Onboard separation technology set to improve fuel economy:
A technology developed by researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory could pave the way for increased fuel economy and lower greenhouse gas emissions as part of an octane-on-demand fuel-delivery system.
Designed to work with a car's existing fuel, the onboard separation technology is the first to use chemistry—not a physical membrane—to separate ethanol-blended gasoline into high- and low-octane fuel components. An octane-on-demand system can then meter out the appropriate fuel mixture to the engine depending on the power required: lower octane for idling, higher octane for accelerating.
Studies have shown that octane-on-demand approaches can improve fuel economy by up to 30 percent and could help reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent. But so far, the pervaporation membranes tested for octane on demand leave nearly 20 percent of the valuable high-octane fuel components in the gasoline.
In proof-of-concept testing with three different chemistries, PNNL's patent-pending onboard separation technology separated 95 percent of the ethanol out of commercial gasoline. The materials are also effective for separating butanol, a promising high-octane renewable fuel component.
More information: Katarzyna Grubel et al. Octane-On-Demand: Onboard Separation of Oxygenates from Gasoline, Energy & Fuels (2019). DOI: 10.1021/acs.energyfuels.8b03781
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @03:31PM (35 children)
The gasoline engine has reached its limit for fuel efficiency.
All these ridiculous efforts to squeeze out a little more are a waste. It's a waste of money and waste of resources. Efforts are better spent to reduce vehicle weight and encourage more passengers per vehicle and shorter trips.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Grishnakh on Monday May 25 2020, @04:21PM (19 children)
You can't have more passengers per vehicle. Cities have been trying this for ages and it doesn't work: the odds of your neighbor going to the same place as you at any given time are minuscule; organizing carpools is a lot of trouble and depends on everyone being able to meet at the same time, twice a day, every day. It isn't realistic. Have you ever gone on group hikes? I used to go on them often pre-Covid. Organizers had to set aside a bare minimum of 15 minutes (really more like 20+, with the organizer getting there a bit early) for everyone to meet and wait enough time for the stragglers to get there before we could all jump into the carpool cars and go to the trailhead. If people have to wait 20-30 minutes extra every single day for their carpool people to get to the meeting point, that's probably a 50-100% increase in travel time. Not going to work.
Weight reduction is mostly a waste of effort. You'd need massively more expensive materials to accomplish this, and the gains would be minimal. I know a little about this, because I'm into cycling. My bike is carbon fibre, and cost a small fortune, around double a typical aluminum frame model, and far more than a more cheaply-made steel model. At the high end, bikes cost absurdly more money, for a minimal decrease in weight: a decent steel-frame road bike probably weighs about 26-30 pounds total, an AL frame closer to 25, while a nice CF road bike (not a time-trial racing model, more like one you'd use for long weekend rides; TT bikes are lighter but delicate) probably weighs 17-22 pounds. In a bike, the lower weight is really useful because they're human-powered, and when you're pedaling uphill, every ounce counts. In a car, however, weight just doesn't make that much of a difference: try tracking your fuel economy for a month of commuting, then add a 50-pound object to your trunk and track it for another month, and see if you can detect a difference. Most likely not. Unlike a bike, where there's no engine, in a car there's only so much you can do to save weight, mainly with the structure. But lower weight usually means lower survivability in a crash, unless you go to exotic materials, which cause your price to go through the roof. Can you imagine how much a titanium or carbon-fibre car body would cost to manufacture? For CF, it's questionable how well it could be engineered for crashworthiness; CF is extremely strong in particular directions (depends on the orientation of the fibres), but when it breaks it doesn't deform at all. It also requires a ton of manual labor to manufacture, unlike metal objects that can usually be cast or pressed and welded.
If you really want to decrease energy usage by the commuting public, the answer is simple: you need to greatly increase density, and build more public transit (which only works well with higher density). This isn't really viable in America, however: not only do you need to build public transit, you need to reliably fund its operations, and you need to get competent people to run it. We can't do these things. In America, we like to blow tons of money building something (way, way more than other developed Western nations would spend for the same construction project somehow), but then not bother spending any money to maintain it properly. Also, competence in anything government-run here has mostly evaporated these days. Just look at how badly the DC Metro system is run.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @04:37PM (5 children)
It doesn't have to be carbon fiber plastic. Aluminum is a good enough optimization. Some cars have aluminum engines now; that technology hasn't been around forever.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @10:27PM (4 children)
Since aluminum costs 3x more than steel (US$0.15 vs. US$0.045/lb), the impact on auto prices would be significant.
I suspect you're just being a douchebag* for the sake of being a douchebag.
*If you object to the use of that term, replace it with "contrarian" in your mind.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by c0lo on Monday May 25 2020, @11:27PM (3 children)
Investment vs running cost, do you realize there's a difference between them?
Besides,
[Citation needed]
Don't forget to transform the $/lb in $/sqm, not only it uses an international system of units but your objective is to have the surface of your car covered with less weight.
In fact don't bother, here you have it:
- aluminium density - 2.7g/cm3
- steel density - 8.05 g/cm3
At the same thickness, from the same mass of metal, you can cover 2.98 more area with aluminium than with steel, thus using aluminium is < 5% more expensive as investment
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @02:05AM (2 children)
Oh boy. You criticize his reasoning and pull out the grams per cubic centimeter business to show cost to cover an area with a metal. It's too bad you don't know about the strength of the materials and that sheet metal in a car body is usually expected to add to the strength of the panel via its bent shape, not just be a floppy flat sheet. When you compare aluminum and steel for that, you find that you need thicker aluminum panels than the steel for the equivalent strength. So, aluminum still wins on weight, but the panels must be made a little differently and you'll require a bit more aluminum than a naive straight substitution would suggest.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday May 26 2020, @03:52AM (1 child)
Says the AC: "no, siree, metal foams simply do not exist and even if they were a thing they'd be suboptimal [wikipedia.org], because profiled steel panels are the pinnacle in absorption of energy by deformation"
---
Rrrright! Then AC continues, in a blissful Dunning-Kruger state of mind:
(fucking simpleton minds, the world's choke full of them)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @07:44PM
You REALLY don't know how automobiles are built, do you? I get the feeling you got your education via science fiction books rather than via any engineering experience.
Here is a link to show how the folks who have been building massive aluminum vehicles FOR DECADES do it. It's still stamped sheet metal.
https://www.todaysmotorvehicles.com/article/aluminum-truck-peterbilt-lessons-123014/ [todaysmotorvehicles.com]
Read it and learn.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @05:12PM
>> You can't have more passengers per vehicle.
Wrong! Cities need to implement policies that attract immigrant families, which tend to breed like rats. The larger families will increase the number of passengers per vehicle.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @07:40PM
What would be nice is an efficient hydrocarbon fuel cell system that is compact and light enough to be used in a car.
Then you could store energy in convenient hydrocarbons (like gasoline) and have the efficiencies of electric motors and regenerative braking (supercapacitor or small battery).
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Monday May 25 2020, @08:09PM (5 children)
No, don't cram everyone close together. Spread them out and telecommute.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Monday May 25 2020, @11:29PM (4 children)
Great idea. So please tell me how we get the following professions to telecommute:
dentists/hygienists
nurses/doctors
cooks/chefs
police
supermarket cashiers and stockers
maids/janitors
shopkeepers
This is just a few offhand professions I've thought of. Most people aren't software developers.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @02:00AM (2 children)
Even maintaining the current level of telecommuting would be good for the planet.
Then all the telecommuters can move out to the countryside.
Make room for telecommuters by ending corn subsidies.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday May 26 2020, @05:30PM (1 child)
Why would the telecommuters *want* to move out to the countryside? First, it costs far more to provide infrastructure services to remote locations than to denser urban locations. Just think of how much it costs to build a mile of road; if there's thousands of people living along that mile, the cost per person is tiny. If there's 5 people, the cost is astronomical. Urban dwellers are subsidizing roads for rural residents. Water and sewer services are even worse, and wells and septic systems don't work everywhere. Secondly, not that many people want to live in the middle of nowhere, with nothing to do and no decent places to eat or shop or get groceries and no one to socialize with except a few hicks.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @08:03PM
*cough* covid-19 *cough* *cough* *sneeze*
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Tuesday May 26 2020, @03:41PM
I agree, there's a sizable fraction that cannot telecommute. As machinist I'm among them. There are two other people at my company that cannot telecommute, but the rest could.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 2) by TheReaperD on Tuesday May 26 2020, @03:27AM (2 children)
You said "we can't do these things" is not technically correct in regards to increasing population density and running a successful mass transit. The correct answer is half of the people in charge don't wan't it to happen and get in the way and muck up the operations of the half that do. People in high density urban areas tend to lean towards the Democratic party in their votes, even in Republican strongholds, whereas more sparsely populated rural areas tend to vote towards the Republicans, so Republicans do everything in their power to make sure high density urban areas don't work to drop their appeal. It's all about politics, not ability.
Ad eundum quo nemo ante iit
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday May 26 2020, @04:27AM (1 child)
Actually, I have to disagree with this some. *More* than half the people don't want it, Democrats and Republicans. Sure, the people in high-density urban areas tend to lean Democrat, but they aren't the only ones; lots of suburban people are Dem voters too, and they don't really care much about public transit.
Remember, Democrats are not a bunch of left-leaners. The Democratic Party is a center-right party, not left or center-left. We don't have a main party on the left in America. We have two parties: one center-right, and one far-right. People on the left tend to vote for the center-right party because it's closest to their leaning.
(Score: 2) by TheReaperD on Tuesday May 26 2020, @06:24AM
True. Modern democrats are Goldwater Republicans or people that don't have a true party with any influence to represent them. I concede the point.
Ad eundum quo nemo ante iit
(Score: 2) by Muad'Dave on Tuesday May 26 2020, @11:58AM (1 child)
Look into the crashworthiness of Formula 1 cars - they're predominantly CF and crash at 300 kph and somehow the meatbag inside survives (and usually walks away).
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday May 26 2020, @05:38PM
Do you have any idea how much an F1 car costs, or how much labor goes into producing it? Carbon fibre is notoriously labor-intensive, and not really automate-able. It works well for high-end bicycles (ones that cost a good fraction of what a car does) with Chinese or Taiwanese labor rates, but there's no way you're going to make a $20k car out of CF unless someone figures out a much cheaper way of making it.
Also, F1 cars aren't even remotely similar to normal passenger cars in design; they have small "safety cells" that the driver sits in, and everything else is bolted to. When they crash, the wheels and engine and everything else fly off while the driver is protected. Moreover, the driver is wearing a lot of safety gear that is impossible to use in a normal car: a crash helmet, and a 5-point safety harness especially. Other types of race cars have this kind of equipment too, but if you think you can get soccer moms and their kids or anyone else to wear this stuff for a grocery run, I have a bridge to sell you. It's not just the chassis that lets the drivers survive these crashes; it's the entire approach to safety, which is absent in passenger cars.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @04:35PM (5 children)
> The gasoline engine has reached its limit for fuel efficiency.
False. New ways to raise engine efficiency are in development at nearly all the car manufacturers. If there are any downsides to this, it could be the added first cost (adding complexity) and possible need for more maintenance as the car ages.
This idea of saving the higher octane parts of the fuel for high power events is clever. Higher octane relates to slower burning of the fuel, thus reducing the tendency for pre-ignition (knock). Most of the time a high compression engine operates at part-throttle and the peak cylinder pressure is relatively low, so a lower octane fuel is perfectly adequate.
Another avenue for increased efficiency is to remove the throttle valve and accompanying pumping losses, control power in a more efficient way. One method is variable intake valve closing--close the intake valve early and there is less air in the cylinder. This would be an excellent compliment to the separation of high and low octane components of the fuel.
> ... encourage more passengers per vehicle ...
Like car pooling is going to increase now, when nearly everyone, worldwide is social distancing? Good luck with that.
Less people is the ultimate solution. I did my bit (no kids).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @05:09PM (2 children)
All these engine complications to try to eke out a teeny bit of gasoline savings are already not worth it. The damn things are complex and prone to breakage. People talk about gasoline savings, but these can be cancelled out easily by the repairs for when they break. My wife's Honda has stop/start that I doubt ever saved $5 of gasoline. Yet, its constant wear and tear on the ignition components meant the battery died after 2 years. A heavy duty starter and battery (not the usual simple plate technology) had to be designed in because of that. When those go (this time outside of warranty), you'll pay extra for that. Better hope the stop/start works when pulling into a busy road, too...
As for the weight argument: cars used to weigh less even in the 90s with plain old steel. Then everything turned into an egg shaped crash capsule with no windows like a tank. That's the govt for you. They decided the cars weren't "safe" enough without adding a lot of extra steel and killing your ability to see out the car. Do they not realize they were mandating lower fuel efficiency with that? That's OK; Democrats think they can just keep requiring higher efficiency standards and magically it will occur. They don't know science. Thus, to meet the figures, companies rig the test but know the car won't meet it in the real world. Cars have gotten way too expensive and flimsy. They should either have stayed the same or gotten cheaper and flimsier just like all other consumer goods.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @07:39PM (1 child)
lol this is the start of every self-made hero story, which "your type" are normally suckers for...
They said it couldn't be done. A man refused to listen. He stood strong when others were weak. His vision. His bold plan. To inject bleach in the nutsack, I mean RIGHT in there.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @09:03PM
It could be done with a completely different engine technology than the diesel or gasoline piston internal combustion engine.
So far, for many uses, battery powered electric cars are winners. We still need a different technology to cover the other uses. As I said before, if you want better mileage (real world, not just cheating the tests), gasoline ICE cars need to get lighter. Back in the 80s and early 90s there were some impressive mileage figures. This was achieved by lower vehicle weights.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @07:36PM (1 child)
> Less people is the ultimate solution. I did my bit (no kids).
And now it's time for you to take the next step.
(Score: 2) by TheReaperD on Tuesday May 26 2020, @03:31AM
Have no fear. Darwinism works and will take its course in due time. No need to rush.
Ad eundum quo nemo ante iit
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @04:51PM (1 child)
It was always the endgame for you liberals not to make us be more efficient but to make us not travel at all.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Monday May 25 2020, @11:33PM
Then the saying of "reality has a liberal bias" is an understatement. Because, based on your definition, COVID is not just biased it's straight liberal.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2, Funny) by khallow on Monday May 25 2020, @07:34PM (5 children)
Money and resources that could do what? The elephant in this room is that hydrocarbon-fueled infrastructure is huge. Even modest improvements in its efficiency will reap huge money and resource gains over more than a billion vehicles.
Which as was already noted has already progressed about as far as it can. Keep in mind that one of the most important human resources is time. The present infrastructure does a pretty good job of saving that resource.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @09:08PM (2 children)
Heavier vehicles save time? WTF?
Back in the 80s and early 90s there were vehicles with very good mileage figures because vehicles back then weighed less on average than today's vehicles. This is the way to achieve real efficiency, not sonething that will cheat and beat an EPA test.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @09:21PM
https://www.autoweek.com/news/trucks/a1689571/heres-why-fords-aluminum-push-didnt-resonate-ram-and-chevy/ [autoweek.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday May 25 2020, @10:56PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @11:24PM (1 child)
There is no way most of these technologies are going to be applied to existing vehicles. Are you expecting the production of a billion new cars before the ICE engine is obsolete?
Worldwide production is about 80 million a year and most are cheap vehicles that will not have these technologies applied.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday May 25 2020, @11:39PM
Yes, billions at least.
(Score: 2) by optotronic on Tuesday May 26 2020, @01:44AM
An easy way to reduce vehicle weight is to buy a smaller/lighter vehicle than most Americans tend to buy.
You can make your trip shorter (as far as gasoline consumption is concerned) by turning the vehicle off while you run inside the store to get your coffee/cigarettes/whatever-these-people-are-buying.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by RandomFactor on Monday May 25 2020, @03:34PM (39 children)
Not as useful as it would have been decades ago. Nowadays with precise computer engine control and vehicles like mine that don't even bother and just shut themselves off instead of idling, the value is likely less than posited and reducing further every year.
Notice how incandescent lights suddenly started innovating and became significantly more efficient as we all moved to fluorescent and then LED?
В «Правде» нет известий, в «Известиях» нет правды
(Score: 4, Disagree) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday May 25 2020, @03:50PM (29 children)
No, but I noticed that I can find normal sized 250W incandescent bulbs now. LEDs and CFLs are all fine and good for general use but if you need to see to get a splinter out, read a paperback, or solder a tiny-ass component, incandescent bulbs kick the complete shit out of everything else.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @04:14PM (6 children)
I mean, as long as you don't care about your lights working, sure. LEDs are fine for lighting up the caps lock key, but for illumination they just don't get it done. And CFLs aren't good for anything.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @04:37PM (5 children)
What are you talking about? They work great.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @06:42PM (1 child)
Go and look at the light spectrum from your average LED bulb, they peak in the greens and blues to make them appear brighter with higher efficiency figures. If you need to do detail work or evenly light for color, incandescent is king. You'll pay a hefty premium for decent LED phosphors. [yujiintl.com] Then there's the cheap modules with stupid, unsmoothed rectifier chips or too-slow PWM drivers on board. You don't want to work with motors or any rotational part under an LED driven like this. [wikipedia.org]
For any kind of worklight you want an incandescent or constant current powered high CRI (>95) LED.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Monday May 25 2020, @11:44PM
You're full of shit. Example warm light - 3 LED bulbs - $21 [bunnings.com.au], cool daylight - 3 bulbs - $21 [bunnings.com.au].
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @03:51PM (2 children)
Hardly. LED bulbs have essentially zero lifespan. I've bought a dozen of them, far more than I ever should have, and they just don't last. About 20% of them are DOA. You get occasional DOA incandescents too, but not nearly at that rate. Then there's the lifespan of the ones that do work. Here's an example. My bathroom has two light fixtures, one for the toilet area and one for the shower/tub. They've always had incandescents. Because the bathroom only needs 30 minutes of light a day or so, a typical incandescent will last for years. Well, last year one of them burned out, and I bought a pair of LEDs to replace them both, but one of them was DOA, so I ended up only replacing one. The new LED has already failed but the old incandescent is still going strong.
This isn't atypical at all. Over the past couple of years I replaced about half of my light bulbs with LEDs and every single LED has failed except for one (which is only a couple of months old). I'm replacing the dead LEDs with incandescents and they work much better. The only exception is in my workshop and home office, where I can get bluish daylight color light. It's enough better light that it's worth the price premium and short lifespan (I have had to replace that one twice). But this only helps in workspaces, it's meaningless for living spaces where incandescent light is more pleasant.
CCFLs on the other hand don't offer nearly the energy savings they claim to, produce truly awful light, take ten minutes to warm up, have to be disposed of at the electronics recycler for $$, and if you break them they spill toxic mercury. I don't break light bulbs often, but the chance is not zero and it's a real problem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @05:12PM
You are buying garbage then. I've bought cheaper bulbs too and have yet to have any failures.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 27 2020, @12:32AM
What is your line voltage?
Does your power have a lot of spikes? (for example, near large motors turning on and off)
Over 10 years ago we lost a desktop PC to a surge from lightning. Sometime after that I had a new panel put in our 1960 house (old panel was full, breakers failing, and only used-spares were available). We had the electrician add a whole-house surge protector. Have various other surge protectors around the house too. We are now mostly LED bulbs and they generally last a long time. A few failures were: one cracked across the base, another started to strobe, and another didn't quite make it's 5 year warranty (replaced by mfr.)
(Score: 4, Informative) by Grishnakh on Monday May 25 2020, @04:26PM (6 children)
I have no idea where you get this nonsense. I've done tons of soldering of SMT components, and my normal lighting is a fluorescent ring light, which surrounds a big magnifying lens on an adjustable arm. I also have a work area that's like by LED tubes (they look like the older fluorescent tube shop lights, but now they have LEDs instead). The whiter light is much better for seeing your work clearly. Incandescent light is too yellow. If you're trying to make a cozy den or something, then sure, I can see why ultra-white LEDs might not be your choice, but for doing work in a garage or shop or something, yellow light is not ideal, which is partly why these places have been lit by fluorescent tubes for many decades now.
(Score: 3, Disagree) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday May 25 2020, @04:48PM (5 children)
From science. Gather your own empirical evidence through apples-to-apples testing if you don't believe me. Take a "60W" CFL, a "60W" LED, and a 60W incandescent. Put them in the exact same fixture in the exact same position and look at the text in a paperback in the exact same position. Then try reading it for a half hour. Separate the tests temporally so you can discount eye strain from reading them back to back.
The issue with the CFLs is that you get very, very poor quality light because of the extremely limited spectrum put out by them. Test it with a spectrometer and you'll see what I mean.
The issue with LEDs is different though. They put out light that very effectively mimics an incandescent but it's "wrong". The way it bounces and casts shadows is like you're in an H. P. Lovecraft story and it leads to an entirely different kind of eye strain.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @05:11PM
> The issue with LEDs is different though. They put out light that very effectively mimics an incandescent but it's "wrong".
What color temperature LEDs have you tried. We tried one "cool white" (high color temp) and gave up immediately. I read books often under a "warm white" LED (behind a table lamp shade) with no difficulty.
The shade looks like heavy parchment paper--perhaps this filters some of the narrow spectral lines from the LED? Don't have any convenient instrumentation to check...
(Score: 1) by RandomFactor on Monday May 25 2020, @05:14PM
Incandescent color temperature and a single filament being more of a point source than an array of LEDs would more closely match sunlight's warmth and shadow behavior, particularly if the light is closer.
I've noted the color temperature difference (although you can get warm LEDs at an upcharge). The shadow thing however hasn't really impinged on my consciousness, but I'm more in the 'general use' cateogory.
В «Правде» нет известий, в «Известиях» нет правды
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @07:26PM
I've no problems reading with fluorescent lights. Heck most computer displays nowadays use fluorescent or LED backlights. Don't know of any that use incandescent backlights.
Where "normal" fluorescent lights have a disadvantage over incandescent lights are when you need to deal with fast moving stuff. Then you can have the danger of stuff looking stationary or slow when it actually isn't.
You can get fluorescent lamps that don't have a completely crap spectrum: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Spectra-Philips_32T8_natural_sunshine_fluorescent_light.svg [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_rendering_index [wikipedia.org] (see Tri-phosphor cool-white fluorescent = 89 ).
LED lights that put out narrow band RGB are fine for displays but crap for illumination of colored stuff. For example if an LED gives off a narrow band red light that hits a surface with color that's a narrowband orange, what reflects off might appear a lot darker than it would under a broader spectrum light.
That's why many "white light LEDs" use phosphor stuff - so that they can get some semblance of a broader spectrum. Broader at least than 3 "narrow hill/spike" RGB.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @02:05AM
Science? Then look at the lumens, not the watts. And then make sure the lumens are not another Chinese lie. I had plenty of CFLs, the ones made in Germany worked with the intensity and lasted around what the box said. The Chinese ones said similar things, but were weaker and lasted less. I am sure a German asshole made some bucks by moving the factory there, trashing the brand for me.
With LEDs it is worse... I still have to find non Chinese ones in the shops I know. Some models do not even list some data like duration. The "experiments" so far say they last 3000-4000 hours, and then start to break in the power circuits, not the LEDs (some minutes of disco blinking just after powe on). Far from the promises about LEDs, and not because the tech is not there, but because we are getting crap for not so crap prices (more money than CFLs for worse quality).
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Tuesday May 26 2020, @08:54AM
If you want to talk about science, don't use the Watt-equivalent marketing numbers. A 60W LED is the kind of bulb you get in projectors, not the kind that you'd use for normal lighting. A "60W" LED in marketing numbers could be anything. We have gradually started replacing CFLs with LEDs. 8W LED are around 800 lumens, which is similar to a 60W incandescent. They're available in a range of colour temperatures.
This is 'science' to you is it? What, they emit more pointy photons that don't have that traditional soft traditional photon sound?
sudo mod me up
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 25 2020, @04:26PM (2 children)
In college I hooked up two 300W bulbs in my dorm room - when I'd have them on with the door open my neighbors said it looked like God was visiting my room.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2, Funny) by RandomFactor on Monday May 25 2020, @05:21PM
Kent.
Kent.
Wake up Kent!
В «Правде» нет известий, в «Известиях» нет правды
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @07:29PM
Try more!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LT5_-A0m8_U [youtube.com]
(Score: 1) by RandomFactor on Monday May 25 2020, @04:30PM (2 children)
Granted.
A decent LED is ok nowadays. CFLs have always been just horrible.
The touted 25x lifetime improvements on LEDs are dramatically overblown in real world usage. Pricier LEDs do last longer but 20x replacement costs make up for much of the lifetime and efficiency benefit I've seen.
LEDs seem to have a marked advantage in things like ceiling fans that vibrate incandescents to death (a bit of air movement likely helps the LEDs since heat kills them).
Interestingly there is an incandescent bulb that has been ~continuously burning since 1901 [wikipedia.org] (probably on aluminum wiring for most of that).
В «Правде» нет известий, в «Известиях» нет правды
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @05:12PM
Several of the LEDs we've bought didn't really fail, instead the light output dropped slowly over time. We finally noticed how dim it was...not our old eyes failing after all!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @07:52PM
Came for the Onboard Separation Technology.
Got Buzzard's opinion on LEDs.
+1 More interesting
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @04:48PM
There are lies, damned lies, and the musty blowhard.
Change is scary I know, just hold your knees to your chest and try to breathe calm, even breaths.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @05:00PM (7 children)
This makes no sense. Modern LEDs produce way more light output per watt than any incandescent ever did.
If you replace a 100W incandescant lighting setup with a 100W LED setup you'll have about 5~10× the illumination you had previously...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @05:16PM (6 children)
Where do you live? Here in USA, LEDs are sold as "60 W equivalent" (~10 W actual power draw).
An LED that actually drew 250 W might be something used in an industrial setting? For example, lighting for very high motion capture speed video. Nothing like that sold for home use.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @05:17PM (4 children)
whoops, meant
/s/250/100
(Score: 1) by anubi on Tuesday May 26 2020, @09:40AM (3 children)
Good luck trying to heat sink an LED dissipating 100 watts. Liquid cooled? I have a hard enough time trying to properly heat sink 10 watt chips.
Sure, they work for a while if underdesigned, but their lifetime disappoints I expect what I design to last 100 years, not a few months Which means I often drive chips rated 10 watts at 2 watts, and use lots of them. They are not all that expensive, but the effort to repair a failed install is often quite expensive.
I flat do not like doing things several times. It is enough pain in the butt to do it once.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @03:08PM (1 child)
That kind of power dissipation is hardly novel in consumer electronics; any old Pentium 4 heatsink laying around should do the trick. ;)
But typically, that wattage would be distributed among dozens of emitters covering a lot of area, such as an 8 foot linear fixture. GP said nothing to suggest it would be a single emitter.
(Score: 1) by anubi on Wednesday May 27 2020, @03:17AM
I've recycled a lot of Pentium heatsinks, but I consider the fan a failure prone item. I often repuopose worn brake disks to make outdoor lighting fixtures. They were made to dissipate heat.
I glue my 10watt LED chips on with silicone sealant,
cover the assembly in yet more silicone sealant, attach some hanging bolts on, and am good to go. Safe to string up in a tree. Just use aircraft cable...those things are heavy!
I've had some running for five years now. My design goal is they will work literally forever, or until rust consumes the underlying brake discs, which I usually acquire free.
These are custom lights I make for friends. They need to be more reliable than things I made under business environments.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @03:10PM
Oops, actually GGP - the one who suggested comparing a 100W incandescent setup to a 100W LED setup.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 27 2020, @04:04PM
Sure. So you can buy six of those 10W LED lamps and run them on the exact same wiring you would use for a single 60W incandescent. Assuming they are actually "equivalent" in terms of illumination, you get 6 times as much illumination.
It's truly staggering how much light you can get from modern LED lighting compared to what we had just a couple decades ago. There's a reason why LEDs have replaced incandescents and even gas discharge lamps in almost every lighting application.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 25 2020, @04:21PM (5 children)
It's not just the difference between idle and acceleration - this fits in with the VD engines that shut off cylinders while on cruise and bring additional displacement online for acceleration.
If we're going to play with variable fuel, we can also downsize the engine for more efficient "cruise" and carry some NOx or other enhancers to get "pulse power" on demand.
The trick with all these systems is balancing the efficiency enhancement with the complexity cost. As fuel costs rise, the more complex systems become more viable.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @06:16PM (4 children)
Fuel costs never justify the outrageous expense for evermore high tech under the hood.
Gas just isn't that expensive, and only high taxes slapped on it in Europe make the drivers get excited about. It's not reality. Present combustion technology is pretty much the peak for a gas-burner.
Oh, as for smaller engines with a "power boost" feature: you wear out your engine much quicker and it runs rougher. Plus it only saves gas if you almost never use power boost. If you use it frequently, you get worse mileage than a normal engine. I am thinking about little turbo Ford truck engines versus Dodge or Chevy normally aspirated engines. Ford only did those engines to fool the govts in America and Europe into thinking they met fuel efficiency standards. In practice, no.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday May 26 2020, @12:09AM (3 children)
They can when fuel is taxed to also pay for road construction and maintenance, etc. Not saying this is an ideal situation, but it is the situation we have.
If you're paying $10/gallon for gasoline, making that cast iron 4 cylinder engine a little more complex to double fuel economy (for the same net performance) has a pretty quick payback - whether that's with electronic fuel injection, variable length intake runners, forced induction, or what have you.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday May 26 2020, @05:42PM (2 children)
They can when fuel is taxed to also pay for road construction and maintenance, etc. Not saying this is an ideal situation, but it is the situation we have.
No it's not, not in America. In America, we subsidize roads with other funding sources. Sure, we pay a lot of gas taxes for roads and bridges, but they don't come close to all the funds needed for that purpose. This is why the Federal government always holds states hostage by threatening to withhold highway funding if they don't comply on various other things. That funding isn't coming from fuel taxes, it's coming from income taxes.
We'd be a lot better off if we reduced, year-by-year, the amount of subsidization, and increased gas taxes to pay for what the roads really cost. This would cause people to drive less, and to move to denser locales, and use more public transit. Of course, then we'd have to do something about the NIMBYism that keeps supply too low and real estate costs too high in cities.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday May 26 2020, @06:03PM
In 'murica we subsidize energy, oil in particular, and food, which explains all the fat asses cruising the Taco Bell drivethroughs in their SUVs and pickup trucks.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 27 2020, @12:47AM
> and increased gas taxes to pay for what the roads really cost.
Since damage to the road is approximated by the load on the tires...to the 4th or 5th power, by rights only heavy trucks should be taxed for road construction. Normal car traffic does negligible road damage.
Our suburban street was paved about 15 years ago and it stayed nice (just a few cracks/patches where shaded by trees). Then last year the county put in a new water main--lots of dump truck traffic carting away what they dug/drilled up (6 foot deep trench, partly in bedrock) and a roughly equal number of dump trucks bringing in loads of gravel and top soil to re-fill the trench. The street is coming apart all over, big cracks and starting to pothole.
Expect the price of anything shipped by truck to increase (and probably some strikes by trucking companies too) if diesel is taxed according to road damage...
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @05:03PM (2 children)
Seems easier and more efficient to just sell ethanol and petroleum separately, and dispense them into separate tanks. Then, you just need a couple solenoid valves, and simple control logic to open them at the right times.
Brand the ethanol as "Acceleration Power Boost Fuel" or something along those lines, and folks will not mind having to fill this other tank every couple months.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @02:10AM
It's too technical.
Normies wouldn't be able to handle it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @03:49PM
There's guys doing more-or-less this right now. Turns out some flavors of windshield washing fluid are pretty much a straight methanol/water mix, so they rig up an alcohol injection system fed from the washer fluid tank.
Their intent, of course, is to cram more fuel through a given size engine, rather than reduce the engine size while retaining peak power for passing/merging, but the concept is the same, and since it seems to work pretty well in a garage, how bad could detroit screw it up?
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Monday May 25 2020, @03:47PM (18 children)
One has to wonder, if given the choice between ethanol gas and gas gas, how many people would choose the gas gas? I know I would, I don't want to burn alcohol in my engine, nor subsidize corn growers and distillers.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday May 25 2020, @03:56PM (12 children)
I use no-ethanol gas always. My car has significantly more power on straight up gasoline and gets 25% or so more miles to the gallon. And since I have to go to the station that has it for my mower/weedeater/generator anyway, why not save some polluting and some money? Yes, straight gas really does pollute less in my car. Do the math. Ten percent ethanol causes a 25% fuel efficiency reduction for my particular vehicle, which means more gas is burned to travel the same distance.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @04:17PM
I definitely think we should get rid of ethanol-fueled. Oh, and the gasoline additive too, sure.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Monday May 25 2020, @04:32PM (4 children)
I would if I could, but around here I don't have that choice. Hence my comment.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @05:19PM
You probably do have the choice of straight petroleum fuel, but might have to drive a ways to find it. Often sold as "racing gas".
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Monday May 25 2020, @11:50PM (2 children)
I would if I could, but around here I don't have that choice.
The name of the choice you have: diesel.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @03:15PM (1 child)
Ah, yes. Buy a new vehicle, and if you love somewhere cold, get block heaters and prepare to leave it running all night in the winter if you have to go to work in the morning.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday May 26 2020, @03:25PM
Personal preference, I know, but I don't like frigid love. (grin)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 25 2020, @04:33PM (5 children)
I believe you're overstating, or overestimating, the difference between 10% Ethanol and Ethanol Free, but the difference is real. We've got a station here that sells various blends and when you get to the high ethanol levels (80% or more) they are significantly cheaper, in part because they do deliver significantly less power and MPG.
However, on the pollution side, Ethanol is an oxygenating fuel and in general it produces less noxious stuff per mile driven than the dead dino blends - a lot depends on a lot - some areas have pretty high sulfur content in their dino fuel, but even without that the NOx levels are lower for Ethanol. As for myself, I put Ethanol Free in my daily driver just to keep the fuel system components from rusting (1999 vehicles) but I'm stuck using the blend in my turbocharged 1991 car because it is tuned for the higher octane level that you can't get in Ethanol Free (anymore.)
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday May 25 2020, @04:58PM (1 child)
Nope. I've got years of data on both types in my vehicle. Given the same usage patterns (two different lakes, one close that's through the city streets and one a couple hours away on the highway), it gets around 25% better mileage on straight gas. Highway mileage over the first half of the tank to the latter lake it gets right at 38MPG on straight gas and 28 and small change off of ethanol-added gas, for example.
Mind you, this is only on my specific vehicle. I'm not making any claims about what it does in any other car.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 25 2020, @11:28PM
A/C called it a "problem" with your vehicle - I'd say that your vehicle was made with no consideration for ethanol in the fuel and it's the ethanol that's giving it a problem - probably something in the O2 sensor, I'd guess, but whatever - you know what works for you - keep putting that lawnmower gas in your car, it's cheaper than trying to re-engineer the whole fueling computer system.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @08:45PM (2 children)
Ethanol has approximately 2/3 the energy content of gasoline. Comparing 100% gas to 10% Ethanol, the latter would give you 90% of the energy from gas and 10% from the Ethanol. So 10% fuel has (1 * 90%) + (2/3 * 10%) or 96% of the energy content. If you need 36% more fuel instead of the 5% the difference in energy content would suggest, it sounds like a problem with your vehicle.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @11:28PM (1 child)
Engine fuel-air maps are not linear. Not even a little bit. It's very easy to cross into a new operating regime and wind up a bunch richer or leaner. That's my guess for TMB's experience--when he runs the ethanol blend, his driving style and route(s) just happen to take him into a rich part of the fuel map.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @06:47AM
If he has that much unburnt fuel in his exhaust, he'd definitely notice. The exhaust would be a different color, have a noticeable odor, erratic idle, engine codes, swampy acceleration, and those are just the most obvious. I could see those escaping notice if the car had something wrong with the various sensors and ran really lean normally, but again he'd probably notice that too, especially when cold starting or in the cold in general. Then you have to consider that Ethanol fuel without adjustments would lean the mixture, which means any rich condition comes from the adjustments from the fuel system. As I sad, the only way you can be so rich to use an extra gallon per 3 gallons of fuel burned in your car when there is nowhere close to that gap is that there has to be something wrong with the vehicle somewhere.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 25 2020, @04:24PM
I drive a 1999 car that has fuel system components that E10 fuel causes to rust. I gladly drive to the 1/5 station that carries Ethanol Free fuel and pay a 20% premium for it. Of course, I also only drive that car maybe 3000 miles a year, so what the hell - it's not that much money for Ethanol Free fuel, and I'd rather keep the car I have and like instead of dumping a ton of money into a new car (which, in the end analysis, is even worse for the environment due to the costs of building the new car.)
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday May 25 2020, @04:28PM
Most people don't know the difference, and given a choice, most people are going to pick whichever is cheaper. That's going to be the one with ethanol in it, because ethanol is cheaper than gasoline. Of course, that's due to subsidies, but people continually vote for these subsidies, so they're not going away.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @04:52PM (2 children)
> nor subsidize corn growers and distillers.
Corn ethanol as burned in USA is pretty dumb, takes a lot of diesel (tractors) and other additional energy input to make it. Ethanol from sugar cane (as used, iirc, in Brazil) has a better chance of being a net energy gain.
Heard a great presentation on this from one of the fuel injection pioneers, Kinsler's family history includes sugar cane plantations in Louisiana -- https://kinsler.com/Shop/jim-kinsler-bio/ [kinsler.com] [snowflake-caution / TMB-honey --this site includes old-style pinup photos] Haven't found his ethanol presentation online, it was a paper given at one of the SAE Motorsports Engineering conferences, about 20 years ago, lots of good engineering info (as well as great stories).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @06:06PM (1 child)
Please! You promised much but delivered little with that link.
This is much better:
https://www.lowrider.com/girls/ [lowrider.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @08:31PM
Eh, some of us did also read the articles in Playboy. Ken Purdy was one of the better authors back then.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @09:21PM (1 child)
Are you enjoying COVID-19, Boomers? I hope you are, because your political response to the pandemic has completely destroyed the economy. Did we really need a Great Recession in 2008 caused by you, and a Great Lockdown in 2020 caused by you? Are you proud of yourselves for creating an economic depression even worse than the Great Depression of the 1930s? Are you proud of yourselves, Boomers? Your legacy will be economic ruin for all. You don't care as long as you Boomers continue to receive your pensions. You Boomers don't have jobs. You Boomers don't create jobs. You Boomers don't do anything for anyone ever. You Boomers are utterly worthless parasites. You don't care about anybody except yourselves. Everybody except you is forced at gunpoint to wear a facemask while you Boomers sit in your giant mansions laughing and waiting to die when you will be buried with your fortunes so nobody will ever touch your precious money.
Boomers did COVID-19.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @11:38PM
> You don't care as long as you Boomers continue to receive your pensions. You Boomers don't have jobs. You Boomers don't create jobs. You Boomers don't do anything for anyone ever. ...
Contra indication--here's my single point rebuttal:
* Boomer here (1954)
* Not taking my pension (Social Security) yet, still working
* Have a job--running a tiny company including all the sales work to bring in contracts.
* Have kept my one contracted employee (he's not a boomer) working steadily all this year, no interruption yet (we both work from our homes, no changes there).
* As a volunteer, I help manage a consortium of 600+ colleges, help them get expensive lab test data at an affordable student price.
* I make a home for my GF's disabled daughter (early 30s), the kid was mostly disowned by her father. Sacrifice on our end was our guest room & spare bathroom--no more fun entertaining our friends as house guests, for the last several years.
* And...I mow my own lawn, keep the hell off it!
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday May 25 2020, @11:19PM (3 children)
Way back, years ago, someone introduced another gimmick on the market. They had a magnetic doo-hickey that slid over your fuel line. The idea was that the molecules in your gasoline would be "aligned" with each other after passing through the magnet, and I guess when they were "aligned" you could get more molecules of fuel in the cylinder. Or something. The problem with that idea was, I've never been able to pick up a gallon, or an ounce, or even a gram of gasoline with a magnet. It might be fun to pass gasoline through some supermagnets, and see what happens, but it takes no great smarts to realize that you weren't getting super magnets for the price of a dinner, even back then.
I never did pay the ten or fifteen bucks for that stupid magnet, nor would I pay for this system. Problem is, if enough people are convinced that this "works", the auto manufacturers will put it in all the autos, and we'll all pay for it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2020, @11:43PM (2 children)
The difference is that this octane separation will make documented fuel economy improvements, as tested in certified labs. The as-tested mileage will appear on the sticker on the new car window, after it runs through a standardized test. Of course, you probably don't drive the same as the standardized test, so naturally YMMV.
The magnet and hundreds/thousands of other aftermarket snake oil gadgets only make money for the sellers and do nothing for the marks.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday May 26 2020, @12:03AM (1 child)
Uh-huh - because those MPG stickers on cars actually have some relationship to real world driving, right?
I'll grant that they have some kind of very broad general relationship to the real world. Smaller engines generally get better mileage, but you can't use those stickers as much of a guide in car buying.
What I'm suggesting here is, the auto industry, as a whole, may very well buy into some snake oil salesman's scheme. There are already thousands (tens of thousands?) of components in the various vehicles on the roads which may or may not do the things which they are designed to do. For instance, air bags. Have you ever investigated how many people have been outright killed by airbags? The one you need worry about, is the one in your steering wheel. If you are a shorter person, that bag has a tendency to shoot over your head, which rolls your head backward, and breaking your neck in the process. But, the industry doesn't exactly publicize the number of people killed by airbags. It's more profitable to sell that snake oil.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2020, @01:29AM
> ... airbags? The one you need worry about, is the one in your steering wheel.
I won't try to defend anyone here, but I will say that as part of certifying an air bag installation each car model goes through extensive testing with different sized dummies. Most of the testing is done "in reverse" with an acceleration sled for ease of repeat tests with the same body buck. There is also crash testing on the whole car but that is more expensive and there is a chance that the dummy setup will have a problem (sensor or out-of-position error) on the acceleration before the car hits the barrier...which means a repeat test.
This is all called out in the detailed regulations (in USA and Euro), so if you are looking for someone to blame, it's the NHTSA and any supporting cast that produce the test standards.
Some trivia--when I was a teenager (c.1970), my father worked at one of the few operating crash facilities at the time and I got in to watch a very early air bag development crash test. There were a lot of high ranking gov't officials there to witness the test. The airbags didn't go off and the dummies were ruined (along with the car of course).
Move the clock ahead, my father (who usually scoffed at airbags) got into a low speed accident and his airbag went off. He was fine, the EMTs were bound determined to take him to the hospital and finally he told them to take his pulse and blood pressure on the spot. It was normal and they took him home.
You may well be correct that airbags have killed some very short people, since child-size dummies are not tested (afaik) in the driver's position. One major change occurred between the first gen airbags (one large charge, big enough to catch a large male) and the current "smart" designs that have at least two different sized charges, one or both go off depending on person's weight and/or height (based on seat position). I made sure to not buy any cars from the first gen period (most of the 1990s) -- skipped from a 1992 that still had the door mounted shoulder belt (no airbags) to a 2001 with 2nd gen airbags.