6- INVENTIONS

ELECTRIC CAR / POWER SOLUTIONS

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As electric cars become more popular, one of consumers main concerns is the limitations of a rechargeable battery. Here are a couple of quick thoughts on some solutions.

Between cities, major and secondary highways could be set up with periodic charge lanes. The charge lane would last for around 50km and consist of an overhead electrical cable. A retractable rod is extended by the car, making contact with the wire and charging the car as it drives. A computer on the car would track the amount of power used and would send the information to the power company for billing.

Another possible solution would be to have electric car batteries standardized. They would be located on the bottom of the car on a quick-release system. To refuel, the car would drive into an automized refueling station. The station would be similar to an automatic car wash but with 2 “oil change” type pits. At the first pit, the automatic system would remove the low battery from the car and place it on the stations charging system. At the second pit a different, fully charged battery would be installed. The battery could be changed in under 2 minutes. Because the car would have a different battery every time it was recharged, the batteries would be rentals from large chain refueling stations. The car owner would be charged a flat rate yearly for the rental as well as a recharging fee every time the battery is changed. The rental battery would also be able to be recharged from home and other current recharging methods when available. The yearly cost of the rental battery would be offset with the savings when purchasing the car by making the battery an option.

Dave Lister

listerlogic.com

3- SOLVING WORLD PROBLEMS

HOW TO FIGHT COVID-19 / ARE WE DOING IT RIGHT?

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March 13, 2020, due to Covid-19 the government has just announced a partial shutdown of the Country. Schools until April 2020 and sporting events until June 2020 to name a few. The public perception seems to be that the worst of this disease will be over in several months and things will go back to normal, but with the development of vaccine possibly a year or more away, there is nothing to stop the rapid spreading of the disease again, as soon as the closures are lifted. Can we keep the Country closed for a year, what about food, essential services, and the economy?

So what is the best way to deal with this problem? The key is in the 2 things that make this virus unique. The first is that it is highly contagious and easily transmitted. The second is that it is not fatal in the vast majority of the population. Until a cure is found the answer is to isolate as much as possible, the small percentage of the population that has conditions that may cause the disease to be fatal. The rest of the healthy population should be allowed to be naturally exposed to the virus as quickly as possible, but at a controlled rate that would not overwhelm our health care system for those that may need extra help recovering. Once a high percentage of the healthy population has built up a natural immunity to Covid-19, it would make it extremely difficult for the virus to remain active. Those people at high risk could then come out of isolation in relative safety.

So what do we do now? We are lucky in Canada as our health system is not already overwhelmed. The current closures should help keep it that way. The next step is to slowly start opening things to the healthy public and allowing the virus to spread at a controlled rate. Monitoring hospital capacity is crucial in how fast we open things up. Who we consider not healthy and should remain in isolation should be based on statistical information from other countries on mortality rates due to age, and underlining conditions. Results from some of these countries like China should be scrutinized for accuracy.

If you are part of the healthy population you need to make a decision on your strategy. Do you try to hide from what may turn out to be inevitable or do you allow yourself to be infected at a time the emergency ward of the hospital is not overrun and can help you if you need them? After all, giving your immune system a workout now may help you get through Covid-2?.

Dave Lister

listerlogic.com

6- INVENTIONS

HYBRID ROCKETS

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When launching a rocket, a large percentage of its fuel is used not only to gain altitude and accelerate from 0 to the speed of sound but to also overcome the drag from the denser air of the lower atmosphere. Could a hybrid rocket be used to overcome these challenges? Launched from inside a high mountain with ground-based energy, it could already have achieved significant altitude and velocity before even starting its engines in the higher thinner air of the upper atmosphere. The entire facility needed could even be hollowed out of a mountain so that all that’s visible from the outside is the launch tube door.

  • LAUNCH TUBE- A near verticle tube used to launch the rocket. (It could be cut in the mountain with a machine currently used to cut subway tunnels.) Before launch, the launch tube vacuum door is closed. With the rocket at the base of the tube, the air in the tube is pumped out, creating a vacuum. At launch, the rocket is pushed through the launch tube using power created from the power tube. As the rocket accelerates through the tube, air is blown in behind it, when it reaches Mach 0.99 near the end of the tube, built-up air pressure from residual air in front of the rocket becomes slightly higher than the outside air pressure at the top of the mountain. Just as the rocket gets to the end of the tube, the launch tube vacuum door is blown open. The rocket exits the tube just under the speed of sound. When clear of the mountain, the main engine ignites and the rocket continues on its trajectory to orbit.
  • POWER TUBE– A verticle tube cut in the mountain to provide the energy to launch. Energy, both Kinetik and electromagnetic is produced by dropping a massive weighted magnet through the coil lined power tube. Before launch, the weighted magnet (weighing more than the launch vehicle) is slowly raised to the top of the power tube and the air is pumped out creating a vacuum. At launch, the weighted magnet is dropped down the power tube. The Kinetik and electromagnetic energy released is used to power the rocket through the tube. The best means of energy transfer between the power tube and the rocket is still to be designed.

Dave Lister

listerlogic.com

3- SOLVING WORLD PROBLEMS

“WHERE’S WALDO” INSPIRES BEST BEFORE DATES ON FOOD

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Have you ever been in a hurry and after rushing through the supermarket and getting home, you realize the expiration date on what you just bought for dinner passed 3 months ago? At almost any given store now, you can find expired food or food that is long past the best before date still selling on the shelves at full price. Enough is enough, its time for the government to impose regulations that will not only protect the consumer but stop the wasting of food and even help with the hunger problem we have in this country.

The “best before” and “expiration” dates on packaging is a problem that’s been driving consumers crazy for years. Every item you pick up is a new game of “Where’s Waldo”. Location, small font size, lack of contrast with the background, or written in a long code the CIA couldn’t crack are some of the biggest problems. Sometimes the date doesn’t say if it is the best before or the expiration and on top of that, a lot of people still aren’t really sure of the difference (the best before is the date of the item’s optimum freshness, but many items are still perfectly good and safe to eat beyond this date, until they reach their expiration date).

If the government were to start phasing in regulations, everyone would benefit. Heres what I would suggest:

  • Every grocery item that is required to currently have a best before or expiry date should be required to have both
  • The best before and expiry date to be located on the front or main side of the item.
  • The size of the font for the dates should be no less than 0.3 cm high.
  • The dates should be written in black on a white background or similar contrast to make it easily readable
  • The dates should all be written in the same format: MMM DD YYYY
This is an example of how the above products would look under the new regulations

So how would the new labeling help?

  • It would make it easier for supermarkets to keep stock rotated on the shelves and harder for them to try saving money by not rotating.
  • Supermarkets would also be pressured to sell items that had passed the best before date but still before the expiration dates at a reduced price, making it more affordable to those on a tight budget.
  • Consumers would have an easier time finding and being more aware of the dates. This would also make it harder for supermarkets to sell expired goods.
  • Those consumers that could afford it would be more likely to donate to food banks when an item in their cupboard passed the best before date but had not yet expired.
  • Less food waste.

You may it unethical for people that can’t afford it, to eat food that has passed the best before date but keep in mind, the taste of food is relative to how hungry you are. The best-tasting meal I ever had was not in a restaurant but on day 3 of a survival course with no food. It consisted of 3 bites of wild game meat, burnt on an open fire, with no seasoning, that had fallen in the dirt.

Dave Lister

listerlogic.com

4- HOW WE THINK, 5- SCIENCE THEORIES

ARE WE REALLY HERE?

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Over the past few years, video games have become an obsession for more and more people. As gaming systems become more advanced, what will the ultimate system turn out to be? Obviously, it would have to seem as realistic as possible but what if you even believed it was real?

Along with video games, medical science has also made huge advancements, right down to a molecular level. Many complex organs can now be transplanted and amputees can control basic functions in prosthetics through there own nerves. It no longer seems impossible that one day even a brain transplant could be done. As our understanding of how signals transmit through the nervous system also advances, it’s reasonable one day they could be duplicated by a computer. Now imagine combining the two. Our brain could be connected and interacting with a computer that would send all the sensations we would feel in reality. If perfected you would not be able to tell this new virtual reality from reality.

How popular would video games be then, if there was no difference in what you feel between virtual reality and reality? At first, all the video games we play now would be extremely popular at this new enhanced level. Racing cars and fighting aliens. The people we interact with could be real players also in VR or computer created.

After a while though, gamers would realize as good as this was there is still something else missing. The game would be even better if they thought it was real and didn’t know they were in a virtual reality world. If this became possible it would also draw the attention of not just gammers but those who also wanted to be educated beyond what a book can do. Imagine being able to experience life at any point of time in history without knowing it was virtual reality, being able to understand not only how people felt at that time but why. Picking wealthy or famous people with lavish lifestyles and perfect bodies would eventually get boring, just like gamers, you would eventually want to try harder, more difficult roles. Facing the challenges of higher levels while gaining the rewards of a further understanding of life.

Could the year now actually be 2220 and you are playing the ultimate virtual reality game. If so, it would be ironic if you wasted too much of it playing a primitive X-box.

Dave Lister

listerlogic.com

Logic That Gets You Thinking