SSME is indeed on par with the boosters used for Energia, in fact its well beyond it technically speaking which is actually part of the problem. SSME's were designed to get the last possible efficiency from the fuel burning process AND burn for 8+ minutes AND be re-useable while energia is a one off staged rocket. Think of Energia as a Saturn 5. It is also a Saturn 5 with many more engines, I forget how many engines are on the main stage of energia but its like 15 or more. Two very different approaches to solve the same problem. They both have problems. They both have advantages. Both systems are very capable of launching mass into orbit.
There is no real reason why you could not adapt SSME's to be used in a staged design like Energia except expense. There is some problem with the choice of fuel as well since Hydrogen is very bulky. Energia uses the same mix as Saturn if memory serves ( LOX and Kerosene ) which takes up far less space.
I think what we should do is build a new staged system around the new Boeing engine ( rs-68 I believe ) or pay for the Russians to ramp up Energia production.
At anyrate a 5 pack of the new boeing engines would give about 3 million pounds of thrust, or more than double what the shuttle 3 pack gives. Toss in SRB's on the side and you have a launch lift in the neighborhood of 11-12 million pounds of thrust for the first 2 minutes ( by comparison shuttle generates about 7.8 ). Properly staged you would see at the bare minimum a shuttle stacks payload capacity to LEO. By that I mean the weight of the orbiter + engines + payload or about 150,000 lbs all told. In addition you wouldn't be luggin around the main engines in orbit which is an aspect of the Buran design I always liked.
Given a specific goal and unwavering support there is no reason we could not build such a design in 5 years. One of the reasons the Russian space agenecy can make this claim ( and I have no doubt make good on it ) is that there is no argument about who is going to build what how. We on the other hand have evolved our infrastructure away from coordinated efforts at achieving a single goal. We have allowed the more negative aspects of competition to spread through our space agency and supporting contractors like a cancer while at the same time stiffling the better parts with government jobs programs to keep them rolling in money. The clean up isn't going to be pretty IF it ever comes.
Why would the user form factor need to be any bigger ?
Think of it as a keyboard with a speaker... so it is an input/output device. You unit is tied to your CPU back at home/dorm/laptop or to server space allocated to you. So you make a request for an audio playback which is simultaneously recorded on your base system, server space or device of choice to which you have access via the WAP ( could be limited to campus network or any net attached system to which you have access ). The brain system just becomes a very sophisticated router for requests. The voice recognition heavy lifting would be done by the main system while your pager/communicator whatever is just an i/o device.
For a wider ranging system your personal user information would be able to be transmitted to the local access point and that might increase the size a bit but I see no reason something along the size of an ipod wouldn't do the trick... and allow signifigant local storage capacity to boot.
A lot of people seem to be complaining about the idea of having a bunch of people walking around essentially on speaker phone.... but so what ? What is it when your walking around with your buddies ? Its not like we all walk around using sign language or anything.
To me the annoying thing with a cell phone is a one sided conversation.. you know the guy standing in the middle of the isle at the grocery store talking to no one... but if your hearing a tiny little speaker voice it should be more natural than just hearing one side. After all we are very accustomed to hearing two+ sided conversations going on around us... one sided conversations stand out because they have a very different cadence due to the constant long breaks while the other person is talking.
past that as far as the annoyance of having conversations in places where they should not be had ( MOVIES !!!! ) goes, it will not matter how many sides of the conversation you hear because they will always be annoying.
Mostly main line troops.. armor divisions, and support personel kind of stuff. In other words the kinds of units least likely to help in a search for a guriella leader with a sympathtic population.
1) I will use the preview button. 2) I will use the preview button. 3) I will use the preview button. . . . . 1,000,000) I will use the preview button.
Why where codes given out on a per veter basis ? Why were the machines not set up according to location to begin with ? IE when the systems are set up the proper disctric code is entered and used the entire time that machine is at that location ?????
Even if the poll workers are giving out the right codes this now allows fat finger voters to enter the wrong district code.
ACK !!!!!!!
Repeat after me... NEVER TRUST THE USER.
In this case you must trust whoever sets up the machine so HAVE THEM ENTER THE DISTRICT CODES !!
I have seen the trailer widget before and I agree it is one possible solution, kind of like the problem of added complexity in a hybrid though. But I think it is a better solution for the most part, less internal complexity to the car.
You hadn't stumbled across the T-zero before ?? Neat car. Course they plan to sell it for Ferrari type prices. I agree with their principle to some extent... but if they could sell the thing for Mustang Prices I think they would have more of an impact.
How long does the battery pack last? What does it cost to replace?
Pack life is on the order of two to three years, or 15,000 to 20,000 miles. At current prices, a set of new batteries costs about $3,000 from Optima.
You know that is one of the few places I have ever found a striaght up cost of battery for an EV. Note from the trailer generator that it also has about 20kw cruise. That is actually one of the places I was pulling info from out of my head earlier. That is for sealed Lead acid battaries. They also have a L-ion in development but it will be quite a bit more expensive. Not nearly as big an issue for that car as it is for something that is supposed to be more economical of course.
I chose the Mustang due to its huge engine and the fact its footprint is as big or bigger than any EV or hybrid I know of. Better comparison would actually be something like a Cavalier which weighs in at 2676 lbs. Tarus is much larger than any of the EV's I am familiar with, anyway it weighs in at 3306 lbs.
You can't remember last time you put down 75 miles in a day ? Can't say the same here, I do that several times a month on average and most of the people I know do as well.
Anyway I think you hit the high points. If I can find some discussion about the motor durability I will post a link. Anyway there is the loss of efficiency eletric motors experience under heavy load ( ie accelerating a car ). Meaning the engine may be 90% efficient at cruise conditions but under a heavy acceleration the same energy input nets you 70% efficiency. Thats a given characteristic.
http://www.specialtyvehiclesonline.com/eprints/b ri ggsandstratton.htm
that link has a good discription of that... and of a technology for ameliorating it as well actually. Anyway that is what causes a loss of range under stop and go traffic conditions.
The other.. the one I am thinking causes a durability issue has to do with fluctuating power levels. Seperate issue from the amount of work being done by the power supplied. As I understand it constant fluctuating of the power supplied ( throttle ) leads to a degredation of the magnets which leads to an overall degredation of the efficiency of the motor. I am having a harder time tracking down a discussion of it so perhaps I am smoking crack rock.
http://www.gmev.com/specs/specs_specs.htm
Went out and checked them out and I have run across them before. I think they benifited from nonstandard practices like high use of aluminum and greater atempt to maximise aerodynamics. My guess is you could put a gas engine/tranny etc in that car and maintain a similar weight. If you made an aluminum block engine and transmission casing you could probably beat it by a fair amount.
Not that I don't agree to some extent with alot of what you said regarding their potential motives in recalling the car and backing hybrid over pure EV. But a mass produced highly aerodynamic largely aluminum econo box is essentially a contradiction in terms.
I also couldn't agree more that they need to make EV's cheap. Right now I think they suck as primary transportation... however as a cheap secondary... say roughly equivalent to a motorcycle ??? That would work very well I think. Might also cut down on the number of second cars in families.. IE one gas and a secondary electric. Course that plays into the consipiracy stuff. Such as car compaies don't want families to buy a cheap second car.. they want it to cost just as much as the first one.
Overall weight actually seems negligible, at least in the hybrids.
Curb weight of a 2004 mustang with a nice big honking V-8 is 3066 lbs. http://www.new-cars.com/2004/ford/ford-musta ng-spe cs.html
Curb weight for a prius hybrid. 2890 lbs. http://www.new-cars.com/2004/toyota/toyota-p rius-s pecs.html
Curb weight for a Civic. 2782 lbs. Hybrid 2740 http://www.new-cars.com/2004/honda/honda-civ ic-si- specs.html
Power density is the woe of the EV. batteries are heavy and to provide useful range means added weight. Pure EV Cars with 100+ mile range are as heavy or heavier than a gas counterpart. In a hybrid on the otherhand, they do not need insane size battery packs. Simple mathmatics. 5.0 V-8 is around 1000 pounds, 15 gallons of gas about 120. lets say its 1500 pounds altogether... 1380 for the engine and 120 for fuel. Electric motors is still a few hundred pounds, lets say 500. Now how far will 1000 pounds of battery get you ? How long till the weight of the batteries are to much for reasonable performance from the motor ? And unlike gas motors, power in an electric is largely tied to weight virtue of the number of turns of wiring used.
As for electric motor durability I am under the impression they do best when used in what is essentially a constant speed scenario.... one of the reasons the serious makers of hybrids and EV's are also the leaders in striving for a reliable CV transmission to isolate the motor from the constant acceleration/deceleration of normal urban driving. Permanent magnet motors tend to be more imune to this kind of use but even so will become less efficient over time. I know R/C motors do not age very well, especially under extreme race use. I have been led to belive this problem is why no direct drive system has actually gotten out of the concept stage even though they are far more efficient than tranmission systems.
As to the range argument... the issue of range was not as much the type of driving ( though that certainly has an effect ) but a combination of type of driving and the life cycle of the battery. Batteries degrade over time as a function of the number of cycles. A daily 30-50% cycle will rack up in a hurry.
As for the necescity of range I say look at it this way. Typical range for a car these days closes in on 400 miles. But you don't really use that range. You tend to stop and gas up at around a 1/4 tank for some reason.. why is that ? Oh yeah its called margian of error.
100 miles is enough to cover your average commute given either you don't approach 100 miles to closely or that 100 mile range represents some margian of error. If that 100 mile ( and for most pure EV's I have seen 100km more commonly ) range is the quoted/advertised max. it dosn't take to much diggin to find that is the optimum range ( be it 100, 120 etc... ). its like that 400 mile range of a car. Realistically it means more like 350 ( spare gallon or two in the tank ). In town that drops to 310-315 ( 19/23mpg or 23/27mpg look familiar ? ). Similar problem for the EV. Thus if you start with 100 mile optimum range then realistically I doubt your going to try more than 85-90.... only with batteries you get degredation which means after a year your optimum could easily be 90 or less and thus your realistic range then becomes something more like 80. Now thats your highway cruise. lets say you get a further 15% drop with in town... now your down to 70 range and 60 comfort.
Now how adventurous are you going to be after work ? how much can you recharge between getting home and going out for some fun ? to run errands ? how many side trips to pick up friends in route to something ?
The long time to charge isn't the problem. The ~ 100 mile range of most designs isn't the problem. Urban sprawl isn't the problem. But all 3 together make a fairly difficult problem to solve.
Said something to the AC before I realized I had a real response. Aluminum is more expensive to manufacture and the quality control is far more difficult. From a safety standpoint it has some issues as well.
Its not like auto manufacturers are trying to make cars as heavy as they can. Weight savings have almost the exact same benifits for a gas car as for an electric. The benifits are just magnified for an electric car because their performance is already so marginal. Being able to go 600 miles on a single tank of gas instead of 400 is not a huge deal ( performance wise ) in most cases. But being able to go 150 miles on a charge versus 100 is a big deal for an EV. In other words the point of deminishing returns for weight savings in an EV is farther down the path than it is for a gas design. But if you develop a cost effective means of producing lighter frames for an electric design it will also benifit gas designs equally and all of a sudden you could build a lower power gas car with the same performance capacity ( which would be lighter still ).
Its a double whammy. When you boil it all down, electric cars will not be more attractive than gas untill A) gas is really running out and prices spike accordingly or B) battaries become far more energy dense and much cheaper and/or longer lasting.
Umm weight savings give the same advantages to a gas design as to an electric. Car manufacturers already try to make cars as light as they can ( and still make money ). Its an interesting balancing act they do. It becomes a little more important for an electric design but it has a double whammy cost. IE electric cars already have a cost issue in the battaries and motor before you even consider using non standard frame materials for lighter design weight. The double whammy is if you make a cost effective lighter fram you just added that much more efficiency to gas designs as well as to you electic lines.
1.60 is the ~ average nationwide price, certainly no argument that more expensive only makes an EV more attractive.
I think you may be surprised by how many people crowd the range limitation. What makes it worse is that range tends to be more along the lines of a best case. Stop and go traffic tends to knock down EV range considerably to more like 60-70. At the top end you see claims of 120-150 miles. The problem is these range estimates tend to be a best case scenario with new batteries. Somehow I doubt that after a year or so of stop and go urban commute you will see anything ressembling that range. That 120-150 is like the ipods 12 hours. In addition another added little issue most automanufactures don't mention regarding those range estimates is the effect of using periphial power drains... stuff like the Radio, A/C, power steering etc... In a gas system there is little effect on range with these items. In an electric car they can sap 20% of your range in a hurry. Check the power req's on a nice sound system or more importantly an A/C system.
In a car you have a constant source of electric power and in most cases are throwing excess generation capacity away. In a pure EV you only have so much juice and everything just opens the drain wider. As you pull more juice you tend to make the system more inefficient as well ( more heat buildup due to resistence etc... ).
General upkeep costs more ? Look 24 200+ amp hour sealed lead acid golf cart battaries will run you $1500 plus and have to be replaced every 2-3 years. More exotic battery types tend to have a lower number of deep cycles not more ( meaning they have to be replaced more often not less ) and cost more. The liquid polymer technology has both a longer life span and higher energy density but is exorbant in price.
An oil change every 3 months is $80 bucks a year. A yearly break service is less than $100, call it $200 for a good break job with fresh pads all round and tires after 50,000 miles for $400. Just for shits and giggles lets toss in a Full Tune up at $200 a year as well. Your talking $880 a year for a dealership type general maintenence schedule and it will be two years before you catch just the cheapest battery replacement charge.
And its not like the electric will not have some ascociated cost as well. For one breaks will cost just as much if not more ( batteries are HEAVY ) in addition the breaking systems will have added complexity with energy regeneration. Electric motors are highly unsuited for stop and go or highly unconsistent usage meaning you will likely be swapping out your motor or at least the magnents every 1-2 years or at best along with your batteries. This degradation of the motor will also have an effect on your range.
In addition if you didn't know, wiring harnesses get replaced for tune ups for a very good reason, their resistence increases over time.. another efficiency and range sapping consideration. I will bet most anything a new set of wires for an EV will cost more than a new set of Spark Plug wires and the install will cost more as well.
Tires for the same reason as brakes will cost as much or more. Suspension as well.
Now, I of course have not yet reached the difference in cost of energy. Gas vrs. electricity. Now one thing missing in EV discussion is a unit of measure for ready comparison so lets create one. Miles per gallon and miles per Kw/hr or mph and mpkh.
Assuming a typical cruise consumption of 20kw ( or ~ 26 Hp ) at 65 mph then 20kw/hr gives you a range of 65 miles. 65/20 = 3.5mpkh. A kw/hr in los angeles cost.07288 acording to
http://www.ladwp.com/ladwp/cms/ladwp001710.jsp
Lets say you have a 40kw/hr capacity EV. Filling it up costs ~40 *.07288 for 2.92 ( rounded ) per fill up and you have an approximate range of 130 miles. If you commute 10,000 miles that will consume 10,000/3.5 = 2857 kw/hr which will cost $208.
A car getting 40mpg at $2 a gallon will cost 500 d
kw/hr tends to be less than 10 cents around here. Cruise power in an EV is normally around 20kw or there bouts so call it no worse than 2$ an hour of cruise time ( 65 miles range ). Not to bad, beats the range you can get from 2$ worth of gas in most cases ( with prices now at 1.60 a gallon for cheap stuff ).
If you want to do it by charge then you need to figure out the stored energy in the battery system Volts * Amps = Watts. So 6 volt battery with 200 amp hours is 1200 watt hours or 1.2kw/hr.... call it 12 cents A charge. If you have 24 battaries then it would be roughly.12*24 to 'fill up' so $2.88. Just remember that is only 28.8 kw/hr or in other words not much more than an hours operation at peak cruise ( given 20kw (~26hp) was your cruise consumption ). That system is an example from a car conversion kit... poor efficiency and lead acid battaries but it is still fairly representitive.
The example battery is a decent golf cart battery which weighs 68 pounds. Thus 24 of the suckers weighs in at 1632 pounds and gives you a good example of the primary problem electric cars face. Using stuff like the LP battaries reduces the weight and increases the storage to a degree but I have yet to see systems that store enough for range much greater than 100 miles of cruise driving much less 100 miles of 'real' driving. And the cost of the things is insane when you realise they have to be replaced every couple years or so.
If they make it look like a regular car that means the frame will be roughly as heavy as a regular car.... then to offset the added weight it will need more battery power which will mean more weight... its an endless cycle.
course that said, I agree.. they could do a better job.
More likely just somthing that is more trouble than its worth to do casually. If the entire front body comes off instead of just a hood to raise its probably not an insubstantial weight to deal with and it would probably be easy to damage if not properly supported. Add it up and you will find that without any propriatary means they can default people to going to the dealership to 'check under the hood'. Probably wouldn't take long before higher end garages would have the ability as well.
Ummm Starship troopers was written in 58 and published in 59
Opus List
Not that I think he invented the thing. However, one has to wonder how many people that have worked on this kind of technology read ST and other Heinlien books growing up. Of course there are many other sources of mecha as well. I have always wondered how much influence our imagination has over what we persue in technology.
Well you think the adoption of issues by the major parties is an illusion. I contend that they become directly proportional in importance to the percentage of votes the issue represents.
That is bad for small fringe issues. Not at all bad for far reaching nation wide issues. Yet at the local area small fringe issues ( nationally speaking ) can be very important to the success of local candidates. Thus the local system is responsive to the local population while the national system is responsive to national issues. Is that not the way it should be ? Why would you want the nation as a whole swayed by the bible belt ? Or by the West coast ? Or the North east ?
The Rep/Dem parties are twin Goliaths no doubt... and betting against them is rarely wise if you want to win. To me all that means is until an issue is important enough that dosn't divide well between the establish party lines we will continue to see the Dem/Rep dominance. But mark me, the day one or both of them become so crytalized and entrenched that they cease to co-opt issues well enough to satisfy a sufficient % of the electorate is the first day of their demise.
However, much as I dislike the party system as it exists I don't really want to see it collapse. System collapse on that level tends to be an ugly affair. America has a history of relatively peacefull political reform... but we also have one of the bloodiest civil wars in history in our past as well.
Mostly I think we are arguing the same thing from opposing directions. I think you are dead on regarding the issue of individual tolerance. Take me for example, I was completely unaware of your capitalisation ( or lack of ) until you mentioned it. I noticed it then went hmmmmm, that is interesting and moved on. Case is meaningless for the most part. It does have a sort of "naming convention" linked with it but by and large a lack of capitalisation will not cause a miscommunication. I imagine in the rare case that it has meaning you generally take the time to do so.
At a guess I would venture to say our cognitive process while reading differ. For me alternative spellings and such things as there/their your/you're are silly distinctions. When someone is talking to me they do not have to specify which spelling of there/their they mean because the context clearly indicates which witch is which. My reading cognitive process is to listen to the voice created by the phonetic representation of the words on the paper. Thus spelling has little impact so long as the phonetic representation and contextual placement is accurate.
I think others, possibly such as yourself, are a little more tied to the actual symbols on the page thus their and there can create a disorientation from your primary coginitive process of interpreting the symbols.
No judgement on either method really, just an observation that seems to explain the disconnect between some folks regarding grammar/spelling.
Anyway, one final thing in regards to my passage containing " presentation and content genrally have only a passing aquiantence ".
I think you are considering your response in terms of most writting with good content has good presentation/organization. I do not disagree with that sentiment. However in writting as a whole my experience has been that worthy content is by far the exception and not the rule. In otherwords looking at it in terms of absolutes and leaving out the exceptions consider the following.
All writting with meaningfull content posseses good grammar
is very differnt from the statement
All writting possesing good grammar has meaningfull content
IMHO 99.9% of all writting is dreck be it properly punctuated or a broken hodgepodge of 10 languages written by a dislexic hooked on phonics graduate. For me the remaining.1% is far to dear to give a rats ass if the person who authored it bothered to run spell check or cracked open a dictionary/style book. That is the genesis of the statement above. The remaing.1% is probably skewed in favor of correct grammar but I do not think it is to the exclusion of improper usage. In fact most intelligent posters I have encountered online or IRL have their personal quirks ( like your disregard for caps ).
Perhaps, but the theory of backing the incumbent is sort of the same as 'Dance/leave with the one that brought you'. And " Don't change horses in mid-stream ".
If the republican party started rumbling as a whole that Bush wasn't the best candidate you would see pressure on him not to campaign. However, the situation would have to be most extreme to not favor him retaining the Republican nomination. By the way, unless I am mistaken the Republican party still decides if he is their candidate. It is just that in the case of an incumbent president it is more or less given that he will have the nomination. Its a leadership vote isntead of a national polling of members but I believe it would be possible for them to reject him and to cause a national run off. Been a while since I have dug into the details of the Dem/Rep nomination process.
Odds are when it comes about that an incumbent is dropped from his parties ticket you will see a splintering of one of the major parties.
Bush also could decide he dosn't want to run... Fat chance but it is always an option.
"Since it's been more than a century since we had a system where third-party candidates were viable, I don't know that there's really enough evidence to make this statement."
To some extent I agree with you. However if the current system were completely unresponsive to the desires of the electorate don't you think it would have caused a major crisis by now ? Nothing stops 3rd parties from forming in the US. Where ever you find a serious disconnect between the electorate and the major parties you see a fair amount of success for third parties at the local and occasionally even state elections. Case in point, the election of Jesse Ventura in Minnesota. Wrestling jokes aside, the guy was independent and he beat one of the most entrenched good ole boy systems in the US and the reason was that the major parties in control lacked sufficient contact with the people in that state.
The thing is that any 3rd party issue that impacts the US on a nationwide level is pretty much the deffinition of an issue the major parites must co-opt. This survival mechanisim kills the 3rd party but also insures the issue lives past their demise. In fact its not uncommon that the parties absorb the candidates along with their issues.
Jackbird hit on a good bit of why the two party system is due to the system bias. In any case a political system has to find a way to empower the government with a mandate. Representational parliment does it by forcing coalitions among the parties. Winner takes all voting tends to cause a polarization of issues where representational voting causes a splintering. Thus the electorate is forced to form coalitions in order to reach a plurality or majority vote percentage needed for claiming the election. In other words same Cat but a differnt means of skinning it.
Hmmm well technically all parties have equal access to state run primaries but the system is deffinatly streamlined for the two major parties.
Mostly a function of the support infrastructure in place for them. IE its not a problem for them to organize 25,000 ( random number ) names on a petition for placing candidates on a ticket. Most 3erd parties do not have national infrastructure to assist with running primaries or doing the leg work to get on the tickets.
Its much less of an issue with the primaries than with the national presidential elections. First off there is rarely much dispute about who the candidates are for 3erd parties which often negates the need for a primary. However for the presidential election it is a very hard task for 3erd party candidates to get on the ballot nationwide.
You just have to remember the primaries are technically not a part of the voting process. It is a mechanisim that has evovled for whitling down the major party candidates which have nationwide memembers that have to unify support behind a single candidate to have any chance of taking the white house.
As for the state invovlement in administering the primaries it boils down to the fact presidential primaries are major events and due to the reality of the two party prominence in the US political system it is important to make sure the major party presidential nominees are fairly selected. Parties could run their own but they would loose legitimacy and would have to expend more money to do so without the help of the state electoral officials.
The months long rolling elections is an aritifact of the days when travel limited how fast candidates could stump around the nation for nationwide support. It has evolved into an endurance litmus test that slowly sloughs off the pretenders. Its alomst like a sports season.
Its incestuous and not entirely perfect but so far it has served its purpose. The system is far from inviting for 3erd parties but there are several realities which bias america towards a two party system and it probably does more good than harm. So long as the two party system provides sufficient choice and responsiveness to americans as a whole it will likely remain in place.
Slashdot Mirror
"A Mars shot would cost one heck of a lot more than a trillion dolars. "
And just exactly how do you know this ? Please lay out the details for the rest of us.
used 30 times to fly into space over 20 years without a problem ? Are they sure its deffective ?
Yeah I know I know... but damn people you have to draw the line somewhere. I wish all things worked that well impropperly installed.
SSME is indeed on par with the boosters used for Energia, in fact its well beyond it technically speaking which is actually part of the problem. SSME's were designed to get the last possible efficiency from the fuel burning process AND burn for 8+ minutes AND be re-useable while energia is a one off staged rocket. Think of Energia as a Saturn 5. It is also a Saturn 5 with many more engines, I forget how many engines are on the main stage of energia but its like 15 or more. Two very different approaches to solve the same problem. They both have problems. They both have advantages. Both systems are very capable of launching mass into orbit.
There is no real reason why you could not adapt SSME's to be used in a staged design like Energia except expense. There is some problem with the choice of fuel as well since Hydrogen is very bulky. Energia uses the same mix as Saturn if memory serves ( LOX and Kerosene ) which takes up far less space.
I think what we should do is build a new staged system around the new Boeing engine ( rs-68 I believe ) or pay for the Russians to ramp up Energia production.
At anyrate a 5 pack of the new boeing engines would give about 3 million pounds of thrust, or more than double what the shuttle 3 pack gives. Toss in SRB's on the side and you have a launch lift in the neighborhood of 11-12 million pounds of thrust for the first 2 minutes ( by comparison shuttle generates about 7.8 ). Properly staged you would see at the bare minimum a shuttle stacks payload capacity to LEO. By that I mean the weight of the orbiter + engines + payload or about 150,000 lbs all told. In addition you wouldn't be luggin around the main engines in orbit which is an aspect of the Buran design I always liked.
Given a specific goal and unwavering support there is no reason we could not build such a design in 5 years. One of the reasons the Russian space agenecy can make this claim ( and I have no doubt make good on it ) is that there is no argument about who is going to build what how. We on the other hand have evolved our infrastructure away from coordinated efforts at achieving a single goal. We have allowed the more negative aspects of competition to spread through our space agency and supporting contractors like a cancer while at the same time stiffling the better parts with government jobs programs to keep them rolling in money. The clean up isn't going to be pretty IF it ever comes.
Why would the user form factor need to be any bigger ?
Think of it as a keyboard with a speaker... so it is an input/output device. You unit is tied to your CPU back at home/dorm/laptop or to server space allocated to you. So you make a request for an audio playback which is simultaneously recorded on your base system, server space or device of choice to which you have access via the WAP ( could be limited to campus network or any net attached system to which you have access ). The brain system just becomes a very sophisticated router for requests. The voice recognition heavy lifting would be done by the main system while your pager/communicator whatever is just an i/o device.
For a wider ranging system your personal user information would be able to be transmitted to the local access point and that might increase the size a bit but I see no reason something along the size of an ipod wouldn't do the trick... and allow signifigant local storage capacity to boot.
A lot of people seem to be complaining about the idea of having a bunch of people walking around essentially on speaker phone.... but so what ? What is it when your walking around with your buddies ? Its not like we all walk around using sign language or anything.
To me the annoying thing with a cell phone is a one sided conversation.. you know the guy standing in the middle of the isle at the grocery store talking to no one... but if your hearing a tiny little speaker voice it should be more natural than just hearing one side. After all we are very accustomed to hearing two+ sided conversations going on around us... one sided conversations stand out because they have a very different cadence due to the constant long breaks while the other person is talking.
past that as far as the annoyance of having conversations in places where they should not be had ( MOVIES !!!! ) goes, it will not matter how many sides of the conversation you hear because they will always be annoying.
damn my that was funny.. and my mod points just ran out... oh the humanity.
Mostly main line troops.. armor divisions, and support personel kind of stuff. In other words the kinds of units least likely to help in a search for a guriella leader with a sympathtic population.
1) I will use the preview button.
2) I will use the preview button.
3) I will use the preview button.
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1,000,000) I will use the preview button.
Why where codes given out on a per veter basis ? Why were the machines not set up according to location to begin with ? IE when the systems are set up the proper disctric code is entered and used the entire time that machine is at that location ?????
Even if the poll workers are giving out the right codes this now allows fat finger voters to enter the wrong district code.
ACK !!!!!!!
Repeat after me... NEVER TRUST THE USER.
In this case you must trust whoever sets up the machine so HAVE THEM ENTER THE DISTRICT CODES !!
SHEESH
I have seen the trailer widget before and I agree it is one possible solution, kind of like the problem of added complexity in a hybrid though. But I think it is a better solution for the most part, less internal complexity to the car.
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You hadn't stumbled across the T-zero before ?? Neat car. Course they plan to sell it for Ferrari type prices. I agree with their principle to some extent... but if they could sell the thing for Mustang Prices I think they would have more of an impact.
http://www.acpropulsion.com/tzero_pages/tzero_F
How long does the battery pack last? What does it cost to replace?
Pack life is on the order of two to three years, or 15,000 to 20,000 miles. At current prices, a set of new batteries costs about $3,000 from Optima.
You know that is one of the few places I have ever found a striaght up cost of battery for an EV. Note from the trailer generator that it also has about 20kw cruise. That is actually one of the places I was pulling info from out of my head earlier. That is for sealed Lead acid battaries. They also have a L-ion in development but it will be quite a bit more expensive. Not nearly as big an issue for that car as it is for something that is supposed to be more economical of course.
I chose the Mustang due to its huge engine and the fact its footprint is as big or bigger than any EV or hybrid I know of. Better comparison would actually be something like a Cavalier which weighs in at 2676 lbs. Tarus is much larger than any of the EV's I am familiar with, anyway it weighs in at 3306 lbs.
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You can't remember last time you put down 75 miles in a day ? Can't say the same here, I do that several times a month on average and most of the people I know do as well.
Anyway I think you hit the high points. If I can find some discussion about the motor durability I will post a link. Anyway there is the loss of efficiency eletric motors experience under heavy load ( ie accelerating a car ). Meaning the engine may be 90% efficient at cruise conditions but under a heavy acceleration the same energy input nets you 70% efficiency. Thats a given characteristic.
http://www.specialtyvehiclesonline.com/eprints/
that link has a good discription of that... and of a technology for ameliorating it as well actually. Anyway that is what causes a loss of range under stop and go traffic conditions.
The other.. the one I am thinking causes a durability issue has to do with fluctuating power levels. Seperate issue from the amount of work being done by the power supplied. As I understand it constant fluctuating of the power supplied ( throttle ) leads to a degredation of the magnets which leads to an overall degredation of the efficiency of the motor. I am having a harder time tracking down a discussion of it so perhaps I am smoking crack rock.
http://www.gmev.com/specs/specs_specs.htm
Went out and checked them out and I have run across them before. I think they benifited from nonstandard practices like high use of aluminum and greater atempt to maximise aerodynamics. My guess is you could put a gas engine/tranny etc in that car and maintain a similar weight. If you made an aluminum block engine and transmission casing you could probably beat it by a fair amount.
Not that I don't agree to some extent with alot of what you said regarding their potential motives in recalling the car and backing hybrid over pure EV. But a mass produced highly aerodynamic largely aluminum econo box is essentially a contradiction in terms.
I also couldn't agree more that they need to make EV's cheap. Right now I think they suck as primary transportation... however as a cheap secondary... say roughly equivalent to a motorcycle ??? That would work very well I think. Might also cut down on the number of second cars in families.. IE one gas and a secondary electric. Course that plays into the consipiracy stuff. Such as car compaies don't want families to buy a cheap second car.. they want it to cost just as much as the first one.
Nice rant. For the most part.
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Overall weight actually seems negligible, at least in the hybrids.
Curb weight of a 2004 mustang with a nice big honking V-8 is 3066 lbs.
http://www.new-cars.com/2004/ford/ford-must
Curb weight for a prius hybrid. 2890 lbs.
http://www.new-cars.com/2004/toyota/toyota-
Curb weight for a Civic. 2782 lbs. Hybrid 2740
http://www.new-cars.com/2004/honda/honda-ci
Power density is the woe of the EV. batteries are heavy and to provide useful range means added weight. Pure EV Cars with 100+ mile range are as heavy or heavier than a gas counterpart. In a hybrid on the otherhand, they do not need insane size battery packs. Simple mathmatics. 5.0 V-8 is around 1000 pounds, 15 gallons of gas about 120. lets say its 1500 pounds altogether... 1380 for the engine and 120 for fuel. Electric motors is still a few hundred pounds, lets say 500. Now how far will 1000 pounds of battery get you ? How long till the weight of the batteries are to much for reasonable performance from the motor ? And unlike gas motors, power in an electric is largely tied to weight virtue of the number of turns of wiring used.
As for electric motor durability I am under the impression they do best when used in what is essentially a constant speed scenario.... one of the reasons the serious makers of hybrids and EV's are also the leaders in striving for a reliable CV transmission to isolate the motor from the constant acceleration/deceleration of normal urban driving. Permanent magnet motors tend to be more imune to this kind of use but even so will become less efficient over time. I know R/C motors do not age very well, especially under extreme race use. I have been led to belive this problem is why no direct drive system has actually gotten out of the concept stage even though they are far more efficient than tranmission systems.
As to the range argument... the issue of range was not as much the type of driving ( though that certainly has an effect ) but a combination of type of driving and the life cycle of the battery. Batteries degrade over time as a function of the number of cycles. A daily 30-50% cycle will rack up in a hurry.
As for the necescity of range I say look at it this way. Typical range for a car these days closes in on 400 miles. But you don't really use that range. You tend to stop and gas up at around a 1/4 tank for some reason.. why is that ? Oh yeah its called margian of error.
100 miles is enough to cover your average commute given either you don't approach 100 miles to closely or that 100 mile range represents some margian of error. If that 100 mile ( and for most pure EV's I have seen 100km more commonly ) range is the quoted/advertised max. it dosn't take to much diggin to find that is the optimum range ( be it 100, 120 etc... ). its like that 400 mile range of a car. Realistically it means more like 350 ( spare gallon or two in the tank ). In town that drops to 310-315 ( 19/23mpg or 23/27mpg look familiar ? ). Similar problem for the EV. Thus if you start with 100 mile optimum range then realistically I doubt your going to try more than 85-90.... only with batteries you get degredation which means after a year your optimum could easily be 90 or less and thus your realistic range then becomes something more like 80. Now thats your highway cruise. lets say you get a further 15% drop with in town... now your down to 70 range and 60 comfort.
Now how adventurous are you going to be after work ? how much can you recharge between getting home and going out for some fun ? to run errands ? how many side trips to pick up friends in route to something ?
The long time to charge isn't the problem. The ~ 100 mile range of most designs isn't the problem. Urban sprawl isn't the problem. But all 3 together make a fairly difficult problem to solve.
Said something to the AC before I realized I had a real response. Aluminum is more expensive to manufacture and the quality control is far more difficult. From a safety standpoint it has some issues as well.
Its not like auto manufacturers are trying to make cars as heavy as they can. Weight savings have almost the exact same benifits for a gas car as for an electric. The benifits are just magnified for an electric car because their performance is already so marginal. Being able to go 600 miles on a single tank of gas instead of 400 is not a huge deal ( performance wise ) in most cases. But being able to go 150 miles on a charge versus 100 is a big deal for an EV. In other words the point of deminishing returns for weight savings in an EV is farther down the path than it is for a gas design. But if you develop a cost effective means of producing lighter frames for an electric design it will also benifit gas designs equally and all of a sudden you could build a lower power gas car with the same performance capacity ( which would be lighter still ).
Its a double whammy. When you boil it all down, electric cars will not be more attractive than gas untill A) gas is really running out and prices spike accordingly or B) battaries become far more energy dense and much cheaper and/or longer lasting.
Umm weight savings give the same advantages to a gas design as to an electric. Car manufacturers already try to make cars as light as they can ( and still make money ). Its an interesting balancing act they do. It becomes a little more important for an electric design but it has a double whammy cost. IE electric cars already have a cost issue in the battaries and motor before you even consider using non standard frame materials for lighter design weight. The double whammy is if you make a cost effective lighter fram you just added that much more efficiency to gas designs as well as to you electic lines.
1.60 is the ~ average nationwide price, certainly no argument that more expensive only makes an EV more attractive.
.07288 acording to
.07288 for 2.92 ( rounded ) per fill up and you have an approximate range of 130 miles. If you commute 10,000 miles that will consume 10,000/3.5 = 2857 kw/hr which will cost $208.
I think you may be surprised by how many people crowd the range limitation.
What makes it worse is that range tends to be more along the lines of a best case. Stop and go traffic tends to knock down EV range considerably to more like 60-70. At the top end you see claims of 120-150 miles. The problem is these range estimates tend to be a best case scenario with new batteries. Somehow I doubt that after a year or so of stop and go urban commute you will see anything ressembling that range. That 120-150 is like the ipods 12 hours. In addition another added little issue most automanufactures don't mention regarding those range estimates is the effect of using periphial power drains... stuff like the Radio, A/C, power steering etc... In a gas system there is little effect on range with these items. In an electric car they can sap 20% of your range in a hurry. Check the power req's on a nice sound system or more importantly an A/C system.
In a car you have a constant source of electric power and in most cases are throwing excess generation capacity away. In a pure EV you only have so much juice and everything just opens the drain wider. As you pull more juice you tend to make the system more inefficient as well ( more heat buildup due to resistence etc... ).
General upkeep costs more ? Look 24 200+ amp hour sealed lead acid golf cart battaries will run you $1500 plus and have to be replaced every 2-3 years. More exotic battery types tend to have a lower number of deep cycles not more ( meaning they have to be replaced more often not less ) and cost more. The liquid polymer technology has both a longer life span and higher energy density but is exorbant in price.
An oil change every 3 months is $80 bucks a year. A yearly break service is less than $100, call it $200 for a good break job with fresh pads all round and tires after 50,000 miles for $400. Just for shits and giggles lets toss in a Full Tune up at $200 a year as well. Your talking $880 a year for a dealership type general maintenence schedule and it will be two years before you catch just the cheapest battery replacement charge.
And its not like the electric will not have some ascociated cost as well. For one breaks will cost just as much if not more ( batteries are HEAVY ) in addition the breaking systems will have added complexity with energy regeneration. Electric motors are highly unsuited for stop and go or highly unconsistent usage meaning you will likely be swapping out your motor or at least the magnents every 1-2 years or at best along with your batteries. This degradation of the motor will also have an effect on your range.
In addition if you didn't know, wiring harnesses get replaced for tune ups for a very good reason, their resistence increases over time.. another efficiency and range sapping consideration. I will bet most anything a new set of wires for an EV will cost more than a new set of Spark Plug wires and the install will cost more as well.
Tires for the same reason as brakes will cost as much or more. Suspension as well.
Now, I of course have not yet reached the difference in cost of energy. Gas vrs. electricity. Now one thing missing in EV discussion is a unit of measure for ready comparison so lets create one. Miles per gallon and miles per Kw/hr or mph and mpkh.
Assuming a typical cruise consumption of 20kw ( or ~ 26 Hp ) at 65 mph then 20kw/hr gives you a range of 65 miles. 65/20 = 3.5mpkh. A kw/hr in los angeles cost
http://www.ladwp.com/ladwp/cms/ladwp001710.jsp
Lets say you have a 40kw/hr capacity EV. Filling it up costs ~40 *
A car getting 40mpg at $2 a gallon will cost 500 d
kw/hr tends to be less than 10 cents around here. Cruise power in an EV is normally around 20kw or there bouts so call it no worse than 2$ an hour of cruise time ( 65 miles range ). Not to bad, beats the range you can get from 2$ worth of gas in most cases ( with prices now at 1.60 a gallon for cheap stuff ).
.12*24 to 'fill up' so $2.88. Just remember that is only 28.8 kw/hr or in other words not much more than an hours operation at peak cruise ( given 20kw (~26hp) was your cruise consumption ). That system is an example from a car conversion kit... poor efficiency and lead acid battaries but it is still fairly representitive.
If you want to do it by charge then you need to figure out the stored energy in the battery system Volts * Amps = Watts. So 6 volt battery with 200 amp hours is 1200 watt hours or 1.2kw/hr.... call it 12 cents A charge. If you have 24 battaries then it would be roughly
The example battery is a decent golf cart battery which weighs 68 pounds. Thus 24 of the suckers weighs in at 1632 pounds and gives you a good example of the primary problem electric cars face. Using stuff like the LP battaries reduces the weight and increases the storage to a degree but I have yet to see systems that store enough for range much greater than 100 miles of cruise driving much less 100 miles of 'real' driving. And the cost of the things is insane when you realise they have to be replaced every couple years or so.
If they make it look like a regular car that means the frame will be roughly as heavy as a regular car.... then to offset the added weight it will need more battery power which will mean more weight... its an endless cycle.
course that said, I agree.. they could do a better job.
More likely just somthing that is more trouble than its worth to do casually. If the entire front body comes off instead of just a hood to raise its probably not an insubstantial weight to deal with and it would probably be easy to damage if not properly supported. Add it up and you will find that without any propriatary means they can default people to going to the dealership to 'check under the hood'. Probably wouldn't take long before higher end garages would have the ability as well.
Ummm Starship troopers was written in 58 and published in 59 Opus List
Not that I think he invented the thing. However, one has to wonder how many people that have worked on this kind of technology read ST and other Heinlien books growing up. Of course there are many other sources of mecha as well. I have always wondered how much influence our imagination has over what we persue in technology.
http://www.sti.nasa.gov/tto/spinoff2000/ip3.htm
interesting link... Rome Ga... went to school there. Interesting.
Well you think the adoption of issues by the major parties is an illusion. I contend that they become directly proportional in importance to the percentage of votes the issue represents.
That is bad for small fringe issues. Not at all bad for far reaching nation wide issues. Yet at the local area small fringe issues ( nationally speaking ) can be very important to the success of local candidates. Thus the local system is responsive to the local population while the national system is responsive to national issues. Is that not the way it should be ? Why would you want the nation as a whole swayed by the bible belt ? Or by the West coast ? Or the North east ?
The Rep/Dem parties are twin Goliaths no doubt... and betting against them is rarely wise if you want to win. To me all that means is until an issue is important enough that dosn't divide well between the establish party lines we will continue to see the Dem/Rep dominance. But mark me, the day one or both of them become so crytalized and entrenched that they cease to co-opt issues well enough to satisfy a sufficient % of the electorate is the first day of their demise.
However, much as I dislike the party system as it exists I don't really want to see it collapse. System collapse on that level tends to be an ugly affair. America has a history of relatively peacefull political reform... but we also have one of the bloodiest civil wars in history in our past as well.
Nice post.
.1% is far to dear to give a rats ass if the person who authored it bothered to run spell check or cracked open a dictionary/style book. That is the genesis of the statement above. The remaing .1% is probably skewed in favor of correct grammar but I do not think it is to the exclusion of improper usage. In fact most intelligent posters I have encountered online or IRL have their personal quirks ( like your disregard for caps ).
Mostly I think we are arguing the same thing from opposing directions. I think you are dead on regarding the issue of individual tolerance. Take me for example, I was completely unaware of your capitalisation ( or lack of ) until you mentioned it. I noticed it then went hmmmmm, that is interesting and moved on. Case is meaningless for the most part. It does have a sort of "naming convention" linked with it but by and large a lack of capitalisation will not cause a miscommunication. I imagine in the rare case that it has meaning you generally take the time to do so.
At a guess I would venture to say our cognitive process while reading differ. For me alternative spellings and such things as there/their your/you're are silly distinctions. When someone is talking to me they do not have to specify which spelling of there/their they mean because the context clearly indicates which witch is which. My reading cognitive process is to listen to the voice created by the phonetic representation of the words on the paper. Thus spelling has little impact so long as the phonetic representation and contextual placement is accurate.
I think others, possibly such as yourself, are a little more tied to the actual symbols on the page thus their and there can create a disorientation from your primary coginitive process of interpreting the symbols.
No judgement on either method really, just an observation that seems to explain the disconnect between some folks regarding grammar/spelling.
Anyway, one final thing in regards to my passage containing " presentation and content genrally have only a passing aquiantence ".
I think you are considering your response in terms of most writting with good content has good presentation/organization. I do not disagree with that sentiment. However in writting as a whole my experience has been that worthy content is by far the exception and not the rule. In otherwords looking at it in terms of absolutes and leaving out the exceptions consider the following.
All writting with meaningfull content posseses good grammar
is very differnt from the statement
All writting possesing good grammar has meaningfull content
IMHO 99.9% of all writting is dreck be it properly punctuated or a broken hodgepodge of 10 languages written by a dislexic hooked on phonics graduate. For me the remaining
Perhaps, but the theory of backing the incumbent is sort of the same as 'Dance/leave with the one that brought you'. And " Don't change horses in mid-stream ".
If the republican party started rumbling as a whole that Bush wasn't the best candidate you would see pressure on him not to campaign. However, the situation would have to be most extreme to not favor him retaining the Republican nomination. By the way, unless I am mistaken the Republican party still decides if he is their candidate. It is just that in the case of an incumbent president it is more or less given that he will have the nomination. Its a leadership vote isntead of a national polling of members but I believe it would be possible for them to reject him and to cause a national run off. Been a while since I have dug into the details of the Dem/Rep nomination process.
Odds are when it comes about that an incumbent is dropped from his parties ticket you will see a splintering of one of the major parties.
Bush also could decide he dosn't want to run... Fat chance but it is always an option.
"Since it's been more than a century since we had a system where third-party candidates were viable, I don't know that there's really enough evidence to make this statement."
To some extent I agree with you. However if the current system were completely unresponsive to the desires of the electorate don't you think it would have caused a major crisis by now ? Nothing stops 3rd parties from forming in the US. Where ever you find a serious disconnect between the electorate and the major parties you see a fair amount of success for third parties at the local and occasionally even state elections. Case in point, the election of Jesse Ventura in Minnesota. Wrestling jokes aside, the guy was independent and he beat one of the most entrenched good ole boy systems in the US and the reason was that the major parties in control lacked sufficient contact with the people in that state.
The thing is that any 3rd party issue that impacts the US on a nationwide level is pretty much the deffinition of an issue the major parites must co-opt. This survival mechanisim kills the 3rd party but also insures the issue lives past their demise. In fact its not uncommon that the parties absorb the candidates along with their issues.
Jackbird hit on a good bit of why the two party system is due to the system bias. In any case a political system has to find a way to empower the government with a mandate. Representational parliment does it by forcing coalitions among the parties. Winner takes all voting tends to cause a polarization of issues where representational voting causes a splintering. Thus the electorate is forced to form coalitions in order to reach a plurality or majority vote percentage needed for claiming the election. In other words same Cat but a differnt means of skinning it.
Hmmm well technically all parties have equal access to state run primaries but the system is deffinatly streamlined for the two major parties.
Mostly a function of the support infrastructure in place for them. IE its not a problem for them to organize 25,000 ( random number ) names on a petition for placing candidates on a ticket. Most 3erd parties do not have national infrastructure to assist with running primaries or doing the leg work to get on the tickets.
Its much less of an issue with the primaries than with the national presidential elections. First off there is rarely much dispute about who the candidates are for 3erd parties which often negates the need for a primary. However for the presidential election it is a very hard task for 3erd party candidates to get on the ballot nationwide.
You just have to remember the primaries are technically not a part of the voting process. It is a mechanisim that has evovled for whitling down the major party candidates which have nationwide memembers that have to unify support behind a single candidate to have any chance of taking the white house.
As for the state invovlement in administering the primaries it boils down to the fact presidential primaries are major events and due to the reality of the two party prominence in the US political system it is important to make sure the major party presidential nominees are fairly selected. Parties could run their own but they would loose legitimacy and would have to expend more money to do so without the help of the state electoral officials.
The months long rolling elections is an aritifact of the days when travel limited how fast candidates could stump around the nation for nationwide support. It has evolved into an endurance litmus test that slowly sloughs off the pretenders. Its alomst like a sports season.
Its incestuous and not entirely perfect but so far it has served its purpose. The system is far from inviting for 3erd parties but there are several realities which bias america towards a two party system and it probably does more good than harm. So long as the two party system provides sufficient choice and responsiveness to americans as a whole it will likely remain in place.