But, as posted earlier, if there was emp occurance, there would be many other problems besides my bus.
Quote from: chev49 on January 17, 2012, 08:54:20 PM But, as posted earlier, if there was emp occurance, there would be many other problems besides my bus. I cant prepare for every problem or contingency and Im not going to try. But if we are far from home and something like this occurred, there are only two options. Make your stand where your at, or try to get home and deal with it there. I want to try to get home. If I come off sounding like a fruit cake because of my desire, so be it. If my daughter is at school, or a football game, and this occurred, I want her home. ASAP. There is no other option I will accept, I will walk if I have to. I'll borrow a horse, I'll ride a bike. But a running vehicle would be light years faster. If I sound crazy for wanting that, so be it. The CME event that happened in 1859 would likely fry the entire North American power grid, and more than likely destroy every transistor, diode and capacitor in the North America, if not most of the world, that wasnt buried underground and protected inside a faraday cage. People can roll their eyes and pretend its all fantasy all they want, but if that kind of event ever comes around again, at least with our current level of preparedness, its going to be lights out.
The EMP commission used a maximum of 25KV per meter as their premise for analyzing the impact. At that level they determined we would lose the power grid for a year or more, but most vehicles would survive, even newer computerized vehicles. The National Guard will eventually show up with generators and food and we'll begin to dig out. But my understanding is that 25KV is near the threshold between our vehicles surviving, and destroying all electronics. If a large weapon were detonated over Kansas shortly after we were struck by a strong solar flare, when the atmosphere is already highly charged, what would be the effect? What if instead of 25KV per meter, it generated 50KV per meter, or higher. Throw up your hands and bury your head in the sand? That is the level of threat some people consider possible, and some consider likely. Something many times more powerful than the Carrington event. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_storm_of_1859 That is why I started this thread with the assumption that all transistors, diodes, condensers (computers) are destroyed, no matter how well shielded. I wanted to start from that premise. That any of those components on your vehicle are destroyed, as well as any spares you carry, no matter how well protected, and there are none available anywhere within a 1000 miles in any direction. Your phones are destroyed, radios are destroyed, etc.. To make it more difficult, lets assume light duty electric coils (ignition coils, solenoids, relays...) are also destroyed. So my starter solenoid is gone, I will have to jump the contacts to start the engine, I can do that. Skinner valve? Can it be manually controlled? Mechanical voltage regulator, I may be able to fix it, or can force it closed if need be to make it charge. And with a large battery bank I could run a long ways without charging. Can your DDEC engine be converted to mechanical? My generator is diesel, I can jump the starter, but will it produce AC power? What could be done to get it working? I guess it would kind of be that "Das Boot" moment. Can we get it back up and moving.
So let's bear in mind that we're discussing lengths of string here, and until the mythical 'it' happens there is no way of really knowing the answers to any of these questions. And don't forget that we still need to figure out how to protect ourselves from those Smurfs.
Yes, it's likely that the power grid will go down - mostly because it is a country sized antenna system. That doesn't mean that all of your stuff will die. Testing has shown that there are "failures" which are not catastrophic, but rather temporary. Most people my find that after EMP, they get weird behavior occasionally, not total destruction.Cheers!-T