Juno reached Jupiter!

This forum is currently archived and READ-ONLY
User avatar
Kellemora
Guardian Angel
Guardian Angel
Posts: 7494
Joined: 16 Feb 2015, 17:54

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Kellemora »

Only on TV advertising Icey.

The added weight on the front end may help in some mud and snow conditions, but where there is snow, there is normally ice, and front wheel drive is the worse possible method of propulsion for such conditions.

Full-time 4wd (aka all-wheel drive) is almost as dangerous as front wheel drive. It's saving grace on early 4wd models was the rear wheels were the dominant driving wheels, which still allowed for steering a braking. However, many of the newer vehicles with all-wheel drive are actually front wheel drive cars with a secondary drive to the rear wheels.
And honestly, they are not truly all-wheel drive, or 4wd vehicles.

I might be able to explain something here about the way wheels drive a car in a way which is easily understandable.

In a conventional car, if you get only ONE of the back wheels stuck in the mud, you are stuck, because the wheel with the least amount of friction becomes the drive wheel. Conventional cars only have one wheel doing the propelling of the vehicle.

A step-up from a conventional drive has many names, Posi-Traction, Limited Slip Differential, etc.
What this means is the wheel with the most amount of resistance becomes the drive wheel.
If your right wheel is off the road in the mud, and your left wheel is still on the pavement, you can get out of the mud because the wheel on the pavement becomes the drive wheel.
If you are on pavement going straight, both back wheels are active and propelling the vehicle forward.

What you won't see in a car is Live Axle drive. This is where both back wheels have the same propelling force.
This would cause excessive tire wear and make it hard to turn corners. Live Axles are only used on some race cars, a lot of dragsters, but can be locked and unlocked to prevent damage to the drive train.

Getting into four-wheel drive vehicles becomes a little more complicated, and depends a lot on the make and model of the vehicle in how they have it set up.
Some 4wd vehicles are akin to the Conventional car mentioned first. Only one of the rear wheels is propelling the vehicle.
A better 4wd vehicle will have a Limited Slip Differential on the rear wheels.
The best 4wd vehicles will have a Limited Slip Differential on both the rear and the front wheels.

Now that much of how a car operates is controlled by computers, and many vehicles use special hubs to allow for different controls to be applied to the wheels, you are at the mercy of the computer programmers to have set it up so it works properly.
However, car makers are not interested in safety or functioning as much as they are in spending less to sell for more.

Just remember, if all of your steering capability, and most of your braking capability is dependent on those front wheels maintaining a solid friction grip on the roadway.
And, acceleration and deceleration are the two primary factors associated with losing the friction grip with the road.
Why would you want to move this hazard from your rear wheels up to your front wheels, which you rely on to steer and stop?

Do you recall my mentioning taking my step-daughter to school one morning in the snow?
I got stuck with a Cadillac Sedan deVille with front wheel drive.
Despite being in bumper to bumper early morning rush hour traffic, I wanted her to see for herself, first hand, why front wheel drive is so dangerous.

I knew the car well enough to know how it would act, so there really was never a danger of me changing lanes into oncoming traffic, or speeding up to hit the car in front of me. I just prayed there was no clear spot of roadway to catch traction, hi hi...

I tromped down on the gas pedal to break the friction grip of my front wheels with the road.
Proceeded to turn my steering wheel completely to the left to the stop, then completely to the right to the stop, repeated this one more time, then centered the wheels and let up on the gas.
My car never changed its direction of travel, never speeded up, but may have slowed down a bit due to no forward propelling action.

One other time, in an empty parking lot, only doing about ten miles per hour, making a huge circle in the parking lot. I showed her what happened while making a turn if your front wheels lose their friction grip with the road. Even though my steering wheels was turned to follow the arc of the circle, the second I touched the gas just a little, the car shot out of the arc and in the opposite direction.
Front wheel drive DOES NOT pull you in the direction the wheels are facing, as they try to get you to believe on TV ads.

And yes I'll keep harping on it, front wheel drive cars are the most dangerous type of vehicle to drive. No matter how many computer modifications they make to claim they are safe, if they were truly safe, they wouldn't need all these computer programs to try to overcome their faults.

OK off my soapbox, hi hi...
Icey

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Icey »

Hi Gary.

No, you weren't on your soapbox at all. You were just telling things as you see them. I agree with you that front wheel driven cars are the least safe, shall we say. It's pretty obvious that rather than dragging everything behind you, it's better for the engine to power the rear wheels so that they're actually pushing the vehicle and you're just steering with the front ones, but 4 x 4's are even better still, in my humble opinion, because the engine's powering all four wheels, which surely gives the car an advantage, especially on uneven, muddy or hilly ground (in other words, better traction and mobility).

Apart from that, I'm not into the economics, or the best bits and pieces that a vehicle can be fitted with. My OH tries to educate me, but I'm not mechanical, technical or even practical sometimes. If something feels right, then it's OK. If it drives well, and isn't a rust bucket, then it's fine by me. Maybe I'm simplifying everything, but I manage Gary, and what I don't understand or WANT to understand .... I let someone with more knowledge sort out for me. : )
User avatar
Kellemora
Guardian Angel
Guardian Angel
Posts: 7494
Joined: 16 Feb 2015, 17:54

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Kellemora »

You'll get a laugh out of this for sure.
After owning almost nothing but full-size cars, I bought a little electric Commuta-Car as a second car.
It was larger and nicer than previous versions and more than twice as powerful.
I didn't buy it for going back and forth to work, although I did use it for that purpose a few times.
One of my jobs was on a 63 acre farm (not our farm), and I was forever running from one end to the other for one reason or another.
The price was right on this little car, and with the bigger motor it pulled a little utility wagon with ease.
By using this instead of my car or one of the trucks, I could zip around a whole lot easier and with less hassles.
I could get to my other job by cutting through a couple of subdivisions so never had to get on a main road. The top speed for these things was just under 40 miles per hour if the batteries were full.

When I no longer worked on that farm, we had our own farm where it came in handy as well. Only now I was using it to go back and forth between my home and work on a little road with a 30 mph speed limit.
The dealer I bought it from closed down, and with no place to have it serviced, when someone asked to buy it from me, I sold it to them, probably for more than it was worth. Heck I used it for two years, and the price for these cars went way up fast. So when I did sell it, I was paid only like 200 bucks less than I paid for it, and never had to do anything to it.

I used the money from the sale to buy a utility cart similar to a golf cart only with a roof. It was still in use on our farm when we sold the place.
Icey

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Icey »

Fantastic! I love hearing about these things.
User avatar
Kellemora
Guardian Angel
Guardian Angel
Posts: 7494
Joined: 16 Feb 2015, 17:54

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Kellemora »

I think I talked about my grandmothers electric car once a long time ago.
I forget the year now, somewhere in the very early 1900s.

After grandma used it for a couple of years, grandpa began tinkering with it, and eventually made some major modifications which made it travel further than any other electric car ever did.

He drove it from St. Louis to Jefferson City (our state capitol) twice. The second time he didn't make it all the way back, came up short by only like five or seven miles. Driving this distance was unheard of in those days, and still is in these days too.
Most electric cars today have roughly a thirty to fifty mile radius, or sixty to one-hundred mile capability.

His original modification was simply to add two more banks of batteries to the car.
But then later, he completely changed the drive train, adding a clutch and huge flywheel.
We all know from his records and the oldsters talking about his way of doing things, he really was onto something important. Unfortunately, not in the automotive industry, his way never became known as being so efficient.

Back in the 1920s, cars were still in their infancy, and an electric car was a novelty at best.
Gas engines had improved, and body styles changed, and interiors got more fancy. But cars remained roughly the same for many decades.

When using an electric motor for anything, starting the motor uses more energy than after it is started, which is still true today.
Almost all electric vehicles, if you are stopped, the motor is stopped also. So if you do a lot of starting and stopping, like you would in a golf cart, you need a lot of battery power to last the 18 holes of golf. Or in an electric car used around town, same thing, the batteries drain down fast from all the starting and stopping.

This was the problem grandpa decided to address in grandmas car.
He treated it more like a tractor running a sawmill, by adding a clutch and humongous flywheel.
The rheostat which once made the car start and speed up or slow down, was also changed to allow the motor to continue to run, so instead of a gas pedal, it had a lever to set the motor to run at different speeds.
So now, the vehicle worked more like a gas driven vehicle with a clutch, the motor didn't stop unless you killed it, hi hi...

Adding the extra two battery racks, and converting it to using a clutch, the weight of the flywheel gave the initial start up energy to the drive train instead of taking it from the batteries. This change doubled the distance it could travel between charges.
That part being accomplished, although the details are sketchy at best. Uncle John said he added magnets and pick-ups like used on a gas lawn mower to charge spark coils, which were then used to return power to the batteries when coasting. I never saw mention of this in any of the old written notes passed down through family members, so don't know if he ever did it or not.

I do know he did something like this to an old one-lung engine used to power a cement mixer for the purpose of having lights if they got stuck working late finishing a job as it was getting to dark to see. This I saw for myself, because everything was stored in our barns and used often or when needed. We still had several one-lung engines in use as I was growing up. I loved the sound of them too!
Icey

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Icey »

Do you know, it's amazing what folk can come up with isn't it, and you seem to've inherited the family trait of being "hands on" when faced with mechanical problems and so forth.

I've often read your posts and thought: "Wow", even when I haven't fully understood something. I've still got the gist though, and it fascinates me, because I've never met/spoke to anyone else like you in my life! That's a compliment, btw, because when someone's good at something, all credit due to them. We have Yogi on here, who I admire for his technical ability and his eagerness to help people with theirs, and then yourself, who comes up with some fabulous stories of how folk managed in times gone by. The glorious thing about it, is that it seems as though whatever you and your family invented or used, was way before its time and'd still be quite capable of working now!
User avatar
Kellemora
Guardian Angel
Guardian Angel
Posts: 7494
Joined: 16 Feb 2015, 17:54

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Kellemora »

If I ever get back to the main series I'm writing, it covers one heck of a lot of the things pioneers made and used long before they were officially invented and someone else given credit for the item.

I would have to go back in my research notes to get the exact dates, but it was in the late 1600s when edible foods were first delivered by a mobile vehicle. However, it was more like a chuck wagon who prepared food after reaching its destination.

Delivery of pre-prepared hot foods did not come about until shortly before WWII. Hot dog carts came about in the 1930s.

In my book I have the complete design and use of a horse drawn lunch wagon, where foods prepared in town were not only delivered to workmen many miles away, but the lunch wagon itself unfolded to provide a picnic table type table and seating on both side of the lunch wagon.
I spent several months and hunted down enough research sources to find out as much as I could about these special wagons. I had hoped to find the manufacturer, but apparently of the three styles I did find, each was made as a special order for a food purveyor to supply workmen working remote to the main city.
The concept was to not have to hire someone to prepare meals on site, which may cause a work slowdown. Workers probably were assigned eating shifts and then had to get right back to work again.
Although some things like soups sounded impossible to bring without problems, the design of one of these wagons was such that no spillage would occur while en-route. Mainly, the unit which folded out to provide a table and seating.

The tabletops and seats were like a mechanical unit that folded up over the top of the wagon, and was designed to press down on top of the lids covering all the pans of food. I thought this was really cool, and it worked perfectly into a scene in my story.
Icey

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Icey »

Wonderful! I suppose all these things DID have to start somewhere, didn't they, but not many people ever pause to find their origins. I'm sure those food wagons were much appreciated at the time.
User avatar
Kellemora
Guardian Angel
Guardian Angel
Posts: 7494
Joined: 16 Feb 2015, 17:54

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Kellemora »

In doing my research into many items, I was actually floored by the number of items I discovered used many decades before someone else was given the credit for being the inventor.
According to Patent Law, even from the beginning, one was not supposed to be able to patent Prior Art. I guess the problem there was, with such poor communications in those days, and the number of isolated communities, the patent office did not know prior art existed, nor did they bother to find out.
However, when any Prior Art was discovered, the patents they did issue for an item, should have been withdrawn due to prior art existing for the item.
It is interesting to read the history of US Patents. The patent act was made law in 1790, but basically meaningless for 100 years when the courts began to uphold patent rights.
Most people find this hard to believe, but the US Patent and Trademark Office was not founded until 1975!
Actually it was just a name change, hi hi...
The rules for Patent Law seem to change at the drop of a hat, but some of the original laws still hold true today.

What remains unchanged is there is no division of the government to enforce patent law.
Enforcement, and the high cost of same, is placed solely on the patent holder, and the majority of inventors cannot afford to utilize the courts to protect their patent rights.
Icey

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Icey »

Yes, which's quite unfair isn't it? It's difficult over here as well Gary.

What happens is, that if someone feels they have a right to patent an idea,they'll be offered an initial free interview with a Patents Lawyer, who'll look at how useful/viable the invention's going to be. Things move on very quickly in the world of design, so if the lawyer feels that only a few people're going to benefit from the submitted idea, he'll tell the client and advise not to go for a patent which can work out very costly. However, on the odd occasion that someone comes up with a magnificent new idea, which's going to sell, they'll be given all the advice and help necessary.
User avatar
Kellemora
Guardian Angel
Guardian Angel
Posts: 7494
Joined: 16 Feb 2015, 17:54

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Kellemora »

I hold three US Patents, I let all of them lapse due to the high cost of maintaining them.
To someone like myself, a Patent is totally useless. If you don't have the 150 thousand dollars per infringer to stop the first few, the big guns can take your patent away by claiming you abandoned it. You can't go after the big guns if you didn't go after the lesser infringers.

Also, in a Patent Claim, you MUST SHOW exactly how to manufacture the product, so anyone familiar in the art can duplicate what you invented. Makes it super easy for anyone to duplicate your invention, especially if it is something they use themselves.

If you invented a fantastic shampoo for example using common readily available ingredients, your patent would show the ingredients and the amounts of each. Everyone could make their own rather than buy yours, just by viewing the patent.
Unless you go after each person doing so, at 150k or more each, there is nothing to stop a big company from making your product and selling it themselves.

This is why I say Patents are Useless, except for the very rich.
Icey

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Icey »

You're probably right there, although our Patents Office apparently has an abundance of them pending.

Swift change of subject - have those photos come in from Jupiter yet?
User avatar
Kellemora
Guardian Angel
Guardian Angel
Posts: 7494
Joined: 16 Feb 2015, 17:54

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Kellemora »

I've checked several of the websites claiming to have the latest photos, and none of them have anything they didn't have already.
The NASA site is not showing anything new yet either, but printing a lot of hype about what they are finding.

Every single car tire on the market is covered by a patent. All they have to do is change one line on the tread design that no one else changed, and they get a patent on it. In other words, they have spread the patents so thin now, one wonders if they have any merit at all.
Even if you invented something totally new that no one in the world has ever created, you still have to claim its usage.
So, someone else can come along and copy your invention, but claim it is for another usage, and still get a patent on it for that usage.

The patent office no longer allows BROAD patents, such as the type of patent that was awarded Mr. Land for his Polaroid camera. Any camera that develops the film within or outside the camera on-site and produces a print or developed negative.
Land's patent covered any and all methods of creating the print or developed negative simply because it was so broad. At the time, no self-developing camera existed. They all used plates or film which had to be developed in a darkroom.
They didn't have to patent the method or methods used, or the equipment, in essence, Land was one of the few who ever got a patent through based on a final result, without disclosing how he obtained that result.
This was despite the fact you could not patent an idea or the result of an idea. He had working models to prove the result, and at the time, the product it produced was the edge he needed for something totally new.
He didn't patent a camera, he didn't patent a type of film (at first), he didn't patent a method of developing, or a method of producing a nearly instant print. What he did patent was the completed output of a camera, in print or developed negative.
He did go on to patent the different methods he used to protect them, but the main patent kept all other camera companies from selling a self-developing camera's output.

I'll see if I can locate the original patent, it is interesting to read.
These days, every single component used in something must carry its own patent, or now be in public domain.
Just like the original fears of allowing patents in the first place would thwart developments in industry, we are beginning to see the same thing happen today with minuscule items needed to make something being patented independently.
Icey

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Icey »

There seems no point in inventing things other than for your own personal use, does there??
User avatar
Kellemora
Guardian Angel
Guardian Angel
Posts: 7494
Joined: 16 Feb 2015, 17:54

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Kellemora »

Well, if you come up with something really great, and a big company is interested in producing it, they will make sure to keep it protected for their own interests.
Icey

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Icey »

Hi Gary. Yes, I suppose there IS that, but who finances things like giant telescopes or satellites? Someone came up with the original ideas, and although things keep being added to them , or they become bigger and better, every country's making them with a technology that's pretty much the same.
User avatar
Kellemora
Guardian Angel
Guardian Angel
Posts: 7494
Joined: 16 Feb 2015, 17:54

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Kellemora »

A patent runs out in like 12 years on design patents, and 17 years on utility patents.
Most of the technology used in those telescopes is over 25 years old, and some probably over 50 years old.
A patent only covers what is in the Claims, not what is in the preferred embodiment or description sections.
Often, if you do look at the claims, even though they are sometimes quite confusing to read, you'll find only a couple of things the patent actually covers. Many times it sounds like it covers a whole lot more than it really does.
Sometimes it is only a single bracket the patent covers.
Icey

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Icey »

Thank you. I just don't know about these things - but I'm learning! : )
User avatar
Kellemora
Guardian Angel
Guardian Angel
Posts: 7494
Joined: 16 Feb 2015, 17:54

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Kellemora »

It's hard to learn about things which keep changing all the time too!
Although the basics have remained the same for many decades, it's the little things they keep changing which can sometimes make all the difference in the world.
A lot of the changes have to do with new technology as it develops.
Patent examiners have to hunt down those who know and understand the technology to determine if something really is new, and what many ways could it be described to make a patent worth issuing.

I know from trying to get one of my patents, where something very similar already existed, and companies made similar products using different methods which produced different items in different ways.
It cost me a fortune to prove what I had was not a Prior Art, and had many things different about it than any other similar looking product. The thing easiest to get around was the basic ingredients. None of my competitors had those ingredients in their product. However, the steel industry used what at first appeared to be my ingredients, until I could show them the major differences between their ingredients and mine. This required all kinds of chemical analysis and basic product structure analysis.
There are many products on the market that are made using the same equipment, but the end result, the output is considerably different in its chemical structure and makeup.
Take Vermiculite for example: It can be used as insulation, or as a cushion under above ground pools. But if you tried to use it as a substrate for growing plants, the plants would die, because of the chemical composition of the product.
So, if you came up with something that looks like Vermiculite, and manufactured like Vermiculite, but the ingredients have a different chemical makeup so the final product is not only safe for plants, but also longer lasting. It also costs more because the base ingredients cost more, so would not hinder the sale of Vermiculite as insulation, or for any other purpose Vermiculite is used.
I had a similar problem with my product. It looked just like something used by the steel industry, although my ingredients were different, and the manufacturing process required an added step their product did not.
Then after all the money we spent to prove how much different our product was than any competitive product, the patent examiner comes up with "There is no difference between a Lump of Coal and a Diamond."
My patent attorney made a few phone calls, and the very next day my patent issued.
I really do think he called the patent examiners wife! Although he never would admit to using her against him, hi hi...
Icey

Re: Juno reached Jupiter!

Post by Icey »

Yes Gary, but does every component of an item have to be analysed? I mean, look at how many things're made with plastic, as an example. Those child locks that you can put on cupboards .... they're made of plastic, which someone else invented, but the person who invented the locks themselves was the first to do so. Now, other child-proof locks're available, with slight modifications to make them seem more secure than, say, cheaper ones, but they're still marketed as "child-proof locks", and still made from the same basic materials, so obviously, newcomers've waltzed in and upgraded the things which other folk first devised, but they're allowed. Some of these items're patented, as shown on their packaging, so how do they manage that?
Locked