Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2014 April 21

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April 21

Bright orange light over the English Channel 20.4, around 2200z

Hello Wikipedians.

I have a question concerning something I observed on the night sky, south-southwest of Portsmouth, UK tonight. I consider myself an avid aviation enthusiast, so I feel I know very well the distinction between strobe lights, navigation beacons, collission lights and landing lights on commercial jetliners. What I observed, however, did not fit with any of these. It moved roughly from east-northeast to west-southwest, and was a bright orange hue - and of course I thought of fire and flames. It flickered somewhat, but the city air could have been disturbed. It moved at a speed common for commercial jetliners, though I couldn't tell the range or height very well. I certainly would not think it above 30,000 feet - much more likely it was between 10 and 20,000 feet. There were no lights apart from the bright orange, which was also much greater in size than a single steady wingtip or beacon light might've been. It kept a steady height as far as I could tell, but I only had it in view for 20-30 seconds before it passed behind a block of houses.

So. Presumably an aircraft with a bright orange light. When does that ever happen? What is the likeliest explanation for what I witnessed? Thank you in advance for any help. 213.104.126.183 (talk) 00:04, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Own edit: Based on the receipt from Tesco I figure the observation was made at 23:20-25 local time. 213.104.126.183 (talk) 00:07, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

A military jet using afterburner? AndyTheGrump (talk) 00:09, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Often, these mysterious lights in a dark sky (so, impossible to judge size, height, speed properly) turn out to be floating lanterns. 212.183.140.42 (talk) 00:13, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

I just checked with the wind direction (why hadn't I done so before?) and that definitely seems the most plausible explanation now. I'll settle for that, especially seeing as flightradar shows no flights of a similar heading during that time. Thank you. 213.104.126.183 (talk) 02:09, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Indeed, one of my favorite parts of nighttime "UFO sightings" is claims that the object had some specific diameter or was traveling at some specific speed, when it's obviously impossible to determine either of those things without knowing the object's altitude, something that's not easy at night (unless, again, you have an idea of its size or speed; determining these things is circular). Evan ^{(talk|contribs)} 03:29, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Sky lantern.--Shantavira|^{feed me} 08:27, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Yes, which floating lantern redirects to. I assumed a registered user would create the redirect for the plural, but I see I was too sleepy to remember to ask. 86.146.28.229 (talk) 09:37, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Redirect now created :) DuncanHill (talk) 11:09, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Thinking bigger, Hot air balloon competition to take place on the Isle of Wight at some date "between the 22nd March and the 2nd May, weather permitting." Alansplodge (talk) 12:01, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Why don't more mass scale auto companies imitate exotic designs?

Although I don't have a source for this, I think it would be reasonable to assume that most people find the designs of exotic cars like Maseratis or Ferraris to be more aesthetically appealing than more conventional cars like Toyotas or Hondas. Why don't the latter, the more conventional car companies, imitate the sleek designs of exotic car producers?

Obviously, copying cars verbatim is probably against some copyright laws, but why don't Toyota or Nissan make more of an effort to shape their average sedans or coupes to resemble those of exotic car companies?

I understand that a lot of high-end cars use more expensive materials like carbon fibre, but surely Toyota, for ex, could just recreate it using steel. It can't be more expensive from a material perspective right? It's more or less the same mass of metal.

Obviously I only speak for myself, but I would be more inclined to purchase a 2-door Honda Civic if it looked similar to a Ferrari F458 or something.

THanks. Acceptable (talk) 01:58, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

They do with certain models. Almost every major car company has models designed for either performance, or are more exotic looking than the average family sedan. Toyota makes the Lexus RC, Honda has the NSX, Nissan/Datsun has always had the Z-series, GM has the Chevrolet Corvette, Ford has the Ford Mustang, Chrysler has the Viper, etc. However, not everyone wants to buy such cars. Many people have lifestyles unlike you, and actually want things like 4-door sedans and minivans and the like. --Jayron32 02:12, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

How do you plan to fit your spouse, children, groceries, etc. in your Ferrari F458? Also, making an SUV look like a sports car just invites ridicule. Clarityfiend (talk) 02:38, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Reminds me of the Volkswagen with a faux Rolls Royce front. Not a pretty sight. Clarityfiend (talk) 02:40, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

I think the more relevant question for you, OP, is why don't more people want exotic looking cars. If the companies thought that consumers wanted it, they would likely make them and thus increase sales/profits. But they don't, so there must be a market reason and not necessarily that they just don't want to make exotic looking cars. Dismas|^(talk) 02:51, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

How do aerodynamics and fuel mileage factor in? Evan ^{(talk|contribs)} 02:56, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

I'm intrigued with the marketing aspect of car design, like the way car headlights, grilles, etc. have deliberately anthropomorphized features... car makers have gone so far as to test focus group members' brain wave responses to test designs.[1]. Some people prefer friendly-looking designs, some prefer "angry"-looking designs. The manufacturers put a lot of research into design. My guess is that it comes down to what niche markets prefer, and not everyone wants to drive a sports car. OttawaAC (talk) 03:00, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

I understand that a car shaped/structured like a F458 won't be practical for a family, but perhaps Honda could shape their 2-door coupes to look something similar. For their 4-door sedans, maybe they can copy design cues from a Maserati Quattroporte or something. Minivans I guess would be excluded from this discussion. Acceptable (talk) 04:20, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

You don't think a Honda Civic would sell better if it looked like this instead?

[[2]]

Acceptable (talk) 04:22, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Once again... for Honda, check the styling on the Honda NSX. Every major manufacturer generally has one of these on the market. --Jayron32 18:12, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Every designer has to consider their target market. The Honda Civic's target market, for example, may well be middle-aged, middle-income couples with no children. With advancing age, however, comes restrictions and limitations on what the body can do, so the designer would have to produce a car that is reasonably easy for someone, say, with arthritic knees to get in and out of. Speaking as a Honda Civic owner with dodgy knees, it suits me perfectly. I look at a Lamborghini or Ferrari and think "if I did manage to get in there I couldn't possibly get out". So if Honda did reshape the Civic to look more like a Lambo, it would lose me at least as a repeat purchaser - and I suspect many others too. (As an aside, when I first got the car I gave a 22 year old guy a lift from one college site to another. He was mega impressed by the dashboard, which he described as "like a spaceship". So it was trendy once!)--TammyMoet (talk) 20:22, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Thanks Jayron. However, the NSX is still a little pricier than a regular 2-door coupe Honda Civic. Why doesn't Honda, Toyota, or Nissan just style all their family cars like an NSX or Ferrari?

@TammyMoet, so is it mainly an ergonomic consideration then? Acceptable (talk) 00:53, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Because they would not sell enough at that particular price point to make it worth their while. The answer is that the companies do intense amounts of market research, and detailed studies, and produce cars that will maximize their profit. The people who will spend a certain amount of cash on a Honda Civic want a Honda Civic. They don't want a Ferrari. And the people who will buy a Ferrari have enough cash for Ferrari to price their cars at high prices and still sell them. Bringing a car to market is an expensive proposition, and cars, even well-built cars, that don't have a market don't sell. That's the lesson behind the Edsel. The main reason the Edsel failed was that it didn't have a market. Ford basically duplicated its Mercury line with the Edsel line, and customers were mostly confused by what they were buying. They stayed with products they were comfortable with; customers at the Mercury price point who wanted a Mercury bought a Mercury, and there just wasn't a market for the Edsel. We know YOU want to buy a Civic that looks like a Ferrari, but Honda knows many more people than just you. People at large don't want one. So Honda doesn't make one. --Jayron32 02:09, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

I think the problem is that those very extreme sports-car designs are hugely impractical. They are hard to park, the low ground clearance is a nightmare, you can't see much out of the back, so reversing is a pain. Their various internal systems tend to be wedged in there very tightly, so the cars are hard (and therefore expensive) to service. Putting those things into an "every day" car would be a very bad idea. Most people who own those very high end 'extreme' cars don't drive them to work every day - and they don't have to haul shopping back from the supermarket or carry more than two people. Sure, they look cool - and they are cool to drive at ridiculous speeds on the freeway...but driving them around town and doing things that most people's cars are called upon to do every day is just a horrible experience. SteveBaker (talk) 17:59, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

I'll second that. I had a car-nut uncle that drove a Lancia Stratos around town. It was a nightmare; even as a 10 year old, when we'd pile in the back there was no room in the tiny back jump seat it had. Wedging myself, my brother, and my cousin in there was painful. There was zero storage in the thing as well. --Jayron32 18:17, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Which series/movie was this?

I remember watching something just a few months back, but can't for the life of me remember whether it was a show or a movie. There is one part where two of the characters are playing locker pranks on each other (one girl and the other a boy, I think). At the very end, the girl infuriates the boy by putting a painted tampon in his locker. And that's when the pranks come to an end. Does anybody remember where/what this might have been? La Alquimista 12:21, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

US style A/C & Heating thermostat.

The house we just bought has some pretty ancient thermostats for the A/C & heat system. I was pleased to discover that upgrading to new ones was super-simple. Honeywell sell four different thermostats - in exactly identical cases and with identical interfaces and identical displays. They range in price from $18 to $65 depending on how fancy the scheduling system is. Basically:

1. Unprogrammable - you set the temperature and that's that.
2. Time-settings - but the same times and temps for every day.
3. One-schedule for weekdays and a different schedule for the weekends.
4. Every day of the week can have a different schedule.

Clearly this is a rip-off - even the tiniest microcontroller chip has enough memory to remember a month of times and temps - so the hardware has got to be identical for all four of them. I very much doubt there is 100 lines of software different between them - and as a programmer myself, I know that I could write the software for one of these things in an afternoon! So charging me almost $50 for the fancy features is ridiculous. Then there are some really up-market thermostats with WiFi or Bluetooth interfaces, so you can program them with your phone/PC. Those are over $250!

Well, I know that the electronics for this should cost around $5 and the bluetooth chip is another $5...and I *KNOW* the software is easy - so maybe I should make my own?

So...here's the question...what do the various wires going between the thermostat and the A/C + heat unit actually *do*? Mine has five wires, colored red, green, yellow, white and blue - and the blue wire wasn't connected on the old thermostat. The color code seems to be some kind of a standard because the new thermostat uses the exact same labels (R,G,Y,W,B) as the old one.

SteveBaker (talk) 19:44, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Here is an explanation [3] of your colors and several others. Rmhermen (talk) 20:37, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Note that a programmable thermostat isn't always better. I have one, and wish I didn't. First off, I don't have a regular schedule, which makes programming it to change the temperature setting at different times to match my schedule a crap shoot. Then there's a problem that I periodically have to change the setting, to adjust for the seasons. With a basic thermostat, I'd only have to change it once, but with mine, which has 4 settings for each of 7 days, I have to change it 28 times ! And when I replace the battery, all 28 settings go back to the 62 degree F default. My thermostat does have an override setting, so I can set the temp I want and override the stored setting. However, it reverts to the stored settings at the next time interval. So, if you get a programmable thermostat, be very careful about how the features work, or you will be forever fiddling with it just to get it back to the same temp you had set before. Features that would make my life easier:

1) An override setting that is permanent, until I turn it off.

2) Persistent memory, so it doesn't lose all the settings when I change the battery, or, failing that, at least the ability to set a default, so it won't go back to 62 degrees each time.

3) The ability to make global changes, like "increase all settings by 1 degree".

4) The ability to change the number of time increments it uses each day.

5) The ability to have different temp settings for heat and A/C.

6) The ability to change the swing amount. That is, does it wait until the temp is 1 degree off the temp setting to kick on the heat or A/C, or 5 degrees ?

Also, regarding your cost figures, consider that there's special hardware, like an LCD panel that can list the day of the week. I suspect that the hardware is the biggest cost.

One other practical consideration when replacing a thermostat is that the new one must fit the old hole, since you don't want part of the old hole showing. This is particularly problematic if the old thermostat was circular and the new one is rectangular, as happened in my case. Sure, you can patch the hole and repaint, but it's difficult to match it exactly. StuRat (talk) 02:10, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

OR: In NYC, steam heating is free (you usually have to open the windows in winter it is so hot and humid) and you have to buy a window unit A/C that has its own thermostat. The worst mistake my parents ever made with their central air was to replace the original mechanical thermostat with an electronic one. The old thermostat had a heat/cool switch, and a maximum and minimum temp setting that kicked in according to whether it was set on heat or cool. At bedtime they turned the temperature down if they wanted. In the morning they turned it up. No programming, no resetting, no problems with power outages. Now they spend several minutes each day cursing at the programmable thermostat, and have to reset it regularly. If your current mechanical thermostat is not broken you may want to consider not fixing it. μηδείς (talk) 02:26, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Your interesting comment led me to New York City steam system that I'd never heard of before. Did you mean free as in supplied at zero cost? Dbfirs 09:56, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

By "mechanical system" do you mean an absorption chiller ? What was their reason for switching to electrical A/C ? StuRat (talk) 11:36, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Steam heat is like the walls, it's included as part of the rent. By mechanical thermostat I meant one consisting of a coiled bi-metallic strip that expands or contracts unevenly due to the change in temperature. μηδείς (talk) 15:33, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Really, the whole point of building my own thermostats is that I can make them as dumb or as smart as I want...so it seems from the description linked to above, it boils down to driving three relays - one connecting the 24 volt input from the A/C unit to the "heat enable" wire, another to the "cold enable" and the third to the "fan enable" wire. Then I just need a temperature sensor and a 50 cent computer chip with a $2 WiFi interface to drive it with.

One thing that always annoys me is the need to manually switch between heat and cool...it would be much better to set two temperatures - if it goes below X, then heat until you reach (X+Y)/2- if it goes above Y then cool until you reach (X+Y)/2...I can finally fix that! Also, I don't need the temperature to jump around at set times, I can have it gradually shift the temperature range 'window' over time.

Follow-on question:

Our house has two thermostats (one upstairs and one downstairs) - but only one A/C & heat system up in the attic. How does the system handle contradictory demands from the two thermostats? Clearly (from the description of the wiring) there is no communication between the two thermostats.

SteveBaker (talk) 17:47, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

What kind of heating system does your house use? Some system have different zones that are each controlled by their own thermostat. For example, my house has an in-floor hot water radiant heat system with four zones. There is only one boiler, but the flow of hot water to each zone is controlled separately by a thermostat for each zone. - Eron^Talk 18:03, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

I have a gas-fired furnace and electric A/C, all in one big machine up in the attic - with the usual outside heat-exchanger for the A/C. There are two thermostats - one for upstairs, the other for downstairs. SteveBaker (talk) 20:34, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

There could be baffles or valves of some sort to direct airflow. That is, if your upstairs is set colder than your downstairs; when the heat is on it closes off the vents to the upstairs if it is warmer than the thermostat is set there; basically how your car HVAC system works where it allows you to direct the heat to the windsheild or the middle vents or the floor vents. --Jayron32 18:08, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

I would start trying to work out the existing wiring of your HVAC system. Trace the wires back to see what all they go to. It's easiest if you can cut the power to the system and use a tone generator/detector, but there are other methods too. Check accessible ductwork for electronic baffles. A reasonable guess is that either thermostat can fire up the furnace or A/C, but they also control baffles. That way if the upstairs thermostat calls for heat, the furnace and fan will kick on and the upstairs baffles open, but the downstairs baffles stay closed because that thermostat is not calling for heat. A well-designed system will also use relay logic to prevent the A/C and heat from being demanded at the same time, but it may not be wired that way. Katie R (talk) 18:58, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Yeah - I could do that - but it would be a lot of hassle. There must be a standard way that this is done. It would be better to find out what the standard way to do it is. In the last house I owned, there were two A/C units with one thermostat each and they were both 'heat pump' systems that did heating by (essentially) driving the air-conditioner backwards. I'm intrigued to see how the system in my new place handles contradictory demands. SteveBaker (talk) 20:34, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

The problem is that I don't think there is a standard you can really rely on. There will certainly be a few common ways to handle the setup, but there are also tons of ways it can vary. Inspecting the wiring at the furnace and AC units could be informative - you'll be able to tell if there is any relay logic going on, even if you don't trace out the whole house. You could also experiment with setting the thermostats to give contradictory demands and just see what happens. My guess is that either both the furnace and AC will come on (just wasting energy and dehumidifying), or the heat demand will open a relay that prevents the cool demand from running the AC. Katie R (talk) 12:06, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

I can think of many ways the two thermostats could be hooked up:

1) One controls the furnace and the other controls the A/C. The heat and A/C settings on the other ones aren't hooked up. This would rely on the homeowner to avoid setting them so they conflict. This setup might be more common where one is added later, probably the A/C, as the A/C installer didn't want to mess with the existing thermostat, which he may not be familiar with, and maybe mess it up.

2) One controls either heat or A/C, while the other controls both.

3) Both thermostats control both devices.

Then, if at least one device is controlled by both thermostats, you have three possibilities:

A) They are hooked up in series. That would mean both would have to agree that heat or A/C is required to turn it on. Since a thermostat normally only allows either a heat or A/C signal to be sent at a time, that would mean, when one sends an "A/C on" signal and the other sends a "furnace on" signal, neither would do anything.

B) They are hooked up in parallel, so either one can trigger heat or A/C. Here you could get both running at once. They may rely on the homeowner to avoid setting them so they can conflict, or may have special circuitry to detect that.

C) Some type of averaging of the signals occurs. For example, maybe both have to agree to turn a device on, but only one needs to send the signal to keep that device on.

I agree that testing it is the way to find out how it works. Turn each thermostat so:

• It sends a "heat on" signal alone, while the other sends no signal. Repeat with the other thermostat sending the signal.

• It sends a "A/C on" signal alone, while the other sends no signal. Repeat with the other thermostat sending the signal.

• Both send the "heat on" signal.

• Both send the "A/C on" signal.

• One sends the "heat on" signal while the other sends the "A/C on" signal.

• Same as above, but reverse the order.

That's 8 tests, which you can do in a few minutes, without doing anything besides climbing the stairs and feeling the vents (or getting somebody else to help you). Create a chart to display the results. This should make it clear how they work. You should wait a few minutes between each test, in case they have a timer to prevent rapid restarts, which can be bad for the equipment. Also, the fan might stay on some time after the furnace or A/C shuts off. If it has a "fan always on" setting for ventilation, turn that off for the duration of the tests. StuRat (talk) 14:19, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

West Bakersfield Interchange

In the description section, second paragraph, there will need to be rewording soon for updating. http://www.bakersfieldfreeways.us/project_StateRoute58GapClosure.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by ElkeWylie (talk • contribs) 20:00, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Go ahead. We won't get in your way. --Jayron32 20:55, 21 April 2014 (UTC)