 | The Cost of Doing Nothing | The Oil Drum: Australia/New Zealand | Chart of the Day - Wednesday 19th December 2007 |  |
100 comments on The Air Car - A Breath Of Fresh Air Or A Waste Of Breath ?
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100 comments on The Air Car - A Breath Of Fresh Air Or A Waste Of Breath ?
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So they "do a lot of damage", they don't "destroy the house". Those are two very different things.
NSW is a dangerous and savage land. HW systems should be outside the house, not in it.
If we can use a high pressure flammable gas safely, then we can use a high pressure non-flammable gas safely.
I agree that cars suck. Here I rant about how and why I hate them ;)
Agreed on all counts :-)
Welding cylinders run 2000 psi+ and are trucked around regularly with safety.
Actually, they are exceedingly dangerous in a vehicle fire, especially acetylene which is not stored at very high pressure because it will spontaneouly explode.
In the UK nobody will go anywhere near a fire with welding cyliders involved - that includes the fire brigade.
Several times this year alone major motorway routes have been closed for twenty four hours after a vehicle has been left to burn itself out before anybody will go within several hundred metres of it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akqvaZ5J1aY&feature=related
Oh, they certainly have the potential to "destroy a house." But the trick is that with 40 gallons or so at 300psi and umpteen degrees...when the pressure is released - it flash boils. So you get that first crack in the water heater and it all turns into water vapor KAPOW! So the power there comes from 40 gallons of liquid turning into a gas - there's some serious expansion there. The MDI car's tank is designed to rupture in a certain way to direct the explosion and diffuse it as much as possible. At 3000 psi though, it's still a fricken bomb.
"The MDI car's tank is designed to rupture in a certain way to direct the explosion and diffuse it as much as possible."
One of the miracles of composite materials. CNG is also stored at this pressure on vehicles with few safety concerns, so given that air is a significantly less flammable gas I'm not so concerned.
Water? Outdoors? But it will all freeze solid in the winter! And in parts of fall and spring, too At least where I live it would. :) In the non-tropical parts of the world, the hot water heater is indoors and a matter of course.