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Message no. 1
From: "Jason Carter, Nightstalker" <CARTER@***.EDU>
Subject: Engine Ideas
Date: Tue, 2 Feb 93 23:29:04 CET
ArkAngel,
Good ideas. Thanks for bring them up. A little fine tuning and they should
be useable. As for engine size, I think they'll need to be a little smaller.
Maybe 75 kg/Unit Cruising speed per NERP. A chart of NERPS to move at speed X
would look like this:

Car Size: NERPS of Engine to Cruise at:
Type NERPS Weight 25 30 40 60 70 80
--------- ----- ------ ----------------------------
Mini 800 400 133 160 213 320 373 427
Small 1400 700 233 280 373 560 653 747
Medium 2000 1000 333 400 533 800 933 1067
Large 2800 1400 467 560 747 1120 1306 1494
Ex. Large 3800 1900 633 760 1013 1520 1773 2027

Of course this chart has some design flaws, mostly the fact that for high
cruising speeds the engines are too big, but some work can even that out. Maybe
engines get a better NERP to power rating as they get larger. And of course
when making an Engine chart we will have to do something like make engines for
say only NERPS that are divisible by 10.
What do you guys think?

See Ya in Shadows,
Jason J Carter
The Nightstalker
Message no. 2
From: R Andrew Hayden <rahayden@*****.WEEG.UIOWA.EDU>
Subject: Re: Engine Ideas
Date: Wed, 3 Feb 93 05:52:44 CET
On Tue, 2 Feb 1993, Jason Carter, Nightstalker wrote:

>
> ArkAngel,
> Good ideas. Thanks for bring them up. A little fine tuning and they should
> be useable. As for engine size, I think they'll need to be a little smaller.
> Maybe 75 kg/Unit Cruising speed per NERP. A chart of NERPS to move at speed X
> would look like this:

I still think those engines are WAY WAY WAY too big.

>
> Car Size: NERPS of Engine to Cruise at:
> Type NERPS Weight 25 30 40 60 70 80
> --------- ----- ------ ----------------------------
> Mini 800 400 133 160 213 320 373 427
> Small 1400 700 233 280 373 560 653 747
> Medium 2000 1000 333 400 533 800 933 1067
> Large 2800 1400 467 560 747 1120 1306 1494
> Ex. Large 3800 1900 633 760 1013 1520 1773 2027

I just don't like this idea. First, in your chart, you suddenly have
produced not five, but thirty different engines. This makes it all the
more complicated to compute an "engine power v vehicle weight" ration.
Also, any accessory that has characteristics based in any way on the size
of the engine would suddently have to have thirty different accessories.
See, in the end, it could get really complicated.

Let me try to throw this out:


Size Weight/NERPs Power
------------ ------------- -----------------
Mini 200 1600
Small 350 2800
Medium 500 4000
Large 700 5600
X-Large 950 7200

Weight = 1/2 weight of comparable Chassis
Power = 4x the weight of the enging

Now, the next step is to figure out a relation between Power and the
weight of the vehicle. This relationship will yield:

MAX cruising Speed
This is the maximum speed a vehicle can travel without losing
efficiency. Driving slower than this won't increase efficiency, but
exceeding it will dramatically decrease it.

MAX Redline Speed
This is the maximum speed a vehicle can travel without seriously
straining the engine. To exceed redline requires checks against the
engine for damage.

Fuel Efficiency (Kilometers/liter or Kilometers/kilowatt)
Essentially, how far you can go on what amount if you don't exceed
cruising speed. Of course, if you exceed that, your gas milage
goes to hell.

I have no idea on equations to yield these numbers (my brain is pretty far
gone right now.).

What the above table does, though, is it provides us with a fairly
straigh-forward (and thus simple) engine. There may be some variation is
weight and power based on whether the engine is electric, but that would
be worked out.

Also, this keeps engines relational between vehicle types. We can say
that a 500kg/500NERP engine is the same whether it is mounted in a
volkswagon or a helicopter, thus building another strength into the system.

As always, comments are appreciated.



]> Robert Hayden <] [> This .signature has been made <]
]> <] [> with 85% recycled pixels. <]
]> rahayden@*****.weeg.uiowa.edu <]
]> aq650@****.INS.CWRU.Edu <]

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