Should we talk about the weather?

[billy rubin]

exclnt

not much in the way of twisters there either

[Icarus]

As a math hobbyist, I calculate such stuff for fun. One of the musings was about a billion dollars. If dollar bills were laid end to end, how many times could a billion one dollar bills circle the earth?  I did this one for a less numerative friend who is a Trumper. He had no idea how much a billion of anything is.

[billy rubin]

approximately 3.38 times, assuming a six-inch dollar bill and a 28 000 mile terran circumference

[Icarus]

Good work Billy !

[billy rubin]

its numbers. i cant help myself.

[Dark Lightning]

1940 in the evening, after a long sunny day.

86 F

i think thats 27 C

wonderful. im loving this heat.

my truck has no ordinary air vent. its either on heat or air conditioning. what i did today is what i normally hav e to do, which is to to set the thermostat to 84 F and turn on the heat. anything less than 84 would activate the air conditioner and start blowing cold air.

mechanical advances make a lot of assumptions. all i want is for the fan to blow air at ambiant temperature, but it cannot do that.

What brand vehicle do you own? At the very least, if you wanted ambient temp in the cab, you could roll down some windows. My econobox (Kia Forte) allows me to take in air with neither heating nor cooling applied.

[billy rubin]

its my work truck, a 2024 peterbilt.



i drive with the winfows down all the time, but if im sitting in line somewhere i cant just turn on a fan to blow air out the dash board.

the truck is totally computerized. not even a single gauge on the dash board-- all electronuc display.

apoarently just living with the weather was not in the designers realm of possibilities. no vent function of just not heating or cooling incoming air-- air has tp pass through the heater core and air con evaporator. so the air ia always minimally heated, and then cooled down to what you want.

[Dark Lightning]

Fauncy! It shouldn't break down on you so often like the older trucks. That AC/heat setup sounds goofy. I don't plan on buying any more newer vehicles. In fact. I'm in a (low level) search for another older (ca '60s or '70s) to drive. I'll wait until I find a really good deal or when my econobox starts breaking down. All electronic is something I can't fix, and they are expensive when broken.

[billy rubin]

its not a good use of technology. the developers put all sorts of bells and whistl;es and options on it, so it does too many things now, and none of them well. i would prefer greater usability of fewer features.

the actual truck doesnt break, although i ve put 104,000 miles on it in the last year or so. but the hoist can be a pain. yesterday i blew a hydraulic line and spilled 91 quarts of fluid onto the asphalt. took some time to clean that up.



i used to make sure that my vehicles were all old enough for the technology to be accessible to me, but theyre all old too, now. where i live is th eopposite of california.

where you are you have old cars and new houses. here its all old houses and new cars.

[Icarus]

I'm with you DL. Gimme one of the old timers and I can fix it, my wife's Prius, not so much.

My econobox is a 2004 Honda Element. I have had it since new. SO far, no problems except the damned check engine light is always illuminated. It seems that it wants a new Knock Sensor. A simple fix with only one wire connecting it to the engine control module ECM. Problem is that it is impossible to get to the walnut sized part. It is hiding behind the intake manifold that would be a PITA to remove and replace.

My Honda econobox is not econo, although it does resemble a box. The 2.4 liter DOHC engine has plenty of power but it delivers only about 20 miles per gallon for city driving. The AC system allows heat, cooling, or ambient air according to the way the knobs are twisted. 

[Icarus]

Back to the weather. There is a possible horror in the form of the Atlantic Meridianal Overturning Circulation. AMOC.

The Gulf stream drift, which is the beginning of AMOC, is possibly going away. That would cause weather pattern shifts that would turn Scandinavia into a far colder and icy territory. It would also influence the environment in most of Northern Europe. Crops would suffer, heat demand would increase and the result would be more carbon emissions....all of which puts us on a sort of evil merry go round.

Meanwhile in North America we are, next week, to be assailed by the Arctic Polar Gyre. a wicked circulation of polar air. The northern areas will endure ice storms and bitching cold weather all across the nation from west to east.

[Asmodean]

Do you prefer "hooded" trucks, or is it just a artefact of them being common over in States?

Over 'ere, the vast majority are cab-overs. I think it's because they are more compact in traffic and on city streets. (comparing like for like with regard to sleeper cabs and what else have you)

Personally, I think a nice. long hood looks better, but then, I don't have to squeeze it through a European city centre.

[billy rubin]

we have cab-over-engine chassis here for residential garbage packers and toploaders. they need to get into tighter places than i do. my truck is already 34 feet long, and i have to have 22 feet behind it just to put a box down, not counting maneuvering room.  that means i already have to have at least 60 or 65 feet before i can work my way in. so the need for a short COE isnt really pressing. also the conventional straight trucks put more weight behind the front axle, while a COE semi can run afoul of the 13 000 lb front axle limit.

but i dont know why the COE chassis isnt more common with the stuff i drive. if people wanted it, it would be available. the peterbilt i use can be fitted out as dump, a water bottle, a flatbed, a roll off, a super sucker, or anything else.

so the answer is, i dont know. id like a little better maneuverability. i routinely work with two-inch clearances on either side when im backing in somewhere, and ill go with one-inch if i have to, but only on very firm ground. the straight truck is pretty awkward, but a 48-foot semi trailer is easy to park within two or three inches of were you want.


this is a top loader for emptying dumpsters overhead



and thi sis a typical rear-load packer

[Asmodean]

Huh. Haven't thought of axle weight limit.

Yes, I suppose in certain applications, a couple of extra meters of hood is neither here nor there. The few such trucks on our roads are usually semis, doing long motorway hauls in the southern-ish parts of the country, where motorways tend to be four-lane and/or pretty straight for around here and/or pretty flat for a mountainous country.

When I lived up North, on the other hand, I think I only saw one truck with an hood, and pretty sure that one was imported for a collection. It was an old Kenworth of some sort. Looked great though. Dominated the parking lot by its mere presence alongside the flat-faced Scanias and Volvos we otherwise have.

[billy rubin]

you see weird shit in scando.

i was in uppsala once and a 1967 chevrolet half ton pickup truck came down the road. i thought, where in the world did that come from?

then i saw a sugga for the first tme. wonderful machine



i need one of these where i live. bad snows and a long way to town.