181–190 of 415 posts
In a few decades the internal combustion engine will be to transportation what the typewriter is to typing today. It’s kind of mind boggling, but there is really no alternative if we want to stop increasing the CO2 concentration in our atmosphere.
Hydrogen can be created with nearly any energy source: renewable, natural gas, etc.
There is a large infrastructure for moving fuels.
It's a lot scarier when you see things going under load at speed. Lots of wiggling, twisty magic, waves. Smokey Yunick (blessed be his name) used to make see-through timing covers, oil pans, valve covers + strobe light + some sort of oscilloscope setup to watch the craziness. I think I remember seeing the results for small block Chevrolet timing gears on sprint car engines as the teeth wiggled more and more with rpm.…
Hopefully the vibration problem is gone.
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I don't think cats are to address greenhouse gasses; they're focused more on reducing pollutants that affect local air quality and human health. The main greenhouse gas from a car is carbon dioxide. The amount you create is directly proportional to the amount of fuel you burn. I don't know why modern cats are expensive; it might have to do with the price of platinum, palladium, and so on, and the relative amount of t…
> A cheap generic cat might have the bare minimum amount of catalyst, and might not do a very good job It depends on the car/engine. My old Mazda RX-8 had a huge cat - longer than the muffler and cost me $2,000 to replace (including labor) back in the late 2000's. The rotary engine in that vehicle had a terribly difficult time passing California's emission laws even when it was brand new off the lot - which led to st…
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How was he "caught" if thats the term?
I would assume that by some point, if one of his cars won, the officials just took the whole thing apart to find out what sort of bizarre loophole he'd found that met the letter of the requirements while totally violating the spirit. His antics weren't secret, even at the time he was working. He was just really good at it.
I guess it depends whether you accept "technically, according to rules as written (...)" is a valid explanation.
Maybe I am wrong, but in racing it seems to be.
One of those web pages which deserves an award. Some place in some kind of Internet Hall of Fame, an historical archive which shows the only best highlights of what websites were actually capable of presenting. Milestones of web development. This page summarizes pretty good what web technology is capable of, when in the hands of a real professional. --- Ok, I just realized this is from Bartosz Ciechanowski, and this…
> [...] We’ve barely scratched the surface of optics and camera lens
A real genius certainly, but, I'm always doing this; bad choice of metaphor here!
The quality of the explanations, and progression of complexity, reminded me of an old video that explains how a car's differential (rear end) works: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYAw79386WI Skip to 3:30 for the explanatory part.
I also appreciated the humor. They seem to have built a working mockup of a car with the driveshaft penetrating the passenger compartment, just to make the joke that it would be inconvenient to rest luggage on the spinning shaft.
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Yeah, aluminum is a worse conductor so you need thicker cable. It's less dense, though, so I think it usually comes out as being lighter. Thicker cables can be more inconvenient. I think aluminum also tends to have more problems with oxidation causing too much resistance at electrical contacts. I think for motors generally you just end up with a larger motor for the same amount of power.
All points you make are very true. In addition, aluminum tends to crack as it ages and you'll find aluminum wiring is usually a culprit in electrical fires. In the world of mobile electronics, it's usually looked down upon as the cheapest alternative when compared to real copper conductor used in higher quality automotive wiring.
If people look down upon it, it’s because they’re either lazy or ambivalent. It’s the superior performance solution in some situations.
One of those web pages which deserves an award. Some place in some kind of Internet Hall of Fame, an historical archive which shows the only best highlights of what websites were actually capable of presenting. Milestones of web development. This page summarizes pretty good what web technology is capable of, when in the hands of a real professional. --- Ok, I just realized this is from Bartosz Ciechanowski, and this…
https://ciechanow.ski/cameras-and-lenses/ > [...] We’ve barely scratched the surface of optics and camera lens A real genius certainly, but, I'm always doing this; bad choice of metaphor here!
Or a funny one.