Showerthoughts

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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.

Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:

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411

Apocalypse movies in the near future won't have survivors scavaging abandoned cars. (lemmy.world)

submitted 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) by LouNeko@lemmy.world to c/showerthoughts@lemmy.world

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Imagine The Walking Dead started in 50 years from now. The way things are going now, picture this scenario:

>A survivor is walking down a lonesome road.
>They arive at a small resort and there's a car covered in dust and dirt in the parking lot.
>They approach the car and check whether it still has some bio fuel left in the tank.
>Still plenty.
>They look around spotting a decayed body close by.
>They search the body and are lucky to find a 'keyless' key belonging to the car.
>There are no door handles and the battery inside the key corroded away.
>They break the glass and open the door from the inside.
>Finally inside, there's still no way to start the engine without the key.
>They have an idea.
>The digital wrist watch on the body should have the same battery as the key.
>After a bit of tinkering with some tools they get the key working again.
>They press the ignition button.
>The displays light up but the engine remains quiet.
>The displays show error messages:

ERROR CODE: ND47089
Tire pressure sensor subscription expired
Please schuedule service or enter payment information
Engine start failed

>MFW

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[–] Bytemeister@lemmy.world 9 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Kinda wrong.

You can't get enough solar energy to directly drive a car any practical distance, but you aren't actually driving your car most of the time. When you look at weekly energy requirements, most drivers would be able to accumulate enough energy for all of their driving with just a few decent panels. You would need a battery to take advantage of this, or only drive at night.

Also, check out the solar cannonball run. A guy made a mobile rig of like 40 flexible panels and drove a Model three across the US using only solar charging.

[–] podperson@lemm.ee 2 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Just gonna leave this here:

https://aptera.us/

[–] Bytemeister@lemmy.world 1 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Oh boy.

Alrighty not even gonna click that link, here is why...

Aptera claims to get about 40 miles of range per day with their full solar package and ideal conditions. Which is fantastic! But, it's not the solar technology that makes that car viable, its the high efficiency of their vehicle. If we assume 40 miles per day, 12 hours of sun, you could hypothetically directly drive the Aptera with solar at a blistering ...3.3mph. To put it simply, unless solar panels get an order of magnitude more efficient, we are not going to get a direct solar driven vehicle. It will always be solar plus a big ass battery.

I've been watching Aptera closely since 2015, and I already have a reservation for one. That's the other reason I don't have to click that link. I get updates straight into my feed and I've gone over their documents multiple times forward and back.

[–] podperson@lemm.ee 1 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Correct - not direct drive, but seems like that’s not really a necessary goal for most of us. If you really need to be able to just drive non stop all day while the sun is out, I don’t think that’s been solved yet (would still have to stop for gas even).

[–] Bytemeister@lemmy.world 1 points 23 hours ago

Hence why I said "Kinda Wrong" .

Practically any solar panel can fully recharge an EV, it's just a matter of how long it's going to take. Sure there are some battery losses, yada yada, but a single 100W panel would charge up an EV in a few months.

[–] spankmonkey@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

practical

If the car is tied to a location that is already safe and secure in a post apocalyptic setting, then sure. But a post apocalyptic car is really only needed to haul stuff around or as protection against things outside the vehicle, and depending on the apocalypse you likely need to stay mobile, reinforce a secure location, or relocate to somewhere remote away from urban areas. Transporting the panels to a remote location will take time and effort, and if you need to be mobile you won't have time to charge.

Now if you had a rural home with solar panels on the roof and the location was secure an electric car would serve you well until something mechanical or the batteries failed and if you didn't need to travel far you could use it regularly too.