Re: (ReacTor) Five SF Novels About Rediscovering Ancient Tech

On 5/15/24 13:22, Scott Lurndal wrote:

BCFD 36 <bcfd36@cruzio.com> writes:

On 5/14/24 10:59, Christian Weisgerber wrote:

On 2024-05-09, James Nicoll <jdnicoll@panix.com> wrote:
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[stuff deleted]
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I was already intrigued by the British TV mini-series _The Last Train_
(1999), where fifty years after the apocalypse our cryo-preserved
protagonists can just start up cars still sitting around in garages.
No flat batteries there.
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Not only flat batteries, but flat gasoline. For those of us who have
gasoline powered power tools (in my case, weed whacker, lawn mower,
chainsaw), we have to add Stabil or some other gas preservative if the
gas is going to sit in a can more than a month or so. Otherwise the gas
goes "bad". If my chainsaw gas is more than a month or two old and has
not been treated, it will not start the saw.
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I have no idea how 10 year old gas would run in a car.

 Well, I can vouch for 4 year old gas - we just started the
'74 450SL in the barn which hadn't been started since
March 2020 - all it took was a new battery and it purred
like a 70's kitten.

Interesting. Was this a gasoline or diesel Mercedes? I think diesel lasts longer.

 I've heard anecdotally that modern gas doesn't deterioriate
as quickly as it used to.

This does not surprise me at all.

 

Would water have
somehow collected in the gas tank under the gasoline? Would the gas be
so "flat" that it would not run?

 It likely depends on how full the tank is/was
and how much headspace there is to produce condensation
and whether it is vented.

My thinking too.
--
----------------
Dave Scruggs
Senior Software Engineer - Lockheed Martin, et. al (mostly Retired)
Captain - Boulder Creek Fire (Retired)
Board of Directors - Boulder Creek Fire Protection District (What was I thinking?)