Automotive Complexity
Electric Cars are new.
Internal Combustion Cars
are old...
Well, perhaps that's an oversimplification.
Internal Combustion Cars
have been REFINED
for about 100 years.
Compare these two videos:
All vehicles require occasional
Maintenance...
Which one seems more
Maintainable ?
Which one could likely
run on Mars...?
Which one could you
repair yourself...?
Which one would frustrate
an experienced mechanic?
You'll have to fix cars on Mars,
too..!
...with no local Dealers parts..!
Obviously, on the Moon, or on Mars, Air would be a premium resource...
You wouldn't want your vehicles
to be using all your breathable Air... Right?
So Electric Vehicles are good
for Space...
Of Course, you would have to
build Nuclear Power Plants
on Mars...
You have no Wind Power,
No Hoover Dam, no Niagara Falls.
Solar Power on Mars is possible,
but to do big things, you need
a Lot of power...
And trying to launch hundreds
of Acres of Solar panels into
space, and land them on Mars...
Is a job bigger than setting up
a small nuclear plant.
Designs would have to be
very different ...
No Water-Cooled Reactors...
Oh... What about the Steam
Turbines..?
Huh.
Solar Mirror powered
Steam Locomotives could
be a stepping stone.
There is ICE out there...
Use them to jump-start
heavy industry...
Until Solar Panels etc. could
be manufactured from
LOCAL MATERIALS...
Of course, even Electric Cars
use air and water for certain things...
Like: Cooling the engine,
Inflating the tires,
Gas-charging the suspension,
Air Conditioning...
Cooling the brakes...
hmmm ...
All those systems would
have to be re-engineered...
Back here on earth,
there's an Electric Car problem,
that needs solving.
If an electric car gets in a crash,
there's a dangerous possibility of Battery Fires.
Fire Departments are dispatched,
but they can't put out the fire !
Lithium Batteries burn at
5000° F, so hosing a car down
can't extinguish the flame,
because it's hot enough to
flash the water into Superheated
Steam...and Hydrogen Gas ...
Fire Departments could use
Concrete Pumper Trucks,
with a slurry of water and sand.
Bury the car in a pile of sand,
and you cut off the air.
No air, no Fire.
It would still take a while
to cool off, but the wet sand
would help that too.
Keep your distance because
of potential Hydrogen Gas
Explosions. (Maybe just use
sand, skip the water...)
Shove a pipe under the car
to vent gasses before you
bury it...(on top...?)
I recommended a similar
method to Tepco, when
they had burning fuel cylinders,
back in 2011.
Click the image, and think
about
And Fire-Fighters should
tow electric cars out of
attached garages, before
they overheat...
Chuck
[ChuckADV JpiCedar]
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