Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Fair enough, so far their attempts at security could be called amateur at best, childlike at worst... -Curt Date: Tue, 21 Jun 2011 21:59:53 -0600 From: Craig diese...@pisquared.net To: mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: 20110621215953.8987133f.diese...@pisquared.net Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 21 Jun 2011 12:36:08 -0700 (PDT) Curt Raymond curtlud...@yahoo.com wrote: The other thing to go right with this is smart meters which charge you more during high demand periods. IF they do an adequate job with (computer/digital) security in the smart meters, else you'll have someone hacking into your power meter and causing all sorts of difficulties (complete shutdown, anyone?). Craig ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Thermodynamics in a nutshell: -You can't win. -You can't break even. -It's the only game (and you have to play it). -- John W Reames jream...@verizon.net Home: +14106646986 Mobile: +14437915905 On Jun 20, 2011, at 21:57, Curt Raymond curtlud...@yahoo.com wrote: Sorry, no. Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, only its form changed, thats your first law of thermodynamics that is. To get hydrogen will always take more energy than said hydrogen is worth. Good oil will always contain more energy than it took to get it. That said we're running short on really good oil. As an aside I'm working on a short post apocalyptic movie that highlights plastic reclamation (ie digging it out of garbage dumps) to turn into oil once oil is impossible (because its gone or the technology to get it is gone) to get. -Curt Date: Mon, 20 Jun 2011 11:50:59 -0700 From: G Mann g2ma...@gmail.com To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: BANLkTikrqr7cUnD=evsco2xxrgdpxcs...@mail.gmail.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Hydrogen for this test program was supplied from large tanks from Air-liquid who is/was a major hydrogen supplier for the space program [rockets use hydrogen fuel... lots of it]. The hydrogen was extracted either from water process using electric current or extracted from free air I believe. The argument can be raised that it takes more energy to crack water than the hydrogen returns, however argument can also be raised that if research was devoted to the process a better system could/would be found to produce hydrogen. Nothing is free, even free oil coming out of the ground costs money to capture and make into diesel/gas. Cheap always wins, except in girlfriends and quality. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
On Jun 20, 2011 10:18 PM, Curt Raymond curtlud...@yahoo.com wrote: Agreed. I think its air conditioning that makes people weak. Spoken like a true Northerner. :) I can't imagine what it was like without AC. Porches, siestas, fans, and sweet iced tea. Long lunch breaks. And airy hats of course. If you visit some of the older Southern working-class houses, you will see a lot of the open air and covered porch action that is popular in green construction now. Small kitchen with an outside door, rising ceilings with the highest in a wide/long hallway, open eaves, thick interior doors... It is interesting how much of Southern culture was just reacting to the different environment, I assume the same is true everywhere though I've never studied it. Here however we'll use our AC maybe 10 days total this summer and most of those we'll shut it off before bed. Likewise, I haven't bothered to fix the heat on the 300D; I use the Harbor Freight electric heater to defrost but it just doesn't get that cold. Yesterday it was 90something, my daughter just walked in wearing a lined coat and sweater since it is only high 70s. I guess if you grow up in it you get used to it. Best, -Tim Son of Yankees ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
The new thorium reactors look very interesting, but probably the no-nuke crowd will prevent them from seeing light of day here. If Canada or Mexico were smart, they'd build the nuke plants and sell us the power. Hey Rich, you habla spaniola, maybe we can form a business partnership to build nukes south of the border? Now we really need to figure out who the nuke guy is on the list and get him on board... Very respectfully, /s/ Max Dillon '87 300TD 334k miles (Off with the head!) '95 E300 283k miles (daily driving duties) '73 Balboa 20 (High dry until the head is back on) Charleston SC From: Mountain Man maontin@gmail.com To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Sent: Mon, June 20, 2011 9:14:08 PM Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Max wrote: Not me that works in a nuke plant, but nuke is the only way to go, in my opinion. Eh... I was convinced to that point-of-view 38 years ago. mao ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Allan, Hey, I didn't write that about the electrical distribution system. I agree with you that in most big city areas hooking up a few hundred or thousand 220v electric cars would bring about brown outs or the need for rolling blackouts. Best Wishes, Roger Hale Monroe, Ga. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Read the link; that guy has an excellent track record of turning his ideas into economically feasible ventures. If he had something like what you describe, I'm sure it would be on the market now if viable. Problem with solar is the energy density of sunlight is simply too low. I think you only get about 3 or 4 watts per square meter, when the sun is shining, and that amount of power is not sufficient to do very much given our current energy requirements. We're back to nuclear power again... Very respectfully, /s/ Max Dillon '87 300TD 334k miles (Off with the head!) '95 E300 283k miles (daily driving duties) '73 Balboa 20 (High dry until the head is back on) Charleston SC From: Mountain Man maontin@gmail.com To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Sent: Mon, June 20, 2011 9:31:06 PM Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Curt wrote: On the news this morning they touted some solar panel company thats come up with some new manufacturing tech that is supposed to drive the cost way down which is apparently a game changer. I remember a 1978 Newsweek article about a guy named Ovshinsky that spoke about amorphous semiconductor materials. That was gonna be the game changer, described as paint one material on the side of the house, paint another material on top of that, hook up wires, and away you go. The guy's company is still around but that system has not happened, yet. That is the game changer I want to see. http://web.mit.edu/invent/iow/ovshinsky.html mao ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
There was a good article in the WSJ a few years ago, several states got bitten bad with lease agreements and subsidies, only to find out they ended up paying the leases, paying for electricity to keep the generators turning when the wind didn't blow, and when the subsidy ran out it was a money loosing proposition. Very respectfully, /s/ Max Dillon '87 300TD 334k miles (Off with the head!) '95 E300 283k miles (daily driving duties) '73 Balboa 20 (High dry until the head is back on) Charleston SC From: Rich Thomas richthomas79td...@constructivity.net To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Sent: Mon, June 20, 2011 10:13:51 PM Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT That's a new one on me. I was out in Medicine Bow, Wyoming some years ago getting up close and personal with one of the largest wind turbines ever built, at a test site there. It was a 5MW Hamilton Standard machine, 250ft rotor diameter with the hub sitting 250ft up. They told the story that during construction, someone got the wires crossed on the thing, and someone else got the meter wires crossed too (a compound error that canceled out the fail safe). So when they first fired the thing up (so to speak) they started drawing power instead of generating power, and were quite happy to see it got up to 5MW right quick in a pretty low breeze. Then they were even more surprised to see it get to 6.5MW and thought wow, this thing is working better than we expected! Then the phone rings, and it is the Bonneville Power Authority wondering what the hell they were doing to be drawing a 6.5MW load all the sudden. All the sudden someone realizes it was running as a giant fan not a windmill, and hit the big red button real fast. Someone outside watching it wondered why the blades were bending the wrong direction too. It was a good smoke test though, and proved the design better than the tests they had planned. Go figger. I have some pictures of the thing and me up on top of it (20F, 25kt wind). --R On 6/20/11 9:23 PM, Max Dillon wrote: All the big wind generators have a motor feature to keep the blades turning when the wind isn't strong enough to do the job, because the high wind speed required to get them spinning doesn't happen often enough. Basically you have to spend some electricity to make some. Long calm spell? Wind farm will consume lots of electricity to get through it. In other words, we can't even predict the weather, let alone the climate, but that is another discussion... Max Curt Raymondcurtlud...@yahoo.com wrote: We've recently (well since last fall anyway) gotten 5 big (1.65MW) windmills in our area. I'm constantly amazed by how little wind it takes them to turn. I'm sure they're not making much power when they're just barely turning though... ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Well, perhaps the technology has advanced or better designs are out there, or maybe I shouldn't believe everything I read and make sweeping generalizations... Very respectfully, /s/ Max Dillon '87 300TD 334k miles (Off with the head!) '95 E300 283k miles (daily driving duties) '73 Balboa 20 (High dry until the head is back on) Charleston SC From: Curt Raymond curtlud...@yahoo.com To: Diesel List mercedes@okiebenz.com Sent: Mon, June 20, 2011 10:14:24 PM Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT I'd heard that for horizontal blades but not big conventional type ones. I don't think thats the case here as sometimes in the morning when I go to work theres no wind and they'll be stopped, there are 2 right off my commute, on my way home they'll be spinning again. -Curt Date: Mon, 20 Jun 2011 21:23:23 -0400 From: Max Dillon meadedil...@bellsouth.net To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: 4bb626be-14ff-445a-b08b-53c8bd82b...@email.android.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 All the big wind generators have a motor feature to keep the blades turning when the wind isn't strong enough to do the job, because the high wind speed required to get them spinning doesn't happen often enough. Basically you have to spend some electricity to make some. Long calm spell? Wind farm will consume lots of electricity to get through it. In other words, we can't even predict the weather, let alone the climate, but that is another discussion... Max Curt Raymond curtlud...@yahoo.com wrote: We've recently (well since last fall anyway) gotten 5 big (1.65MW) windmills in our area. I'm constantly amazed by how little wind it takes them to turn. I'm sure they're not making much power when they're just barely turning though.. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Max Dillon wrote: Problem with solar is the energy density of sunlight is simply too low. I think you only get about 3 or 4 watts per square meter, when the sun is shining, and that amount of power is not sufficient to do very much given our current energy requirements. We're back to nuclear power again... Average over the entire planet, including the parts that are totally dark, is supposed to be around 164 W/m^2. I think solar panel rates watts are based on insolation of 1kW/m^2. From Wiki: Over the course of a year the average solar radiation arriving at the top of the Earth's atmosphere is roughly 1,366 watts per square meter[2][3] (see solar constant). The radiant power is distributed across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, although most of the power is in the visible light portion of the spectrum. The Sun's rays are attenuated as they pass though the atmosphere, thus reducing the insolation at the Earth's surface to approximately 1,000 watts per square meter for a surface perpendicular to the Sun's rays at sea level on a clear day. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
I speak Suthrun and learning Gullah, I think we should build them South of the Border in SC, we have Savannah River, all them squids up there in the Navy who know that nukular stuff, and already produce about 2/3 of our power here from nukes. Let's get Nikki to build a bunch more and sell power to the Yankees and charge them lots of money for it. --R On 6/21/11 8:26 AM, Max Dillon wrote: Hey Rich, you habla spaniola, maybe we can form a business partnership to build nukes south of the border? ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Actually, I read somewhere that the electrical utilities are encouraging EVs because they build the capacity for the peaks - and have difficulty dealing with the valleys. The EVs are expected to be charging after the peak use times -the middle of the day afternoon. On Mon, Jun 20, 2011 at 10:47 PM, Allan Streib str...@cs.indiana.eduwrote: roger...@comcast.net writes: As for no distribution system you got no outlets at your place? We've got a HUGE distribution system. What we'll need is more 220v outlets to get better charge times. I have my doubts whether the current electical infrastructure in many areas would be up to handling the additional load of thousands of EVs being recharged every evening. A lot of urban areas operate right on the borderline of brown-outs/rolling blackouts during the summer as it is. Allan -- 1983 300D ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com -- OK Don 2001 ML320 1992 300D 2.5T 1990 300D 2.5T 1997 Plymouth Grand Voyager ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
OK Don wrote: Actually, I read somewhere that the electrical utilities are encouraging EVs because they build the capacity for the peaks - and have difficulty dealing with the valleys. The EVs are expected to be charging after the peak use times -the middle of the day afternoon. And there's talk of giving discounts to people who let the utility remote control the charger, so they can use your cars as waste dumps for excess nighttime juice. There's also talk of you not making it home from work the next day if the utility has a problem with output one night, or if there's a giant need for nighttime air conditioning and the utility doesn't turn on your charger. Mitch. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
So maybe we need to convert to the metric system and the standard outlet is now 220v. I know I did this for my server farm here at work, all servers are on 220v. I really don't think we sill see a solution in this current decade. Here you can see what Calif is demanding for electricity http://www.caiso.com/outlook/SystemStatus.html Rory On Tue, Jun 21, 2011 at 10:54 AM, OK Don okd...@gmail.com wrote: Actually, I read somewhere that the electrical utilities are encouraging EVs because they build the capacity for the peaks - and have difficulty dealing with the valleys. The EVs are expected to be charging after the peak use times -the middle of the day afternoon. On Mon, Jun 20, 2011 at 10:47 PM, Allan Streib str...@cs.indiana.edu wrote: roger...@comcast.net writes: As for no distribution system you got no outlets at your place? We've got a HUGE distribution system. What we'll need is more 220v outlets to get better charge times. I have my doubts whether the current electical infrastructure in many areas would be up to handling the additional load of thousands of EVs being recharged every evening. A lot of urban areas operate right on the borderline of brown-outs/rolling blackouts during the summer as it is. Allan -- 1983 300D ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com -- OK Don 2001 ML320 1992 300D 2.5T 1990 300D 2.5T 1997 Plymouth Grand Voyager ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Yup and many states have net metering laws which force the utility to buy electricity from all producers. Some net metering laws even pay a higher price during peak demand. The other thing to go right with this is smart meters which charge you more during high demand periods. It would suddenly push all users to conserve during the day and move loads like washing machines and dryers to the evening when demand is lower. Most home EV charging would be in the evening or night so I think the old it'll drive the electrical grid to its knees argument is bunk. Also worth remembering is that these cars won't just appear overnight. As the grid is stressed the utilities can do what they should have been doing all along and add additional capacity... -Curt Date: Tue, 21 Jun 2011 12:54:39 -0500 From: OK Don okd...@gmail.com To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: BANLkTi=5PPq5FhF3RpEPFiwZJxF=ruu...@mail.gmail.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Actually, I read somewhere that the electrical utilities are encouraging EVs because they build the capacity for the peaks - and have difficulty dealing with the valleys. The EVs are expected to be charging after the peak use times -the middle of the day afternoon. On Mon, Jun 20, 2011 at 10:47 PM, Allan Streib str...@cs.indiana.eduwrote: roger...@comcast.net writes: As for no distribution system you got no outlets at your place? We've got a HUGE distribution system. What we'll need is more 220v outlets to get better charge times. I have my doubts whether the current electical infrastructure in many areas would be up to handling the additional load of thousands of EVs being recharged every evening. A lot of urban areas operate right on the borderline of brown-outs/rolling blackouts during the summer as it is. Allan -- 1983 300D ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
What does the metric system have to do with it? My dryer runs on 220v, my electric stove runs on 220v, my air conditioner runs on 220v. At some point I'll have 220v in the garage because 220v welders have better duty cycles and a 220v air compressor can have a more powerful motor for better recycle time. -Curt Date: Tue, 21 Jun 2011 11:02:01 -0700 From: Rory amsoil...@gmail.com To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: BANLkTi=-wbfkgub05+xu94ec4zeorq8...@mail.gmail.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 So maybe we need to convert to the metric system and the standard outlet is now 220v. I know I did this for my server farm here at work, all servers are on 220v. I really don't think we sill see a solution in this current decade. Here you can see what Calif is demanding for electricity http://www.caiso.com/outlook/SystemStatus.html Rory ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
On the subject of saving the environment, some of you may have seen this little car/concept. It is now being produced and is scheduled for import, I think. http://www.popularmechanics.com/cars/news/preview-concept/4251491 No plug in, no long down time while batteries recharge [with the proper support systems in place] . No heavy batteries to carry around so overall weight of car is greatly less than EV's. Plus claimed 200 mile range on one charge of air, plus the engine also can run on gasoline for extreme mileage. The car runs on compressed air but engine is also rigged to run on gas so you are never left out and empty.. I've been following the designer for some years [a frenchman] and it's now licensed for production in India. Grant... On Tue, Jun 21, 2011 at 10:54 AM, OK Don okd...@gmail.com wrote: Actually, I read somewhere that the electrical utilities are encouraging EVs because they build the capacity for the peaks - and have difficulty dealing with the valleys. The EVs are expected to be charging after the peak use times -the middle of the day afternoon. On Mon, Jun 20, 2011 at 10:47 PM, Allan Streib str...@cs.indiana.edu wrote: roger...@comcast.net writes: As for no distribution system you got no outlets at your place? We've got a HUGE distribution system. What we'll need is more 220v outlets to get better charge times. I have my doubts whether the current electical infrastructure in many areas would be up to handling the additional load of thousands of EVs being recharged every evening. A lot of urban areas operate right on the borderline of brown-outs/rolling blackouts during the summer as it is. Allan -- 1983 300D ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com -- OK Don 2001 ML320 1992 300D 2.5T 1990 300D 2.5T 1997 Plymouth Grand Voyager ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
G Mann wrote: On the subject of saving the environment, some of you may have seen this little car/concept. It is now being produced and is scheduled for import, I think. http://www.popularmechanics.com/cars/news/preview-concept/4251491 I've got to assume that compressed air is just another severely inefficient battery. (although energy density per pound might be high, energy out per energy in is going to be very low) ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Curt Raymond wrote: As the grid is stressed the utilities can do what they should have been doing all along and add additional capacity... The grid is already stressed. And the environmental laws have made it _tough_ to add capacity. As I understand, the growth in the last dozen years or so has been at the expense of capacity buffer. That is, rather than building new generation plants to keep up with current and anticipated growth, the system has just dipped into the built in deal-with-emergencies buffer capacity. Meaning there is very little buffer left. -- Philip ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Actually, the guys design is pretty ingenious. It's a compound engine that uses several tricks that are pretty neat to maximize the stored energy of the compressed air. The compressed air tanks are recharged either externally, or through a rather ingenious system that uses fuel [this thing will use almost anything that burns for fuel it seems]. The system is an external combustion system that is much like a steam engine of the 1800's only on steroids, hence the extreme range claims. As with all such claims, the proof comes in the hands of the complete and total mechanical idiots it will be sold to. if it passes that gauntlet, it has a chance. Until then, I follow the concept with some interest. Thought perhaps some here might find interest as well. Grant... 82 300D AZ 83 300SD...AZ On Tue, Jun 21, 2011 at 1:30 PM, Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net wrote: G Mann wrote: On the subject of saving the environment, some of you may have seen this little car/concept. It is now being produced and is scheduled for import, I think. http://www.popularmechanics.**com/cars/news/preview-concept/**4251491http://www.popularmechanics.com/cars/news/preview-concept/4251491 I've got to assume that compressed air is just another severely inefficient battery. (although energy density per pound might be high, energy out per energy in is going to be very low) __**_ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/**archive/http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/**mailman/listinfo/mercedes_**okiebenz.comhttp://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
roger...@comcast.net writes: Allan, Hey, I didn't write that about the electrical distribution system. Sorry... must have been some funny quoting in someone else's message, then. A lot of email software doesn't handle quoting properly. Allan -- 1983 300D ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
On Tue, 21 Jun 2011 12:36:08 -0700 (PDT) Curt Raymond curtlud...@yahoo.com wrote: The other thing to go right with this is smart meters which charge you more during high demand periods. IF they do an adequate job with (computer/digital) security in the smart meters, else you'll have someone hacking into your power meter and causing all sorts of difficulties (complete shutdown, anyone?). Craig ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Mr. Mann I salute you. A voice of reason in a forest of misinformation. Bravo! I still contend that drilling and converting oil shale to oil would tap America's oil reserves. Some estimates show US has more oil reserves (when oil shale is included) than the rest of the world combined and would last ~400 years at current usage. During that time maybe we could come up with a energy policy and new technology to solve the problem. I also think widespread diesel use would reduce oil demand more easily than the other new technology. After all, diesel technology is very advanced, the infrastructure is in place *today* and there's a 20-30% improvement in mpg's when compared to similar gas vehicles. LarryT 91 300D -Original Message- From: G Mann Sent: Sunday, June 19, 2011 12:12 PM To: Mercedes Discussion List Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT I object, the whole idea that electric vehicles are clean is a manufactured lie. First, the entire electronics industry uses and makes some of the nastiest chemicals in history, which stay in the environment for lifetimes, not days. No natural thing eats them or breaks them down. Second, batteries, which are the heart and soul of electric cars, are a disposal problem by themselves, and getting more so as the switch to lythium and other exotics is made. Third, the lie that burning coal, or nuke plants in a remote location producing electricity to charge these electric cars is somehow clean cause it doesn't happen in my back yard is more BS. Pollution is pollution, nothing is free. Fourth, The whole idea that government and only government will make choices for us counters the whole land of the free, home of the brave idea of America. The real world numbers don't add up, unless you use Al Bore math, for the whole electric car / save the earth thing. CO2 comes out of combustion,, plants breathe CO2 plant more, instead of chopping down trees to make paper to print more government regulations... save the world from ignorant decisions and global warming will solve it's self in the next natural cycle ice age. On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 6:07 AM, Lee einer...@yahoo.com wrote: Electric vehicles have a problem - grid-based electricity in the US is dirtier than just running an economical gas-burner. Wind power has a problem - wind being an intermittent source of energy, it only makes sense when coupled with a storage device, but the grid has zero storage capacity. But electric vehicles are a place to store energy. Maybe wind farms near municipalities should include wired parking lots for lots of electric vehicles. That would to some degree address both problems, the cars would charge from a clean energy source and the wind farms would be connected to batteries. Lee LWB250 wrote: Points well taken, Tim. The one thing that nags at me regarding the electric vehicles is how much gas/coal/oil has to be burned to produce the electricity to charge or run them? I never see this in the information, and I think it's a very relevant aspect of the whole electric vehicle thing. Dan From: Tim C bb...@crone.us To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Sent: Sunday, June 19, 2011 8:34 AM Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT More than that, the anemic sales of the Volt are clearly due to supply issues, since dealers don't have them in stock and can't get them. The Leaf is having similar issues. I suspect part of it, like was done with the early hybrids, is limiting supply so as to work bugs out with committed early adopters. For what it's worth I have trouble seeing the Volt called an electric vehicle; it is a hybrid just like my Escape, except it has a night plug for precharging the battery, and is built to Chevrolet (versus FORD :) standards. I am not a fan of the idea that all cars should have the same propulsion system. Some are better suited to certain things, for example I don't think many in this forum will argue that diesels are the best choice for short trips around town, or drag racing, but I am pretty sure many of us agree that diesels are the best for distance and highway travel. Electric vehicles have been in use for more than a century, and among other things make good delivery vehicles, and are common for low-speed or fixed-location applications already. I don't get why the same folks who curse California for banning diesels get upset that battery cars are going into production. I am not arguing that the government -should- be subsidizing the cost of the cars, but I can see the argument that it is only making up for the support for oil, ethanol, and to a lesser degree biodiesel production. Best, Tim who killed the electric car (purchase because it is too expensive, for now) On Jun 18, 2011 9:46 PM, Jaime Kopchinski jaime...@gmail.com wrote
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Excellent points Rich! now, don't you feel better ? ;-) LarryT -Original Message- From: Rich Thomas Sent: Sunday, June 19, 2011 1:35 PM To: Mercedes Discussion List Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT You miss the whole point of this exercise. It's not about what is rational, it's about what feeels good! And electric cars feeel good! And if you have one you can drive around feeling smug that you are clearly smarter and better than that other guy who does not have one, and that you Care More than the other guy. Of course, if you run the numbers (in whatever dimensions you choose) you find out how stupid all that is, but that is not the point. --R ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Peter - What SIU are you talking about? Peter On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 5:56 PM, Peter Frederick psf...@earthlink.netwrote: A Guide Dog will help, certainly, but if you are trying to get around without one, hybrids and electrics can be very scary. They get lost in the surrounding noise in urban settings. Sorta like the hallway in the Student Center at SIU -- had perforated ceiling tile ventilation and was acoustically quite dead. I had a board meeting regularly up there, and had to lead our blind member into the room every time (I'd meet him at the elevator). He hated that, was quite proud of being independent, but after I found him walking into the walls going in circles he allowed me to take him in. Strangest hallway I've ever been in, it was disconcerting for a sighted person it was so dead. Peter __**_ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/**archive/http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/**mailman/listinfo/mercedes_**okiebenz.comhttp://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Larry wrote: Mr. Mann I salute you. A voice of reason in a forest of misinformation. Bravo! I still contend that drilling and converting oil shale to oil would tap America's oil reserves. Some estimates show US has more oil reserves (when oil shale is included) than the rest of the world combined and would last ~400 years at current usage. During that time maybe we could come up with a energy policy and new technology to solve the problem. I also think widespread diesel use would reduce oil demand more easily than the other new technology. After all, diesel technology is very advanced, the infrastructure is in place *today* and there's a 20-30% improvement in mpg's when compared to similar gas vehicles. It's not always easy squeezing oil from a rock. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
What is the projected service life for a set of batteries on the chevy volt? {How many charge /discharge cycles will they take before degradation or failure} What is the cost of a replacement set of batteries? [I'm betting it's a new form of sticker shock] When you factor the car chassis life vs fuel cost + electrical cost + upkeep cost+ battery replacement cost + inflated go green purchase cost , my bet is the numbers add up fast to a no purchase decision. Anything I learned on shore leave was that feel good costs money paid up front.. or later.. If the money spent on electric hybrid car development was instead spent on hydrogen fuel development we would be ahead and green already. H2O covers 70% of the planet, when H2 is split and burned the result is .. .. H2O... water... steam comes out the exhaust pipe. NO pollution. No rich Arabs wanting to kill us selling us oil... hmmm novel thought there. About 30 years ago I was an engineering assistant on a hydrogen fuel test program that ran a V8 350 Chevy engine in a dyno test cell at 80% power for 100,000 mile [equiv ] with tear down at end of run. Zero wear, and we wiped the combustion chambers clean with a facial tissue. NO carbon anywhere. Measured pollution for the run... zero. On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 6:26 PM, Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net wrote: It looks like a Chevy Dolt can, without using climate control, do about 35 miles on 13kWh, so your .5kWh per mile was actually conservative. You mentioned not paying 10 cents, what do you pay? My marginal cost of electricity is about 22 cents in the summer and 14 cents in the winter. It'd still take longer than the batteries will live to pay back the cost of trading in an SDL on a Dolt with fuel savings. And some of those fuel savings will go away when they figure out a way to make electric drivers pay road tax. Mitch. __**_ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/**archive/http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/**mailman/listinfo/mercedes_**okiebenz.comhttp://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
G Mann wrote: About 30 years ago I was an engineering assistant on a hydrogen fuel test program that ran a V8 350 Chevy engine in a dyno test cell at 80% power for 100,000 mile [equiv ] with tear down at end of run. Zero wear, and we wiped the combustion chambers clean with a facial tissue. NO carbon anywhere. Measured pollution for the run... zero. What if you started and stopped it 10,000 times, with a few hours to a few days wait in between? Would that wet exhaust have promoted rust inside the engine, or would it have been no worse than the H2O + CO2 from hydrocarbon fuels? Mitch. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Good question. Thanks... there were start / stop cycles in the test program. The combustion process produced plenty of heat to prevent damage from water droplet corrosion or formation. There was no liquid water inside the engine or the exhaust system. What came out the pipe was high temp steam. Remember, for nearly 100 years steam engines ran the world. What we ran with the hydrogen program was basically an internal combustion steam engine, rather than an external /steam boiler/ engine. The difference of course was fuel source and delivery plugged into a very standard car engine. On Mon, Jun 20, 2011 at 8:17 AM, Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net wrote: G Mann wrote: About 30 years ago I was an engineering assistant on a hydrogen fuel test program that ran a V8 350 Chevy engine in a dyno test cell at 80% power for 100,000 mile [equiv ] with tear down at end of run. Zero wear, and we wiped the combustion chambers clean with a facial tissue. NO carbon anywhere. Measured pollution for the run... zero. What if you started and stopped it 10,000 times, with a few hours to a few days wait in between? Would that wet exhaust have promoted rust inside the engine, or would it have been no worse than the H2O + CO2 from hydrocarbon fuels? Mitch. __**_ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/**archive/http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/**mailman/listinfo/mercedes_**okiebenz.comhttp://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
How was the hydrogen produced? --R On 6/20/11 11:10 AM, G Mann wrote: NO carbon anywhere. Measured pollution for the run... zero. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
The problem with using hydrogen as a fuel is getting that hydrogen free from the oxygen so that you can recombine at a later date. Basically it's exactly the same problem as electric batteries, you are just moving the polluting part of the process somewhere else. In addition, all the energy derived from oxidizing the hydrogen (plus more) is required to split the hydrogen and oxygen apart, so you have a net energy loss. Another issue is energy density (How large is the H2 tank required to get the same amount of BTU's contained in 20 gallons of gasoline?). I think that the cheapest/easiest source of hydrogen is, unfortunately, splitting it from some form of hydrocarbons that come from a well. Less energy required than splitting H2O apart, but polluting nevertheless and you are still tied to that hydrocarbon well. Might as well just burn it and deal with the pollution. Very respectfully, /s/ Max Dillon '87 300TD 334k miles (Off with the head!) '95 E300 283k miles (daily driving duties) '73 Balboa 20 (High dry until the head is back on) Charleston SC From: G Mann g2ma...@gmail.com To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Sent: Mon, June 20, 2011 11:10:56 AM Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT What is the projected service life for a set of batteries on the chevy volt? {How many charge /discharge cycles will they take before degradation or failure} What is the cost of a replacement set of batteries? [I'm betting it's a new form of sticker shock] When you factor the car chassis life vs fuel cost + electrical cost + upkeep cost+ battery replacement cost + inflated go green purchase cost , my bet is the numbers add up fast to a no purchase decision. Anything I learned on shore leave was that feel good costs money paid up front.. or later.. If the money spent on electric hybrid car development was instead spent on hydrogen fuel development we would be ahead and green already. H2O covers 70% of the planet, when H2 is split and burned the result is .. .. H2O... water... steam comes out the exhaust pipe. NO pollution. No rich Arabs wanting to kill us selling us oil... hmmm novel thought there. About 30 years ago I was an engineering assistant on a hydrogen fuel test program that ran a V8 350 Chevy engine in a dyno test cell at 80% power for 100,000 mile [equiv ] with tear down at end of run. Zero wear, and we wiped the combustion chambers clean with a facial tissue. NO carbon anywhere. Measured pollution for the run... zero. On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 6:26 PM, Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net wrote: It looks like a Chevy Dolt can, without using climate control, do about 35 miles on 13kWh, so your .5kWh per mile was actually conservative. You mentioned not paying 10 cents, what do you pay? My marginal cost of electricity is about 22 cents in the summer and 14 cents in the winter. It'd still take longer than the batteries will live to pay back the cost of trading in an SDL on a Dolt with fuel savings. And some of those fuel savings will go away when they figure out a way to make electric drivers pay road tax. Mitch. __**_ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/**archive/http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/**mailman/listinfo/mercedes_**okiebenz.comhttp://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Hydrogen for this test program was supplied from large tanks from Air-liquid who is/was a major hydrogen supplier for the space program [rockets use hydrogen fuel... lots of it]. The hydrogen was extracted either from water process using electric current or extracted from free air I believe. The argument can be raised that it takes more energy to crack water than the hydrogen returns, however argument can also be raised that if research was devoted to the process a better system could/would be found to produce hydrogen. Nothing is free, even free oil coming out of the ground costs money to capture and make into diesel/gas. Cheap always wins, except in girlfriends and quality. On Mon, Jun 20, 2011 at 9:44 AM, Rich Thomas richthomas79td...@constructivity.net wrote: How was the hydrogen produced? --R On 6/20/11 11:10 AM, G Mann wrote: NO carbon anywhere. Measured pollution for the run... zero. __**_ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/**archive/http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/**mailman/listinfo/mercedes_**okiebenz.comhttp://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
G Mann g2ma...@gmail.com writes: The argument can be raised that it takes more energy to crack water than the hydrogen returns, however argument can also be raised that if research was devoted to the process a better system could/would be found to produce hydrogen. Hydrogen is the most abundant element but on earth very little exists as free hydrogen gas. It's almost all bound up in water or hyrdocarbons and it takes more energy to separate water into H2 and O2 than you get back when burning it. Simple thermodynamics, there is no better system that will overcome that. Hydrogen is nothing more than another form of battery, and like all batteries is not perfectly efficient. Allan -- 1983 300D ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
The other factor that's usually ignored in hydrogen discussions is that you're not combining it with pure oxygen - air contains many other gasses that do various things at different temperatures On Mon, Jun 20, 2011 at 2:42 PM, Allan Streib str...@cs.indiana.edu wrote: G Mann g2ma...@gmail.com writes: The argument can be raised that it takes more energy to crack water than the hydrogen returns, however argument can also be raised that if research was devoted to the process a better system could/would be found to produce hydrogen. Hydrogen is the most abundant element but on earth very little exists as free hydrogen gas. It's almost all bound up in water or hyrdocarbons and it takes more energy to separate water into H2 and O2 than you get back when burning it. Simple thermodynamics, there is no better system that will overcome that. Hydrogen is nothing more than another form of battery, and like all batteries is not perfectly efficient. Allan -- 1983 300D ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com -- OK Don 2001 ML320 1992 300D 2.5T 1990 300D 2.5T 1997 Plymouth Grand Voyager ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
If you lived in Canada could you call in hydro powered? We've recently (well since last fall anyway) gotten 5 big (1.65MW) windmills in our area. I'm constantly amazed by how little wind it takes them to turn. I'm sure they're not making much power when they're just barely turning though... If you had a couple K of solar on your roof you could make a relatively large percentage of the energy your car would need for short rides. If you lived someplace like Arizona I'm sure its even better. On the news this morning they touted some solar panel company thats come up with some new manufacturing tech that is supposed to drive the cost way down which is apparently a game changer. You lot are just haters on electric cars, its the old They won't solve all our problems so they're useless! I think electric cars have a place, their place is not in my commute so I drive a diesel which suits me well. My wife on the other hand would be well suited by an electric, Randy would be VERY well suited, especially if they had one with a small propane heater (what a hoot eh?) since his car never really warms up anyway... As with everything its a mix of technologies that are going to carry us into the future, not any one of them. -Curt Date: Sun, 19 Jun 2011 14:10:22 -0500 From: Fmiser fmi...@gmail.com To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: 20110619141022.b0549ed0.fmi...@gmail.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII LWB250 wrote: Points well taken, Tim. The one thing that nags at me regarding the electric vehicles is how much gas/coal/oil has to be burned to produce the electricity to charge or run them? I never see this in the information, and I think it's a very relevant aspect of the whole electric vehicle thing. They are often called zero emission - but really, it should be displaced emission 'cause most electricity in the country comes from burning coal. But that coal plant is not in the LA bowl so it doesn't contribute to the smog. Therefore, since it is located out of sight, it can't be causing any pollution. :) --Philip ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
I'm given to understand that 50+ miles is not a difficult to attain range with a homebuilt EV, its 60+ where the challenge comes in. Its also nice that mileage doesn't really decrease in heavy traffic unless you had to run a heater. I still think a little propane heater would be just the ticket there... Back when I was a wee tiny bairn my mother drove a Type III VW that had a propane heater on the floor so we didn't freeze in northern Maine winters. -Curt Date: Sun, 19 Jun 2011 20:27:16 -0400 From: Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: 4dfe93e4.70...@voyager.net Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Tim C wrote: Why do I want an electric car? Because: - I drive a very predictable 20 miles round-trip in a day. That's 1 gallon of diesel, give or take, so call it $3.75 +/- $0.75. Using a relatively-conservative hobbyist conversion 0.5 KWh/mile, I would spend $1.00 (I pay $0.10/KWh) for my commute, plus I never have to go out of my way to the good diesel station. If you're willing to accept hobbyist electric performance, why don't you run those numbers again after sticking a 15hp Kubota diesel in a VW Rabbit? It'll be a lot more than 20mpg that way. Mitch. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
G Mann wrote: H2O covers 70% of the planet, when H2 is split and burned the result is .. .. H2O... water... steam comes out the exhaust pipe. NO pollution. No rich Arabs wanting to kill us selling us oil... hmmm novel thought there. But there is no such thing as a free lunch. Or perpetual motion. The energy required to turn H2O into hydrogen is more than what comes out when it returns to water. So from what I can tell, it's better to think of it as a chemical battery fluid rather than a fuel. Now, if there was an existing, necessary process that has H2 as a by-product... --Philip ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Walt wrote: I'd put it in the charging station, and have the stations just report car X charged for Y hourss using X KW. I'd do it like Tesla - no ability to meter it. But then JPMorgan cut funding as he wanted to meter and bill users. Oh, well - death of a good idea, killed and destroyed. mao ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Max wrote: Not me that works in a nuke plant, but nuke is the only way to go, in my opinion. Eh... I was convinced to that point-of-view 38 years ago. mao ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
All the big wind generators have a motor feature to keep the blades turning when the wind isn't strong enough to do the job, because the high wind speed required to get them spinning doesn't happen often enough. Basically you have to spend some electricity to make some. Long calm spell? Wind farm will consume lots of electricity to get through it. In other words, we can't even predict the weather, let alone the climate, but that is another discussion... Max Curt Raymond curtlud...@yahoo.com wrote: We've recently (well since last fall anyway) gotten 5 big (1.65MW) windmills in our area. I'm constantly amazed by how little wind it takes them to turn. I'm sure they're not making much power when they're just barely turning though... -- Sent from my Android phone with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Curt wrote: On the news this morning they touted some solar panel company thats come up with some new manufacturing tech that is supposed to drive the cost way down which is apparently a game changer. I remember a 1978 Newsweek article about a guy named Ovshinsky that spoke about amorphous semiconductor materials. That was gonna be the game changer, described as paint one material on the side of the house, paint another material on top of that, hook up wires, and away you go. The guy's company is still around but that system has not happened, yet. That is the game changer I want to see. http://web.mit.edu/invent/iow/ovshinsky.html mao ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Curt wrote: Back when I was a wee tiny bairn my mother drove a Type III VW that had a propane heater on the floor so we didn't freeze in northern Maine winters. That is not the american way. But, I think it serves much better than our traditional limp wristed needs of today. We can even learn to live without electricity on days the sun doesn't shine. Being tough is not a detriment - it should be seen as an asset. mao ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
They were saying on the radio that some of the Canadian oil sands produce only 1.5x the energy it takes to get the fuel out. Thats the argument usually made against biodiesel but it seems (to me anyway) the anti-oilsands crowd is pretty quiet... -Curt Date: Mon, 20 Jun 2011 07:19:09 -0400 From: Larry l02tur...@comcast.net To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: 4103E3C06EAF4181AD0B489455D92F30@Acer Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=iso-8859-1; reply-type=original Mr. Mann I salute you. A voice of reason in a forest of misinformation. Bravo! I still contend that drilling and converting oil shale to oil would tap America's oil reserves. Some estimates show US has more oil reserves (when oil shale is included) than the rest of the world combined and would last ~400 years at current usage. During that time maybe we could come up with a energy policy and new technology to solve the problem. I also think widespread diesel use would reduce oil demand more easily than the other new technology. After all, diesel technology is very advanced, the infrastructure is in place *today* and there's a 20-30% improvement in mpg's when compared to similar gas vehicles. LarryT 91 300D ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
We got 50 MPG with the 84 Escort. BTDT Not hard to do if the gummit motors/gummit didn't lock diesels out. I'm given to understand that 50+ miles is not a difficult to attain range with a homebuilt EV, its 60+ where the challenge comes in. Its also nice that mileage doesn't really decrease in heavy traffic unless you had to run a heater. I still think a little propane heater would be just the ticket there... Back when I was a wee tiny bairn my mother drove a Type III VW that had a propane heater on the floor so we didn't freeze in northern Maine winters. -Curt Date: Sun, 19 Jun 2011 20:27:16 -0400 From: Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: 4dfe93e4.70...@voyager.net Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Tim C wrote: Why do I want an electric car? Because: - I drive a very predictable 20 miles round-trip in a day. That's 1 gallon of diesel, give or take, so call it $3.75 +/- $0.75. Using a relatively-conservative hobbyist conversion 0.5 KWh/mile, I would spend $1.00 (I pay $0.10/KWh) for my commute, plus I never have to go out of my way to the good diesel station. If you're willing to accept hobbyist electric performance, why don't you run those numbers again after sticking a 15hp Kubota diesel in a VW Rabbit? It'll be a lot more than 20mpg that way. Mitch. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
UGH! The Hydrogen economy is a total fallacy, answer 1 question, Where does the hydrogen come from? -Curt Date: Mon, 20 Jun 2011 08:10:56 -0700 From: G Mann g2ma...@gmail.com To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: banlktinixihh7zju1ezuqwy6lo-63nc...@mail.gmail.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 What is the projected service life for a set of batteries on the chevy volt? {How many charge /discharge cycles will they take before degradation or failure} What is the cost of a replacement set of batteries? [I'm betting it's a new form of sticker shock] When you factor the car chassis life vs fuel cost + electrical cost + upkeep cost+ battery replacement cost + inflated go green purchase cost , my bet is the numbers add up fast to a no purchase decision. Anything I learned on shore leave was that feel good costs money paid up front.. or later.. If the money spent on electric hybrid car development was instead spent on hydrogen fuel development we would be ahead and green already. H2O covers 70% of the planet, when H2 is split and burned the result is .. .. H2O... water... steam comes out the exhaust pipe. NO pollution. No rich Arabs wanting to kill us selling us oil... hmmm novel thought there. About 30 years ago I was an engineering assistant on a hydrogen fuel test program that ran a V8 350 Chevy engine in a dyno test cell at 80% power for 100,000 mile [equiv ] with tear down at end of run. Zero wear, and we wiped the combustion chambers clean with a facial tissue. NO carbon anywhere. Measured pollution for the run... zero. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Curt Raymond wrote: UGH! The Hydrogen economy is a total fallacy, answer 1 question, Where does the hydrogen come from? Just think of it as a cheap battery without toxic waste. Mitch ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Sorry, no. Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, only its form changed, thats your first law of thermodynamics that is. To get hydrogen will always take more energy than said hydrogen is worth. Good oil will always contain more energy than it took to get it. That said we're running short on really good oil. As an aside I'm working on a short post apocalyptic movie that highlights plastic reclamation (ie digging it out of garbage dumps) to turn into oil once oil is impossible (because its gone or the technology to get it is gone) to get. -Curt Date: Mon, 20 Jun 2011 11:50:59 -0700 From: G Mann g2ma...@gmail.com To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: BANLkTikrqr7cUnD=evsco2xxrgdpxcs...@mail.gmail.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Hydrogen for this test program was supplied from large tanks from Air-liquid who is/was a major hydrogen supplier for the space program [rockets use hydrogen fuel... lots of it]. The hydrogen was extracted either from water process using electric current or extracted from free air I believe. The argument can be raised that it takes more energy to crack water than the hydrogen returns, however argument can also be raised that if research was devoted to the process a better system could/would be found to produce hydrogen. Nothing is free, even free oil coming out of the ground costs money to capture and make into diesel/gas. Cheap always wins, except in girlfriends and quality. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
I've seen the ones in Oklahoma sitting dead still on the few days we don't have wind sweeping down the plains. Most times they are spinning at a fair rate. On Mon, Jun 20, 2011 at 8:23 PM, Max Dillon meadedil...@bellsouth.netwrote: All the big wind generators have a motor feature to keep the blades turning when the wind isn't strong enough to do the job, because the high wind speed required to get them spinning doesn't happen often enough. Basically you have to spend some electricity to make some. Long calm spell? Wind farm will consume lots of electricity to get through it. In other words, we can't even predict the weather, let alone the climate, but that is another discussion... Max -- OK Don 2001 ML320 1992 300D 2.5T 1990 300D 2.5T 1997 Plymouth Grand Voyager ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Hi Roger, Its awful hard to see the next big thing and so many people get it wrong its easy to get gunshy. I too remember the Segway, in fact I remember it when it was called Ginger. I've even met Dean Kayman (I think I spelled that wrong but I'm too tired to check) once, he used to live in Manchester, NH. I was a big doubter of the iPad and I've had to eat crow on that one, I totally get the attraction of tablets now, I don't have one but I understand why other people do. Anyway I also don't have a good commute for an electric but as I say my wife does, so do my parents, my Dad is even talking about getting one as a runabout. Folks who don't need to go real far on their commute will find electric quite satisfactory I think, especially those in the south that don't need heat that much. As for no distribution system you got no outlets at your place? We've got a HUGE distribution system. What we'll need is more 220v outlets to get better charge times. What we don't really have now is a good metering system to allow you to pay places, but I think in the short term businesses will start giving free charges for employees to show off how green they are. In fact we've started talking about getting my wife's landlord to put in a charging station. I'm sort of long term pondering a 190EV. It'd be a fun project anyway. -Curt Date: Mon, 20 Jun 2011 23:17:53 + (UTC) From: roger...@comcast.net To: mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: [MBZ] e: The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: 1641574284.1941916.1308611873652.javamail.r...@sz0097a.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Curt, I don't hate electric cars. I just think they are much like the segway. Hope I spelled it right. Remember it was going to change the way we travel in cities. I think the Atlanta Police bought some for downtown police to use. I've never seen one up close and for real, only on TV. So, I think they changed the bank account of the creator, much like I think electric cars will help GE, politicians, GM, and a few others. But the average citizen that needs transportation will not be helped. I, as do many people, live far enough outside of large cities to make an electric impractical. Like hydrogen, there is no distribution system (unless you can always plug into your own or someone elses outlet). Now synthetic diesel from natural gas or methane, now we already have pipelines and gas pumps (diesel pumps), but no one wants to take that seriously. Probably because some company that supports some politicians can't make a boatload of money providing a distribution network at the taxpayers expense. Just my ramblings. I hope you'll get your wife an electric if she wants one and then report back to us about the results. Best Wishes, Roger Hale Monroe, Ga. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
That's a new one on me. I was out in Medicine Bow, Wyoming some years ago getting up close and personal with one of the largest wind turbines ever built, at a test site there. It was a 5MW Hamilton Standard machine, 250ft rotor diameter with the hub sitting 250ft up. They told the story that during construction, someone got the wires crossed on the thing, and someone else got the meter wires crossed too (a compound error that canceled out the fail safe). So when they first fired the thing up (so to speak) they started drawing power instead of generating power, and were quite happy to see it got up to 5MW right quick in a pretty low breeze. Then they were even more surprised to see it get to 6.5MW and thought wow, this thing is working better than we expected! Then the phone rings, and it is the Bonneville Power Authority wondering what the hell they were doing to be drawing a 6.5MW load all the sudden. All the sudden someone realizes it was running as a giant fan not a windmill, and hit the big red button real fast. Someone outside watching it wondered why the blades were bending the wrong direction too. It was a good smoke test though, and proved the design better than the tests they had planned. Go figger. I have some pictures of the thing and me up on top of it (20F, 25kt wind). --R On 6/20/11 9:23 PM, Max Dillon wrote: All the big wind generators have a motor feature to keep the blades turning when the wind isn't strong enough to do the job, because the high wind speed required to get them spinning doesn't happen often enough. Basically you have to spend some electricity to make some. Long calm spell? Wind farm will consume lots of electricity to get through it. In other words, we can't even predict the weather, let alone the climate, but that is another discussion... Max Curt Raymondcurtlud...@yahoo.com wrote: We've recently (well since last fall anyway) gotten 5 big (1.65MW) windmills in our area. I'm constantly amazed by how little wind it takes them to turn. I'm sure they're not making much power when they're just barely turning though... ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
I'd heard that for horizontal blades but not big conventional type ones. I don't think thats the case here as sometimes in the morning when I go to work theres no wind and they'll be stopped, there are 2 right off my commute, on my way home they'll be spinning again. -Curt Date: Mon, 20 Jun 2011 21:23:23 -0400 From: Max Dillon meadedil...@bellsouth.net To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: 4bb626be-14ff-445a-b08b-53c8bd82b...@email.android.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 All the big wind generators have a motor feature to keep the blades turning when the wind isn't strong enough to do the job, because the high wind speed required to get them spinning doesn't happen often enough. Basically you have to spend some electricity to make some. Long calm spell? Wind farm will consume lots of electricity to get through it. In other words, we can't even predict the weather, let alone the climate, but that is another discussion... Max Curt Raymond curtlud...@yahoo.com wrote: We've recently (well since last fall anyway) gotten 5 big (1.65MW) windmills in our area. I'm constantly amazed by how little wind it takes them to turn. I'm sure they're not making much power when they're just barely turning though.. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Agreed. I think its air conditioning that makes people weak. I was in Dallas last week and it was over 100F every day I was there. Brutal, I can't imagine what it was like without AC. Here however we'll use our AC maybe 10 days total this summer and most of those we'll shut it off before bed. -Curt Date: Mon, 20 Jun 2011 20:33:41 -0500 From: Mountain Man maontin@gmail.com To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: banlktinq-6o5_b14pq9movcdotaer3e...@mail.gmail.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Curt wrote: Back when I was a wee tiny bairn my mother drove a Type III VW that had a propane heater on the floor so we didn't freeze in northern Maine winters. That is not the american way. But, I think it serves much better than our traditional limp wristed needs of today. We can even learn to live without electricity on days the sun doesn't shine. Being tough is not a detriment - it should be seen as an asset. mao ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
The oil companies fund (and organize) the anti-biofuels lobbies. They do NOT fund anti-oilsand lobbies. Relly drinks the koolaid, and so hates biofiuels. They were saying on the radio that some of the Canadian oil sands produce only 1.5x the energy it takes to get the fuel out. Thats the argument usually made against biodiesel but it seems (to me anyway) the anti-oilsands crowd is pretty quiet... -Curt Date: Mon, 20 Jun 2011 07:19:09 -0400 From: Larry l02tur...@comcast.net To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT Message-ID: 4103E3C06EAF4181AD0B489455D92F30@Acer Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=iso-8859-1; reply-type=original Mr. Mann I salute you. A voice of reason in a forest of misinformation. Bravo! I still contend that drilling and converting oil shale to oil would tap America's oil reserves. Some estimates show US has more oil reserves (when oil shale is included) than the rest of the world combined and would last ~400 years at current usage. During that time maybe we could come up with a energy policy and new technology to solve the problem. I also think widespread diesel use would reduce oil demand more easily than the other new technology. After all, diesel technology is very advanced, the infrastructure is in place *today* and there's a 20-30% improvement in mpg's when compared to similar gas vehicles. LarryT 91 300D ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Curt, This is my point about no distribution system. As you said, we need 220v outlets (you can't always be home for a charge on 110v) and someone needs to develop and implement a metering system, etc. etc. I don't know about you, but I don't want to be plugging a car into a 220v outlet when it's raining. Anymore than I want to hook my car to a hydrogen tank that might spark and blow me into the next county. Businesses in the Atlanta area have tried all sorts of things to look green, etc. like van pools and such, but nothing has made a dent in the problem. So maybe I'm an optimistic pessimist. I hope for the best, but my practical side says these things are not the answer...at least not in my lifetime. As for no distribution system you got no outlets at your place? We've got a HUGE distribution system. What we'll need is more 220v outlets to get better charge times. What we don't really have now is a good metering system to allow you to pay places, but I think in the short term businesses will start giving free charges for employees to show off how green they are. In fact we've started talking about getting my wife's landlord to put in a charging station. I'm sort of long term pondering a 190EV. It'd be a fun project anyway. -Curt Best Wishes, Roger Hale Monroe, Ga. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] : The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
roger...@comcast.net writes: As for no distribution system you got no outlets at your place? We've got a HUGE distribution system. What we'll need is more 220v outlets to get better charge times. I have my doubts whether the current electical infrastructure in many areas would be up to handling the additional load of thousands of EVs being recharged every evening. A lot of urban areas operate right on the borderline of brown-outs/rolling blackouts during the summer as it is. Allan -- 1983 300D ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Would that wet exhaust have promoted rust inside the engine, or would it have been no worse than the H2O + CO2 from hydrocarbon fuels? All exhaust is wet. For every gallon of fuel you pour in your existing vehicle about a gallon of water (vapor) comes out. -- Jim ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
On Mon, 20 Jun 2011 18:57:52 -0700 (PDT) Curt Raymond curtlud...@yahoo.com wrote: Sorry, no. Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, only its form changed, thats your first law of thermodynamics that is. 1. You can't win. 2. You can't break even. 3. You can't quit. Craig ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
More than that, the anemic sales of the Volt are clearly due to supply issues, since dealers don't have them in stock and can't get them. The Leaf is having similar issues. I suspect part of it, like was done with the early hybrids, is limiting supply so as to work bugs out with committed early adopters. For what it's worth I have trouble seeing the Volt called an electric vehicle; it is a hybrid just like my Escape, except it has a night plug for precharging the battery, and is built to Chevrolet (versus FORD :) standards. I am not a fan of the idea that all cars should have the same propulsion system. Some are better suited to certain things, for example I don't think many in this forum will argue that diesels are the best choice for short trips around town, or drag racing, but I am pretty sure many of us agree that diesels are the best for distance and highway travel. Electric vehicles have been in use for more than a century, and among other things make good delivery vehicles, and are common for low-speed or fixed-location applications already. I don't get why the same folks who curse California for banning diesels get upset that battery cars are going into production. I am not arguing that the government -should- be subsidizing the cost of the cars, but I can see the argument that it is only making up for the support for oil, ethanol, and to a lesser degree biodiesel production. Best, Tim who killed the electric car (purchase because it is too expensive, for now) On Jun 18, 2011 9:46 PM, Jaime Kopchinski jaime...@gmail.com wrote: ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Points well taken, Tim. The one thing that nags at me regarding the electric vehicles is how much gas/coal/oil has to be burned to produce the electricity to charge or run them? I never see this in the information, and I think it's a very relevant aspect of the whole electric vehicle thing. Dan From: Tim C bb...@crone.us To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Sent: Sunday, June 19, 2011 8:34 AM Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT More than that, the anemic sales of the Volt are clearly due to supply issues, since dealers don't have them in stock and can't get them. The Leaf is having similar issues. I suspect part of it, like was done with the early hybrids, is limiting supply so as to work bugs out with committed early adopters. For what it's worth I have trouble seeing the Volt called an electric vehicle; it is a hybrid just like my Escape, except it has a night plug for precharging the battery, and is built to Chevrolet (versus FORD :) standards. I am not a fan of the idea that all cars should have the same propulsion system. Some are better suited to certain things, for example I don't think many in this forum will argue that diesels are the best choice for short trips around town, or drag racing, but I am pretty sure many of us agree that diesels are the best for distance and highway travel. Electric vehicles have been in use for more than a century, and among other things make good delivery vehicles, and are common for low-speed or fixed-location applications already. I don't get why the same folks who curse California for banning diesels get upset that battery cars are going into production. I am not arguing that the government -should- be subsidizing the cost of the cars, but I can see the argument that it is only making up for the support for oil, ethanol, and to a lesser degree biodiesel production. Best, Tim who killed the electric car (purchase because it is too expensive, for now) On Jun 18, 2011 9:46 PM, Jaime Kopchinski jaime...@gmail.com wrote: ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Electric vehicles have a problem - grid-based electricity in the US is dirtier than just running an economical gas-burner. Wind power has a problem - wind being an intermittent source of energy, it only makes sense when coupled with a storage device, but the grid has zero storage capacity. But electric vehicles are a place to store energy. Maybe wind farms near municipalities should include wired parking lots for lots of electric vehicles. That would to some degree address both problems, the cars would charge from a clean energy source and the wind farms would be connected to batteries. Lee LWB250 wrote: Points well taken, Tim. The one thing that nags at me regarding the electric vehicles is how much gas/coal/oil has to be burned to produce the electricity to charge or run them? I never see this in the information, and I think it's a very relevant aspect of the whole electric vehicle thing. Dan From: Tim C bb...@crone.us To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Sent: Sunday, June 19, 2011 8:34 AM Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT More than that, the anemic sales of the Volt are clearly due to supply issues, since dealers don't have them in stock and can't get them. The Leaf is having similar issues. I suspect part of it, like was done with the early hybrids, is limiting supply so as to work bugs out with committed early adopters. For what it's worth I have trouble seeing the Volt called an electric vehicle; it is a hybrid just like my Escape, except it has a night plug for precharging the battery, and is built to Chevrolet (versus FORD :) standards. I am not a fan of the idea that all cars should have the same propulsion system. Some are better suited to certain things, for example I don't think many in this forum will argue that diesels are the best choice for short trips around town, or drag racing, but I am pretty sure many of us agree that diesels are the best for distance and highway travel. Electric vehicles have been in use for more than a century, and among other things make good delivery vehicles, and are common for low-speed or fixed-location applications already. I don't get why the same folks who curse California for banning diesels get upset that battery cars are going into production. I am not arguing that the government -should- be subsidizing the cost of the cars, but I can see the argument that it is only making up for the support for oil, ethanol, and to a lesser degree biodiesel production. Best, Tim who killed the electric car (purchase because it is too expensive, for now) On Jun 18, 2011 9:46 PM, Jaime Kopchinski jaime...@gmail.com wrote: ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Pretty much the greenest thing you can do is buy a non-hybrid used car and keep it in good running order. Anything made in the past couple of decades is pretty clean-running, and by buying used you are not creating demand for more raw materials for manufacturing. Of course that doesn't help GM, Ford, or the politicians so you'll never hear that promoted anywhere. On Sun, 19 Jun 2011 09:21 -0700, Lee einer...@yahoo.com wrote: I'm pretty sure that the printing of government regulations is not the primary cause of global deforestation. Last time I checked, the timber, ranching and agricultural sectors had something to do with it. And you forgot about the hybrid and electric-car induced global rare-earth shortage that is causing dirty, polluting mines to reopen. Lee ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Is this going to end up like GM's EV1 electric cars? Rory On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 9:47 AM, Allan Streib str...@cs.indiana.edu wrote: Pretty much the greenest thing you can do is buy a non-hybrid used car and keep it in good running order. Anything made in the past couple of decades is pretty clean-running, and by buying used you are not creating demand for more raw materials for manufacturing. Of course that doesn't help GM, Ford, or the politicians so you'll never hear that promoted anywhere. On Sun, 19 Jun 2011 09:21 -0700, Lee einer...@yahoo.com wrote: I'm pretty sure that the printing of government regulations is not the primary cause of global deforestation. Last time I checked, the timber, ranching and agricultural sectors had something to do with it. And you forgot about the hybrid and electric-car induced global rare-earth shortage that is causing dirty, polluting mines to reopen. Lee ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
I object, the whole idea that electric vehicles are clean is a manufactured lie. First, the entire electronics industry uses and makes some of the nastiest chemicals in history, which stay in the environment for lifetimes, not days. No natural thing eats them or breaks them down. Second, batteries, which are the heart and soul of electric cars, are a disposal problem by themselves, and getting more so as the switch to lythium and other exotics is made. Third, the lie that burning coal, or nuke plants in a remote location producing electricity to charge these electric cars is somehow clean cause it doesn't happen in my back yard is more BS. Pollution is pollution, nothing is free. Fourth, The whole idea that government and only government will make choices for us counters the whole land of the free, home of the brave idea of America. The real world numbers don't add up, unless you use Al Bore math, for the whole electric car / save the earth thing. CO2 comes out of combustion,, plants breathe CO2 plant more, instead of chopping down trees to make paper to print more government regulations... save the world from ignorant decisions and global warming will solve it's self in the next natural cycle ice age. On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 6:07 AM, Lee einer...@yahoo.com wrote: Electric vehicles have a problem - grid-based electricity in the US is dirtier than just running an economical gas-burner. Wind power has a problem - wind being an intermittent source of energy, it only makes sense when coupled with a storage device, but the grid has zero storage capacity. But electric vehicles are a place to store energy. Maybe wind farms near municipalities should include wired parking lots for lots of electric vehicles. That would to some degree address both problems, the cars would charge from a clean energy source and the wind farms would be connected to batteries. Lee LWB250 wrote: Points well taken, Tim. The one thing that nags at me regarding the electric vehicles is how much gas/coal/oil has to be burned to produce the electricity to charge or run them? I never see this in the information, and I think it's a very relevant aspect of the whole electric vehicle thing. Dan From: Tim C bb...@crone.us To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Sent: Sunday, June 19, 2011 8:34 AM Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT More than that, the anemic sales of the Volt are clearly due to supply issues, since dealers don't have them in stock and can't get them. The Leaf is having similar issues. I suspect part of it, like was done with the early hybrids, is limiting supply so as to work bugs out with committed early adopters. For what it's worth I have trouble seeing the Volt called an electric vehicle; it is a hybrid just like my Escape, except it has a night plug for precharging the battery, and is built to Chevrolet (versus FORD :) standards. I am not a fan of the idea that all cars should have the same propulsion system. Some are better suited to certain things, for example I don't think many in this forum will argue that diesels are the best choice for short trips around town, or drag racing, but I am pretty sure many of us agree that diesels are the best for distance and highway travel. Electric vehicles have been in use for more than a century, and among other things make good delivery vehicles, and are common for low-speed or fixed-location applications already. I don't get why the same folks who curse California for banning diesels get upset that battery cars are going into production. I am not arguing that the government -should- be subsidizing the cost of the cars, but I can see the argument that it is only making up for the support for oil, ethanol, and to a lesser degree biodiesel production. Best, Tim who killed the electric car (purchase because it is too expensive, for now) On Jun 18, 2011 9:46 PM, Jaime Kopchinski jaime...@gmail.com wrote: ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
I'm pretty sure that the printing of government regulations is not the primary cause of global deforestation. Last time I checked, the timber, ranching and agricultural sectors had something to do with it. And you forgot about the hybrid and electric-car induced global rare-earth shortage that is causing dirty, polluting mines to reopen. Lee G Mann wrote: I object, the whole idea that electric vehicles are clean is a manufactured lie. First, the entire electronics industry uses and makes some of the nastiest chemicals in history, which stay in the environment for lifetimes, not days. No natural thing eats them or breaks them down. Second, batteries, which are the heart and soul of electric cars, are a disposal problem by themselves, and getting more so as the switch to lythium and other exotics is made. Third, the lie that burning coal, or nuke plants in a remote location producing electricity to charge these electric cars is somehow clean cause it doesn't happen in my back yard is more BS. Pollution is pollution, nothing is free. Fourth, The whole idea that government and only government will make choices for us counters the whole land of the free, home of the brave idea of America. The real world numbers don't add up, unless you use Al Bore math, for the whole electric car / save the earth thing. CO2 comes out of combustion,, plants breathe CO2 plant more, instead of chopping down trees to make paper to print more government regulations... save the world from ignorant decisions and global warming will solve it's self in the next natural cycle ice age. On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 6:07 AM, Lee einer...@yahoo.com wrote: Electric vehicles have a problem - grid-based electricity in the US is dirtier than just running an economical gas-burner. Wind power has a problem - wind being an intermittent source of energy, it only makes sense when coupled with a storage device, but the grid has zero storage capacity. But electric vehicles are a place to store energy. Maybe wind farms near municipalities should include wired parking lots for lots of electric vehicles. That would to some degree address both problems, the cars would charge from a clean energy source and the wind farms would be connected to batteries. Lee LWB250 wrote: Points well taken, Tim. The one thing that nags at me regarding the electric vehicles is how much gas/coal/oil has to be burned to produce the electricity to charge or run them? I never see this in the information, and I think it's a very relevant aspect of the whole electric vehicle thing. Dan From: Tim C bb...@crone.us To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Sent: Sunday, June 19, 2011 8:34 AM Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT More than that, the anemic sales of the Volt are clearly due to supply issues, since dealers don't have them in stock and can't get them. The Leaf is having similar issues. I suspect part of it, like was done with the early hybrids, is limiting supply so as to work bugs out with committed early adopters. For what it's worth I have trouble seeing the Volt called an electric vehicle; it is a hybrid just like my Escape, except it has a night plug for precharging the battery, and is built to Chevrolet (versus FORD :) standards. I am not a fan of the idea that all cars should have the same propulsion system. Some are better suited to certain things, for example I don't think many in this forum will argue that diesels are the best choice for short trips around town, or drag racing, but I am pretty sure many of us agree that diesels are the best for distance and highway travel. Electric vehicles have been in use for more than a century, and among other things make good delivery vehicles, and are common for low-speed or fixed-location applications already. I don't get why the same folks who curse California for banning diesels get upset that battery cars are going into production. I am not arguing that the government -should- be subsidizing the cost of the cars, but I can see the argument that it is only making up for the support for oil, ethanol, and to a lesser degree biodiesel production. Best, Tim who killed the electric car (purchase because it is too expensive, for now) On Jun 18, 2011 9:46 PM, Jaime Kopchinski jaime...@gmail.com wrote: ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Points well made. The housing industry which built city overcowding into our ecology certainly cut down the forests. And what's a few million pages of IRS and EPA regulations compared to that? Mines only pollute under EPA jurisdiction... those in Mexico and China don't pollute apparently cause THEY have no EPA thus those electric car components Made in China are clean energy... Grant... On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 9:21 AM, Lee einer...@yahoo.com wrote: I'm pretty sure that the printing of government regulations is not the primary cause of global deforestation. Last time I checked, the timber, ranching and agricultural sectors had something to do with it. And you forgot about the hybrid and electric-car induced global rare-earth shortage that is causing dirty, polluting mines to reopen. Lee G Mann wrote: I object, the whole idea that electric vehicles are clean is a manufactured lie. First, the entire electronics industry uses and makes some of the nastiest chemicals in history, which stay in the environment for lifetimes, not days. No natural thing eats them or breaks them down. Second, batteries, which are the heart and soul of electric cars, are a disposal problem by themselves, and getting more so as the switch to lythium and other exotics is made. Third, the lie that burning coal, or nuke plants in a remote location producing electricity to charge these electric cars is somehow clean cause it doesn't happen in my back yard is more BS. Pollution is pollution, nothing is free. Fourth, The whole idea that government and only government will make choices for us counters the whole land of the free, home of the brave idea of America. The real world numbers don't add up, unless you use Al Bore math, for the whole electric car / save the earth thing. CO2 comes out of combustion,, plants breathe CO2 plant more, instead of chopping down trees to make paper to print more government regulations... save the world from ignorant decisions and global warming will solve it's self in the next natural cycle ice age. On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 6:07 AM, Lee einer...@yahoo.com wrote: Electric vehicles have a problem - grid-based electricity in the US is dirtier than just running an economical gas-burner. Wind power has a problem - wind being an intermittent source of energy, it only makes sense when coupled with a storage device, but the grid has zero storage capacity. But electric vehicles are a place to store energy. Maybe wind farms near municipalities should include wired parking lots for lots of electric vehicles. That would to some degree address both problems, the cars would charge from a clean energy source and the wind farms would be connected to batteries. Lee LWB250 wrote: Points well taken, Tim. The one thing that nags at me regarding the electric vehicles is how much gas/coal/oil has to be burned to produce the electricity to charge or run them? I never see this in the information, and I think it's a very relevant aspect of the whole electric vehicle thing. Dan From: Tim C bb...@crone.us To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Sent: Sunday, June 19, 2011 8:34 AM Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT More than that, the anemic sales of the Volt are clearly due to supply issues, since dealers don't have them in stock and can't get them. The Leaf is having similar issues. I suspect part of it, like was done with the early hybrids, is limiting supply so as to work bugs out with committed early adopters. For what it's worth I have trouble seeing the Volt called an electric vehicle; it is a hybrid just like my Escape, except it has a night plug for precharging the battery, and is built to Chevrolet (versus FORD :) standards. I am not a fan of the idea that all cars should have the same propulsion system. Some are better suited to certain things, for example I don't think many in this forum will argue that diesels are the best choice for short trips around town, or drag racing, but I am pretty sure many of us agree that diesels are the best for distance and highway travel. Electric vehicles have been in use for more than a century, and among other things make good delivery vehicles, and are common for low-speed or fixed-location applications already. I don't get why the same folks who curse California for banning diesels get upset that battery cars are going into production. I am not arguing that the government -should- be subsidizing the cost of the cars, but I can see the argument that it is only making up for the support for oil, ethanol, and to a lesser degree biodiesel production. Best, Tim who killed the electric car (purchase because it is too expensive, for now
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
When you see the articles written about comparing hybrids to straight gas burners, they almost always come out in favor of the non-hybrid car. There are so many efficient gas burners out there, that if you use good driving habits and keep them in good order, they will be less expensive in the long run. My 2004 Ford Focus wagon averages about 26 MPG across the board, and costs me very little to maintain it. It's about ready to pass 140k this week and it still runs like new. I think about my CPA buddy who bought a Prius for his wife. Within a couple of years he was getting poorer mileage than his Hyundai sedan. As he described it, as the battery loses capacity, the engine runs more often, drawing down the gas mileage. Don't know how true that is (he is not a car guy, just a bean counter) but he does keep detailed records, so I have to assume there is some truth to it. Dan Sent from my iPhone On Jun 19, 2011, at 12:47 PM, Allan Streib str...@cs.indiana.edu wrote: Pretty much the greenest thing you can do is buy a non-hybrid used car and keep it in good running order. Anything made in the past couple of decades is pretty clean-running, and by buying used you are not creating demand for more raw materials for manufacturing. Of course that doesn't help GM, Ford, or the politicians so you'll never hear that promoted anywhere. On Sun, 19 Jun 2011 09:21 -0700, Lee einer...@yahoo.com wrote: I'm pretty sure that the printing of government regulations is not the primary cause of global deforestation. Last time I checked, the timber, ranching and agricultural sectors had something to do with it. And you forgot about the hybrid and electric-car induced global rare-earth shortage that is causing dirty, polluting mines to reopen. Lee ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
You miss the whole point of this exercise. It's not about what is rational, it's about what feeels good! And electric cars feeel good! And if you have one you can drive around feeling smug that you are clearly smarter and better than that other guy who does not have one, and that you Care More than the other guy. Of course, if you run the numbers (in whatever dimensions you choose) you find out how stupid all that is, but that is not the point. --R ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
I don't dispute all the evidence that electric cars aren't as green as they say they are but one nice thing about them is they produce at least somewhat less in the way of emissions. Yes, this is offset by the manufacturing drawbacks, etc. But I am talking about the air that I actually breathe on a regular basis. I can tell you that I really like being passed by a hybrid - or especially an all electric - when I am riding my bicycle. On the other hand, the plentiful supply of Suburbans and full-sized pickups in town make me want to hold my breath as I struggle up the hills around here. Brian 83 240D 2010 Prius 8 or 9 bicycles On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 10:35 AM, Rich Thomas richthomas79td...@constructivity.net wrote: You miss the whole point of this exercise. It's not about what is rational, it's about what feeels good! And electric cars feeel good! And if you have one you can drive around feeling smug that you are clearly smarter and better than that other guy who does not have one, and that you Care More than the other guy. Of course, if you run the numbers (in whatever dimensions you choose) you find out how stupid all that is, but that is not the point. --R __**_ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/**archive/http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/**mailman/listinfo/mercedes_**okiebenz.comhttp://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Actually I caught my own flub here: Going up hills, hybrids are running on their good old gas engines. The mpg gauge in our Prius dives down into what appears to be the teens as we climb the hills. Brian On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 10:35 AM, Rich Thomas richthomas79td...@constructivity.net wrote: You miss the whole point of this exercise. It's not about what is rational, it's about what feeels good! And electric cars feeel good! And if you have one you can drive around feeling smug that you are clearly smarter and better than that other guy who does not have one, and that you Care More than the other guy. Of course, if you run the numbers (in whatever dimensions you choose) you find out how stupid all that is, but that is not the point. --R __**_ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/**archive/http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/**mailman/listinfo/mercedes_**okiebenz.comhttp://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
LWB250 wrote: Points well taken, Tim. The one thing that nags at me regarding the electric vehicles is how much gas/coal/oil has to be burned to produce the electricity to charge or run them? I never see this in the information, and I think it's a very relevant aspect of the whole electric vehicle thing. They are often called zero emission - but really, it should be displaced emission 'cause most electricity in the country comes from burning coal. But that coal plant is not in the LA bowl so it doesn't contribute to the smog. Therefore, since it is located out of sight, it can't be causing any pollution. :) --Philip ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Allan Streib wrote: Pretty much the greenest thing you can do is buy a non-hybrid used car and keep it in good running order. Anything made in the past couple of decades is pretty clean-running, and by buying used you are not creating demand for more raw materials for manufacturing. Of course that doesn't help GM, Ford, or the politicians so you'll never hear that promoted anywhere. I call reusing an old device high-level recycling. As opposed to low-level, which means melt it down and start again. EBay, Craigslist, and yard sales are excellent for this. Cash-for-clunkers was _quite_ the opposite. Which type is the government program? --Philip ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
They scare the shit out of me because I can't hear them coming and BANG! there they are (and one hopes there is no bang). Goes also for walking in parking lots. One came up me last week somewhere, it got me thinking that for low-speed tooling around they need a speaker on the front with some sort of engine-like sound, so you can at least get an aural reference on them. --R On 6/19/11 3:05 PM, Zoltan Finks wrote: I can tell you that I really like being passed by a hybrid - or especially an all electric - when I am riding my bicycle. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
True. I can actually recognize the Toyota hybrid sound. Seems the same in all their hybrid models. Kinda space age-ish. But yeah. They really do need to have some warning. Reminds me of a harrowing experience one day when I was passed by an RV on a road with no shoulder. Was the kind of RV that is the size of a greyhound bus. It was rear engine. Didn't hear it until is was next to me. The driver did not get over one bit. And he was pulling a trailer with a pickup on it. It was so bad that I pulled over and called the cops. An annoying thing: Our Prius has a beeper that lets everyone inside the car know when you're in reverse. Useless! Brian On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 12:54 PM, Rich Thomas richthomas79td...@constructivity.net wrote: They scare the shit out of me because I can't hear them coming and BANG! there they are (and one hopes there is no bang). Goes also for walking in parking lots. One came up me last week somewhere, it got me thinking that for low-speed tooling around they need a speaker on the front with some sort of engine-like sound, so you can at least get an aural reference on them. --R On 6/19/11 3:05 PM, Zoltan Finks wrote: I can tell you that I really like being passed by a hybrid - or especially an all electric - when I am riding my bicycle. __**_ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/**archive/http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/**mailman/listinfo/mercedes_**okiebenz.comhttp://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
The associations of blind people have been demanding this for as long as there have been hybrids. They are so quiet that blind people often step off curbs in front of them, not being able to SEE the car coming because it makes no noise. Peter ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Or a playing card affixed so it rubs against wheel spokes, etc. ;))) Wilton - Original Message - From: Rich Thomas richthomas79td...@constructivity.net To: Mercedes Discussion List mercedes@okiebenz.com Sent: Sunday, June 19, 2011 3:54 PM Subject: Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT They scare the shit out of me because I can't hear them coming and BANG! there they are (and one hopes there is no bang). Goes also for walking in parking lots. One came up me last week somewhere, it got me thinking that for low-speed tooling around they need a speaker on the front with some sort of engine-like sound, so you can at least get an aural reference on them. --R On 6/19/11 3:05 PM, Zoltan Finks wrote: I can tell you that I really like being passed by a hybrid - or especially an all electric - when I am riding my bicycle. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Since hearing is all I've got, electrics and hybrids are a problem. The guide dogs did well with the Prius used in training. It was sure quiet, and even when I didn't hear it, the dog provided plenty of buffer zone for our safety. Kevin in Hillsboro, Oregon ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
A Guide Dog will help, certainly, but if you are trying to get around without one, hybrids and electrics can be very scary. They get lost in the surrounding noise in urban settings. Sorta like the hallway in the Student Center at SIU -- had perforated ceiling tile ventilation and was acoustically quite dead. I had a board meeting regularly up there, and had to lead our blind member into the room every time (I'd meet him at the elevator). He hated that, was quite proud of being independent, but after I found him walking into the walls going in circles he allowed me to take him in. Strangest hallway I've ever been in, it was disconcerting for a sighted person it was so dead. Peter ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Heck with hybrids, they need to come out with more small 4 cylinder diesel powered cars. On 6/19/2011 12:27 PM, Dan Penoff wrote: When you see the articles written about comparing hybrids to straight gas burners, they almost always come out in favor of the non-hybrid car. There are so many efficient gas burners out there, that if you use good driving habits and keep them in good order, they will be less expensive in the long run. My 2004 Ford Focus wagon averages about 26 MPG across the board, and costs me very little to maintain it. It's about ready to pass 140k this week and it still runs like new. I think about my CPA buddy who bought a Prius for his wife. Within a couple of years he was getting poorer mileage than his Hyundai sedan. As he described it, as the battery loses capacity, the engine runs more often, drawing down the gas mileage. Don't know how true that is (he is not a car guy, just a bean counter) but he does keep detailed records, so I have to assume there is some truth to it. Dan Sent from my iPhone -- Kaleb C. Striplin/Claremore, OK 99 E430, 99 E320. 97 E300, 95 E300, 93 300D, 92 500SEL, 92 300SD, 91 350SDL, 91 300D, 90 300D, 89 560SEL, 87 300SDL x2, 85 190D, 84 190D, 84 300D euro manny, 76 240D, 76 300D http://www.okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Brian wrote: I can tell you that I really like being passed by a hybrid - or especially an all electric - when I am riding my bicycle. Trouble maker. I would love to ride my 1938 Schwinn more, but I live on the outskirts. mao ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Geez, I go outside for a few hours and you guys go crazy! :) Electric motors put power to the wheels more efficiently. People who have electric cars use less energy than people who use gas cars of comparable size and weight. (Electric cars are also dragging around a literal ton of extra weight per volume, give or take, compared to a gas version. Hybrids are worse, because you have the weight of the motor plus the batteries, though we know they get 30% higher MPG, so there you go.) I figure that is mostly made up environmentally by the damages for batteries and PCBs and copper and whatnot, as well as coal mining and nuclear material etc., and maybe even makes up for the environmental damage from drilling for oil and engine aluminum. There was a Swiss study a year or two ago that found that electric cars run on batteries and charged from the grid were equally pollutant with the most efficient modern gas cars. Alex's take (Banned about the time, but I don't think it's archived) was, duh, you use as an assumption the worst-polluting coal farm you wind up with the worst-case. The study did take into account environmental impact from battery element mining and disposal, but did not take into account coal removal environmental impact. Even taking the study at face value it would be a wash, environmentally, for an average car user who drives 12Kmi/year in spurts of 50 miles per day using the smallest economy car, so for those of us with vehicles larger than Neons we are putting out more pollutants than an electric of comparable size/weight would. Still probably not a great environmental argument, but then I'm not a great environmentalist.* Why do I want an electric car? Because: - I drive a very predictable 20 miles round-trip in a day. That's 1 gallon of diesel, give or take, so call it $3.75 +/- $0.75. Using a relatively-conservative hobbyist conversion 0.5 KWh/mile, I would spend $1.00 (I pay $0.10/KWh) for my commute, plus I never have to go out of my way to the good diesel station. To be honest, I figure my commute is about break-even, given the incremental recurring cost of batteries every few years, so I'd be hard pressed to give up the 300D/SDL, but the economics are pretty favorable - if I was willing to pay more now you hedge against future oil price increases. If I was going to buy a new car at some point I would think really hard about an electric, though I think the odds of me buying a new car, versus new, for my own use approach zero. :) - My wife drives 3-4 miles round-trip a day, or 50+ miles in a day. The 2-ish mile trips are killer for mileage, and is not doing any favor to the longevity of the engine either. Her 50-mile days are very predictable, and fairly rare, so she will not be in a position that she is out and then have to suddenly make a long trip. Thus, she would be well-served to use an electric vehicle with no warm-up time - and no oil, spark plugs, etc. - at $0.20/day. (Well, practically, she'd be better off with an electric scooter, but she is too risk averse for that.) Since the batteries wouldn't be discharging much she could easily go multiple days, and low discharge means longer battery life so the big maintenance would be spread out a bit. She treats her cars as commodities. She would need a separate car for the 50-mile days, but I'd be a lot more comfortable putting her in a diesel with the understanding that it was not going to be killed by regular short trips. I'm not one to foist my views on others, but I'd be happy to buy SWMBO an electric car, if I thought I could afford it and the current build quality was satisfactory, so I am happy to see some products shipping. I believe I have aptly demonstrated that I am too lazy to do a hobbyist conversion, but maybe once I retire in 150 years I will be able to get around to it. :) Happy Fathers' Day! -Tim *also not a great mentalist On Jun 19, 2011 1:35 PM, Rich Thomas richthomas79td...@constructivity.net wrote: You miss the whole point of this exercise. It's not about what is rational, it's about what feeels good! And electric cars feeel good! And if you have one you can drive around feeling smug that you are clearly smarter and better than that other guy who does not have one, and that you Care More than the other guy. Of course, if you run the numbers (in whatever dimensions you choose) you find out how stupid all that is, but that is not the point. --R ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to:
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Tim C wrote: Why do I want an electric car? Because: - I drive a very predictable 20 miles round-trip in a day. That's 1 gallon of diesel, give or take, so call it $3.75 +/- $0.75. Using a relatively-conservative hobbyist conversion 0.5 KWh/mile, I would spend $1.00 (I pay $0.10/KWh) for my commute, plus I never have to go out of my way to the good diesel station. If you're willing to accept hobbyist electric performance, why don't you run those numbers again after sticking a 15hp Kubota diesel in a VW Rabbit? It'll be a lot more than 20mpg that way. Mitch. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Wonder what the mileage on one of those little single-cyl gas deathtrap cars was... On Jun 19, 2011 8:27 PM, Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net wrote: Tim C wrote: Why do I want an electric car? Because: - I drive a very predictable 20 miles round-trip in a day. That's 1 gallon of diesel, give or take, so call it $3.75 +/- $0.75. Using a relatively-conservative hobbyist conversion 0.5 KWh/mile, I would spend $1.00 (I pay $0.10/KWh) for my commute, plus I never have to go out of my way to the good diesel station. If you're willing to accept hobbyist electric performance, why don't you run those numbers again after sticking a 15hp Kubota diesel in a VW Rabbit? It'll be a lot more than 20mpg that way. Mitch. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 8:27 PM, Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net wrote: Tim C wrote: Why do I want an electric car? Because: - I drive a very predictable 20 miles round-trip in a day. That's 1 gallon of diesel, give or take, so call it $3.75 +/- $0.75. Using a relatively-conservative hobbyist conversion 0.5 KWh/mile, I would spend $1.00 (I pay $0.10/KWh) for my commute, plus I never have to go out of my way to the good diesel station. If you're willing to accept hobbyist electric performance, why don't you run those numbers again after sticking a 15hp Kubota diesel in a VW Rabbit? It'll be a lot more than 20mpg that way. Geez, if I was willing to drive a Rabbit, or put SWMBO in one, the Kubota would have to hit 75MPG to beat the straight numbers above, and I don't really pay $0.10/KWh, either. I get that batteries are expensive, but fuel fluctuates too, and has net risen as long as I've been driving, so a hedge is not a bad thing... as you of all people will understand. :) At least an electric motor will accelerate. A lot of them will even go highway speeds! -Tim http://avt.inel.gov/pdf/fsev/costs.pdf ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Walt Zarnoch wrote: Wonder what the mileage on one of those little single-cyl gas deathtrap cars was... A Messerschmitt KR200 (two stroke) was said to get 87 imperial mpg, or 70 US mpg, probably about what you would get with a 1970's subcompact and a diesel lawn mower engine, or a 200cc motorcycle. I got 78mpg on my 200cc Honda four stroke twin when I was in high school, but the odometer might have been optimistic, I know the speedo read high. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Remember the all-electric RAV-4? Leases terminated and vehicles crushed. And people who were lucky to get them LOVED them. A few even fought and got to keep them, albeit without ANY dealer parts backup. Now we have a gas engine tacked on, and it's called a Prius. I've also heard it's damn impossible to keep that gas engine from starting up, and you need to void your waranty to add the euro-option plug-in pack... Just my musings, Walt On Jun 19, 2011 8:59 PM, Tim C bb...@crone.us wrote: On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 8:27 PM, Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net wrote: Tim C wrote: Why do I want an electric car? Because: - I drive a very predictable 20 miles round-trip in a day. That's 1 gallon of diesel, give or take, so call it $3.75 +/- $0.75. Using a relatively-conservative hobbyist conversion 0.5 KWh/mile, I would spend $1.00 (I pay $0.10/KWh) for my commute, plus I never have to go out of my way to the good diesel station. If you're willing to accept hobbyist electric performance, why don't you run those numbers again after sticking a 15hp Kubota diesel in a VW Rabbit? It'll be a lot more than 20mpg that way. Geez, if I was willing to drive a Rabbit, or put SWMBO in one, the Kubota would have to hit 75MPG to beat the straight numbers above, and I don't really pay $0.10/KWh, either. I get that batteries are expensive, but fuel fluctuates too, and has net risen as long as I've been driving, so a hedge is not a bad thing... as you of all people will understand. :) At least an electric motor will accelerate. A lot of them will even go highway speeds! -Tim http://avt.inel.gov/pdf/fsev/costs.pdf ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
It looks like a Chevy Dolt can, without using climate control, do about 35 miles on 13kWh, so your .5kWh per mile was actually conservative. You mentioned not paying 10 cents, what do you pay? My marginal cost of electricity is about 22 cents in the summer and 14 cents in the winter. It'd still take longer than the batteries will live to pay back the cost of trading in an SDL on a Dolt with fuel savings. And some of those fuel savings will go away when they figure out a way to make electric drivers pay road tax. Mitch. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
I wonder if they'll start factoring projected road tax into the purchase price... Walt On Jun 19, 2011 9:26 PM, Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net wrote: It looks like a Chevy Dolt can, without using climate control, do about 35 miles on 13kWh, so your .5kWh per mile was actually conservative. You mentioned not paying 10 cents, what do you pay? My marginal cost of electricity is about 22 cents in the summer and 14 cents in the winter. It'd still take longer than the batteries will live to pay back the cost of trading in an SDL on a Dolt with fuel savings. And some of those fuel savings will go away when they figure out a way to make electric drivers pay road tax. Mitch. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 9:26 PM, Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net wrote: It looks like a Chevy Dolt can, without using climate control, do about 35 miles on 13kWh, so your .5kWh per mile was actually conservative. Hobbyist numbers, converting by removing gas engines and adding batteries does not yield the ideal car form factor. Usually assumes lead-acid (heavy) batteries, too. You mentioned not paying 10 cents, what do you pay? My marginal cost of electricity is about 22 cents in the summer and 14 cents in the winter. .092 last month. Nuclear country, thanks Max! It'd still take longer than the batteries will live to pay back the cost of trading in an SDL on a Dolt with fuel savings. And some of those fuel savings will go away when they figure out a way to make electric drivers pay road tax. Sure, and the SDL is more fun (and spacious). On the other hand I have a hybrid already, so my e-car purchase would be a Leaf, which saves carrying the gas engine around all the time. And it'd be for SWMBO, not me, and she's not as content driving a beat-up old car like the SDL, and certainly not the 300D. SWMBO happy is a value without price. :) ...although the more practical question is, would the battery outlive the SDL's transmission? My money is on yes, but my hope is on no. May or may not be able to outlast the hybrid if I drive it into the ground, which I fully intend to do. NC has proposed GPS monitoring for road tax, but I think even here it wouldn't fly. I expect we'll see additive default road tax (assume 20Kmi@30mpg or something) on property tax forms for EVs in the coming years, all of NC pays property taxes on automobiles already so it's just a matter of the counties collecting incrementally for the state. -Tim waits three seconds for reverse ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net writes: It'd still take longer than the batteries will live to pay back the cost of trading in an SDL on a Dolt with fuel savings. And some of those fuel savings will go away when they figure out a way to make electric drivers pay road tax. It won't be long if EVs catch on in any significant number. You'll be required to have a special metered outlet installed in the garage (at your expense, probably several thousand dollars as the electricians will know a good thing when they see it) and you'll pay road tax on any electricity used from there. Heavy fines for bypassing, which will be suspected if your household power usage is high but your charger usage is low. Allan -- 1983 300D ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
While we can talk about the rational and economic factors of electric vs dino juice vs hybrid all day long, most car choices and purchases are emotional, not rational. It doesn' treally matter whether you think your saving money or the environment - you're going to buy the latest technology, or old technology as you want. I admit that my fixation on Mercedes is not necessarily a rational decision. I expect to keep the 300Ds a long time - the van and the ML are throw away cars to be used up. I'd like to play with an electric car, just for the instant torque, braking regeneration, etc. One with a serial Diesel generator would be cool for the ability to travel long distances. However, it's for emotional reasons, not rational ones. On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 8:43 PM, Tim C bb...@crone.us wrote: On Sun, Jun 19, 2011 at 9:26 PM, Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net wrote: It looks like a Chevy Dolt can, without using climate control, do about 35 miles on 13kWh, so your .5kWh per mile was actually conservative. Hobbyist numbers, converting by removing gas engines and adding batteries does not yield the ideal car form factor. Usually assumes lead-acid (heavy) batteries, too. You mentioned not paying 10 cents, what do you pay? My marginal cost of electricity is about 22 cents in the summer and 14 cents in the winter. .092 last month. Nuclear country, thanks Max! It'd still take longer than the batteries will live to pay back the cost of trading in an SDL on a Dolt with fuel savings. And some of those fuel savings will go away when they figure out a way to make electric drivers pay road tax. Sure, and the SDL is more fun (and spacious). On the other hand I have a hybrid already, so my e-car purchase would be a Leaf, which saves carrying the gas engine around all the time. And it'd be for SWMBO, not me, and she's not as content driving a beat-up old car like the SDL, and certainly not the 300D. SWMBO happy is a value without price. :) ...although the more practical question is, would the battery outlive the SDL's transmission? My money is on yes, but my hope is on no. May or may not be able to outlast the hybrid if I drive it into the ground, which I fully intend to do. NC has proposed GPS monitoring for road tax, but I think even here it wouldn't fly. I expect we'll see additive default road tax (assume 20Kmi@30mpg or something) on property tax forms for EVs in the coming years, all of NC pays property taxes on automobiles already so it's just a matter of the counties collecting incrementally for the state. -Tim waits three seconds for reverse -- OK Don 2001 ML320 1992 300D 2.5T 1990 300D 2.5T 1997 Plymouth Grand Voyager ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
I'd put it in the charging station, and have the stations just report car X charged for Y hourss using X KW. That way it wouldn't matter who's charger you used, it'd always bill you the tax. It would be up to the charge station operator to bill for usage (in the event that parking garages start getting them or you top off at a friends place). Watch them steal my idea... Walt On Jun 19, 2011 9:59 PM, Allan Streib str...@cs.indiana.edu wrote: Mitch Haley m...@voyager.net writes: It'd still take longer than the batteries will live to pay back the cost of trading in an SDL on a Dolt with fuel savings. And some of those fuel savings will go away when they figure out a way to make electric drivers pay road tax. It won't be long if EVs catch on in any significant number. You'll be required to have a special metered outlet installed in the garage (at your expense, probably several thousand dollars as the electricians will know a good thing when they see it) and you'll pay road tax on any electricity used from there. Heavy fines for bypassing, which will be suspected if your household power usage is high but your charger usage is low. Allan -- 1983 300D ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Allan Streib wrote: It won't be long if EVs catch on in any significant number. You'll be required to have a special metered outlet installed in the garage (at your expense, probably several thousand dollars as the electricians will know a good thing when they see it) and you'll pay road tax on any electricity used from there. Heavy fines for bypassing, which will be suspected if your household power usage is high but your charger usage is low. Might be easier to just charge you $500 a year for the EV's license plate. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
They gotta make up the gas tax somehow. So you pay a premium to fel good then another tax to make up for the gas you aren't burning and the pollution you are spewing (from the tailpipe anyway) and pretty soon your smugness might be a bit less forthright. At least until the rest of the tax-paying population increases the subsidies for your Care More approach to motoring. --R On 6/19/11 10:27 PM, Mitch Haley wrote: Allan Streib wrote: It won't be long if EVs catch on in any significant number. You'll be required to have a special metered outlet installed in the garage (at your expense, probably several thousand dollars as the electricians will know a good thing when they see it) and you'll pay road tax on any electricity used from there. Heavy fines for bypassing, which will be suspected if your household power usage is high but your charger usage is low. Might be easier to just charge you $500 a year for the EV's license plate. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Not me that works in a nuke plant, but nuke is the only way to go, in my opinion. Tim C bb...@crone.us wrote: .092 last month. Nuclear country, thanks Max! -- Sent from my Android phone with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Etre d'accord! Fred Moir Lynn MA Diesel preferred On 6/19/2011 6:56 PM, Kaleb C. Striplin wrote: Heck with hybrids, they need to come out with more small 4 cylinder diesel powered cars. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
electric cars use less energy than people who use gas cars of comparable size and weight. Charging efficiency is rarely talked about. A diesel-electric micro-hybrid, where the diesel was underpowered except for the average fwy requirement, and only enough battery to get you up to speed a time or two, would probably do the very best. The diesel should be run at peak efficiency, the battery would be cheap and small. The beauty of the diesel is that at lesser output (than peak) it is more efficient than a gasser. Hit the long hills and it might slow down, but if it was doing 75 mpg I bet many would overlook that. I might. -- Jim ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
[MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
The Rest of the Story Patrick Michaels is a senior fellow in Environmental Studies at the Cato Institute and the editor of the forthcoming Climate Coup: Global Warming's Invasion of our Government and our Lives, as well as the author of several other books on global warming. His Forbes column on the Chevy VOLT is a case study in the nexus between big government corruption and big business rent-seeking. Michaels briefly recaps the well-known consumer fraud in which GM has touted the VOLT as an all-electric mass production vehicle on the supposed basis of which its sales receive a $7,500 taxpayer subsidy, which still renders it overpriced and unmarketable. Michaels notes that sales are anemic: 326 in December, 321 in January, and 281 in February. There seems to be a trend here . . . Michaels adds that GM has announced a production run of 100,000 in the first two years and asks what appears to be a rhetorical question: Who is going to buy all these cars? But wait! Keep hope alive! There is a positive answer to the question. Jeffrey Immelt's GE will buy a boatload of those uneconomic GM cars. Here the case study opens onto the inevitable political angle: Recently, President Obama selected General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt to chair his Economic Advisory Board. GE is also awash in windmills waiting to be subsidized so they can provide unreliable, expensive power. Consequently, and soon after his appointment, Immelt announced that GE will buy 50,000 VOLTs in the next two years, or half the total produced. Assuming the corporation qualifies for the same tax credit, we (you and I) just shelled out $375,000,000 to a company to buy cars that no one else wants, so that GM will not tank and produce even more cars that no one wants. And this guy is the chair of Obama's Economic Advisory Board? But of course. Michaels includes this hilarious detail in his case study: In a telling attempt to preserve battery power, the heater is exceedingly weak. Consumer Reports their tests averaged a paltry 25 miles of electric-only running, in part because it was testing in cold Connecticut . (The [GM] engineer at the Auto Show said cold weather would have little effect.) It will be interesting to see what the range is on a hot, traffic-jammed summer day, when the air conditioner will really tax the batteries. When the gas engine came on, Consumer Reports got about 30 miles to the gallon of premium fuel; which, in terms of additional cost of high-test gas, drives the effective mileage closer to 27 mpg. A conventional Honda Accord, which seats 5 (instead of the VOLT's 4), gets 34 mpg on the highway, and costs less than half of what CR paid, even with the tax break. The story of the GM VOLT deserves a place in the Harvard Business School curriculumbut of course, it won't. It's a classic tale of the GOVERNMENT deciding what the public needs, not the marketplace. What is one of the reasons for this? Why, to keep the UAW in business, because Obama owes them for his election. Starting to make sense yet? Michaels' article in full: http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=12892 Buy hey, why am I telling you. You already know about the corrupt top of our country. But you can tell others that maybe don't. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Very interesting, but I'd like to see a fact check to get a more unbiased version of the story. Jaime On Sat, Jun 18, 2011 at 8:36 PM, relng...@aol.com wrote: The Rest of the Story Patrick Michaels is a senior fellow in Environmental Studies at the Cato Institute and the editor of the forthcoming Climate Coup: Global Warming's Invasion of our Government and our Lives, as well as the author of several other books on global warming. His Forbes column on the Chevy VOLT is a case study in the nexus between big government corruption and big business rent-seeking. Michaels briefly recaps the well-known consumer fraud in which GM has touted the VOLT as an all-electric mass production vehicle on the supposed basis of which its sales receive a $7,500 taxpayer subsidy, which still renders it overpriced and unmarketable. Michaels notes that sales are anemic: 326 in December, 321 in January, and 281 in February. There seems to be a trend here . . . Michaels adds that GM has announced a production run of 100,000 in the first two years and asks what appears to be a rhetorical question: Who is going to buy all these cars? But wait! Keep hope alive! There is a positive answer to the question. Jeffrey Immelt's GE will buy a boatload of those uneconomic GM cars. Here the case study opens onto the inevitable political angle: Recently, President Obama selected General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt to chair his Economic Advisory Board. GE is also awash in windmills waiting to be subsidized so they can provide unreliable, expensive power. Consequently, and soon after his appointment, Immelt announced that GE will buy 50,000 VOLTs in the next two years, or half the total produced. Assuming the corporation qualifies for the same tax credit, we (you and I) just shelled out $375,000,000 to a company to buy cars that no one else wants, so that GM will not tank and produce even more cars that no one wants. And this guy is the chair of Obama's Economic Advisory Board? But of course. Michaels includes this hilarious detail in his case study: In a telling attempt to preserve battery power, the heater is exceedingly weak. Consumer Reports their tests averaged a paltry 25 miles of electric-only running, in part because it was testing in cold Connecticut . (The [GM] engineer at the Auto Show said cold weather would have little effect.) It will be interesting to see what the range is on a hot, traffic-jammed summer day, when the air conditioner will really tax the batteries. When the gas engine came on, Consumer Reports got about 30 miles to the gallon of premium fuel; which, in terms of additional cost of high-test gas, drives the effective mileage closer to 27 mpg. A conventional Honda Accord, which seats 5 (instead of the VOLT's 4), gets 34 mpg on the highway, and costs less than half of what CR paid, even with the tax break. The story of the GM VOLT deserves a place in the Harvard Business School curriculumbut of course, it won't. It's a classic tale of the GOVERNMENT deciding what the public needs, not the marketplace. What is one of the reasons for this? Why, to keep the UAW in business, because Obama owes them for his election. Starting to make sense yet? Michaels' article in full: http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=12892 Buy hey, why am I telling you. You already know about the corrupt top of our country. But you can tell others that maybe don't. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
Re: [MBZ] The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy VOLT....
Let us know your results.Most of it has been widely reported already. Very interesting, but I'd like to see a fact check to get a more unbiased version of the story. Jaime On Sat, Jun 18, 2011 at 8:36 PM, relng...@aol.com wrote: The Rest of the Story Patrick Michaels is a senior fellow in Environmental Studies at the Cato Institute and the editor of the forthcoming Climate Coup: Global Warming's Invasion of our Government and our Lives, as well as the author of several other books on global warming. His Forbes column on the Chevy VOLT is a case study in the nexus between big government corruption and big business rent-seeking. Michaels briefly recaps the well-known consumer fraud in which GM has touted the VOLT as an all-electric mass production vehicle on the supposed basis of which its sales receive a $7,500 taxpayer subsidy, which still renders it overpriced and unmarketable. Michaels notes that sales are anemic: 326 in December, 321 in January, and 281 in February. There seems to be a trend here . . . Michaels adds that GM has announced a production run of 100,000 in the first two years and asks what appears to be a rhetorical question: Who is going to buy all these cars? But wait! Keep hope alive! There is a positive answer to the question. Jeffrey Immelt's GE will buy a boatload of those uneconomic GM cars. Here the case study opens onto the inevitable political angle: Recently, President Obama selected General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt to chair his Economic Advisory Board. GE is also awash in windmills waiting to be subsidized so they can provide unreliable, expensive power. Consequently, and soon after his appointment, Immelt announced that GE will buy 50,000 VOLTs in the next two years, or half the total produced. Assuming the corporation qualifies for the same tax credit, we (you and I) just shelled out $375,000,000 to a company to buy cars that no one else wants, so that GM will not tank and produce even more cars that no one wants. And this guy is the chair of Obama's Economic Advisory Board? But of course. Michaels includes this hilarious detail in his case study: In a telling attempt to preserve battery power, the heater is exceedingly weak. Consumer Reports their tests averaged a paltry 25 miles of electric-only running, in part because it was testing in cold Connecticut . (The [GM] engineer at the Auto Show said cold weather would have little effect.) It will be interesting to see what the range is on a hot, traffic-jammed summer day, when the air conditioner will really tax the batteries. When the gas engine came on, Consumer Reports got about 30 miles to the gallon of premium fuel; which, in terms of additional cost of high-test gas, drives the effective mileage closer to 27 mpg. A conventional Honda Accord, which seats 5 (instead of the VOLT's 4), gets 34 mpg on the highway, and costs less than half of what CR paid, even with the tax break. The story of the GM VOLT deserves a place in the Harvard Business School curriculumbut of course, it won't. It's a classic tale of the GOVERNMENT deciding what the public needs, not the marketplace. What is one of the reasons for this? Why, to keep the UAW in business, because Obama owes them for his election. Starting to make sense yet? Michaels' article in full: http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=12892 Buy hey, why am I telling you. You already know about the corrupt top of our country. But you can tell others that maybe don't. ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com ___ http://www.okiebenz.com For new and used parts go to www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com