Beat rust with a cannabis car

[Spurious]

This is from a while ago. I wonder if any progress has been made?

 

 

 

 

Beat rust with a cannabis car

5/21/01

 

 

Sydney - Australian researchers believe cars could be made from hemp - the cannabis plant - within a decade.

 

A team at the University of New South Wales is working to create a plant-fibre based material to make biodegradable cars to beat the growing problem of getting rid of rusting car bodies.

 

Associate Professor Alan Crosky, of the School of Material Science and Engineering, said hemp looked more viable than coconuts or banana trees.

 

Crosky said that with the increasing cost of getting rid of cars the development of an environmentally-friendly material was now a viable option. The material was like fibreglass, but a natural product.

 

"Disposal of old cars is a growing problem, especially in Europe," he said on Monday. "It is only a matter of time before the expense of the disposal becomes the owner's responsibility and the consumer is forced to pay the full life-cycle costs of their car."

 

Crosky said a plant-fibre based material would be renewable and biodegradable.

 

"It would also be light, which would be a huge advantage in environmentally-friendly battery-powered cars," he said.

 

"In theory, a plant-based material should absorb more of impact than metal but we want to check the hemp to see if any weaknesses develop as it grows," Crosky said.

 

Plant-based materials were already being used for building construction in the developing world and hemp is widely used in making textiles and rope.

 

The hemp to be used in car construction would contain only minute amounts of the narcotic tetrahydrocannabinol (THC).

 

"It's renewable, you don't have to put as much energy into making it, and best of all, burning it doesn't get off anymore carbon dioxide than it absorbed during growing, what we call CO2 neutral," Crosky said.

 

And although research was at an early stage he predicted it would not be long before hemp cars were on the roads.

 

"It might take a decade," he said.

 

 

http://www.planetsave.com/ViewStory.asp?ID=714

[Pickle]

Cheech & Chong were men ahead of their time.

 

Environmental visionaries.

[Pure]

Ford made a hemp car YEARS ago , and it widthstood somethign like 20 times the damae of a standard car , very cool shit and I really think they will have to consider it one day

 

there is a short clip about it at pot tv

[WantDaChronic]

a cannabis car would be a great leap forward in the war against marijuana....

 

im all for it and the benifits for the environment should make cars like this standard in the near furute :thumbsup

[Spurious]

During the 'dry times' , out of desperation, you could smoke the door handles.

[F420]

so we have the details on how to make an engine run on water, and now we have car made from cannabis.

 

Hmm I reakon Toyota must have the patents on this bong car as I would call it.

 

eg- Oh what a feeling, toyota .

[Pure]

water engine is general motors I belive and the hemp car should be ford still unless they sold the patent , it was most likely shelved untill a time it was less controversial

[Pure]

In the 1910s Henry Ford experimented with using agricultural materials in the manufacture of automobiles. Ford was partly motivated by a desire to find nonfood applications for agricultural surpluses, which existed then as they do now. He tried out many agricultural crops, including wheat.

Coil cases for the 1915 Model T Ford were made from a wheat gluten resin reinforced with asbestos fibbers. Eventually he focused on soybeans, and in the 1920s began promoting soybean products at every opportunity. He recruited Robert Boyer, a young chemist, to lead the research. In the following few years, uses were found for soy oil in automobile paints and enamels, in rubber substitutes, and in the production of glycerol for shock absorbers. Viscous solutions of soy protein were extruded and "set" in formaldehyde bath to form fibers for upholstery cloth. But Ford’s special interest was in converting soy meal into plastics. Soy meal is what is left after soy-beans are crushed or ground into flakes and the soy oil extracted with a hydrocarbon solvent. Soy meal is about 50 percent protein and 50 percent carbohydrate- mainly cellulose. The compositions of Ford’s soy plastics, and the methods of their processing, evolved over time and varied according to the application. In general the resin core was made of soy meal reacted with formaldehyde to produce cross-linked protein (reminiscent of casein plastics and animal horn), but for added strength and resistance to moisture, phenol or urea was cocondensed with the protein. The resulting resin was part phenol formaldehyde (or urea formaldehyde) and part cross-linked soy protein; the soy meal was not merely a filler.

The condensation took place in the presence of the cellulose and other carbohydrates that were part of the soy meal. Fillers, up to 50 to 60 percent, provided additional cellulose fibbers, from HEMP, wood flour or pulp from sprice or pine, cotton, flax, ramie even wheat. The final mix was about 70 percent cellulose and 10 to 20 percent soy meal. When additional strength became necessary, glass fiber was also used. Relatively low pressures and temperatures were used in the molding process. Soy meal plastics were used for a steadily increasing number of automobile parts- glove-box doors, gear-shift knobs, horn buttons, accelerator pedals, distributor heads, interior trim, steering wheels, dashboard panels, and eventually a prototype exterior rear-deck lid. Finally Ford gave the go-ahead to produce a completely prototype "plastic car," including an entire plastic body. The body consisted of fourteen plastic panels fixed to a welded tubular frame (instead of the customary parallel I-beam frame). The panels and frame each weighed about 250 pounds. The total weight of the automobile was 2,300 pounds, roughly two-thirds the weight of a steel model of comparable size.

 

 

 

Ford, a master at generating publicity, exhibited the prototype with great fanfare in 1941. But then, by late 1941, Ford no longer publicized the "plastic car". The reasons for this are unknown, but his media contacts, the strength of the DuPont organization and World War II are likely to have played a role. Also, technology was not yet well developed and limited options. Plastics have become more common, but plastics from renewable resources got sidetracked. This is where Hemp Plastics have continued with research projects and collaborations to re-visit and re-new the use of plant based plastics.

 

http://www.chanvre-info.ch/info/en/article1864.html

 

the source has a pic of him laying into the car with an axe and leaving no dent