The Chocolate Fireguard as designed by Mercedes Benz

“Soylent Green is people”

Mike

Steamdave, I think you'll find as many of not many more articles showing the opposite- that EV's reduce CO2 - not that I made any pretence of getting mine to be 'green' - I simply wanted to play with it and with free supercharging then if I dismiss the actual cost/depreciation of the behemoth then using it is cheap to free.

Bazyle, There was an aussie neurosurgeon who suggested (some years ago) that car fatalities would be reduced if there was a spike fitted above the driver to puncture the skull and prevent intracranial pressure increases in the event of a severe head trauma. It's a brilliant idea - a bl***y great spike in front of the drivers face and I doubt many would be going more than 20mph - saves deaths and way better fuel economy....

I also hada colleague who's idea was to have heavy lift helicopters patrolling the motorways - bad drivers or car accidents would be lifted by electromagnet and dropped into the nearest field to take their chances. No traffic jams and cautious driving guaranteed.

Brilliant idea except it doesn't work! If people had a proper sense of danger they wouldn't inject Heroin with dirty needles, drink alcohol, smoke or ride motorbikes without a helmet. Quite common in the US for drivers to think they can beat a train over a level-crossing despite flashing lights and horns blasting.

Some chaps refuse to wear steel toe caps because they can imagine all too clearly the pain resulting from removing a crushed boot . Strangely they don't comprehend what happens if they aren't wearing a safety-boot at all! When seat-belts were made compulsory I remember chaps of my father's generation arguing it was safer to be 'thrown clear' in an accident, and that wearing a belt encouraged dangerous driving. (The statistics disagree.) And as the truth about tobacco emerged loads of smokers preferred to remember elderly relatives with no health issues after a lifetime on Capstan Full Strength whilst forgetting anyone with heart problems, emphysema, lung-cancer or bronchitis.

Trouble is most people believe nasty things only happen to others. No-one would volunteer to work in Bomb Disposal if that weren't true. The notion of personal immortality wears off as you get older but ladders still get a lot of pensioners!

The side-effects of spikes are unfortunate. Who should the widow sue when innocent hubby is pierced due to another driver crashing in to him?

I've thought about this carefully. The proper solution is that only I should be allowed to drive. The world will be much safer when the rest of you are locked up...

Dave

Dave,

You're probably right. Apparently in a recent survey 96% of americans identified themselves as above average drivers..

pgk

American drivers don't really scare me.

It's our own.

Dave'll soon come round when he can't get his cornflakes 'cos all the truck drivers are in chokey...

Alternatively one could buy something like this.

Merlin

Edited By V8Eng on 30/04/2019 22:15:09

Ah! The. I was discussing the same topic with some RAF buddies and the "Injector Seat" evolved. Back to the retinal scanning proposal. If a driver stops being attentive for extended periods a bloody great spike comes out of the seat. Rather than being a pain in the arse they get a pain in the arse....

There was an argument earlier that EV's are overall higher in CO2 due to the manufacturing process. VW has just released an analysis (yeah we know how honest they are) of the phases of production, use and recycling and while currently EV's use produce more CO2 in manufacture their overall carbon footprint is substantially better and would be better still if their electricity came from purely renewable sources.
I don't want to keep banging the Tesla drum but likely their carbon footprint of manufacture is lower due to their philosophy of using renewable in assembly - it's sourcing the battery raw materials where there's hurdles to overcome. Also they aim for a longer vehicle life.

VW Link

Doubletop,

A radio program recently discussed the argument that the world is designed around men with the valid point that car safety studies are conducted using a 50 percentile male dummy shape i.e insufficient study regarding the different shape, weight and size of ladies and their higher risk of injury in car crashes. It's something also affects folk like me at over 2 metres tall and 106Kg - cars aren't designed that far outside the bell-curve. You should include these concerns in your design of an injector seat.

One of the items not shown by the accidents by car type statistics is what car caused the accident, many times the idiot who forces their way through the traffic putting everyone's life in danger is not actually involved in the accident, yet leaves a trail of destruction behind them.

Occasionally there is some poetic justice; whilst on the way to a friend's wedding, I was taking the M4 slip road off the M25, when one such idiot who had been in the outside lane of the M25 decided that he was also going to take the M4, cut straight across the 4 lanes of traffic on the M25 and the 2 lanes of the slip road to embed his car directly into the armco at the left side of the slip road.

Another one who was overtaking everyone on the A41, at silly speeds, when we caught up with him several hundred yards down the road had wrapped his car around a tree on the right hand side of the road. Obviously no space to pull in for the lane he was supposed to be in and a car bearing down on him at speed from the other direction left him with no other options.

As can regularly be seen on the various police related TV programmes, a high percentage of these people are repeat offenders, often having no license or insurance and a previous ban, however all they receive is a fine that they can't pay as they have no money and a further ban that has no effect either, and they are back out causing havoc again the very next day.

Whilst we have people like this on the roads, no amount of safety features are going to make any difference, short of everyone being forced to use automated vehicles/public transport that is itself forced to follow the regulations.

Curses, Mick has spotted a tiny flaw in my cunning plan.

Apart from cornflakes and perhaps a few other minor details, I'm still convinced locking everyone up is the answer...

Working alongside some of the staff from EDF energy, you tend to get involved in a lot of discussions regarding energy supplies and distribution.

The recent conversation revolved around the increasing use of electric vehicles and the additional demands that were already being placed on the grid.

The two main points raised were: 1, the availability of 'Economy 7' meters will be phased out as there will be no surplus of power during the off peak periods, and 2: the position of the government with regard to lost fuel duties from fossil fuel burning vehicles, the general concensus was that additional dudies (tax) would be placed on EV charging rates in order to recover the losses.

Think about adding another 40% cost (Based on current fuel duty) to eack KWH of charge time - plus VAT of course.

Regards

Edited By Mick B1 on 04/05/2019 09:53:10

I had asked the same question about the government’s loss of fuel tax as everybody switches over to EV's. It was pointed out to me that we already have a system working in New Zealand. We don't pay tax on diesel fuel but diesel vehicles are subject to Road User Charges. You pay in advance depending on the type of vehicle you own. In an attempt to encourage take up EV's don’t pay RUC at the moment but it would be easy to tag them on

https://www.nzta.govt.nz/assets/resources/road-user-charges/docs/road-user-charges-handbook.pdf

Removing the off-peak electricity charges will be the tip of the iceberg. The generation and power transmission infrastructure will need beefing up and that will need to be paid for. That will be by all users not just the EV's owners.

Over here,We had a Gal arrested for drunk driving 2 times within 15 minutes. We are cracking along here, Has to be a record. Bring back flogging and chain gangs I say. About 30 years ago I had seen a real chain gang in operation.

If memory serves there is a plan to require all eu vehicles be fitted with GPS locators... the obvious final reason being to charge road usage fees as well as more tracking of everyone (just in case they don't have a phone...)

pgk

Mandatory GPS trackers on vehicles opens up many possibilities

• Missing vehicle searches
• Road user charges
• Automatic speeding fines
• Automatic crash detection (tied to airbag triggers they'd know how major a crash was before anybody managed to get out of their cars)

Big Brother is certainly with us. The 'Thought Police" will be next

Surely “smart meters” will simply replace E-7 meters? So no real change there. The availability of the cheap rate periods will just be transferred from one device to another. Simple, really and doesn’t need a lot of lengthy discussion I would have thought.

Most EV charging will (continue to) be carried out from domestic supplies. Only those with no home charging facilities will be affected - or those making longer journeys and needing a fast charge en route.

As above, the tax will be rendered on vehicles and mileage in the future. Home charging tax would surely hurt those with electric-only households - not a sensible plan.

I foresee people being more careful with how they use electricity, when statistics start to emerge from the most efficient users and the ‘don’t think mob’ who are wasteful and inconsiderate to the grid and other users.

And don't buy a new Tesla 3. It may be environmentally friendly but will cost you £315 road tax after the first free year.

 Also, a mate was convinced that all the electrickery passing through a white meter was cheaper so he was going to have one fitted for his main supply.

Regards Ian.

Edited By Circlip on 05/05/2019 09:43:38

With regard to the Economy 7 meters, I should have been clearer - it would be the Economy 7 RATE that would be discontinued, as there would effectively be no 'off peak' period, this would add massive costs to many domestic users.

From a coleague that owns a Nissan Leaf with the uprated charging port, it already has a facility built in to meter its supply independently from the house, and would therefore be able to be costed seperately at a different rate to that of the domestic supply.

It was also mentioned that any VAT charged would be at 20% as per current fuel duty rate and Not 5% domestic supplies.

Regards

Day rate is dearer than standard rate on a white meter, and night rate has been slowly catching up with it over the years

Regards