recycle a/c condensation (good especially in warm humid areas) by using it to clean the windshield , or even use engine heat to distill the water and serve the hot water to drink inside the car! only problem is ---- why would you want coffee on a hot day? hey , that's two in one , gimmie a bun or what?-- supershnitzel, Oct 24 2005 the disease http://www.multilin...au/~mg/legion1.html [Madai, Oct 24 2005] Drinking water from car exhaust http://usmilitary.a...apons/a/arwater.htm [DrCurry, Oct 25 2005] Unsafe drinking water in closed systems http://www.medicine...sp?articlekey=39249...in this case, airplanes. [DrCurry, Oct 25 2005] Pure water is sterile http://www.bionatur...om.au/?newsID=92144Not even fish can live in pure H20 (distilled) water. [Madai, Oct 25 2005] Scaremongering http://www.nytimes....chology/25essa.html...keeps our mind off the day-to-day stresses of our lives. Not everyone believes this is a good thing. (Oh, yeah, this a NY Times article, you will need an account to read it, but they are free, and you do not have to give accurate information to set one up.) [DrCurry, Oct 25 2005] Given that recycled hot water is responsible for Legionnaires disease, amongst other things, you should probably stick to washing the windows with it.
And you might also consider recapturing the water coming out the exhaust pipe.
Oh, and I'm sorry, but I'm all out of croissants today. You should have stopped by sooner.-- DrCurry, Oct 24 2005 Have you seen the schmutz that grows on a condenser coil? I don't like touching that water with my bare hands, let alone fancy drinking it.-- elhigh, Oct 24 2005 Dr Curry, your response about legionaire's disease is poorly thought out. True, it is a disease associated with air conditioners, but it's not caused by drinking the water, but by breathing the air.
But, you have the WRONG type of AC unit. Legionaire's disease is associated with evaporative coolers. I.e. coolers that cool the air by evaporating MORE water.
The Air conditioning unit supershnitzel seems to be refering to is one that does not rely on water, rather, one that has exposed cold parts on which condensation forms. Typically, the condensation is just allowed to drip to the ground. It's not used, and does no harm. On a hot humid day, you'll see a water puddle under your car.
A properly designed air conditioner would not allow the bacteria to multiply. There's many substrates on which bacteria cannot live. Copper is one of many well-known bacterial control tools
Meanwhile, condensing the water is basically extra work for the air conditioner. It's wasteful on a small scale like in a car. It *might* be worthwhile on a large scale like in a city.-- Madai, Oct 24 2005 nevertheless, I'll stick with my thermos mug, thank you.
not to mention all these unhealthy ducks that are flying into the county.-- po, Oct 24 2005 Madai: same difference, see comment by elhigh.-- DrCurry, Oct 24 2005 Don't get me wrong, I voted against this idea, but not for health reasons. As for "unhealthy ducks", are you referring to the avian flu?
90% scaremongering, plain and simple. Let's take the last overhyped "superbug", SARS. Totally overhyped.
Next time the media tries to create a panic, get informed, but take the scaremongering with a grain of salt. Everyone dies eventually, and it's regrettable, but stressing out over the newest superbug will actually weaken you further. Be informed, but be fearless.
You're far more likely to die of a car crash, anyway, and you don't really have much fear of that, do you?-- Madai, Oct 24 2005 "Even in humid areas the amount of water that you can get from the atmosphere is fairly limited."
Nuh uh. Even a relatively small building in an arid climate, Spokane, for example, produces a garden hose size stream of water continuously from the AC unit. I know, I've seen it. It was at a post-production facility and the condensation water was routed into a sink in the janitor's closet. I was amazed at the volume of water created from a 7,000 sqft studio building.-- bristolz, Oct 24 2005 You want to make coffee using the distillate from an air-con system? You deserve to die horribly.-- angel, Oct 24 2005 Angel, why harp on the "source" of the water? All water was dinosaur piss at one time or another.
It should be a given that, this water would pass though a filteration system that would get rid of anything nasty. Water purification techniques are common, and easily scaled.
While the designers cannot take anything for granted, the end user can take for granted that the water will be pure, even if totally impractical. Of course, given the fact everyone has an irrational fear of condensed water, this system is obviously not marketable.-- Madai, Oct 24 2005 Might work well in a water-restricted area with an energy source.-- Worldgineer, Oct 24 2005 what angel said.
//90% scaremongering, plain and simple// oh dear, tempting fate somewhat aren't we?-- po, Oct 24 2005 fqhwgads: cleaner too, unless you're of Madai's trust-me-I'm-a-scientist persuasion.-- DrCurry, Oct 24 2005 Po, if you haven't already, read the rest of the anno. It's simple: get informed, but don't be afraid. It's moreso tempting fate to scaremonger.-- Madai, Oct 24 2005 //gimmie a bun or what?//
You had avoided my fishbone until that point.-- wagster, Oct 24 2005 Mad-one. I lost my baby brother to life's lottery.
fishy to this one.
love your profile page btw. the modification blew me away.-- po, Oct 24 2005 ¿nothing there?-- DrCurry, Oct 24 2005 yep! bravery inc.-- po, Oct 24 2005 That's quite scary [UB], I know that Spanish Flu wiped out about 1-2% of everyone and I was about to dispute your figure of 90 million, but doing the sums that would be about right.-- wagster, Oct 25 2005 //fqhwgads: cleaner too//
Whether it's from the CAR EXHAUST (omg I can't believe you think that's clean) or the condenser coils, it's not going to be human drinkable as is. It'll have to go through SOME kind of filtering process.
//trust-me-I'm-a-scientist persuasion//
No, not trust-me-I'm-a-scientist. It's more like, duh, purifying water is easy. A distiller will kill anything nasty. It doesn't take a scientist to debunk you, DrCurry.
Meanwhile, if getting water from the condenser coils is a waste of energy, getting it from the exhaust is an even bigger waste of energy. Exhaust is... gasp! much hotter than ambient, and will take more effort to cool. A stationary powerplant could have a large, heavy heat sink, bigger than the plant itself. Even so, most power plants don't recapture water, in fact, they use evaporative cooling. That should tell you something about how impractical capturing exhaust vapor is. A car needs to be light(among many other things) so it can be fuel efficient. You don't need to be a scientist to know any of this. It's common sense.
Po, I'm sorry about your loss. I've lost people close to me as well.-- Madai, Oct 25 2005 Madai: purifying water may be easy, but keeping it clean is not, which is the limitation where science meets the real world. And you prove your own ignorance: exhaust pipe water is quite potable, once you get the soot out.-- DrCurry, Oct 25 2005 And how do you get the soot out? With as I said,
//SOME kind of filtering process//
Your reading comprehension is quite poor.
//purifying water may be easy, but keeping it clean is not, which is the limitation where science meets the real world.//
Keeping water clean is "difficult" relative to perhaps tying one's shoes, and, I admit there would be additional difficulties in keeping it clean in a moving vehicle, but it is not so difficult that it is not done, DAILY, with ease, on scales large and small.
One way to keep water clean: uh, bottle it. Now obviously you need a good, reliable bottling process, but, to use the local lingo, such a process is VERY BAKED.
Now, obviously, you can't quite "bottle" water in a car. But, in order for bacteria to grow in water, you need relatively impure water. It is completely possible, but not practical, to distill the water to the point nothing can grow in it, then store it in a container which does not permit biological agents, or nutrients said agents need to enter, on a vehicle.
Mistakes can be made, but those mistakes have been analyzed, and hopefully, corrected quickly. It's not like the public and the scientific community turns a blind eye to any mistakes.-- Madai, Oct 25 2005 random, halfbakery