Tuesday, December 27, 2016

Does Anyone Make One of These?

The TrailBlazer's 4WD has failed with a very useful icon: a wrench next to a simplified drivetrain.  In the meantime I am looking for a better solution to my aspirational glacier.  We get a fair amount of sun when it isn't actually snowing, and even enough when lightly snowing to produce photovoltaic output.  My thought is a small solar panel and a small storage battery feeding a resistance heating unit abutting the edge of the asphalt.  It doesn't have to heat up all the asphalt; once one section is clear, the asphalt absorbs infrared and soon, the rest of the asphalt engages in sympathetic magic, and melts the snow.  Of course, a thermostat shuts off the coil above freezing.  Put a few of those along a silly long driveway like mine, and in mild snow conditions, you have a clear road.  In severe conditions, with a day or so of full sunlight, it clears.

8 comments:

  1. Well, there is always this: http://ceramics.org/ceramic-tech-today/its-electric-conductive-concrete-cost-effectively-heats-up-to-melt-away-snow-and-ice

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  2. I suspect that the energy required to initiate snow melting would be a bit expensive. I think it would require a quite large panel/battery system. You have to overcome the heat sink effect of the pavement to reach melting conditions. That means speed heating to offset those losses.

    Consider this problem to be a good excuse to buy one of those high-tech flame throwers!

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  3. The most common failure in 4x4 systems is the electronic/electrical system that switches between 2H, 4H, 4L.

    (not brand or model specific)

    Fuses/Circuit Breakers/fusible links
    Dash switch
    Relays
    Wiring at the transfer case
    Switching motor
    Position sensors
    computer module for trans

    Mechanical issues:
    motor gearing
    shift fork/linkage
    Lubrication (lack of)
    motor mounting loose
    chain drive
    bearings
    u-joints
    axle broken
    differential broken

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  4. Will: $647 to replace the motor that does the switching.

    LCB: My experience with trying to get a patent confirmed what a patent attorney I met at a Second Amendment conference told me: if it isn't worth at least $4 million, there's no point. The patent office has to usually be sued into issuance. They certainly do not follow federal law, regulations, or their internal rules.

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  5. If there were enough energy in the sunlight to produce enough electricity to melt the snow, why not just put something black on the snow and ignore the middleman?

    I tend to agree with Will - not enough energy to do this with photovoltaics. But, one could do some not-too-difficult physics and calculate it.

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  6. StormCchaser: Just tried. No success.

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