Just when you thought ic engines were at the end of the line…

[FlyBoy1960]

Vapourware

[Old Koreelah]

23 hours ago, facthunter said:

We would be better to go with the majority. It has to happen eventually…

Obvious trends are sometimes interrupted by something from left field.

We assume that in a decades or two humans will still be driving road vehicles.

[Old Koreelah]

23 hours ago, facthunter said:

We would be better to go with the majority. It has to happen eventually…

Obvious trends are sometimes interrupted by something from left field.

We assume that in a decades or two humans will still be driving road vehicles.

[Old Koreelah]

23 hours ago, facthunter said:

We would be better to go with the majority. It has to happen eventually…

Obvious trends are sometimes interrupted by something from left field.

We assume that in a decades or two humans will still be driving road vehicles.

[Old Koreelah]

23 hours ago, facthunter said:

We would be better to go with the majority. It has to happen eventually…

Obvious trends are sometimes interrupted by something from left field.

We assume that in a decades or two humans will still be driving road vehicles.

[Old Koreelah]

23 hours ago, facthunter said:

We would be better to go with the majority. It has to happen eventually…

Obvious trends are sometimes interrupted by something from left field.

We assume that in a decades or two humans will still be driving road vehicles.

[Old Koreelah]

23 hours ago, facthunter said:

We would be better to go with the majority. It has to happen eventually…

Obvious trends are sometimes interrupted by something from left field.

We assume that in a decades or two humans will still be driving road vehicles.

[turboplanner]

1 minute ago, Old Koreelah said:

Obvious trends are sometimes interrupted by something from left field.

We assume that in a decades or two humans will still be driving road vehicles.

Very true.

 

I did a drawing once for our legislators showing how the Australian Design Rules would lock design into the state of design for that year.

 

The drawing was of a horse drawn Carriage.

There was an ADR which specified the thickness and transparency of Isinglass.

The brakes, when applied with a four foot lever had to slow the carriage against a four horsepower pull by bolting horses.

The wheels had to be a minimum 2 inches wide and half an inch thick made from mild steel.

The turntable had to have steel faces to avoid a lock up.

I think I finished it with:

The dashboard must be big enough to ensure that no Horse Sh!t flies into the eyes of the driver.

[Old Koreelah]

11 minutes ago, turboplanner said:

Very true.

 

I did a drawing once for our legislators showing how the Australian Design Rules would lock design into the state of design for that year.

 

The drawing was of a horse drawn Carriage...

You’ve just confirmed my fears about our leaders’ lack of vision.

[turboplanner]

4 minutes ago, Old Koreelah said:

You’ve just confirmed my fears about our leaders’ lack of vision.

They do what they can. I participated in some Vicroads forecasting of the use of our road reservations which look 50 years ahead.

This week I posted Victoria's plans out to 2050 on this site

In 1979 we were rudely interrupted by the Fuel crisis. Some manufacturers made decisions that all but put them out of business; others went into profits of hundreds of millions of dollars.

[jackc]

On 28/08/2021 at 12:22 PM, FlyBoy1960 said:

I'm sorry but I fail to understand how using left-hand Drive vehicles (of which I currently own 5) is going to make any difference to Australia's road system. Just because we go left-hand drive vehicles doesn''t mean we have to change the side of the road that we drive on ?

Maybe, but many Australian drivers struggle to drive RHD cars properly now 😞.  Sadly on average we are a nation of under performing drivers……change to LHD would make everyday driving, a demolition derby. 😞

[marshallarts]

This looks interesting, but all those cranks and levers in the middle worry me a bit.  I'm no mechanical engineer, so I wonder why the two halves of the crankshaft need to turn in opposite directions - is that to damp out vibrations, by rotating 180 degrees out of phase?  If so then maybe it's OK, but my uneducated thought is that vibration could be damped using a weighted flywheel somewhere.  Or by using two pairs of opposed pistons, arranged so that the pairs are 180 degrees our of phase - but if I've thought of that (and it works), then I'm sure Ampere Inc has too!  Happy to be corrected on any of these assumptions.

[skippydiesel]

On 28/08/2021 at 3:31 PM, turboplanner said:

 

.................................................

As OK mentioned, we can still get a full car range from the Japanese, but there are gaps in the market. Tradies, and people towing the recreational equipment want to two 3 to 4 tonnes and still maintain as close to 100 km/hr as they can. Some have bought imported Dodge Rams or F150s but these are really too light for the applications and there are hours of sub stories about vehicles which failed. These all have to be converted to RHD here in Australia for around $75,000.00 so only the rich can afford them. Trucks are a lower cost alternative but you have to go up to big five tonners to get an engine powerful enough to tow the weight at cruise speed. So there is a gap which could be filled by something like F350 built in the US for peanuts if we changed to LHD. .....................................................

 

Well Turbs me old mate... Yes there is the "look at me crowd" who want a  a big flashy US derived tug and then there are the majority of recreational people who only tow  2  - 3 tonne. For nearly 30 years or so, I pulled a double horse float, with 2  x 16hh lumps of geegee on board (say 2 + tonne all up ), with a Daihatsu Rocky 2.8 turbo diesel, 5 speed. Good for 110 kph (maxed out) on the freeway, bit slow on the longer, steeper hills but got there. Never a problem - great little truck.

 

Would still be driving Rocky, unfortunately  "T boned" by a nice young lad, on his mobile, coming out of a private drive. Now drive a Ford Ranger, 3.2 turbo diesel, 6 speed manual - slightly better fuel econamy than the Rocky and have upgraded to a larger horse float, we are now easily in the 2.5 tonne bracket and its way way easier to get done for speeding.

 

The tradies & a few recreators, who want bigger pay load , mainly go for the small Japanese trucks and many of them can easily sit on 110 kph . If they have a US ute, its for driving round (without a load) to "big note" themselves.

 

Another point  Rams, in RHD, were/are made that way in Mexico - not conversions, as erlier imports were. The 6.7 turbo diesel with up to 9 tonne towing capacity (overseas) was the pick. Not sure if this is still coming into Au. What I dont get is that the manual variants are not available here but then that skill is slowly being lost anyhow.

 

[APenNameAndThatA]

With cars becoming more and more fly-by-wire, producing RHD and LHD cars might actually eventually become cheaper. 

[turboplanner]

 

 

 

8 hours ago, skippydiesel said:

Well Turbs me old mate... Yes there is the "look at me crowd" who want a  a big flashy US derived tug and then there are the majority of recreational people who only tow  2  - 3 tonne. For nearly 30 years or so, I pulled a double horse float, with 2  x 16hh lumps of geegee on board (say 2 + tonne all up ), with a Daihatsu Rocky 2.8 turbo diesel, 5 speed. Good for 110 kph (maxed out) on the freeway, bit slow on the longer, steeper hills but got there. Never a problem - great little truck.

Well the Australian market leader of all cars is the Toyota Hilux, and that class will tow up to about 2.5 tonnes legally the way Australia tows.

Above that is where the problems are.

Your Rock had the gearbox for startability and gradability with the horse float but you must have had Jesus with you in terms of braking and suspension capacity.

However, there are other markets not being served; the bigger, luxury car market is one, albeit a much smaller segment.

 

 

8 hours ago, skippydiesel said:

The tradies & a few recreators, who want bigger pay load , mainly go for the small Japanese trucks and many of them can easily sit on 110 kph . If they have a US ute, its for driving round (without a load) to "big note" themselves.

Some tradies do that, but others tow 2.5 metre wide tandem and tri trailers with materials,equipmment, machines etc so they are looking for more GCM without going to trucks either becaise they use them as family cars, or they need low floor level.

 

This is the tear jerker market sector because the ones that don't buy trucks don't usually get what they want.

 

For example, The Ram 1500 Laramie GCM of 7,713 kg in theory allows a 4,871 kg trailer/load, but that's only if the trailer is a 4 wheeler with turntable and A frame.

When you load the Laramie with driver and fuel you can impose a load of just 608 kg, add 1 adult passenger in front and three in the back and you have 248 kg for cargo but nothing available to tow with an Australian caravan, trailer which requires 10% of its gross on the tow bar for stability.

 

If you keep the passengers and put your cargo in the trailer you'll be legal with a trailer/load of around 2.5 tonnes, hence the tears from the people who just looked at the bigger vehicle and thought it would tow a bigger trailer.

 

 

8 hours ago, skippydiesel said:

 

Another point  Rams, in RHD, were/are made that way in Mexico - not conversions, as erlier imports were. The 6.7 turbo diesel with up to 9 tonne towing capacity (overseas) was the pick. Not sure if this is still coming into Au.

Chrysler sold The RAM which is no longer branded Dodge. It's imported as LHD by Ram Trucks Australia and "manufactured to RHD" here.

Interestingly, they've sold 10,000 here, so grabbed a decent market slice.

8 hours ago, skippydiesel said:

 

 

 

 

 What I dont get is that the manual variants are not available here but then that skill is slowly being lost anyhow.

 

 

[jackc]

The comic is sitting in a caravan park watching a RAM pilot trying to put their road whale sized caravan onto a site!

Thats why many only want drive through sites, because most could not back a Bunnings wheelbarrow. 

[turboplanner]

8 hours ago, skippydiesel said:

 What I dont get is that the manual variants are not available here but then that skill is slowly being lost anyhow.

It's a Millenial thing Skippy. 

I took a lot of Jackaroos off road and into the outback and found the auto had a few advantages; you can creep forward and scrape the transmission over a rock, and you don't get caught as often in a gear where you are losing torque, and with Torque converter lock up you've got 24 to 32 ratios for soft tracks.

[facthunter]

IVECO"S seem to be puling the biggest Caravans up north. Caravans seem to be getting bigger all the time. Is it a "mine's bigger than your's' thing?  Yes they all want drive throughs . I thought you went to see the country not live in a house.  Five minutes after they park "fatman' is in a deck chair on the computer. If enough arrive they overload the parks diesel generator heating their hot water and the lights go out..Nev

[Old Koreelah]

1 hour ago, facthunter said:

IVECO"S seem to be puling the biggest Caravans up north. Caravans seem to be getting bigger all the time. Is it a "mine's bigger than your's' thing?  Yes they all want drive throughs . I thought you went to see the country not live in a house.  Five minutes after they park "fatman' is in a deck chair on the computer. If enough arrive they overload the parks diesel generator heating their hot water and the lights go out..Nev

So many people claim they are “getting away from it all” but end up taking it all with them.

Some friends of ours once came on a weekend camping trip with us and overloaded their car and trailer, so dad brought the Ute along too. 

 

I’m spending Lockdown building a camper body that fits over my trailer. It has a queen-sized bed, lots of convenient storage bays, lots of lights and power points, a kitchenette, etc. Total trailer weight about 650kg.

I’ve discovered the downside of having made it so streamlined: it’s plurry hard to reverse into the shipping container because the curved sides give little reference to where its pointing!

 

I know so many locals who are planning the big around-Oz caravan trip as soon as they are allowed to travel. The roads and caravan parks won’t be able to cope.

[skippydiesel]

8 hours ago, turboplanner said:

 

Your Rock had the gearbox for startability and gradability with the horse float but you must have had Jesus with you in terms of braking and suspension capacity.

 

 

Bought new in 1985. Not only pulled the horse float, survived teaching two sons to drive and multiple holiday trips.

Daily commuter for 28 years - never let me down.

Had 520,000 km when T boned. Still havent quite got her back together.

Cast iron transmission cases, cast iron engine (other than crank shaft seals never worked on), indirect injection (pretty much burn anything).

Lovely smooth short shifting gear box. HD cable actuated clutch, light & simple.

Pull started a tractor once, low range, barely knew it was there.

New HD shocks all round every 100,000 km. If you didn't do this handling quickly degraded and tyre "shoulder" wear increased markedly.

Religiously serviced every 5000 km.

Despite big front disk brakes and generous rear drums - terrible braking from new - tried everything, short of complete replacement, still poor but you drive accordingly.

Cart springs all round, other than replacement bushes, trouble free.

Hitch  point almost in line with rear cart spring hangers, so trailer tow bar weight ,made only small difference to car "geometry". 

When towing at a 110 kph you dont want to make any sudden changes in direction, when towing more than the tugs weight.

Except when towing, fuel consumption hardly varied from 10L/100 km no matter how you drove it.

West of Parks, big rains/flooding, idiot Police directed us through the road block. because we were in a 4X4 - water "popped" all the floor pan blanking grommets, 1/2 filled the headlamps - couple of times trucks/wash coming the other way, almost pushed us  of the road, veeery scary.  When we got home, took  carpets, seats out, checked transmission for water (none) and days and days to dry her out

The only electronics were the radio - bugger all to go wrong.

[turboplanner]

1 hour ago, Old Koreelah said:

So many people claim they are “getting away from it all” but end up taking it all with them.

Some friends of ours once came on a weekend camping trip with us and overloaded their car and trailer, so dad brought the Ute along too. 

 

I’m spending Lockdown building a camper body that fits over my trailer. It has a queen-sized bed, lots of convenient storage bays, lots of lights and power points, a kitchenette, etc. Total trailer weight about 650kg.

I’ve discovered the downside of having made it so streamlined: it’s plurry hard to reverse into the shipping container because the curved sides give little reference to where its pointing!

 

I know so many locals who are planning the big around-Oz caravan trip as soon as they are allowed to travel. The roads and caravan parks won’t be able to cope.

Have a look on the net. Maybe you could put a bluetooth camera inside the shipping container

[facthunter]

I think you will be right and in the Territory they won't take bookings ahead at some places.. A lot of vans will make the road North of Alice springs a bit dangerous. It's got a high speed limit and there a no fences where the cattle run. Easy to break your rear window when towing a van if you get off the edge. Nev

[Old Koreelah]

3 hours ago, turboplanner said:

Have a look on the net. Maybe you could put a bluetooth camera inside the shipping container

No doubt I could, but I’d prefer to improve my skills rather than rely on another bit of technology.

Practice needed.

[Old Koreelah]

1 hour ago, facthunter said:

… Easy to break your rear window when towing a van if you get off the edge.

From rocks tossed up and bouncing forward off the can?

[nomadpete]

Yes, it's a common problem for some drivers.