On 29 Jul, 16:23, John Larkin
highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote:> On Tue, 29 Jul 2008 08:02:16 -0700 (PDT), disgoftunwells
>
>
>
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yahoo.co.uk> wrote:>>On 26 Jul, 01:19, John Larkin
>>
highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote:>>> On Fri, 25 Jul 2008 15:17:58 -0700 (PDT), disgoftunwells
>
>>>>> The Tesla is powered by 7,000 Li-Ion laptop batteries for an output of
>>>>> 200 kW.
>
>>>>> A similarly powered 300 kW electric tractor (10,500 batteries) would
>>>>> turn a 400 hp articulated 22 gallon/hour diesel tractor every which
>>>>> way but loose in a tractor pull which apparently is vitally necessary
>>>>> education as well as entertainment for those too ignorant do basic
>>>>> IEOR calculations.
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>>>>> Running either tractor wide open to work a square mile at 0.5 mph
>>>>> would take 3 months of 7 day work weeks at 8 hours / day.
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>>>>> It would also require 17,000 gallons of diesel.
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>>>>> Today the cost is "only" $80,000 for the diesel.
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>>>>> In 2 years, with the price of hydrocarbon fuel spiraling by 30%% a
>>>>> year, that cost will be $150,000/yr.
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>>>>> In six years the cost of the fuel will be half a million dollars.
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>>>>> And that's just for one field.
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>>>>> Maybe if we have massive truck and bus conversion to natural gas --
>>>>> include farm tractors in Pickens plan -- the price will "only" be
>>>>> $350,000/field in 6 years.
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>>>>> The battery tractor would be cheaper even if grid power tripled and
>>>>> even if you went to your overpriced Apple Inc. store and bought the
>>>>> batteries one by one and wired them together one by one yourself.
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>>>>> Now, if you don't believe laptop batteries exist, please go to alt.
>>>>> conspiracy and post there.
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>>>>> Bret Cahill
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>>>>I've read that over time, crop fields suffer from the compression of
>>>>tractor wheels.
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>>>>Would it make sense, for heavily utilised fields, to lay down a rail
>>>>track?
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>>>>Whatever the tractor / harvester is doing, it could be a 20m wide
>>>>vehicle necessitating a single track spaced every 20m.
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>>>>The track could also be used to provide electric power.
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>>>>A few details to work out about how the tractor changes track at the
>>>>end of the rails.
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>>> Why not monorails in all the cornfields? Then the electric power
>>> could be provided by the rail, and there would be zero unnecessary
>>> contact with the soil. And you could give tourists rides in the off
>>> season.
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>>> Or just use nuclear powered helicopters for plowing; as a bonus,
>>> they'd blow the bugs away, and irradiate the produce.
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>>> I you bury superconductors under the crop rows, you could use a maglev
>>> tractor. Put Luke Skywalker back on the farm.
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>>> Or the San Francisco farming technique, cable-car tractors. No power
>>> needed at all!
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>>> We'll teach all those dumb farmers how to do it right.
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>>Quite funny, but actually cable car tractors could be quite feasible
>>and low cost. They'd run on wheels - just be pulled from a fixed
>>motor, instead of from an oxen.
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> So instead of putting an engine on the tractor, you'd have it located
> at the end of each (perfectly straight) row, pulling on a cable
> attached to the tractor, somehow not tearing up the rows and the crops
> between. And every time the tractor turns, the engine vehicle has to
> move down one row, with nothing getting tangled. We'd make all the
> rows somewhat shorter to allow for the extra machinery and maneuvering
> room. Of course, the plowing patterns couldn't be a serpentine any
> more - the cable doesn't allow that - but a comb shape, with a
> plow-and-backtrack pattern for every row. That will take a little more
> time (like, 2x), and will work fine as soon as you figure out how to
> make a cable push as well as pull. [1]
>
Thanks to Mark Thorson for pointing out this was done a long time ago.
The optimum way to plough a field is influenced by the relative values
of fuel costs, labour costs, equipment costs, yield levels.
Fuel has been rather cheap over the last 100 years or so. as it gets
more expensive methods may change.
The technique above would work best with longer rows, with the plough
or harvester running between two movable points. No reason why it
can't be just as fast as normal ploughing, with less room required for
the wheels.
Probably works best on large prarie fields.
> We all know that farmers have a lot of spare time, so won't mind
> increasing their plowing time by, say, 6:1 or so.
>
6:1? Why not make it 100:1?
I would have thought sitting in a control centre controlling multiple
units would be faster. Actually, farm labour must be cheap otherwise
most of this would have automated long ago. Or at least remote
controlled.
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>>Besides, there's nothing new about engineers teaching farmers (dumb
>>one and smart ones) how to do it right. If they didn't, farmers would
>>still be using oxen.
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> The aggies of the nation thank you. [2]
>
> John
>
> [1] San Francisco's cable cars only go in one direction over each
> slot. Maybe you could help them, too.
>
They're a tourist attraction, not an efficient people mover.
> [2] Are you an engineer?
Yes
