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In response to the linked idea, which advocated rear-
facing
seats, crash helmets and bondageuse degrees of
webbing.
Obviously, the logical extension of this is to fill the car
completely with water (or a very viscous form of Special
Air).
Vision and respiration would be catered for in
the usual
subaquatic manner.
In the event of a crash, not only are the occupants
cushioned
in the most effective possible way, but the chances of a
conflagration are greatly diminuted.
Plus you could take your goldfish with you to work.
Unspired by:
crash_20seats
[MaxwellBuchanan, Sep 15 2011]
Inevitable outcome...
Integral_20Side_20A..._20Window_20Breaker
[normzone, Sep 15 2011]
Scuba House
Self_20Contained_20...eathing_20Apparatus
[theircompetitor, Sep 16 2011]
Top Gear Water-filled Car Challenge
http://www.youtube....watch?v=roS_MT8xiwM
[DrBob, Sep 16 2011]
"Home James."
http://funnyartpict...ish-tank-truck.html
[2 fries shy of a happy meal, Sep 16 2011]
carsequencer
[xenzag, Sep 17 2011]
Aquareep
Aquareep
by [wagster] [csea, Sep 20 2011]
Queen Elizabeth's Pocket Pistol
http://en.m.wikiped...eth's_Pocket_Pistol
She must have had quite big pockets… [8th of 7, Sep 21 2011]
For [8th]
http://en.wikipedia...tt_(nuclear_device)
[MaxwellBuchanan, Sep 21 2011]
[link]
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I imagine that an occupant would accelerate through the water at about the same speed, displacing it, and the water would add extra crushing force. |
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Not so. The human body is about as dense as
water, and therefore, if the water stopped dead,
so would your body. |
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Yes, it's true that the four tons of water behind
you would collapse your ribcage, but that's a small
price to pay for avoiding brain injury. |
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In any case, that problem can be simply avoided
by breathing that fluorocarbon stuff whilst in the
vehicle. |
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Alternatively, the airbag system could be
cunnishly adapted and coupled to your snorkel,
providing a violent burst of highly compressed air
directly into your respiratory tract at the moment
of impact. With a bit of fine tuning, this could
offset the huge pressure spike at the moment of
collision. |
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Prefinally, the windscreen would need to be
thickened to withstand the impact. Otherwise,
the driver and water would be ejected, more or
less as a contiguous unit. Your last appearance on
earth would be as a besnorkelled and alarmed
figure suspended in an airborne, car-interior-
shaped block of high-speed water. Possibly minus
legs. |
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Finally last, the thickened windscreen could have
small breakable ports in it. In this case, the water
would burst out of these ports in a controlled
flow, thereby decelerating the driver (and
goldfish) in the optimal manner. |
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The future of motoring is assuredly aquatic. |
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With all the stupid things people do to their cars these days, expect an increase in koi breeding experiments. Maybe you could breed them to resemble those pine tree shaped deodorizers. |
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Yet another Halfbakery first: "Fish-scented car deodourisers". |
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We would like to point out that the interior dimensions of most passenger cars are very approximately 2m x 2m x 1m, which is 4 cubic metres, hence 4 metric tonnes, of water. |
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Being generous about the volume of the occupants, furnishings, trim, etc., at least two tonnes of water will be needed to fill the space. |
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Since an average car is about a tonne (more or less), this will require a 200% increase in engine power and equivalent braking performance. |
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Of course, in a train ..... |
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"Would you, could you, on a train?" |
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"What the hell happened? All of the sudden, this car turned into a cannoli." |
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You could get one of those fishy pedicures at the same time [+] |
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//the four tons of water behind you would
collapse your ribcage// That might happen if your
car actually decelerated. But, in collision with
anything less massive than a cement truck, your
vehicle might enjoy, shall we say, an advantage? |
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Agreed, there should be controlled rupture to
allow egress of water in an energy dissipating
manner. But shouldn't the relief valves be in the
*sides*
(assuming a head-on collision)? There should be
turbulent flow, so that 1) no bulk flow of water
carrying the occupants towards a solid obstacle
and B) energy dissipated as heat. Since water
flowing out means air flowing in, the latter should
be admitted in a frothy manner: more
opportunity to dissipate energy, and also, a
chance to add elastic resistance to the inertial
and
viscous resistance provided by the water. |
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Also, if your ribcage *were* collapsed, but the
remaining, water-filled portions of your anatomy
survived reasonably intact, then you could
survive, provided positive-pressure ventilation
was started immediately. Which, since this is,
after all, a SCUBA system, seems perfectly
feasible. |
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Why stop at mandatory seatbelts? Mandatory
prophylactic endotracheal intubation would be
even safer. |
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//Mandatory prophylactic endotracheal intubation// |
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If you can put that to music, you've got a winner. |
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//the four tons of water behind you would collapse your ribcage, but that's a small price to pay for avoiding brain injury.// |
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Wouldn't your brains still slosh within your skull with the same force as any other full stop? |
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But brain function is unlikely to be a significant issue for the sort
of individual who would drive such a vehicle. |
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Oh ye of little faith. Might I point out that the
number of fish injured in car accidents is far lower
than the number of people injured in car accidents.
I
think this speaks for itself. |
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It's impossible to argue with figures like that. |
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Your logic is, as ever, flawless. |
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Baked-ish by those wacky Top Gear chaps, for reasons other than road safety obviously. |
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// Of course, in a train ..... // |
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Trains with liquid-filled cars already exist. They're very
difficult to stop once moving, and occasionally tip over,
catch fire, and destroy suburban neighborhoods in southern
California. |
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"January 9th, 2012. Monday. Car is still frozen solid. Haven't been to the grocery store in two weeks, and it looks like I won't make it to work this week either. I can see Goldie, just above the dashboard..." |
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//water amplifies shockwaves//
Oh dear. Skipped physics
lectures, did we, 21Q? |
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// Car is still frozen solid // |
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Ooops ... who forgot to add the methanol/glycol blend to their car this winter ? Easy to tell - the one with the passenger compartment that's 9% bigger than it was before the temperature dropped below 0C.... |
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Has the problem been considered that ingress to and egress from the vehicle would have to be through roof hatches, and that a level compensation reservoir would be needed to allow for the displacement produced by different sized drivers and variable numbers and sizes of passengers ? |
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//Has the problem been considered...// |
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After reading this idea and being somewhat skeptical I decided to fill the bathtub and slide around in the water, displacing and shifting water etc. Interestingly enough I noticed later that this idea was also about being in water. Coincidences like that always amaze me. |
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I was trying to think of some reason why this was not practical. The only minor thing I could think of was trying to operate the pedals with flippers on. |
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Max - thought you might like Carsequencer (see link) |
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//The only minor thing I could think of was trying to operate the pedals with flippers on.//
We divers call then "fins". |
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And why would the pedals have flippers on anyway? |
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Yes, well, admit it - you kinda walked into that one. |
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Admitted. No need to make a flap. |
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[8th] water known better. |
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//We divers call then "fins"// |
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Don't the fins get upset about that? The Swedes, I hear, can take a joke better. Not much better, mind you. |
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You would look stupid trying to d(r)ive with a turnip strapped to each foot. |
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I think that pales into insignifance compared to driving with a dead Fin on each foot (unless they also have rather long snorkels). |
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Because water is (nearly) incompressible it transmits shock-waves very well. So, if the exterior of your water-filled car interior suffered a sudden impact - e.g as a result of a soon-to-be-dead motorcyclist's helmet hitting the windscreen - the shock of that impact would be transmitted with great efficiency to you, probably with sufficient power to turn your brain to mush. |
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I'm not sure that's necessarily so. A sharp shock
will be worse through water than through air (a
bullet passing three inches from your face in air
makes a noise; in water it might do serious
damage). A smooth acceleration will be worse in
air than in water (which is why water-couches
have often been proposed to soften g-forces in
spaceflight; the water transmits all the forces, but
that's better than having them all transmitted
through a few points of contact with a rigid seat). |
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A car crash is intermediate between those two
extremes, thanks to the crumple zone (or, on
older British Leyland cars, the crumble zone). |
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Consider the airbag: it spreads the force of
impact across a larger area of your body, which is
better than all the force being absorbed by a few
ribs on the steering wheel. The force _will_ be
with you, and it's best to absorb it over as much
body area as possible. |
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Of course, this is probably nonsense, but I will
defend it to the hilt. If needs be, I nominate
[8th] to duel with any naysayers. |
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//Of course, this is probably nonsense, but I will defend it to the hilt// Likewise, in the spirit of the Halfbakery, I would rather slice off my eyelids with rusty razorblades than admit that my
hastily-cobbled-together pseudoscientific waffle is incorrect. Anyway, you'll note that the example I gave was of a hard, heavy object (crash-helmet worn by an overweight biker) hitting a part of the car without crumple zones (the windscreen) so that the impact, when represented on some kind of graph, would would show as a sharp 'spike', rather than being spread out over time. |
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This might work in some ways if the water were somehow supended only in front of the occupant. |
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As mentioned above, pressure waves travel quickly through water due to it's high bulk modulus. In a collision, the object is to reduce peak acceleration of the occupant to a minimum. This is best achieved by smoothing the acceleration to a near constant level for the entire duration of the event. Crash structures are designed to do this. |
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Airbags play some part in smoothing acceleration. In the distance between the occupant and the vehicle interior there is some opportunity for energy absorbtion. |
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The function of the airbag is mostly to spread acceleration loads over a large area, avoiding local trauma. |
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Water in front of the occupant would spread load, but would not provide any further energy absorbtion. |
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Of course, all this is quite academic, since the practicalities of a car filled with water prohibit driving. The Top Gear guys must have seriously modified those cars to be able to fill them with water. Even modern cars doors are not stiff enough to keep the seal in place with a metre head of water acting on their area. Quite apart from that, items like the gearlever gaiter, the card which seperates the boot space and all the grommets for wiring and hoses would all allow rapid egress of water. |
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Hey, I never said I was right... |
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[wagster] did the "car-pool" idea back in '04. [link] |
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Well I'll be knighted - [Wag] beat me to it. [marked-
for-deletion] redundant. |
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//No, you won't.// Will too. I'm saving up. |
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//Likewise, in the spirit of the Halfbakery, I would rather slice off my eyelids with rusty razorblades than admit that my hastily-cobbled-together pseudoscientific waffle is incorrect.//
This sums up the halfbakery perfectly but is sadly too long for taglinery. |
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[21], I think you have those two mixed up. |
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Bun for whisky filled cars. |
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//I'd take 8th on any day.// |
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OK, [8th], you're up. I'm sorry to put you on the
spot, but duelling is something I've never really felt
qualified to handle in person. I choose pistols. |
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As regards Code Duello, Irish, Marquess of Queensbury, or Southern? |
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I'll ask [8th] to go by Queensbury. It'll be tough, if
[21quest] is using pistols, but at least honour will be
maintained. |
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I read an article about a special, super-effective shock resistant case for a phone made from a non-Newtonian material that hardened under sudden impact. |
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If only there was some kind of water-based non-Newtonian fluid available that we could fill our cars with. |
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Hey! Were'd my custard anno go? |
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Our pleasure. We complement you on your choice of weapons, as
it permits us to employ our favourite handheld firearm. <link> |
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A fine choice, as long as you can find a brace of
them. Might I suggest an alternative (link)? |
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//We complement you// - aaah! - how sweet! |
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//Webley// Adj., the feeling that comes over a
person who has just realized that they are, after all,
going to vomit. |
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