The physics of the modern air conditioner

Last year my old central air died.  In its place came a brand new system, running the new freon - R410A.  Now we going into a discussion that Mr. Covfefe would love.  My spell checker gets upset with that word, but I'm sure it will a real word one day.  :)

I take us back to the eighties.  At that time, with no previous data, some scientists declared that polar ozone holes were growing and would kill us all.  The carbon people noted their success.  These people went nuts, noting that the existing CFC could release chlorine, and kill ozone.  They came up with a reaction, and just assumed an actual rate.  This was a great 'just so' story.

In 2007, somebody decided to do some actual atmospheric physics.  Never done for carbon.  Anyway, they discovered that the actual reaction rate for that magic chlorine reaction, was a factor of 10 lower than what had been assumed.

It was probably good to kill the original freon, since it didn't break down easily, somewhat like DDT.  Which gets me back to my story.  R410A uses flourine, not chlorine, and nobody has made up a story about that.  So, it was declared 'safe', without physics.  However, the infra-red thing is much higher than carbon, so it is declared a horrible greenhouse gas.  Lucky for us, it was declared 'good', since it is much more efficient.

Back to the new air thing.  It works at a much higher pressure than the old one, and can have those little finny things 10 times thinner and closer.  This is wonderful, until you want to start the thing in the spring.  Those stupid fins are clogged with spider webs!  I tried a powerwash with oxy-clean but it did nothing.   You have to get it serviced every year and they soak with with their 'super magic' chemical that I think is pinksolution enzyme cleaner.  The junk just dissolves, and you can just rinse it with a hose.

Personally, I'll stick with the guy coming every year for under 200.  It also needed a cup of gas, but that was not charged.  If I were cheap, I'd look at getting pinkstuff or something else.  I'm pretty sure that detergent alone can't handle it.

**stupid ozone holes are caused by atmospheric conditions, and goes up and down (like temperature) like a toilet seat.

***the holes happen because the extreme cold stops the standard ozone reaction.  Someone should tell them that there are no chemical reactions at extreme cold, especially the fictional freon reaction.  Oh well, that's all sewage under the bridge.  Nobody cares.  Surely we can't make that mistake again!

Solving the wobbly dock spur problem

Our marina has put in docks like this, with a main runner, and spurs for boat access.  Trouble is that these spurs are connected with hinges, so that they can take the big waves.  These hinges have a give which translates into a wobble at the end of about 2 cm either way.  There is no damping, so the velocity is about 10 cm/s.  So a displacement of 2 cm with 10 cm/s is a good earthquake.  People are going nuts!

This ground motion, just like an earthquake, makes people think they are going to dump into the lake.  But you really need a displacement of 20 cm to lose your balance, and probably 50 cm/s.  That's a damaging earthquake!

Nevertheless, these dock earthquakes are a bad feeling.  You need to dampen the torsion of the spurs.  Basically, I am thinking about rubber at the inside corners.  I was looking at an inside corner docking bumper, but they don't have those.  Probably just heavy dock bumper strips bent at a 50 cm radius on the inside corner will do.

ps.  I really like recycled rubber crumble stuff.  The damping coefficient must be huge.

Another Great Amazon Thing

I get some of these things to try out and review.  This is an air fryer, about 2-300 bucks.  Here's my video.

Fantastic fries.  Now I'm doing sweet potato, which we love.  We're talking majorly healthy here.  We just came back from the buggy cottage and went to our favourite chip wagon.  Beautiful fries, soggy with fat or the cheap palm oil they use.  You won't live to your nineties with that!  These fries are better.



ps.  just tried sweet potatoes -- great!  And we had cut up roasted veggies for dinner. -- zucch, peppers and onions.  great!

pps.  Everybody is going nuts about this thing!  Driving me nuts!  I'm cooking up everything with it, and it always need stirring at 10 minute intervals.  I don't like doing work.  :)