When did vehicles start having batteries in them as a standard? 1920?
How much power did the first automotive batteries supply?

On Dec 15, 9:18*pm, Justin <jus... (AT) nobecauseihatespam (DOT) com> wrote:
It would have been earlier than that. The first car with an electric
starter was the Caddy in 1915.
There is one in the San Diego Auto Museum. (FWIW, this meant the start
of many women drivers.)
As the first car radios came some years later and headlights were gas
(Propane or aceteline produced by a device on the car) what would be
the need?

Stude wrote:


What about power? How much electricity did they provide? 6v at a few amps?

Justin wrote:

Check out early radio batteries. That's what cars first used.

George Patterson
The cost of living hasn't affected its popularity.

On Dec 17, 8:10*pm, George Patterson <grpph... (AT) verizon (DOT) net> wrote:
That will take some reearch. Why do you need the info? I might have
to charge if it gets too deep.

Also, the battery will not be putting out a full 6 volt when loaded
with starting an engine. Watch your lights dim when the starter is
cranking.

Stude wrote:

Its a bit embarrassing. We're know are writing a screenplay; and we're
wondering what kind of power a old battery circa 1920 or so can produce.
Its a major part of the plot.

On Dec 18, 8:56*pm, Justin <jus... (AT) nobecauseihatespam (DOT) com> wrote:
If you're talking that era, it can put out maybe 50-100 amps to the
starter.
If you're trying to to kill someone, you will have to get into the
flesh to where the resistance is less.

Try putting your hand across the battery terminals in your car, which
is 12 volts, no doubt.
(Don't touch any other part of the car while doing this.)
You'll live.
Now, wet your hands and do it and you'll feel it a bit more. (try it
with one wet hand, first)

OKI,enough fooling around, I just did all I wrote above, licked
fingers - and felt NOTHING.
Admittedly, the terminals were dry and insulated by the natural
(oxide?) skin that insulates most
battery teminals.

I'm afraid that our plan is NG.
Now, if you could rewrite it so that a victim with a weak heart is
working on a running car and gets one hand on a sparkplug termnal of
the running car while the other hand is on a (wet?) part of the clean
car chassis, you might be on to something.

Now, if you take into account the ignorance of the average play / film
auduence, you'll usually get away with anything.
Playwrites don't take the geeks of Silicon Valley into account when
writing.

BTW, in the twenties, most cars were 6 volts.

For a car-involved way of underhood death, have a blade come loose
from a spinning fan on a reving engine.
This happens several times a year - never stand in the line of fire
around a running engine. This is no BS!

Let me know what you come up with.

Stude wrote:

He, nice!
But we're not killing anyone. Bascially the story involves hooking up
two or three modern laptops with car/airline adapters to antique batteries.
Basically its a sci fi short story involving time travel. While a bit
lame I'll give him credit for thinking of these things. Ever see Star
Trek 4? They slingshot around the sun and up back in time. The
characters involved take a four passenger space fighter jet thing
shaped like a NASA X-23 but with faster than light capability.
Something happened to the spacecraft sending our crews back to the
1920's. In order to get back, they need to refine enough fuel to make
orbit - kerosene. They also have to calculate the trajectory via the
laptops in parallel. Since they keep the spacecraft in a shed out in
the middle of nowhere, there aren't any power lines. I also know modern
power supplies tend to fry electrical systems left over from the 1920's.
I'm not exactly sure when the modern north american sad face plug
came around, but the point is moot since they can't just bring a modern
looking spacecraft rolling around in a 1920's city.
While not exactly original, I think the fact we're trting to make it
somewhat feasible should be interesting.
I want to set it in Chicago. Chicago in the 1920's would have been
interesting. The author wants to set it in Italy, pre WW2. Where are
we supposed to get Italian antique vehicles from that period?
Surprisingly we got good responses from antique car owners who don't
mind having their vehicles involved when we start shooting - around
July. We'll probably put them in costume and have them do something.

I'm not sure, all I do is research for now.

Main obstacles for the characters: refine kerosene or alcohol for the
rocket to achieve orbit - can't fire the FTL drive in the atmosphere.
Keep the clustered laptops running and crunching numbers for the
trajectory calculations. last but not least, having the characters
interact with people of that era - after all they need food, and money
to buy fuel.

Justin <justin (AT) nobecauseihatespam (DOT) com> wrote in
news:gif9ht$bu6$1 (AT) news (DOT) motzarella.org:

to involve Nicola Tesla - the inventor of alternating current and the
electrical generator. You could look up the tesla coil too. That is in the
same timespan. Plenty of voltage and current that way.

On Fri, 19 Dec 2008 18:20:22 -0500, Justin
<justin (AT) nobecauseihatespam (DOT) com> wrote:


No problem. Two 6 volt car batteries in series, even car batteries of
that era, would run a laptop for days.

You might toss in a couple of battery recharge events to keep it
believable and realistic, but the power part is a slam dunk.

Joe
--
Heather & Joe Way
Sierra Specialty Automotive
Brake cylinders sleeved with brass
Gus Wilson Stories
http://www.brakecylinder.com