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Rising gasoline prices may just make other forms of alternative means of transportation become more attractive. One of the ways not to be affected by the rising prices of gas is to have an alternative means of travel. Of course, saving up on gasoline use may help in some way, but such actions may still leave one affected with the rising prices of gas. A better way would be trying to use a mode of transportation aside from one that makes use of fuel aside from gasoline. One such example is the use of an electric car.

An electric car is one type of an alternative vehicle. It makes use of electricity as its primary power source. Instead of an internal combustion engine, the electric car, also commonly called as an EV or electric vehicle, has an electric motor to make the vehicle move. It is an alternative fuel vehicle that does not use refined fossil oil for fuel.

Electric cars get electricity for power by means of electric battery packs built on board. One of the advantages of using electric vehicles or EV’s is that they are environmentally friendly. Unlike fossil fuel that emits a number of pollutants into the air when being used, the use of electricity for power does not do so, except that the power plants that may produce them do. But with using electric cars, the emission of harmful pollutants may be reduced substantially. Less cars using fossils fuel and gasoline would help make this possible. And someday, when more electric power is sourced from nuclear, solar, wind and hydro-electric power plants, pollutant emissions will even be reduced more.

Performance-wise, electric cars offer smoother and noiseless operation that cars relying on gasoline. Electric cars provide stronger acceleration and the electric motor requires lesser maintenance than the internal combustion engines of cars using gasoline and other fossil fuels. By using electricity through batteries, energy conversion is more efficient. Electric motors makes use of 75 percent of the chemical energy converted into electricity to run the car. Internal combustion engines or ICE’s only are able to make use about 20 percent of the energy stored in gasoline to power the vehicle.

If most think that the electric car is a recent invention, then they are mistaken. The electric vehicle is in fact one of the earliest vehicles known to exist. Small electric powered vehicles even predate the development of the diesel and gasoline engines. The earliest electric carriage was built between 1832 and 1839. The development of other electric cars also increased for some time during the 1860′s along with the improvement of the storage battery. It was even the electric cars that held many of the speed and distance records during this time. But unfortunately, the advent of the internal combustion engines came during the early 1900′s, which led to the decrease in the use of electric cars.

With the appearance of the more powerful and affordable diesel and gasoline powered cars starting in the early 1900′s, the market for electric cars slowly disappeared. Although there were still electric cars being made, those that do exist were being produced for specialized applications. One of the most common use for the electric vehicle today may be found in the golf carts as a primary mode of compact transport in golf courses. But because of the rising gasoline prices as well as the worsening pollution, there has been an renewed demand for the less polluting alternative electric vehicles in recent years.

 NOVYAR

The media are full of news about electric cars. The $100,000 Tesla electric sports car is going to be sold soon, automakers are falling over each other to announce new electric vehicles, and entrepreneurs across the world are jockeying for venture capital.

Petroleum prices have jumped during the last year and everybody is feeling the pain at the pump. Not a single soul is concerned about filling up the batteries of his next electric car with electricity. After all, you just plug the car into the next receptacle and there seem to be no appreciable costs.

Joe owns a Corvette, a high performance car manufactured by General Motors, which according to the car manufacturer drives 25 miles per gallon.

Joe’s monthly commute is 1000 miles, he drives very carefully, and actually achieves 25 MPG on his daily trip going to work and running errands. At $4.00 per gallon at the pump he is paying $160 for gasoline every month.

Joe is thinking about buying the Tesla, an electric sports car. He tried to find the cost of electricity for driving this car. He could not find any data anywhere. Joe knows that he must explain to his wife why he needs to save energy and money before buying the Tesla, a new, very fast electric sports car.

The Tesla will accelerate faster than his Corvette. There is no doubt that an electric vehicle can have a faster acceleration than a gasoline car. Electric motors and liquid fuel engines are just two different devices converting electric energy or petroleum fuel energy into mechanical energy. Electric motors can generate much higher torque at the wheels at much lower turning speeds.

In comparison, electric motors will have several shortcomings, too. They certainly will emit more pollutants and more carbon dioxide as long as coal is used for producing electric power. Overall energy efficiency of the electric car, from power plant to the road, is still worse than that of a modern automobile propelled by an advanced combustion engine.

The biggest drawback of electric cars is the small number of miles they can drive after a complete recharge. Additionally, the charging of an empty electric battery will take forever, high performance batteries are expensive, and will only have a limited life expectancy.

What about energy costs for driving an electric car compared to a gasoline powered car? Both vehicles will have to store energy. The electric car stores electric energy in its battery, the combustion engine powered car stores energy in the form of gasoline or diesel fuel in its fuel tank.

Now let us take a comparative look at the cost of storing and paying for enough electric energy or liquid fuel energy to drive 100 miles. Let us assume that both cars will have the same power requirements to drive 100 miles. In this respect the match-up between Tesla and Corvette is perfect. But how do we compare prices at the gas station with utility costs at the receptacle?

Energy contained in gasoline can be converted into mechanical energy only at the limited energy conversion efficiency of a typical heat engine. The Corvette engine will have an energy conversion efficiency of about 35%. (Fuel fired engines may eventually reach 50% peak energy conversion efficiency after decades of future advancements). Conversion efficiency of electric power from the receptacle into stored energy first and into mechanical energy later is much higher at about 85%.

The energy content of gasoline is 131 MJ/gallon (megajoule per gallon). For driving 100 miles the Corvette will burn four gallons of gasoline or 524 MJ/100 miles. Only 35% of the energy in gasoline or 183 MJ will be used to propel the Corvette. This is the mechanical energy transmitted to the rear wheels of the Corvette. Virtually the same amount of energy must be transferred to the wheels of the electric car, the Tesla. Both cars are very similar in size and driving characteristics.

However, the Tesla has to take a little more energy from the receptacle because the charging, storing, and discharging of electricity in the battery experiences energy losses. These losses are about 15% of the electric energy taken from the receptacle and will not be available at the wheels. The Tesla owner will, therefore, pay 1.15 times as much to get the same energy to the wheels as the Corvette or 211 MJ per 100 miles. Electric energy is priced in the form of dollar per kilowatt hour or $/kWh. The average price of electricity in the US is $0.09/kWh. The factor for converting energy measured in MJ to energy measured in kWh is 0.2778 kWh/MJ.

To drive 100 miles, the Tesla will consume 58.6 kWh of electricity at a cost of $5.28. The Corvette will consume 4 gallons of gasoline at a cost of $16. Now we know that the Tesla will save about $10 per 100 miles or $10,000 over 100,000 miles.

The Tesla will cost $100,000. The Corvette is priced from $50,000 to $75,000. Guess who gets the square deal with the roar of the engine as a free bonus.

You’ll take the checker flag every time when you show off your collector cars on a checkerboard floor.

Now the Internet can get you complete quotes with step-by-step instructions on how to put down the checkerboard floor you have always dreamed of. By being artistic, you can make concrete floors develop character and give you easy maintenance. All too often collectors fail to take full creative advantage of their facilities largest single surface, their floors. Epoxy coatings can not only give you the ease of maintenance associated with a class III laboratory floor surface but great individualized looks as well.

Your project will start by measuring your floors, length and width. Then decide on the size and color of the squares that you want. 24″ x 24″ squares will be less work than 12″ x 12″ and will not give that tile look. The color can be traditional black and white, but if you have a blue car, dark blue might be the answer. Naturally, if you’re going to do the work to achieve a custom checkerboard floor you want it to last. Just as with that glowing car finish, we all know that it is prep, prep, and prep that make the difference between a good job and a great job.

Ever notice how when you walk across concrete in your socks they get all dusty on the bottoms. That’s because concrete continuously deteriorates and breaks apart leaving the garage dusty like your socks. A few dips of oil on concrete might still be seen years later as the oil soaks into porous concrete. But if you seal the floor with an epoxy coating that adheres well to the concrete because your prep job was good, you can just wipe off oil, gas, and dirt with a rag. You can hose out and squeegee that garage floor to a clean shiny surface in minutes.

Your prep should include a high alkaline cleaner used with a rotary scrubber and a black pad or stiff Nilo grit type concrete brush. Your prep should include a high alkaline degreaser to bring the pH of the floor up to nearly 12 as it removes the left over adhesive and contaminants. Then you shock the concrete and contaminants into letting go by switching to scrubbing with an acidic cleaner containing water softeners, detergents, and rinse agents that bring the floor down to a pH of 3.5. This jump in pH will force contaminants and vulnerable cement particles to release from the floor. The acidic cleaner also opens the floor up to allow the epoxy top coats to create a strong long-lasting bond. A final scrub rinse and the floor is ready to dry and start accepting repairs and artistic coloring.

First you should coat the entire floor with two coats of your light color. You can screen between coats with your scrubber to remove any sand, bugs or contaminants that fell into the first coat. Next pull a chalk line diagonally through the widest part of your floor to set your pattern. Now lay down any size template squares side by side in two rows along the chalk line, and remove every other one. Using blue tape, place paper that is cut one inch smaller than your templates, setting them in the open squares. Tape the paper masking down with blue tape and move on. Once complete, you just walk on the paper and use a roller and brush to fill in the open squares. Note that for best results, brush from the tape towards the center to avoid getting epoxy leaking under your tape. One coat of your dark color should be sufficient. Once you have filled in all the open squares with your dark color be sure to remove the tape and masking paper. You don’t want to glue that tape to your floor.

Durall Industrial Flooring supplies kits of materials including checkerboard templates in 24″ x 24″ size that are customized to owner specification and delivered directly to the job site. Kits include full directions and 24/7 help lines staffed by seasoned flooring experts, so professionals and amateurs alike can successfully install a quality floor.

Web visitors can obtain free, job-specific quotes on materials or nationwide turnkey installations by completing a simple questionnaire at http://www.concrete-floor-coatings.com.

For high-resolution photo examples, visit: http://www.concrete-floor-coatings.com/photos/checkerboard

For more information, contact Harvey Chichester at: harvey@concrete-floor-coatings.com Phone: 1-800-466-8910 or 952-888-1488 (24/7)

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