I was listening to the radio today and the jockey was talking about hot & cold fuel.... :blink: This is what I found so far.. Well I thought I had heard everything until now! :huh: This is the Data site: Intresting, What do the scientific minds here on PC think/say about this?? :mellow:
I say sue the frikin' sun...that's the thing making it hot here. Illegally warming our gasoline so we only get 99% of our gallon instead of the full 100%. Better yet, let's make everyone in the Northern states pay a subsidy to the southern states...since they get 'cold gas' during ~1/2 the year and thus are getting 101% of a gallon they should reimburse the southerners for this horrendous financial loss each of them is taking. Good gosh, b/w the variability of each pump, temp of fuel coming out of the underground tanks, spillage, etc....the cost and/or gain to any individual consumer is a drop in the bucket (or gas tank)...how stupid to create a law suit over something like this.
I think Evan's right in filing a class-action lawsuit. But he's looking the wrong way. Clearly, as the Earth's molten-iron core rotates, it's heating the gasoline. The Earth's core, of course, is being fed by the Troglodytes living between the mantle and the Outer Core. So perhaps they are the ones we should target. Clearly, regardless of who we go after, a lawsuit is the American way! With all that silliness aside, how do the retailers heat the fuel? How much energy is put into heating a full holding tank of gasoline?
I say sue the tobacco lobby. Yeah, they have nothing to do with it, but they have so many lawsuits already they won't notice another one.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(TonyPSchaefer @ Dec 27 2006, 09:50 AM) [snapback]367213[/snapback]</div> I'm a scientific type (astronomer) and I'd like to join the suit, especially against this administration that is allowing global warming, the obvious culprit. (Did we have any lawsuits before Bush's administration? Proves my point!) Pretty soon I'll have to wear asbestos gloves at the pump. I'm really against suing the frikin' sun, however. It's my main stock in trade and I just can't stand another hit right now. Bad enough I lost Pluto! As a Californian, in the heat of things, so to speak, I take a cold compress to Costco each time I fill up and wrap it around the hose. I manage to get a little over 12 gallons into my Prius with some work. (Be ready to slap the gas cap on real fast if you try this.) (And please watch the name-calling on PriusChat! Troglodytes have feelings too. You want another law suit? We have Moderators to keep this sort of thing down.)
I don't see anything ridiculous about this. Let's reverse the tables for a moment, do you think, even for a moment, if there was some way the oil companies could come up with a new way to "game" more cash out of what they manufacture, no matter how incredulous the mechanism, they wouldn't? :lol: Just think of W.K.T.E.C... More has been lost over a lot less... h34r:
I've pretty well managed to put my previous life as a TWA pilot behind me but this got me to thinking. On my L-1011 I ordered fuel by the pound, not the gallon. The airplane gauges registered pounds burned per hour. This was because of fuel density. Depending on the temperature, 10,000 pounds of fuel took up more or less space in the tanks. This was not normally something I had to think about too much because I seldom ever took off with full tanks. (You burn fuel to carry fuel, a waste.) But an individual tank might be full and any excess I required had to go in another. Fuel density would limit the number of pounds I could put on board but it rarely was a problem because we had so many tanks. In our car, we ALWAYS order a full tank. In the same way, the number of gallons we get weighs something different depending on the temp. It's the pounds, the "mass" of the fuel, that counts. E = mc^2. In a 10 gallon tank it would be interesting to see the difference in pounds delivered in winter vs. summer. For us, the whole thing is probably a wash but a professional truck driver might see some important differences. As Sen. Proxmire once famously said about the budget, "A billion here, a billion there... Pretty soon we're talking about real money." (I think he said "million" but that isn't real money anymore.) So, the solution for this is to sell gasoline by the pound, I think. This would require a density sensor that varied with the temperature be put on each fuel pump. This alone would probably send the cost of gas to astronomical levels. Give the truckers a subsidy and forget all this. It's cheaper.
Sales of large wholesale volumes take temperature into account, and Hawaii and Canada require gas prices to be adjusted for temp at the pump.
Well, the solution is to gas up when it's cold. Even in California it gets into the 60s or lower at night. So you just have to find a station where you can gas up at 3am. Should be pretty cold then. Of course that station will probably charge more for being open 24 hours so in the end it will be a wash.
The solution here is obvious. A "simple" in-line device attached to each pump that detects the temperture of the gasoline before it hits the volume meter. It would then either heat or cool the gas to within =/- -.5 degrees F of 60 degrees. Such a device should cost no more than $15,000 per pump and take no more than 10 years to install nationwide.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Alnilam @ Dec 27 2006, 04:33 PM) [snapback]367280[/snapback]</div> As much as this? [attachmentid=6027] Taken at a fill up about two weeks ago...!
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(efusco @ Dec 27 2006, 03:47 PM) [snapback]367331[/snapback]</div> Teehee! Don't forget that first we have to commission a "Blue Ribbon" panel to discuss the idea...that ought to add another decade, easy, onto the lag between ideation and implementation.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Pinto Girl @ Dec 27 2006, 03:14 PM) [snapback]367353[/snapback]</div> Oh, of course....I bet they could pump $10-15 billion into this project. In the mean time Darellddl will have strong-armed the big 3 into convertering their entire fleets to pure EV!
I call BS. At least in regards to retailors. Years ago, I managed a gas station. It is expensive enough for an operator to put in a tank, let alone put in heating elements. And by the way...How much would the electricity cost to heat up a tank of about 7000 gallons? I would guess that it costs much more than any supposed increase they'd get by the fuel expansion. I can see the oil refineries storing their tanker trucks in a heated warehouse (esp. here in the north) to keep the fuel warm, but that's about it.
