sucking cell phone service.
I just got my box from Packet8 today, and I immediately claled my dad to test the service. I'm happy so far.:)
It doesn't have to be. Pencil and paper (or charcoal and hide, if you like) "just work", for an extreme example. Bridges "just work". Even POTS "just works". Certainly the latter examples have had a lot of effort put into them, but declaring at the outset that stability, "just works"-ness if you will, is rare--and, by implication, not a feasible goal--seems overly pessimistic, and is certainly disappointing to hear from an engineer.
YOu mentioned you were in Japan already, so a lot of what you see as POTS "just working" is probably going to be stuff that isn't true in America. Forgetting for the moment that Japan typically adopts technology faster than America (along with the rest of the world). Also forgetting for the moment that Japan has had a wired POTS network that is the envy of every major industrialized nation for years. Laying out cable and running new fiber and so forth in Japan isn't nearly the same scope of a project as doing the same in just hte 48 contiguous united states. Add in Alaska and Hawaii and you've got a project that'll drive anyone to the loony bin. There are still wide swaths of rural America that have the copper lines and switching from the 70s. It wasn't so very long ago that the little shit-hole town I spent my high school years in still had echos on the line of other callers. If you got quiet, you could pick up a fair amount of the town's gossip. This was in 1990, I might add. Now they offer fiber, but the baby bells aren't nearly as fat and complacent as they were in the 80s, so it's coming along.
We've still got last mile issues in many areas to just bring POTS up to the same level of service and quality the rest of the country enjoys. We've still got last mile issues in many areas getting high speed internet. But cable goes almost everywhere. In fact,
I don't see how that's obstruction of justice. If the ISP requires you to follow due process, and you follow it, then there's no problem at all. You might be pissed they made you go through all that extra work only to have to do what you told them to, but you can't actually do anything about it.
Naturally, I'm not a lawyer, but my understanding is that obstruction of justice is a criminal charge that can only be brought in a criminal case where you have actually tried to prevent the court or the representative of the court (the prosecutor, investigators, etc) from acquiring evidence that materially affects the case.
The reason this doesn't apply in a civil suit is because a civil suit isn't about justice, it's about liability. Copyright is (was) a civil matter. Now copyright infringement is slowly being criminalized. I think it's because the war on drugs failed, so it's just another mechanism to make sure you can always put someone in jail for something.
Its kind of like ordering a hamburger at Friendlies
"How do you want it cooked?"
"Medium rare"
"Oh we only do medium well or well"
(yes I was actually given that "choice" once)
Just in case you didn't know this, it's quite common for state health departments to not allow restaurants to cook hamburger and have it come out any sort of pink. It's dangerous. Furthermore, while pink steaks and stuff are allowed, they're still required to reach a minimum temperature to be legally served (in WA state it's 140 degrees F).
So your complain would be with the establishment that claimed to cook it the way you wanted and then failed to do so when you asked them to.:) Not that it detracts from your point, exactly. A better comparison could have been used, though. That's all.
Well, to be technical, fossil fuels are also already on the earth. I mean, we're not mining them off the moon or anything.
Now to be pedantic, I think you meant that we're made up of substances that are already in our current environment, since the whole greenhouse gas thing has to do with digging up substances that aren't part of our environment, blowing them up, and releasing the products into our environment.:)
I can believe in the Sentra withotu power steering, just like I can believe in the Tercel without power steering, and a few other of the really cheap cars that are made to sell brand new for really cheap. The Celica isn't one of those cars, that's all. It's a sporty thing, and the target market of the Celica actually wants power steering.
Surprised you changed the motor out on that Sentra instead of changing the timing chain. Now, instead of being able to say "It's got 3 million miles on it with the original engine".....
That engine is pretty indestructible.:) Change the timing chain at regular intervals and you'll never want anything else done to it.
Dodges are just...weird. Any transmission that you have to shift into neutral with the engine running to check the fluid level is fucked. Honda's the only company to get it right.:) You check those with the engine off, tranny in park.
I can see how you'd have to pull the driveshaft off the buses to get them to tow it. You can't use a flatbed (unless it's on an 18 wheeler, which aren't used by wreckers) at all, and the come-alongs won't take the weight either. Buses aren't supposed to be towed, they're supposed to be fixed in the field.:) (I know, that's almost never as practical as it sounds, and I'd gladly pay $100+ to tow the car to a place where I can use a lift and an air compressor. That's money well-spent)
I'm not sure what the deal is with dodge transmissions. It might have more to do with the fact that they use so many disposable mitsushitty parts... Of course, even with the flywheel spinning it shouldn't affect the transmission since the engine has to spin up a bit before the fluid in the torque converter actually locks and engages the tranny. Don't know for a fact about Dodges, though, but I have noticed the excessive amount of failed Chrysler transmissions compared to other manufacturers. I'm hoping DaimlerChrysler will finally fix the problems. They've certainly got the technology in their Mercedes division.
Ack. I'll take an auto over walking most of the time, I'll admit. There are some nice things about driving an automatic. It is nice, for example, after driving for 3 hours on a bumpy road to be able to cruise into the gas station without having to suddenly remember how to shift. But then I'd rather have the efficiency of a manual on a long trip. Ok, now that I think about it, maybe there aren't any nice features about an auto. Heh.
Actually, my point was that at 55 mph you shouldn't have noticed a loss of power steering unless the loss of power steering also caused the mechanical portion of the steering to become inhibited somehow (like a piece of rubber getting stuck in the gearbox). There's a valve that tapers off your power steering so that at highway speeds you don't have power assist on the system anymore.
So, there's a valve that controls it. If your truck was fuel injected, there's a strong possibility that valve was opened/closed by a solenoid using signals from the speed sensor/ECU. Most people aren't aware of this so they don't even think to fix it when it breaks, and most mechanics don't care enough about it to tell a customer (if they even know, it's not common knowledge, even if it is blatantly obvious on so many cars).
Yes, it can! Brakes are WAY more powerful than engines.
Your four-wheel brakes can usually overpower the engine, that is true.
However, the parking brake (incorrectly but commonly referred to as the emergency brake) only powers two wheels, and does not have power assist. It has mechanical advantage through leverage. So it's both harder to stop the car and easier to lock up the brakes. And in this application, using your brakes at all would be going up against the cruise control that's determined to keep your car at a specific speed.
So when the tires slip with cruise control on, the wheels keep spinning at the same speed, while the car slows down.
Depends on the cruise control system. Until recently, cruise control worked off engine vacuum, in which case engine vacuum would decrease when the wheels slipped (engine breaks loose, spins faster) and the cruise control would actually close the throttle to correct.
The beauty of using engine vacuum to do it meant that you didn't have to care about road surface, slope, gear, or anything. The disadvantage was that the system took awhile to compensate for changes.
Generally when someone's talking about traction control using ABS, they're referring to a fancy system that's designed for high-speed maneuvarability, like in a slalom or something, and actually has *nothing* to do with the road surface.
of course, the GP isn't aware of that, poor guy.
Just being pedantic, because generally when people argue about what traction control does, they're all right, it's just that "traction control" is such a nebulous phrase as to be virtually meaningless.
Um, technically, "popping the clutch" is when you've got the clutch disengaged (pedal down) and you slide your foot of the pedal. The clutch engages suddenly, and the pedal "pops" up.
The only downside here is that without your vehicle running the oil pump that lubes your automatic tranny won't be running, thus causing extreme wear and tear.
Some, yes. Some have a pump that's mechanically powered at the tail-end of the gear, so if it's mechanically engaged fluid flows. Most, though, drive the pump off the torque converter. All, however, store tons of fluid in the tranny. If you drain it, you only get like 1/3 of the fluid that's in there. That's why those quick oil change places have their fancy machines.
. This is why you don't tow vehicles with automatic trannies.
I know what you mean, but I'm gonna clarify this. You don't tow vehicles with automatic trannies with their drive wheels on the ground. That's why a wrecker will either put the wheels on the ground on a come-along, or will pick up the drive wheels.
The real danger has to do with where the torque is coming from. A manual tranny is bisexual, you can apply torque to it from either side and it doesn't care. An automatic cares. If you apply torque from the drive wheels, you spin gears backwards, build up fluid pressure, and what happens next depends entirely on the individual tranny. Most that I've seen break pilot gears (new ones ranging in price from $600 up).
Deep in the bowels of an automatic tranny you don't find gears in the same form as you find them in a manual tranny. There is no mechanical connection anywhere from the engine to the drive wheels. It's a hydraulic connection. You do find some friction-type stuff (clutch wheels, or something, I forget the names) in some of them. Others have a big band around it that gets squeezed.
Man I hate automatic trannies. Both my car and my truck are stick-shifts. My wife's car is an automatic. Got it from her mom, who is deathly afraid of stick-shifts. Says it's too distracting and they shouldn't even be allowed on the road.
Power steering and braking is provided by a cylinder of fluid. You've got enough for probably 4 or 5 hard 'full brake' depressions and at least 3 or 4 good wheel cranks.
That's extremely oversimplified, and somewhat inaccurate. 99.99999% of cars with power assist brakes use a vacuum booster that runs off engine vacuum. I can tell you all the technical details of how it works, but I don't really feel like it.:)
Power steering isn't exactly provided by a cylinder of fluid. A cylinder is just a cylinder, you need a pump to pump the fluid for it to be useful. Surprisingly, power steering works similar to the vacuum booster on your brakes, only using fluid instead of vacuum.
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I think they both spell stuff the same way: S-T-U-F-F
I don't see it quite that way. I'm sure Novell wouldn't be short-sighted enough to release the stuff under the GPL. That may well disarm those patents. However, another licensing scheme could be used which would allow the IP to retain it's teeth when needed. IANAL, but I bet someone can find some fairly bullet-proof wording that would allow use of the IP in F/OSS projects without restriction, yet still retain it's usefullness for cross-licensing with the closed source folk.
I'm not a lawyer either, but I presume that GPL would be the right license for this, actually. If a closed source project wants to use Novell's patent, they can license the patent. Otherwise, they can lift the patented stuff from the GPL project, and they have to GPL their work. If they don't, Novell gets to sue them for violating the GPL, and for infringing on their patent. So they get two chances to rough 'em up, where before they only got one.
Furthermore, just because Novell releases some code under the GPL doesn't mean they can't take that same code and do something else with it. They own it, they can do whatever they want with it. However, when other people contribute to the project and add stuff, Novell can't take *their* work and close it up. But they still have their original code, patented and so forth, that they can do whatever they want with.
Furthermore, even *after* people have added to Novell's patented code in a GPL context, Novell can still license the patent within the code to any company/individual they desire in any closed source fashion they want. However, the people who have added code to the GPL project still retain rights to their code, so even after Novell licenses the patent to someone, they still need to either GPL their code, negotiate with the other affected developers, or get the snapshot from Novell from before anybody outside Novell had added to it.
Furthermore, by releasing their patented code under the GPL, Novell also gains the benefit of many eyes looking at the code. So when someone else comes up with some stupid patent for which Novell's now GPL-code contains/is prior art, it can be quickly assimilated in a case against the USPTO to pull the stupid new patent off the shelves. THEN Novell can be informed, and if needed they can sue the company for infringing their patent, if they desire. They can't go after them for GPL violation (assuming clean-roomness), but they can still use the patent to go after them if needed in pursuit of their goal of defending open source products they care about. Something like "You patented *this file format* for the purpose of suing OpenOffice.org. We don't just have prior art on the matter, we also have it patented. Our good buddies that have been using our patented code for years brought it to our attention and the USPTO's attention, and your patent got pulled. Now we're gonig to sue you into oblivion for making this move to threaten our buddies, and let the world take note that we're not taking shit anymore."
The patent application has to provide a complete working solution, with software this'd be a complete and visible solution (i.e., you see the source and compile it, but you can't copy it); moreover, it should be a solution that becomes open source (probably under a BSD license) once the patent expires
You're seeking compromise when we should be seeking the original intent of the law. :)
A standard device patent requires plans, drawings, notes, anything you've got. You must provide documentation to back up any claims you make about your invention. During the period of the patent, anybody can build your device from the plans, but nobody can produce it commercially. Only *you* can decide who will produce it commercially. But anybody can build the device, study it, and learn about it. I could even design a new device based on your device, and I wouldn't be able to commercially produce my own patented device without a license for your patent, because I built on it.
If software is to be patented, why can't we have the same rules? The whole point is that society benefits from the patent itself. We give you an opportunity to make some money from your invention, and in exchange we get the invention. The purpose of patent is to secure the technology for society, not to make money for you.
When the patent expires, your invention becomes public domain. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. It's public domain. Not BSD-licensed open source, not GPL, not CPL, none of that shit. Public domain. Just like when your copyright expires and you failed to renew it.
And that's the whole point of both patent and copyright. The ultimate goal of IP law is to bring the IP into the public domain, and to do so in a fashion that encourages private organizations and individuals to create IP.
Like he really had time to check the latest polls before he made the movie...
i'm still trying to figure out what possesses people to work so much. QUIT YOUR JOB. i mean, are you married? have kids? because if it's just you, just stop working so hard (think office space, it worked for me). if you have kids, and can't take such risks (because eventually you do get laid off and unemployment wasn't available to me), take job with better hours even if it means a slightly lower* standard of living. parents are more important than new things. *no amount of money can properly replace my time. seriously, stop working so hard. you're making the rest of us look lazy. but even worse, no amount of money can bring back lost time -- money (and the drugs you buy with it) only help you not think about how important time is and how you've wasted it
As sweet as this all is, you should try living at/below the poverty line sometime. Especially with three kids.... Free time is a luxury you can afford only after you've earned money for foood.
I'm well aware of this, and not arguing the fact. I'm just puzzled as to why such a complex, untested system is seen as a sufficient replacement for a simple, well-tested system.
The main advantage that I can see is the ability to upgrade the system for dirt cheap. With POTS, every time they've wanted to upgrade the system (upgrading to fiber being the most recent that I am aware of) it's been a $billions dollar investment, and small towns have always suffered. OTOH, if you're using VOIP over a cable connection, upgrading the system is just a matter of replacing a box on your end and the VOIP provider doing software upgrades on their end. Cheap by comparison, which means the technology can evolve much faster and incorporate many more uses. The IP network itself is well-proven and as solid as POTS. So solid, in fact, that many POTS providers are *already* passing some of their traffic over the IP network.
If the reduced cost is worth the inconvenience, then I guess that counts as a reason. Personally, I'd get a POTS phone line for phone service and a separate data connection for Internet service--but then again, I live in Japan where they already have fiber to the home in major cities, so maybe that's not an option for you. (I also don't subscribe to the "cheaper is better" theory, so that may by itself put me in the minority.)
Having had POTS, cable internet, and a cellphone all at the same time, I think I can say that the most reliable performance I've had is from the cable internet. Outages were few and far between, and usually associated with the last time I had paid the bill. POTS (in Bellevue, WA, not exactly rural America) was fairly unreliable. Calls would frequently not go through and had to be dialed several times. Also frequent (especially bad on holidays) was the "no line available" noise. And this doesn't count the fact that at least once every couple of months I"d pick up the phone and *not* get a dial tone. And don't get me started on Verizon's shittier-than-shit smeg-sucking cell phone service.
I just got my box from Packet8 today, and I immediately claled my dad to test the service. I'm happy so far. :)
It doesn't have to be. Pencil and paper (or charcoal and hide, if you like) "just work", for an extreme example. Bridges "just work". Even POTS "just works". Certainly the latter examples have had a lot of effort put into them, but declaring at the outset that stability, "just works"-ness if you will, is rare--and, by implication, not a feasible goal--seems overly pessimistic, and is certainly disappointing to hear from an engineer.
YOu mentioned you were in Japan already, so a lot of what you see as POTS "just working" is probably going to be stuff that isn't true in America. Forgetting for the moment that Japan typically adopts technology faster than America (along with the rest of the world). Also forgetting for the moment that Japan has had a wired POTS network that is the envy of every major industrialized nation for years. Laying out cable and running new fiber and so forth in Japan isn't nearly the same scope of a project as doing the same in just hte 48 contiguous united states. Add in Alaska and Hawaii and you've got a project that'll drive anyone to the loony bin. There are still wide swaths of rural America that have the copper lines and switching from the 70s. It wasn't so very long ago that the little shit-hole town I spent my high school years in still had echos on the line of other callers. If you got quiet, you could pick up a fair amount of the town's gossip. This was in 1990, I might add. Now they offer fiber, but the baby bells aren't nearly as fat and complacent as they were in the 80s, so it's coming along.
We've still got last mile issues in many areas to just bring POTS up to the same level of service and quality the rest of the country enjoys. We've still got last mile issues in many areas getting high speed internet. But cable goes almost everywhere. In fact,
No. I'm still working on what it would be like to have free weekends.
I'm still trying to figure out what free hours would look like.
Why don't you just use a flat-file ascii database stored on a floppy disk?
I don't see how that's obstruction of justice. If the ISP requires you to follow due process, and you follow it, then there's no problem at all. You might be pissed they made you go through all that extra work only to have to do what you told them to, but you can't actually do anything about it.
Naturally, I'm not a lawyer, but my understanding is that obstruction of justice is a criminal charge that can only be brought in a criminal case where you have actually tried to prevent the court or the representative of the court (the prosecutor, investigators, etc) from acquiring evidence that materially affects the case.
The reason this doesn't apply in a civil suit is because a civil suit isn't about justice, it's about liability. Copyright is (was) a civil matter. Now copyright infringement is slowly being criminalized. I think it's because the war on drugs failed, so it's just another mechanism to make sure you can always put someone in jail for something.
Its kind of like ordering a hamburger at Friendlies "How do you want it cooked?" "Medium rare" "Oh we only do medium well or well" (yes I was actually given that "choice" once)
Just in case you didn't know this, it's quite common for state health departments to not allow restaurants to cook hamburger and have it come out any sort of pink. It's dangerous. Furthermore, while pink steaks and stuff are allowed, they're still required to reach a minimum temperature to be legally served (in WA state it's 140 degrees F).
So your complain would be with the establishment that claimed to cook it the way you wanted and then failed to do so when you asked them to. :) Not that it detracts from your point, exactly. A better comparison could have been used, though. That's all.
Since we don't have a +1, No Shit, Sherlock moderation, I guess the Informative mod is accurate.
And you'll finally have a use for my mother-in-law
Well, to be technical, fossil fuels are also already on the earth. I mean, we're not mining them off the moon or anything.
Now to be pedantic, I think you meant that we're made up of substances that are already in our current environment, since the whole greenhouse gas thing has to do with digging up substances that aren't part of our environment, blowing them up, and releasing the products into our environment. :)
Just being both technical and pedantic.
I can believe in the Sentra withotu power steering, just like I can believe in the Tercel without power steering, and a few other of the really cheap cars that are made to sell brand new for really cheap. The Celica isn't one of those cars, that's all. It's a sporty thing, and the target market of the Celica actually wants power steering.
Surprised you changed the motor out on that Sentra instead of changing the timing chain. Now, instead of being able to say "It's got 3 million miles on it with the original engine".....
That engine is pretty indestructible. :) Change the timing chain at regular intervals and you'll never want anything else done to it.
Dodges are just...weird. Any transmission that you have to shift into neutral with the engine running to check the fluid level is fucked. Honda's the only company to get it right. :) You check those with the engine off, tranny in park.
I can see how you'd have to pull the driveshaft off the buses to get them to tow it. You can't use a flatbed (unless it's on an 18 wheeler, which aren't used by wreckers) at all, and the come-alongs won't take the weight either. Buses aren't supposed to be towed, they're supposed to be fixed in the field. :) (I know, that's almost never as practical as it sounds, and I'd gladly pay $100+ to tow the car to a place where I can use a lift and an air compressor. That's money well-spent)
I'm not sure what the deal is with dodge transmissions. It might have more to do with the fact that they use so many disposable mitsushitty parts... Of course, even with the flywheel spinning it shouldn't affect the transmission since the engine has to spin up a bit before the fluid in the torque converter actually locks and engages the tranny. Don't know for a fact about Dodges, though, but I have noticed the excessive amount of failed Chrysler transmissions compared to other manufacturers. I'm hoping DaimlerChrysler will finally fix the problems. They've certainly got the technology in their Mercedes division.
Ack. I'll take an auto over walking most of the time, I'll admit. There are some nice things about driving an automatic. It is nice, for example, after driving for 3 hours on a bumpy road to be able to cruise into the gas station without having to suddenly remember how to shift. But then I'd rather have the efficiency of a manual on a long trip. Ok, now that I think about it, maybe there aren't any nice features about an auto. Heh.
Actually, my point was that at 55 mph you shouldn't have noticed a loss of power steering unless the loss of power steering also caused the mechanical portion of the steering to become inhibited somehow (like a piece of rubber getting stuck in the gearbox). There's a valve that tapers off your power steering so that at highway speeds you don't have power assist on the system anymore.
So, there's a valve that controls it. If your truck was fuel injected, there's a strong possibility that valve was opened/closed by a solenoid using signals from the speed sensor/ECU. Most people aren't aware of this so they don't even think to fix it when it breaks, and most mechanics don't care enough about it to tell a customer (if they even know, it's not common knowledge, even if it is blatantly obvious on so many cars).
Yes, it can! Brakes are WAY more powerful than engines.
Your four-wheel brakes can usually overpower the engine, that is true.
However, the parking brake (incorrectly but commonly referred to as the emergency brake) only powers two wheels, and does not have power assist. It has mechanical advantage through leverage. So it's both harder to stop the car and easier to lock up the brakes. And in this application, using your brakes at all would be going up against the cruise control that's determined to keep your car at a specific speed.
So when the tires slip with cruise control on, the wheels keep spinning at the same speed, while the car slows down.
Depends on the cruise control system. Until recently, cruise control worked off engine vacuum, in which case engine vacuum would decrease when the wheels slipped (engine breaks loose, spins faster) and the cruise control would actually close the throttle to correct.
The beauty of using engine vacuum to do it meant that you didn't have to care about road surface, slope, gear, or anything. The disadvantage was that the system took awhile to compensate for changes.
Elevators have emergency breaks...
Elevator: Quick, it's an emergency, BREAK! *crash*
"traction control" is nebulous.
Generally when someone's talking about traction control using ABS, they're referring to a fancy system that's designed for high-speed maneuvarability, like in a slalom or something, and actually has *nothing* to do with the road surface.
of course, the GP isn't aware of that, poor guy.
Just being pedantic, because generally when people argue about what traction control does, they're all right, it's just that "traction control" is such a nebulous phrase as to be virtually meaningless.
Um, technically, "popping the clutch" is when you've got the clutch disengaged (pedal down) and you slide your foot of the pedal. The clutch engages suddenly, and the pedal "pops" up.
/pedantic off
Ooo, so close. :)
The only downside here is that without your vehicle running the oil pump that lubes your automatic tranny won't be running, thus causing extreme wear and tear.
Some, yes. Some have a pump that's mechanically powered at the tail-end of the gear, so if it's mechanically engaged fluid flows. Most, though, drive the pump off the torque converter. All, however, store tons of fluid in the tranny. If you drain it, you only get like 1/3 of the fluid that's in there. That's why those quick oil change places have their fancy machines.
. This is why you don't tow vehicles with automatic trannies.
I know what you mean, but I'm gonna clarify this. You don't tow vehicles with automatic trannies with their drive wheels on the ground. That's why a wrecker will either put the wheels on the ground on a come-along, or will pick up the drive wheels.
The real danger has to do with where the torque is coming from. A manual tranny is bisexual, you can apply torque to it from either side and it doesn't care. An automatic cares. If you apply torque from the drive wheels, you spin gears backwards, build up fluid pressure, and what happens next depends entirely on the individual tranny. Most that I've seen break pilot gears (new ones ranging in price from $600 up).
Deep in the bowels of an automatic tranny you don't find gears in the same form as you find them in a manual tranny. There is no mechanical connection anywhere from the engine to the drive wheels. It's a hydraulic connection. You do find some friction-type stuff (clutch wheels, or something, I forget the names) in some of them. Others have a big band around it that gets squeezed.
Man I hate automatic trannies. Both my car and my truck are stick-shifts. My wife's car is an automatic. Got it from her mom, who is deathly afraid of stick-shifts. Says it's too distracting and they shouldn't even be allowed on the road.
Let's see, a Frenchman driving a French car...
His name wasn't Clousseau, by any chance, was it?
Ack, what rock do you live under? :)
Power steering and braking is provided by a cylinder of fluid. You've got enough for probably 4 or 5 hard 'full brake' depressions and at least 3 or 4 good wheel cranks.
That's extremely oversimplified, and somewhat inaccurate. 99.99999% of cars with power assist brakes use a vacuum booster that runs off engine vacuum. I can tell you all the technical details of how it works, but I don't really feel like it. :)
Power steering isn't exactly provided by a cylinder of fluid. A cylinder is just a cylinder, you need a pump to pump the fluid for it to be useful. Surprisingly, power steering works similar to the vacuum booster on your brakes, only using fluid instead of vacuum.
Why don't you drive your Dodge ram 250 to my house and I"ll show you the cutoff valve? Maybe it's broke.