OK for water, but...........: Motoring Motoring Discussion forum

Motoring Discussion > OK for water, but...........	Miscellaneous
Thread Author: Old Navy	Replies: 18

View Threaded

Sun 15 Dec 13 16:37

OK for water, but........... - Old Navy

What about greasy road dirt? If it was feasible it would have been done long ago. The aircraft mentioned don't tend to fly behind an articulated lorry on a dirty motorway.

tinyurl.com/pvysb4g

Last edited by: Old Navy on Sun 15 Dec 13 at 16:41

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 18:04

OK for water, but........... - CGNorwich

"If it was feasible it would have been done long ago"

I think critics of the Wright brothers said something similar when they announced that they proposed to build an aeroplane.

I don't see why some sort of ultra sound device shouldn't remove all dirt even of the greasy sort. Don't opticians and jewellers use ultrasound to clean greasy spectacle frames and jewellery?

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 18:16

OK for water, but........... - Old Navy

As it seems to be cost effective, £10 for a mass produced system, which I would think is cheaper than a wiper motor, linkage, and blades. It would be faster, (cheaper) to fit on the assembly line too, just another electronic device to plug in to the loom. I have a small ultrasonic cleaner in my garage for watches, glasses, jewellery, etc. the technology exists. So why hasn't it been done?

Last edited by: Old Navy on Sun 15 Dec 13 at 18:19

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 18:27

OK for water, but........... - ....

>> So why hasn't it been done?
>>
It has been done, in a military application which the designer at McLaren observed.
It's just taking a while to work down the chain.

Think GPS and the military application which now most people have in their cars behind the satnav systems.

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 18:36

OK for water, but........... - Old Navy

I wonder who has the patent for the ultrasonic system, assuming it works in the real world? The reason only one mass car maker fits heated windscreens. If it is cheaper, works, and is not patented, I would think the car manufacturers would have jumped at the chance to use it long ago.

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 18:53

OK for water, but........... - Zero

>> I wonder who has the patent for the ultrasonic system, assuming it works in the
>> real world? The reason only one mass car maker fits heated windscreens.

Ford do not have a patent on electrically heated screens, they were commonly used in Aircraft long before Ford started using them. Other car makers have fitted them at various times as well.

Ford only have a trademark on the name they give it.

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 19:13

OK for water, but........... - Old Navy

>> Ford do not have a patent on electrically heated screens,

I believe that the Ford heated car windscreen patent expired in 2010. Companies that Ford owned or had an interest in used the screens, JLR and Volvo.

Last edited by: Old Navy on Sun 15 Dec 13 at 19:14

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 19:26

OK for water, but........... - Zero

Land Rover were using it before then, (before they were anything to do with Ford) without paying Ford a bean, as have Subaru in the past. There was no patent even up to 2010 on heated screens. As I say Aircraft were using them at least as early as the 1960s.

Ford may have had a patent on some particular technology they used to do it, but there are plenty of (better) ways it can be done without recourse to the Ford method.

Last edited by: Zero on Sun 15 Dec 13 at 19:28

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 19:47

OK for water, but........... - Slidingpillar

Think Renault have offered heated screens for a while too.

Reply to this message | Report message

Mon 16 Dec 13 08:00

OK for water, but........... - IJWS14

>> >> Ford do not have a patent on electrically heated screens,
>>
>> I believe that the Ford heated car windscreen patent expired in 2010. Companies that Ford
>> owned or had an interest in used the screens, JLR and Volvo.
>>

It won't have expired yet - it will have reached the "must license" period of its life.

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 18:21

OK for water, but........... - Robin O'Reliant

>> Don't opticians and jewellers use ultrasound to clean greasy spectacle
>> frames and jewellery?
>>

Commonly used in the biking world for cleaning carburettors.

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 18:26

OK for water, but........... - Old Navy

>>
>> Commonly used in the biking world for cleaning carburettors.
>>

And nuclear submarines for cleaning reusable stainless steel filter elements.

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 18:40

OK for water, but........... - Armel Coussine

I wonder if ultrasound will clean caked old coffee-machines? You can sort of scour it out but it's a bind. Because no way will I do it every day and the stuff does build up in there.

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 18:51

OK for water, but........... - sooty123

All the 'fighter' aircraft I know about use air from the engines to keep the windscreen clear. Some have screenwash, defrost was via a heater element in the windscreen itself. Never heard of a vibration system to keep them clean, might be out there though.

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 19:57

OK for water, but........... - ....

How do you like your coffee AC ? V8 or V12

www.espressoveloce.com/

Hand built in RSA a shade under £9k for the V12.

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 20:18

OK for water, but........... - Boxsterboy

My wife has an ultra-sound cleaner in her (dental) surgery. I'll try and persuade her to let me rig it up to the windscreen and report back with the results!

Reply to this message | Report message

Mon 16 Dec 13 11:47

OK for water, but........... - Cliff Pope

>> My wife has an ultra-sound cleaner in her (dental) surgery. I'll try and persuade her
>> to let me rig it up to the windscreen and report back with the results!
>>

My dentist uses an ultrasound drill for more delicate drilling than the ordinary type.
Recently he had to extricate the broken off stump of a platinum peg holding a crown. The ultrasound was apparently powerful enough to loosen the cement but not so powerful as to risk damaging the root wall.

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 20:19

OK for water, but........... - sherlock47

A little bit of googling finds some interesting articles uses for sound, although much of the material is on infra rather than ultra sound. www.forteantimes.com/features/articles/256/sonic_weapons.html is some waht long but I have copied below just one paragraph.

"There is, however, evidence to suggest that ultrasound has been considered by military and law enforcement authorities as a likely technology for so-called ‘non-lethal weapons’ for use in crowd control and ‘coercive interrogation’. ‘White noise’ is believed to have been a key element in sensory deprivation techniques since the early 1970s and ultrasonic riot control devices are also believed to have been deployed in quelling civil unrest. One such device – the ‘squawk box’ – blasts two slightly different, intolerably high-pitched ultrasound frequencies (16,000Hz and 16,002Hz) at rioters; the two, when combined in the ear, effectively produce the frequencies 32,002Hz and 2Hz. "

You can picture the situation where 2 adjacent cars, (parked maybe?) have the ultrasonics turned on at slightly differing frequencies - the driver opens his window and ends up receiving a dose of infrasound in the range of 1-20 Hz (the difference frquency). All sorts of things happen - from visual disturbance (19 Hz affects the eyes), to nausea and sickness at lower frquencies. Apocryphal stories abound, although stories of massive brown trouser moments seem to have been discredited.

Reply to this message | Report message

Sun 15 Dec 13 20:28

OK for water, but........... - Robin O'Reliant

Be handy if it works, they presumably would also keep the insides from misting up and could be fitted to side windows too.

In fact if the car body were festooned with the things they might never need a wash again. Bring it on.

Reply to this message | Report message

Forum Version 3.0 - By Khoosys