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Wouldn't a legged vehicle still have that problem if it can achieve the same speeds and weights that regular cars go at? Scale up a human for example to the we
by polishdude20 2y ago
Wouldn't a legged vehicle still have that problem if it can achieve the same speeds and weights that regular cars go at?
Scale up a human for example to the weight and speed of a car. Crazy powerful and big legs, big feet, big shoes. The rubber must hit the road either way and push down with a force to propel the weight of this car-heavy legged human at speeds of 100km/h. It would still wear rubber away just like tires do.
Legged vehicles aren't a replacement for regular vehicles if tire particulates are your concern.
- necovek 2y agoCouldn't you do away with rubber and shoes since for legs you don't need flat, smooth roads either (so metal legs of a multi-ton vehicle won't have anything to damage too bad). For comfort, you could have springs and air and hydraulic dampeners.
- polishdude20 2y agoThe metal itself would damage the ground that is walked on though no?
- necovek 2y agoYes, but walking on rough terrain would still keep it a rough terrain.
- wizzwizz4 2y agoRough terrain with less and less purchase, until it just turns into a pile of dry dust / wet mud (depending on weather). A legged vehicle as heavy as a car would wear away stone, tear roots… I don't think there's any surface that could withstand heavy traffic, except maybe something ridiculous like a fast-growing woody grass.
- wizzwizz4 2y agoFor some reason, I was imagining a machine with legs like a footstool. Any realistic machine like this would have large, wide feet. With proper suspension, the pressure might be low enough to not completely destroy the ground. Though, I'm struggling to see how this would be better than a wheeled vehicle: you've still got static friction between the feet and the ground… I guess maybe they're flexing less?
- necovek 2y agoYeah, large feet would reduce the pressure on the ground, though it would still suffer some effects for sure — but the goal is to avoid rubber and microplastics, so metal feet it is :) Anyway, I agree that a wheeled vehicle is probably going to win on efficiency just the same, though wheels do require better roads than legs do (eg. common example is stairs).
- wizzwizz4 2y agoA bicycle can do stairs just fine. They're tricky, but not much more than a similarly-steep hill would be. (Of course, that's ignoring wear on the tyres from going over the edges of the steps.)
- necovek 2y agoWith wheels, it depends on the size of the wheel what unevenness in the terrain it can cover. Eg. a monster truck can handle more of it, but it's impractical for a bunch of other reasons. Similar holds for legs, but legs can usually do jumps too.
- lucianbr 2y ago> one big upside is that you can theoretically avoid the rubber/microplastic particulate emission associated with tires and wheeled vehicles if you can make legged vehicles as good as wheeled ones. How does keeping rough terrain rough help with that?
- necovek 2y agoMy implication is that you want rubber for nice asphalt/road surface to avoid damaging it — for comfort, other suspension components can help out instead. If you don't care about preserving the terrain (which you can when it's rough to begin with), you can just go with large surface metal feet and you should not get any rubber/microplastics, though you will get metallic dust.
- Loughla 2y agoI believe the main issue is the rubber and chemicals from the nice road surfaces. So your argument seems like a problem looking for a solution?
- necovek 2y agoThat's wrong: the problem is the rubber on the wheel (or feet in case of legs) being spent due to the traction and emission of rubber microparticles as it is.
- Loughla 2y agoYes sorry I wasn't clear enough. Rubber and chemicals from tires on the nice road surfaces. That's what that should have said. But the legs are still a solution in search of a problem.
- necovek 2y agoSure, the original article is about a legged movement, and the entire thread is about microparticle (plastics/rubber) emission comparison between wheels and legs.
- fragmede 2y ago> The rubber must hit the road if the wheels were metal and the roadway was also metal, but arranged into parallel small roadways, then we could avoid using rubber and not have the problem of rubber particulates.
- anamexis 2y agoSeems like in that case, you could just use cogwheels and racks, and avoid the complexity of legs.
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- mensetmanusman 2y agoMetal particles are more reactive and toxic than rubber particles.
- numpad0 2y agoYou'll get microsteels, microstones, microbrakedusts and microlubricants for trains, by the way. Some of those may also qualify as microplastics too.
- user_7832 2y ago> It would still wear rubber away just like tires do. It’s been a hot minute since I learnt rolling friction in high school physics but (iirc) a very interesting and unintuitive aspect of it is that there’s always an opposing/slowing force on a (rubber) wheel. Only a slippping wheel will not experience a slowdown. Static friction is different from rolling friction, and (I think) can offer zero wear in ideal conditions - but rolling wear is always non-zero.
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