magnetic propulsion system.

Before I do what I am going to do in this reply, I wish to point out some important things I have said in this thread in response to ruthless. It seems he believes I am totally trashing him, but in reality I have already admitted:

1) The maglev technology, in a car, as he has described it is certainly viable. It CAN be done.
2) This technology implemented in the way he has described is even a GOOD IDEA, for the non-polluting and lack of oil required (at least to run the magnets. Oil would still be required to build some components, but that is not terribly important for this discussion).

The point I have been trying to make to ruthless is that, while it is technically viable, and even a good idea, it is not economically viable in the current time and will not be for at least several decades, if even by then. This is not a "knock" on ruthless. It is merely stating an engineering fact which can be backed-up with several simple analyses. One thing someone who seeks to be an engineer needs to learn how to do is de-emotionalize themselves from valuable, factual feedback that one receives from their fellow engineers and analysts. All engineers learn to perform economic viability analyses for good ideas which are technically viable. Because being a good idea and technically viable is not sufficient. We must show that the idea can be implemented, as a minimum, at not an exorbitantly greater cost than our current solutions for the same problem.

Therefore: I am now going to provide just one, simple (dispassionate) fact-based economic analysis of ruthless' idea, just to show that his statement about building magnetic roads with his magnets would be as cheap as tar roads, is incorrect. This is NOT a knock against ruthless. It is just an engineering analysis to uncover facts. Here we go...

Before we estimate how much a magnet-based road would cost to build, we first need some estimate of how much a conventional road costs to build. One reason I contacted my old college roommate (who is a practicing civil engineer) when this dicussion began was because I knew he would immediately know the specifics of estimating road-building costs. He did. He told me about an empirical equation that all civil engineers use to estimate overall costs to build a road. With a little research I was able to find that equation in a google preview of a book on Transportation Economics by Patrick S. McCarthy. He applies the equation to come up with the cost of 1 mile's length of a 1 lane road for three locations: central city, suburban, and rural highways. The quantifiable metric used for these estimates is called "dollars per (Lane-Mile)" or expressed as a fraction it would be ($/(Lane-Mile)). Here is a chart I put together to document this part of my analysis that shows the approximate cost per (Lane-Mile) in these three areas, along with a calculation for how many square feet are in a (Lane-Mile):
Road_Now.gif


So we see a range of $416 to $1649 per (Lane-Mile) for today's definitively low-tech road. Now we must estimate how much a magnetic road would cost. We have to worry about labor costs, but I am not even going to estimate those now. I am ONLY going to estimate what it would cost for the raw materials...the neodymium magnets that ruthless talked about. Using the website for purchasing such magnets that ruthless, himself, provided I found that the 1"x1" block style magnet is the most appropriate for our application. So they come in a square inch, and if you buy in a lot size of 250 of these things they will cost you $377.19 per lot. Using the square footage for a (Lane-Mile) I converted that into square inches, and that tells us for one (Lane-Mile) of road we will need 6,079,680 of these square-inch magnets! This equates to purchasing 24,319 lots of these magnets at the above price (maybe you could get a bigger price break, and we can do "what ifs" with a spreadsheet if such were the case). Here is the chart for this analysis, which includes some of the quotes from ruthless as its basis:
Road_Mag.gif


So we end up with a comparitive cost of <font color="red">$9,119,625 per (Lane-Mile)!!![/COLOR] for building just one lane and one mile of our magnetic road. Clearly this is way, WAY, W-A-Y more expensive than the $416-$1649 per (Lane-Mile) of today's road technology! And I should point out this is ONLY the cost of the magnets. We have not figured any other materials that might be necessary nor the labor to actually build the road, which is all included in the prices from the empirical equations. I would encourage anyone to take these numbers and calculate what it would cost just to build a 2-lane highway that is 100 miles long! First calculate the cost with today's road tech, and then calculate its cost of JUST the neodymium magnets.

Now, of course one could say "well, yeah, but we could get magnets cheaper than the number you used from ruthless' web page." To that I would ask "how much cheaper?" Because clearly you would need a MASSIVELY LARGE cost break to get the cost of the magnet materials anywhere close to what it costs to build a road today. In fact, it is left as an engineering problem to the student to use the analysis I have done above, and calculate what the cost per 1"x1" neodymium magnet would have to be just to get the road building cost equal to $1649 per (Lane-Mile). Calculate how much each of those magnets would have to cost to get the road building cost to that level, and post your answer here.

In summary, I have done what ruthless asked me to do. I have used engineering to prove one of his assumptions was grossly in error. Does it mean magnetic cars and roads will never be built? Of course not. It only means it is highly unlikely they will be built in our near future (10-50 years, I would say). And once again let me point out: This is NOT about getting emotional. This is NOT about putting ruthless down. This is NOT about trying to humilitate him. This is about dispassionate engineering analysis of a GOOD IDEA that is TECHNICALLY FEASIBLE to see if implementing that idea makes economic sense.

I do these types of analysis all the time as an engineer and a teacher. It ain't rocket science!
And folks who wish to make themselves better engineers need to realize that if someone is questioning the viability of someone else's good idea, they are not attacking them personally.

RMT
 
RMT &amp; Ruthless: Both of you are friends. Stop it and move on. I've watched you guys debate many times and I enjoy reading both of your view points. Let it go. I will admit I was kinda of interested in watching RMT or Ruthless prove it but hey guys. Don,t get mad just show your proof. Ruthless you told me not to take RMT and Darby personal. I have really tried to stop doing that and I do enjoy their higher education and real world experiance in matters when they post back to me even if I don,t like how they said it to me. Its a trade off for me. I gain knowledge though I might not like exactly how they said it to me. All and all I appreciate their points. Im going to say to both of you what my wife says to me. Cool it and chill out. You guys in my opinion really are friends. Please don,t ruin it. That is all I am going to say.
Click to expand...

I appreciate those words, reactor. Thanks! And I can honestly say I have definitely seen a major change in your attitude since you first showed up. While you can be (and are) still passionate about your ideas (which is a fantastic thing!), you have come to realize that when people question your ideas, they are not mounting a personal attack on you. You are separate from your ideas. You're a good guy. I question some of your ideas sometimes, but that is just me the engineer. I still think you are a good guy. My questioning your idea does not change the fact that I could sit down over a beer with you and chat about anything under the sun.

Ruthless mentioned something about him being a "mirror". To some extent he is, and this is a tactic I myself use quite often when someone I am having a discussion with gets emotional. In fact, in this case when I raised the "volume" of the rhetoric with my words of "You want to get ugly? Bring it!", I was mirroring ruthless in his taking my points personally. I BECAME personal because I saw ruthless could not separate engineering feedback from my friendship with him.

One thing about a teacher: We always tend to be in teaching mode. And this is exactly what I have been doing in my debate with ruthless. I have been trying to help him understand that even with good ideas that are technically feasible, that does not mean we should run out and try to implement them. Further analysis is required to make sure we have not made a gross error in some of our unstated assumptions.

I don't hate ruthless. I still consider him my friend. But sometimes hard lessons are some of the most valuable ones that you carry with you the rest of your life. They certainly have been for me. What you see me doing with ruthless' idea (picking it apart to find erroneous assumptions) is something that has been done to me since my engineer father started to teach me how to do engineering analysis. My logic and ideas have been smacked-down quite often. It is how I have learned...

RMT
 
Hi Ray

I've got this big 40 inch LCD TV that I use for my computer monitor. I couldn't help but notice that your road construction costs don't seem to match the costs depicted in the picture you posted. Did you maybe mistake a comma for a decimal point? Because what I see in the picture looks like everything is 1000 times more than what you stated. So it looks like you made an error in your favor.

Actual road costs are:
Central City Freeway $1,648,427.00
Urban Suburban Freeway $540,545.00
Rural Freeway seems to be clipped off in the picture

Next we get to the amount of magnets needed. I disagree with you completely on this one. The average car weighs around 4000 lbs. The average length of a car is 16 feet and 4 inches. Now we are given that a one foot length of neodymium magnets will lift a car. A one inch square neodymium magnet can lift 500 lbs. A foot length of neodymium magnets would be able to lift 6000 lbs. So a one foot length of neodymium magnets which is really just 12 one inch square neodymium magnets can be dispersed over a 16' 4" length of road. So how many times does 16' 4" go into a mile?
1 mile/16' 4" converts to 63,360"/196" = 323.2653061. Let's just round it off to 324 segments of roadway that only need 12 neodymium magnets per segment. 324 x 12 = 3888 neodymium magnets needed. Now if you can only purchase them in lots of 250: 3888/250 = 15.552 Lets round that off to 16 lots needed. At $377.19 a lot that comes out to 16 x $377.19 = $6035.04 which is a lot lot less than the $9,119,625.00 estimate you provided.

So it does look like Ruthless wins this one.

But all is not lost. I think you actually did win this one, just not for the reasons you stated. Supply and demand for neodymium would go way up, since it is a rare earth metal. Also there is something else about neodymium magnets that I believe you and Ruthless may not be aware of. The Curie point. Magnets lose their magnetism when heated above the Curie point. The Curie point for a very strong neodymium magnet is 80 degrees celsius or 176 degrees fahrenheit. On a hot summer day I wouldn't be surprised to see those neodymium magnets lose their magnetism.
 
this will be my last post.

the reason i am upset about this is because first, you attacked my intelligence. second you gave several low blows like assuming i have a problem with fluid dynamics and thermal dynamics. you assume this because of some conversations we had and i really dont appreciate low blows like that. i have taken potshots like that since i have gotten here and never gotten upset. the single biggest reason i am upset is because this is one of my best ideas, and now its time to prove its a great, feasible idea. it is now time for ray to realize this aint rocket science and to see all that he missed.

you have to add in the cost for research and development for every car ever made and every prototype ever made.

you have to add in construction costs for every vehicle ever made.

you have to add in the cost of gas that is used from 1900 to, lets say 2030.

you have to add in the cost of every road that has been paved and repaved.

you have to add in the cost of maintenence to every car ever made.

you have to add in the cost of polluting the environment for over 100 years.

you have to add in the cost of all liquids an automobile uses. oil, brake fluid, transmission fluid, transaxle grease, etc.

you have to add in the cost of tires and replacements every 50,000 miles or so.

you have to add in the cost of safety.

there are more, but that will more than suffice. now, compare that to:

the cost for magnets to repave every road.

the cost for magnets to put on the car.

the cost for a computer guidance system for the car.

the cost for research and development for the car.

when you add it up, my way is hilariously cheaper. ridiculously cheaper. and its not some idiotic idea of having to fill your tank up with gas.

now, when people start to realize that when you build this, its done and you will never need to do any upkeep, you never have to pay a dollar for gas ever again, that you will never have an accident again, there will never be pollution from vehicles again, then people will realize that it is definitely worth it to change the world.

i have taken alot of crap while i have been at this site. i have been attacked, my wife has been attacked. i was even told by one person that they hope my wife dies in front of me and my family. i have taken it all and been very humble about it.

i draw the line when someone attacks my intelligence, wich is excactly what ray did. every idea ive ever given on this site, ray has struck down with his "supreme brilliance." and im very tired of it.

ray told me i would never build a working plane without going to school for engineering. what he did not realize is that i have already built several. sure they were smaller scale than what i could fit in, but they can be easily scaled up. they flew and all too. some better than store bought models. i told him he was right, and never brought up the fact that i had already done such a task. why? because i respected rays opinions. if he wouldve said i could build a better plane if i were to go to school for engineering, i wouldve agreed. but to tell me i cant is a bit bothersome.

it upsets me very much that the ideas behind the great inventions come from wanting to get paid. i dont care about money and give my ideas freely to help the world. all i want is a world i can actually have fun in. all i want to do is be able to walk down my street without having to worry about some bad guy trying to ruin all of my happiness. i want to be able to do the things i want to without the reprocussions of my pride. but alas, i will always have my pride, and when i am challenged, i will always rise to the occasion.

give it some thought ray. if you ever want to apologize for your rude behavior and jumping to conclusions, i will accept. i may even come back. but until then, i will be an honorable person and not accept personal attacks.

even though the money argument is on my side, no amount of money compares to making the world we live in a better one. goodbye all, i wish you all the best.
 
"The Curie point for a very strong neodymium magnet is 80 degrees celsius or 176 degrees fahrenheit."

paint em white. that should handle that problem. if they reflect the heat, they wont absorb the heat.

...and thats my last post, i swear. im just too passionate about this idea. its one of my dreams.
 
Rainman,
A good teacher encourages his students they don't discourage and disrespect them and cause them to walk out. I am not attacking you... just your ideas.
 
Before I do what I am going to do in this reply, I wish to point out some important things I have said in this thread in response to ruthless. It seems he believes I am totally trashing him, but in reality I have already admitted:

1) The maglev technology, in a car, as he has described it is certainly viable. It CAN be done.
2) This technology implemented in the way he has described is even a GOOD IDEA, for the non-polluting and lack of oil required (at least to run the magnets. Oil would still be required to build some components, but that is not terribly important for this discussion).

The point I have been trying to make to ruthless is that, while it is technically viable, and even a good idea, it is not economically viable in the current time and will not be for at least several decades, if even by then. This is not a "knock" on ruthless. It is merely stating an engineering fact which can be backed-up with several simple analyses. One thing someone who seeks to be an engineer needs to learn how to do is de-emotionalize themselves from valuable, factual feedback that one receives from their fellow engineers and analysts. All engineers learn to perform economic viability analyses for good ideas which are technically viable. Because being a good idea and technically viable is not sufficient. We must show that the idea can be implemented, as a minimum, at not an exorbitantly greater cost than our current solutions for the same problem.

Therefore: I am now going to provide just one, simple (dispassionate) fact-based economic analysis of ruthless' idea, just to show that his statement about building magnetic roads with his magnets would be as cheap as tar roads, is incorrect. This is NOT a knock against ruthless. It is just an engineering analysis to uncover facts. Here we go...

Before we estimate how much a magnet-based road would cost to build, we first need some estimate of how much a conventional road costs to build. One reason I contacted my old college roommate (who is a practicing civil engineer) when this dicussion began was because I knew he would immediately know the specifics of estimating road-building costs. He did. He told me about an empirical equation that all civil engineers use to estimate overall costs to build a road. With a little research I was able to find that equation in a google preview of a book on Transportation Economics by Patrick S. McCarthy. He applies the equation to come up with the cost of 1 mile's length of a 1 lane road for three locations: central city, suburban, and rural highways. The quantifiable metric used for these estimates is called "dollars per (Lane-Mile)" or expressed as a fraction it would be ($/(Lane-Mile)). Here is a chart I put together to document this part of my analysis that shows the approximate cost per (Lane-Mile) in these three areas, along with a calculation for how many square feet are in a (Lane-Mile):


So we see a range of $416 to $1649 per (Lane-Mile) for today's definitively low-tech road. Now we must estimate how much a magnetic road would cost. We have to worry about labor costs, but I am not even going to estimate those now. I am ONLY going to estimate what it would cost for the raw materials...the neodymium magnets that ruthless talked about. Using the website for purchasing such magnets that ruthless, himself, provided I found that the 1"x1" block style magnet is the most appropriate for our application. So they come in a square inch, and if you buy in a lot size of 250 of these things they will cost you $377.19 per lot. Using the square footage for a (Lane-Mile) I converted that into square inches, and that tells us for one (Lane-Mile) of road we will need 6,079,680 of these square-inch magnets! This equates to purchasing 24,319 lots of these magnets at the above price (maybe you could get a bigger price break, and we can do "what ifs" with a spreadsheet if such were the case). Here is the chart for this analysis, which includes some of the quotes from ruthless as its basis:


So we end up with a comparitive cost of $9,119,625 per (Lane-Mile)!!! for building just one lane and one mile of our magnetic road. Clearly this is way, WAY, W-A-Y more expensive than the $416-$1649 per (Lane-Mile) of today's road technology! And I should point out this is ONLY the cost of the magnets. We have not figured any other materials that might be necessary nor the labor to actually build the road, which is all included in the prices from the empirical equations. I would encourage anyone to take these numbers and calculate what it would cost just to build a 2-lane highway that is 100 miles long! First calculate the cost with today's road tech, and then calculate its cost of JUST the neodymium magnets.

Now, of course one could say "well, yeah, but we could get magnets cheaper than the number you used from ruthless' web page." To that I would ask "how much cheaper?" Because clearly you would need a MASSIVELY LARGE cost break to get the cost of the magnet materials anywhere close to what it costs to build a road today. In fact, it is left as an engineering problem to the student to use the analysis I have done above, and calculate what the cost per 1"x1" neodymium magnet would have to be just to get the road building cost equal to $1649 per (Lane-Mile). Calculate how much each of those magnets would have to cost to get the road building cost to that level, and post your answer here.

In summary, I have done what ruthless asked me to do. I have used engineering to prove one of his assumptions was grossly in error. Does it mean magnetic cars and roads will never be built? Of course not. It only means it is highly unlikely they will be built in our near future (10-50 years, I would say). And once again let me point out: This is NOT about getting emotional. This is NOT about putting ruthless down. This is NOT about trying to humilitate him. This is about dispassionate engineering analysis of a GOOD IDEA that is TECHNICALLY FEASIBLE to see if implementing that idea makes economic sense.

I do these types of analysis all the time as an engineer and a teacher. It ain't rocket science! And folks who wish to make themselves better engineers need to realize that if someone is questioning the viability of someone else's good idea, they are not attacking them personally.
Click to expand...

RMT:

You really spent some time on this and you showed it was very expensive. I thought your points were well put. With your training, experience, and education you know before hand before someone else can truely understand your points. Which is why before you show proof like this that others including myself sometimes take it personally to your comments when you just simply say what you think without showing this kind of proof. Which you do sometimes but that is not an insult. You took the time to show this to use less understanding of your experience and education. It was work, that is your time you are not paid for. Thank you anyway for taking the time to explain. Others including myself are not always as educated and experienced as you are in your field.
 
I appreciate those words, reactor. Thanks! And I can honestly say I have definitely seen a major change in your attitude since you first showed up. While you can be (and are) still passionate about your ideas (which is a fantastic thing!), you have come to realize that when people question your ideas, they are not mounting a personal attack on you. You are separate from your ideas. You're a good guy. I question some of your ideas sometimes, but that is just me the engineer. I still think you are a good guy. My questioning your idea does not change the fact that I could sit down over a beer with you and chat about anything under the sun.

Ruthless mentioned something about him being a "mirror". To some extent he is, and this is a tactic I myself use quite often when someone I am having a discussion with gets emotional. In fact, in this case when I raised the "volume" of the rhetoric with my words of "You want to get ugly? Bring it!", I was mirroring ruthless in his taking my points personally. I BECAME personal because I saw ruthless could not separate engineering feedback from my friendship with him.

One thing about a teacher: We always tend to be in teaching mode. And this is exactly what I have been doing in my debate with ruthless. I have been trying to help him understand that even with good ideas that are technically feasible, that does not mean we should run out and try to implement them. Further analysis is required to make sure we have not made a gross error in some of our unstated assumptions.

I don't hate ruthless. I still consider him my friend. But sometimes hard lessons are some of the most valuable ones that you carry with you the rest of your life. They certainly have been for me. What you see me doing with ruthless' idea (picking it apart to find erroneous assumptions) is something that has been done to me since my engineer father started to teach me how to do engineering analysis. My logic and ideas have been smacked-down quite often. It is how I have learned...
Click to expand...

I understand.
 
this will be my last post.

the reason i am upset about this is because first, you attacked my intelligence. second you gave several low blows like assuming i have a problem with fluid dynamics and thermal dynamics. you assume this because of some conversations we had and i really dont appreciate low blows like that. i have taken potshots like that since i have gotten here and never gotten upset. the single biggest reason i am upset is because this is one of my best ideas, and now its time to prove its a great, feasible idea. it is now time for ray to realize this aint rocket science and to see all that he missed.

you have to add in the cost for research and development for every car ever made and every prototype ever made.

you have to add in construction costs for every vehicle ever made.

you have to add in the cost of gas that is used from 1900 to, lets say 2030.

you have to add in the cost of every road that has been paved and repaved.

you have to add in the cost of maintenence to every car ever made.

you have to add in the cost of polluting the environment for over 100 years.

you have to add in the cost of all liquids an automobile uses. oil, brake fluid, transmission fluid, transaxle grease, etc.

you have to add in the cost of tires and replacements every 50,000 miles or so.

you have to add in the cost of safety.

there are more, but that will more than suffice. now, compare that to:

the cost for magnets to repave every road.

the cost for magnets to put on the car.

the cost for a computer guidance system for the car.

the cost for research and development for the car.

when you add it up, my way is hilariously cheaper. ridiculously cheaper. and its not some idiotic idea of having to fill your tank up with gas.

now, when people start to realize that when you build this, its done and you will never need to do any upkeep, you never have to pay a dollar for gas ever again, that you will never have an accident again, there will never be pollution from vehicles again, then people will realize that it is definitely worth it to change the world.

i have taken alot of crap while i have been at this site. i have been attacked, my wife has been attacked. i was even told by one person that they hope my wife dies in front of me and my family. i have taken it all and been very humble about it.

i draw the line when someone attacks my intelligence, wich is excactly what ray did. every idea ive ever given on this site, ray has struck down with his "supreme brilliance." and im very tired of it.

ray told me i would never build a working plane without going to school for engineering. what he did not realize is that i have already built several. sure they were smaller scale than what i could fit in, but they can be easily scaled up. they flew and all too. some better than store bought models. i told him he was right, and never brought up the fact that i had already done such a task. why? because i respected rays opinions. if he wouldve said i could build a better plane if i were to go to school for engineering, i wouldve agreed. but to tell me i cant is a bit bothersome.

it upsets me very much that the ideas behind the great inventions come from wanting to get paid. i dont care about money and give my ideas freely to help the world. all i want is a world i can actually have fun in. all i want to do is be able to walk down my street without having to worry about some bad guy trying to ruin all of my happiness. i want to be able to do the things i want to without the reprocussions of my pride. but alas, i will always have my pride, and when i am challenged, i will always rise to the occasion.

give it some thought ray. if you ever want to apologize for your rude behavior and jumping to conclusions, i will accept. i may even come back. but until then, i will be an honorable person and not accept personal attacks.

even though the money argument is on my side, no amount of money compares to making the world we live in a better one. goodbye all, i wish you all the best.
Click to expand...


This forum can be rough on people and others say things that can sometimes be really hurtful to our feelings myself included. Ruthless you called me a idiot once. I forgive you and Ray too about what he said about Devry only making techs. I am sure he had his reasons. First of all there will always be accidents. I highly disagree with you on that. Sometime you seem to realize the cost and other times you do not. These are still cost that have to be figured in with the cost of construction and the cost of using the roads. The cars or trucks may be different and in doing so there is different cost. The cost of repair and maintenance of the vehicles even though they are different will still have to be added on to the cost of construction in the figures that you textually spoke about as well as the cost of energy to use the roads that does not seem like it was brought up either. You seem to be forgetting these points. And sure it may be your last post but I am still saying the construction is still not by itself without the cost of construction, use of the roads (some locations could not afford the cost of these roads and would have to charge tolls), energy not talked about, maintenance, and repair of the vehicles that use the roads and the maintenance and repairs of the road itself, tolls again already said, and the administrative and labor cost. This is a really big cost estimate here that can not simply be done by one person in a post because there are a lot of factors here. Even if parts of the country converted to these roads other parts of the country may not. What then? I say this respecting the different opinions of cost here of course.

P.S. When I started this thread I never intended to get anyone into a argument and I am sorry to see someone go away mad. I was trying to have fun and get feedback about what I thought of. Heck, I was really surprised when anyone posted back. I really was. When I first posted here here at TTI in another thread Darby posted about a websight of mine which I came here advertising. I took that really personal. Later as I was here longer I finally did learn that his intentions were well put. He ment to say I was putting my credibabilty at risk that was all. Nothing personal about me. Even today I have to watch it and try to realize that that what is said here is not always what was meant. And yes sometimes people do say things to be hurtful on purpose but that is because they are mad and angry too. Usually they forget about it way before the the person they posted to does. Is that worth being staying mad about. I don't think so. Ruthless I hope you will be ok. Take care guy.
 
Einstein,
I've got this big 40 inch LCD TV that I use for my computer monitor. I couldn't help but notice that your road construction costs don't seem to match the costs depicted in the picture you posted. Did you maybe mistake a comma for a decimal point? Because what I see in the picture looks like everything is 1000 times more than what you stated. So it looks like you made an error in your favor.

Actual road costs are:
Central City Freeway $1,648,427.00
Urban Suburban Freeway $540,545.00
Rural Freeway seems to be clipped off in the picture
Click to expand...

Yes, you did catch an error on my part. A big one. Thanks for pointing that out, and I readily admit I did not look very closely at that page. I just went with those numbers.

Next we get to the amount of magnets needed. I disagree with you completely on this one. The average car weighs around 4000 lbs. The average length of a car is 16 feet and 4 inches. Now we are given that a one foot length of neodymium magnets will lift a car. A one inch square neodymium magnet can lift 500 lbs. A foot length of neodymium magnets would be able to lift 6000 lbs. So a one foot length of neodymium magnets which is really just 12 one inch square neodymium magnets can be dispersed over a 16' 4" length of road. So how many times does 16' 4" go into a mile?
1 mile/16' 4" converts to 63,360"/196" = 323.2653061. Let's just round it off to 324 segments of roadway that only need 12 neodymium magnets per segment. 324 x 12 = 3888 neodymium magnets needed. Now if you can only purchase them in lots of 250: 3888/250 = 15.552 Lets round that off to 16 lots needed. At $377.19 a lot that comes out to 16 x $377.19 = $6035.04 which is a lot lot less than the $9,119,625.00 estimate you provided.

So it does look like Ruthless wins this one.
Click to expand...

You can disagree all you want, but you might wish to wait until more analysis is done before denoting a "winner" (and there is no winner, here. It is analysis). What you have not addressed at all is handling qualities of the vehicle. This is a speciality of mine since I do handling qualities analysis for aircraft. You see, once you get rid of tires ALL of the reactive forces that shape the handling qualities of this magnetic vehicle will have to be generated by magnetic forces. So all your analysis deals with is lifting force. You have not addressed turning forces at all. And those turning forces and their sensitivity to the human driver (who is closing the control loop) will depend heavily upon the spacing of those magnets. I'm afraid your analysis would have to grow significantly (into at least a set of 3-DOF force and moment equations) to be able to predict handling forces and their impact on the dynamic modes of the vehicle. The frequency and damping factor of the natural modes of the vehicle determine the handling qualities. My experience with these things tells me that your attempt to minimize the number of magnets would lead to poor handling qualities. Very jumpy...very quantized. That leads a human to overcorrection, and that leads to oscillations. In the airplane biz we say that poor handling qualities of the airplane can lead to airplane-pilot coupling. This situation is only different in that there are only 3 DOFs.

Sorry I do not have much time to go into more detail, but I am off to build a steel building here in Colorado. I did want to acknowledge the error you caught. But it does not change the conclusion of my analysis. No matter what ruthless tries to (erroneously) add to the analysis, most of those costs are "sunk cost". It is improper to include those in an economic analysis of a future idea. Those costs are paid, and making a magnetic road will not get them back. In fact, new costs associated with the new cars themselves must be analyzed. And let's not forget the magnet costs I estimated are ONLY for those magnet materials. Does not inlude any labor or any other materials. So they even represent the absolute minimum cost to refurbish an existing road.

RMT
 
I agree. Forums can be tough. Even though there may be a disagreement on any idea...the idea is always worth posting. There will always be critics...some nicer than others. No reason to give up.

I posted the idea that developing a program that could accurately predict the movement of billiards balls brought criticism..but the responses weren't taken personally...and provided other points-of-view.

I proceeded to contact people that were actually involved in such programs...and eventually got a really good idea from many different sources what exactly was involved. There may have been sentences formated that I didn't like, but oh well...those sentences didn't sway me from my course...AND every single person I contacted said something of value, even if that tid-bit was small, perhaps a one-liner hidden in a vast sea of grime and sludge.

Some of the 'experts' I contacted were much worse than anyone here...so it happens.

The idea as presented here is fascinating. A good idea...and I don't believe anyone ever said that "it can't be done"...only that this wasnt the right time for such a project to be applied on a large scale.

Even though I haven't put alot of time examining the idea in depth, and I am not an engineer..it seems that 'right now' would be tough. I see the mention of automobiles...but what about heavy vehicles like a Big-Rig that is loaded down with freight ?

Do the magnets in the road remain constant, or is it the vehicle that needs to be adpated to comply with whatever type of weight it will be ?

And if the vehicles still require tires, to be able to make a transition from the magnetic road, to a dirt road, then tires would still be needed, as would suspension, and any suspension needs lubrication...so no savings there. I may be wrong, but am curious how you would overcome these type of obstacles with this transportation system.

And is the structure of a levitating vehicles as strong as a vehicle that is required to be able to handle various road conditions ?

Many of the counties here in Texas are cash poor...and there are hundreds, if not thousands of miles of roads that are just plain old dirt and rock. I don't understand how a magnetic system would work in those areas.

I would hope that you don't see this as trying to knock down anybody's idea's..but am interested enough to want to know how such a system would be used in various regions and/or varying condtions.

And I agree that the current system seems to be lacking compared to the technology that is and may be available in the future.

The way I see it, is that if we focused on the vehicles first..to get them off of fossil fuels...or are able to use re-newable sources of energy...that would be a step in the right direction.

I drive a 4 x 4 into some fairly rough terrain -- and I don't see a magnetic vehicle doing the same.

In a large city like Los Angeles...the conditions may be different than out in the remote regions of the country. It sure would be nice to drive down a rough road, floating off the ground, however, I don't see our county government shelling out the money to magnetise all of the areas that wheeled vehicles now travel.

I hope that nobody stop's posting, even when met with a bit of negativity...this can be a good play ground for idea's...all that is here are letters on a screen. When I contacted some of the 'experts' regarding the billiards thing, talking to someone on the phone was a whole different thing if they treated me in a way I didnt like -- it was far more personal.

And I am sure these threads are being read by lurkers..who either haven't joined the forum, or havent written anything. You may have influenced someone without knowing it, who will be instrumental in one day bringing your dream to reality.

If nobody said anything, then a good idea may have just vanished, never even given the opportunity to inspire.
 
"I agree. Forums can be tough. Even though there may be a disagreement on any idea...the idea is always worth posting. There will always be critics...some nicer than others. No reason to give up."

your right. but the thing is, i am leaving because i felt insulted by a friend. sometimes that hurts alot worse than if a total stranger does it. and it really hurts when someone who is supposed to be as smart as ray becomes blind to alot of things.


"The idea as presented here is fascinating. A good idea...and I don't believe anyone ever said that "it can't be done"...only that this wasnt the right time for such a project to be applied on a large scale."

this is the perfect time, in my opinion. it could possibly even stabilize an ailing economy.


"I see the mention of automobiles...but what about heavy vehicles like a Big-Rig that is loaded down with freight ?"

i am not sure about that, but i believe putting more magnets on the vehicle would do the trick. if the truck were designed right, im sure it could spread the weight evenly enough to lift it.

that brings me to another idea. high speed goods lines. you could have pipeline type deals above or below ground that transport goods to various nodes across the usa. they could then be removed and taken to the place it needs to be much easier because its closer. people get their goods faster, and much simpler.


"Do the magnets in the road remain constant, or is it the vehicle that needs to be adpated to comply with whatever type of weight it will be ?"

the magnets in the road should stay constant. but i believe this will work with big rig type deals. the rig will basically be a steel frame with magnets attached, so it shouldnt be much weight, and if built correctly, could spread the weight out instead of bulking it into one place.


"And if the vehicles still require tires, to be able to make a transition from the magnetic road, to a dirt road, then tires would still be needed, as would suspension, and any suspension needs lubrication...so no savings there. I may be wrong, but am curious how you would overcome these type of obstacles with this transportation system."

the reason there are dirt roads is because there is no money to pave them. we have plenty of dirt roads where i am from too. i believe that with this system, there will be enough money to pave every road. so you would not need another system in place.

you could put tires, an electric motor, a battery, and a solar panel onto the car to be able to go from place to place that does not have the magnetic system, but i dont like that idea very much. it adds weight to the vehicle, and would be alot more working parts that would have a chance to fail. with the original setup, the only thing that can break is the computer, or whatever turns the magnets.

"Many of the counties here in Texas are cash poor...and there are hundreds, if not thousands of miles of roads that are just plain old dirt and rock. I don't understand how a magnetic system would work in those areas."


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26381283/
carmakers ask for alot of money from the government. im sure that 50 billion would be enough to pave every road in texas.

"The way I see it, is that if we focused on the vehicles first..to get them off of fossil fuels...or are able to use re-newable sources of energy...that would be a step in the right direction."

the way i see it, filling up your tank with any kind of gas is a bad thing. running out of gas does not seem very futuristic to me. i would like to stay away from gas tank ideas because i would like for running out of gas to be a thing of the past.


"I drive a 4 x 4 into some fairly rough terrain -- and I don't see a magnetic vehicle doing the same."

your correct, if theres no magnets, it cant go there. but there is hope on that area. if einstein perfects his antigravity, you would be able to then. i dont know how feasible that would be though.

however, people could buy specialized offroad vehicles that are electric. it would suck not to be able to hear a v8 rip up mud, but it would have alot of benefits.

another thing about this setup that ive read prople think it will fail at is hills. it will not fail when going up a hill. it will not fail when going down a hill. it will not fail going left, right, front or back. it will actually handle better than vehicles nowadays.

and another thing. there will be no accidents because the computer itself will control the aspects of that. even a suicidal person would not be able to crash their car becuase the computer will not let it go into the other lane. you can also make it to where the cars have a magnetic field that pushes other cars. that way there are no more fender benders. and in extreme emergencies, you could grab the emergency brake, wich would turn the magnets over, causing the machine to instantly hit the ground and stop. it would not be a hard impact because the neodymium road would absorb the impact. neodymium magnets are actually magnetic powder that has been compacted.


"If nobody said anything, then a good idea may have just vanished, never even given the opportunity to inspire."

im really not trying to "sell" anyone on this idea. i have been just defending my beliefs about it. i do plan later on in life to have a go at it though. i would want to put on a great presentation before i tried to do this though. im 27 now. i plan on doing it at 40-50 years old. thats my plan at least. i will have the money and credibility by then.
 
"You really spent some time on this and you showed it was very expensive. I thought your points were well put. With your training, experience, and education you know before hand before someone else can truely understand your points."

heh. he was wrong reactor.

and i apologize for calling you an idiot. it came from frustration. i wanted you to realize how big of a task you were undertaking. videogames nowadays have millions and millions of lines of code, and thats just a videogame. i hope you understand. i get frustrated when noone listens to me. sorry.
 
"No matter what ruthless tries to (erroneously) add to the analysis, most of those costs are "sunk cost". It is improper to include those in an economic analysis of a future idea. Those costs are paid, and making a magnetic road will not get them back."

500 million for r&amp;d on gm's newest vehicle is sunk cost? wow... 50 billion from the government is sunk cost? double wow...'

if it is improper to include these in an economic analysis, then im a total idiot...

...too bad im not.

they are not erroneously added. this vehicle will never use any of those things, yet the automobile will. i wanted you to add it all up to see how much money has really been wasted. and will continue to be wasted.
you can use those figures to get an idea of how much money the automotive industry has used in the past. now you can use it to model the cost of its future.

it seems to me that your out to bust this idea apart. im still waiting for you to. you havent shown me anything yet except a math teacher not doing their math right. and a "master" in economics fail miserably. i bet your students would get a good kick out of that. you would do good to learn a lesson in humbleness and manners.
 
this will be my last post.
Click to expand...

And yet you continue. I wonder why? Actually, I know why. No need to say here.

ray told me i would never build a working plane without going to school for engineering. what he did not realize is that i have already built several. sure they were smaller scale than what i could fit in, <font color="red">but they can be easily scaled up.[/COLOR]
Click to expand...

And this is exactly your error. I could bombard you with all the past projects that prove "scaling things up" is oh so very non-trivial. If you don't believe me, ask Elon Musk. Don't recognize the name? He's the guy who started Paypal who started SpaceX and is still trying to fly the Falcon 1 launch vehicle. 3 tries, 3 failures (lost payloads). He is exactly finding that it is NOT easy and NOT trivial to scale-up the simple rockets that amateurs fly. And he has tinkled away a LOT of his own fortune making mistakes that were made and learned from on past aerospace programs. He has a habit of not listening to the engineers he hires who have many more years experience in aerospace vehicles.

Elon Musk is a very smart guy. He might even be as smart as ruthless!
But he assumed "people are flying rockets, it should be easy to scale them up into big-time launch vehicles... just like the big boys (Boeing/Lockheed) have done."

He is a living testament for exactly how hard scaling-up anything is, and being able to make it right.

when you add it up, my way is hilariously cheaper. ridiculously cheaper.
Click to expand...

You are incorrect in your assessment. I can not only update my numbers above, but I can continue to walk thru the details of how you would build up a development and certification plan for the system you propose. And how you estimate the costs for all phases of a technology development program. And each time I go further into the analysis, it will show you just how wrong (and arrogant) you are to make the statements immediately above.

You asked me to prove you wrong. I have started that process with the estimates above. Are you ready to put your numbers next to mine? That is, if you have the numbers? So far it is you making statements like the above, and not having ANY numbers to back them up. I have started showing numbers.... and the more numbers I show, the harder it will be for you to back your claims.

But you wanted to stop posting. So let me ask you explicitly:

<font color="blue"> DO YOU WISH TO GO ON? [/COLOR]

If you say no, I will leave it at this. But if you wish me to continue the analysis, you will get it all.

RMT
 
heh. he was wrong reactor.

and i apologize for calling you an idiot. it came from frustration. i wanted you to realize how big of a task you were undertaking. videogames nowadays have millions and millions of lines of code, and thats just a videogame. i hope you understand. i get frustrated when noone listens to me. sorry.
Click to expand...

I understand and I am listening. I know my work is cut out for me. RMT and Einstein are a little out of my league in the Math department but I enjoy looking at their work on this. It would be nice if we could convert on a large scale to the roads and vehicles you have suggested. Just the money along we spent invading Iraq probably could of done your project not counting everything the united states gives away to other countries while we are still going into debt. So on the money side this country wast so much money that projects like this instead of throwing all that cash away could be done. Heck, just the bribes along that congress accepts on the side to increase there personal income along with their 10 percent raises would be a good start.
 
"And yet you continue. I wonder why? Actually, I know why. No need to say here."

yes, i know theres no need. you would hate it if everyone knew your dirty tactics. i told you through personal message that i would not be posting here anymore until you decided to quit being an ass. you then replied through personal message and said that would be just fine. after that, you reply to me in this post with even more negative comments. not a very honorable thing to do. you couldve let it die right there, but nooo. you had to stir the pot a little more to make yourself feel better and look better. i dont need to do such things. but what i do need to do is rid the world of cheats, cons, and all around dirty MF's.

you need to realize that although my screen name is ruthless, i do not live up to that name. you have never, ever seen me get ruthless. but i will tell you this, i can thrash you both physically and mentally. you may not think so and thats fine, but keep playing games and you will find out. you might want to think on that a little. you have alot to lose, i dont.


"He is a living testament for exactly how hard scaling-up anything is, and being able to make it right."

yeah, that really convinces me that i cant...

heres a secret: i cant never could do anything. ponder on that one for a bit.

"DO YOU WISH TO GO ON?"

yes.

i suggest you choose your path wisely.
 
ruthless

"DO YOU WISH TO GO ON?"

yes.

i suggest you choose your path wisely.
Click to expand...

If you really want to know how to handle Ray, I suggest you read some of Creedo's posts. Ray was like putty in Creedo's hands. LOL....
 
Back
Top