Practically Classics Forum

They haven't really thought this through. Just work out the power needed to charge a car in ten minutes and the infrastructure needed to support it. Probably written by some journalist with an arts degree.

suffolkpete wrote: ↑

Fri Nov 01, 2019 9:19 am

They haven't really thought this through. Just work out the power needed to charge a car in ten minutes and the infrastructure needed to support it. Probably written by some journalist with an arts degree.

Back in the days when I was a student, (when God was a lad) arts degrees where seen as airy fairy nonentities. One of the best pieces of graffiti ever was written above the toilet roll holder, it read: "Arts Degrees, please take one."

You're right about not thinking it through Pete, however research continues. Anyone who was around back in the eighties, would have laughed at you when you predicted how slim and small phone batteries would be in years to come, as they but their cumbersome great brick-like phone back in their pocket.

My speculative guess for future electric power is something akin to today's fossil fuel. You drive for a given distance, two or three hundred miles, pull into a garage, lift out your batteries and replace them with charged batteries, pay your money and off you go. It sounds fanciful now, but how fanciful are the everyday things that we take for granted, before they were invented?

Of course your electric bill will double...

Dick wrote: ↑

Sat Nov 02, 2019 9:04 pm

Of course your electric bill will double...

Double? You will be lucky if it only doubles.
British fuel tax highest in Europe. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews ... urope.html
61% of the pump price is tax, and as the fuel tax is added to the pump price then VAT is charged, UK drivers pay a tax on tax.

Fuel duties are levied on purchases of petrol, diesel and a variety of other fuels. They represent a significant source of revenue for government. In our latest forecast, we expect fuel duty to raise £28.4 billion in 2019-20. That would represent 3.5 per cent of all receipts and is equivalent to £1,000 per household and 1.3 per cent of national income. https://obr.uk/forecasts-in-depth/tax-b ... el-duties/ That figure does not include the VAT levied on fuel. VAT is shown as a whole, meaning it's lumped together with all and sundry, that's probably deliberate so that it masks just how much per annum motorists pay, but it could also be because those in the transport industries that buy large quantities of fuel claim their VAT back, if they are VAT registered that is.

It doesn't take a degree in quantum mathematics to see the shortfall to the exchequer when the fossil fuel either dries up or when the world goes over to renewables.

Since we installed our heat pump I've found that every year we use a little less electric the price still goes up... I'm not complaining too much as the oil fired heating would be far too expensive to run.. we were heating 1 house burning 750 litres a year and burning 7m3 of timber..

GHT wrote: ↑

Sat Nov 02, 2019 6:12 pm

My speculative guess for future electric power is something akin to today's fossil fuel. You drive for a given distance, two or three hundred miles, pull into a garage, lift out your batteries and replace them with charged batteries, pay your money and off you go. It sounds fanciful now, but how fanciful are the everyday things that we take for granted, before they were invented?

That would only work if batteries were standardised for all vehicles, otherwise you'd have to go to a main dealer, who probably knocks off for the weekend at lunchtime on Saturdays. The other aspect that fills me with horror is the fact that lithium ion batteries steadily lose their capacity with each charge/discharge cycle, so how would you know how much electricity you're buying? The issue with electric cars is not the size and capacity of the battery, but the rate at which you have to transfer energy in order to charge it. I calculate that to charge a Nissan Leaf in ten minutes would require nearly quarter of a megawatt. The connection between the charging point and the car would have to be capable of carrying this and still be safe for Joe Public to use.

Not to mention (soz if said before....) the environmental impact of making said batteries.....and then disposal at end of life...

Pete & Paul, you both make a good deal of sense, but my speculation isn't based on what we have, it's what we could have, after some smart arse genius has invented it for us. What you both point out is the pitfalls of using today's technology. The best way of trying to describe what I'm getting at is this article in an American newspaper circa 1953. I hope I get my point across.

Mr Sullivan was most likely laughed at when he made that alarmingly accurate prediction. I put it to you that his words are evidence of the existence of time machines in 1953! And yes, Mr Sullivan, we can indeed use our devices to translate either on screen, or via a conversation involving that most pleasant young woman, Google Assistant, whose skill set does extend to real time translation of calls, in both directions. Though it/she doesn't (yet?) translate between English and Doric, so trips up to the North East coast mean that I have to carry something called a phrase book. Can anyone under thirty remember those? I can, but then I still have my late mother's set of eight sixteen rpm (sixteen and two thirds, if you want to be anal about it) "Linguaphone" LPs that tell me how to speak foreign. And yes, one of my other devices can play records at that speed, and at 78.
Classic Jimmy Shand, anyone?

JPB wrote: ↑

Mon Nov 04, 2019 2:03 am

Mr Sullivan was most likely laughed at when he made that alarmingly accurate prediction. I put it to you that his words are evidence of the existence of time machines in 1953! And yes, Mr Sullivan, we can indeed use our devices to translate either on screen, or via a conversation involving that most pleasant young woman, Google Assistant, whose skill set does extend to real time translation of calls, in both directions. Though it/she doesn't (yet?) translate between English and Doric, so trips up to the North East coast mean that I have to carry something called a phrase book. Can anyone under thirty remember those? I can, but then I still have my late mother's set of eight sixteen rpm (sixteen and two thirds, if you want to be anal about it) "Linguaphone" LPs that tell me how to speak foreign. And yes, one of my other devices can play records at that speed, and at 78. Classic Jimmy Shand, anyone?

On my wife's day to day calendar is a daily motto, more like a daily bitch. But one such bitch read: "Despite my university degree, I still find the microwave difficult to operate." How I empathised with that. Whilst I can warm food in the microwave, all it's other functions just go over my head, as does, her sat-nav, the TV recorder, e-mail, handhold wotsits, paying at the till with a mobile phone, (why?) and modern cars. Why does the dashboard of modern cars resemble something akin to a fighter-jet? And as for our washing machine, that just defies all logic, even a quantum physics degree wouldn't explain that bloody thing.

However, I do have hundreds and hundreds of 78rpm records, and I have even more at 45rpm. Most of my playing favourites you will never have heard of but if I could choose just one, it would have to be, Bull Moose Jackson, and the song is called, "My Big Ten Inch." If you are curious, look it up, it's on YouTube. Pride of place in my record collection are the five records that Elvis recorded at The Sun Studio, before his manager, Colonel Parker, signed him to RCA. And what do I play my records on? You can forget any fancy gizmos, there's only one record player worthy, and that's this one.