Network of autonomous small cargo vessels ("Matternet" on the water)

I've owned all the different types of cars, well most..

I've owned all the Eastern cars. The Toyotas were quite reliable back in the day and now the Hyundai we had for the last 8 years or so ran great until its dying day. The timing belt went (should have been serviced) and that killed it. Other than that, the car was indestructible. Talk about a work horse. We used it like a pickup truck to haul firewood on many occasions. We just threw it in the back seat and trunk! The car always started the instant you turned the key. Front wheel drive and skinny tires (best car for the snow).

First car was a 1980's Ford Mustang. It gave a whole new meaning to the term "found on road dead."

A few years back I got my first German vehicle and I'm in love. Straight 5, common rail, turbo diesel engine. It's insane how well it works. If you can afford the fuel, you can drive this thing to the moon and back and not even begin to see it getting tired. Any worries about timing belts? NO! It's got a timing *chain* than never needs to be replaced. Other similar vehicles do 500,000 miles regularly. I'm still in the 100,000's. Love everything about it. So much better built and more sturdy than the American counterparts.

If I was not moving back onto a boat soon, I would get a Volkswagen TDI Sportwagen.

Hey Daiquiri...

Here is the video that changed my mind. I was on my phone before, I couldn't get the right YouTube link. You should be able to see this. I can see a Smart car doing find in roll overs and collisions with stationary objects. But.. when it's "car on car" crashes, E=1/2 MV^2 comes into play.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJt1SYQiuEI

Look at how the E from the slightly larger car makes the Smart car (with small M) fly off with huge V.

Now, take a human and put them in both vehicles. The car with little (delta) V means there is little acceleration. The Smart car with huge (delta) V means there is huge acceleration.

Assume for both cars we have identical people with the same mass.

The force on the person in the Smart car is (obviously from the video) much MUCH larger than the force on the person in the slightly larger economy car due to the massive acceleration the Smart car undergoes in the collision.

Huge force on the human body is bad. So, Smarts are good for a lot of things, but they are not good in direct collisions with other vehicles.

 

Woman I know was recently in a head-on crash (direct hit) at a closing speed between 140 km/h and 160 km/h. She was driving a late model mid-sized Toyota with lots of air bags. Idiot coming the other way flicked out onto her side of the road to overtake a turning car, one or both of them weren't paying attention.

She's got a number of bruises but that's all. The car is totalled but it crumpled as designed and the air bags deployed as designed.

I'm not saying any other vehicle would have done better or worse, just that it's pretty impressive engineering. Don't know what happened to the other person. The only information about speed was, the woman I know was doing 80 km/h in an 80 zone and the other person was doing between 60 & 80, hence closing speed. No time to even think about braking.

FWIW I don't own and never have owned a Toyota so I don't have any bias because of ownership. I've always preferred Subarus for reasons totally irrational, which I freely admit.

PDW

 

The car I've been stolen, in my previous post - it was a 2005 VW Golf 2.0 TDI. I loved that machine, so comfortable yet compact, neatly manufactured and absolutely reliable, very nice plastics inside, nearly perfect ergonomics. It gave me plenty of power when I'd hit the pedal, yet was very fuel-sparing when I drove in a more relaxed way. On few occasions I'd touch a trip average of 3.5 l/100 km (80 mpg), but 4.5 l/100 km (65 mpg) was a norm.
Unfortunately, it is also one of the most stolen cars in the Europe (for a reason), so the insurance costs pretty high. That fact, plus the high cost of spare parts has made me decide to buy the latest Renault Megane this time. Nice car, nice engine, nice interiors, comfortable, all nice but... I don't feel love.
I've already decided that my next car will be a Golf TDI.

 

That sounds like a very nice car!

I'm so sorry to hear she was stolen. I am actually surprised. Is car theft very common? I have never known anyone to have their car stolen in the States. Usually, it is just a smashed window and no more radio or even a smashed window and nothing taken.

They took your whole car? Where do they take them to? Eastern Europe? Into Russia?

Wonderful vehicles. Ah, I forgot to comment that I also owned one of the first 50 or so new Mini Coopers in the USA. Also a fun car, but not as good of an engine as the TDIs have.

 

Yes, they steal cars here, because there's a market for them in the Balkan and Eastern Europe countries. Another common reason they (thieves) steal powerful cars here is to use them for robberies. And finally, to dismantle it and sell the costly parts.

 

I can drive a beer can?!?!

Cool!

 

http://www.google.com/imgres?hl=en&...w=203&start=0&ndsp=12&ved=1t:429,r:9,s:0,i:95

 

Most Excellent!!!

 

My union doesn't run the company, and we don't tell it what vehicles to buy. And in fact, it has a large fleet of Toyota meter-reading pickups.

The full-sized Chevy, Dodge and Ford company trucks I've spent countless hours in are not junk.

I'm sure there's treatment available for that irrational fixation you have on unions. Get help.....

 

Does the aerial version of Matternet base the concept on solar and batteries too, or any renewable energy for cargo transport?

The energy density and economy are not there.

 

Ever meet anyone who was beat up because they refused to join a union? I have. I also knew a woman whose father was beat to a pulp for not joining. Thugs. I would and have worked for minimum wage rather than taking a higher paying union job, just so my dollars won't go to the DNC.

 

I didn't realize that this dumb idea was originally based on a aerial version. That is all we need little UAVS flying around delivering pharmaceuticals. Do you think that drug addicts and criminals are not going to find ways to shoot down or in other ways pirate them.

That one is even dumber than boat idea.

This will only work the day humanity changes its evil way.

 

If Matternet could solve the issues of power density / battery supply / landing & docking emergencies, danger to other vessels, etc. in an aerial solution, a marine solution would be less difficult. Obstacle avoidance and water routes would be the smaller of my concerns.

 

Why not just beam cargo to location... Just as technically feasible.

 

Is there a threshold beyond which batteries won't improve and where is it relative to where we are?
We have seen some slow progress with both power to weight and capacity and also the price of solar cells. It's a long way from being practical much less economical for either boats or planes. I think it will come sooner than star trek... maybe 30 years...