RE: Beer as a Measure of Work

[Ron Katona <ron3b@xxxxxxxx>]

Someone asked if a person who does not drink beer can actually perform a
"0 Beer" job on a car. He he he... how naive we are! It's not that
simple my friend. Note that I've removed the <wob> tag from this topic
as any discussion about beer is certainly not a waste of anything.

Now, think about the scientific definition of "Work," and stay with me
on this:

The average (non-light) beer has 167 calories. A 6-pack therefore has
1000 calories (1 kilo calorie - 1 kcal)

1 kcal = 3.97 Btu

We don't like to think of British things when we work on our cars, so we
convert 3.97 Btu to .001163 kW hours.

.001163 kWh = .00156 hp (now we're talkin' - HORSEPOWER)

.00156 hp = 51.48 lb-ft/min (.00156*33,000)

Now, for example, an E36 BMW has 20 lug nuts. If each is to be torqued
to 74 lb-ft to accomplish the mounting of a set of R1s, that's 1480
lb-ft total. If performed in an hour, that's 1480/60 which equals 24.67
lb-ft/min.

Now, divide our expended energy of 24.57 lb-ft/min by a six pack's
rating of 51.48 lb-ft/min and you get .478 six-pack, or roughly 3 beers.
Yes, mounting R1s for the next day's autocross is typically a three beer
job.

Knowing that energy cannot be created or destroyed, you HAVE to drink
three beers to accomplish this job or the universe will be out of
balance. Of course, you can eat a Powerbar to balance the universal
forces, but the fact remains that mounting four tires will ALWAYS have
the Pilsner Energy Equivalent (or, PEE rating) of three beers.

So you see, each job we perform on the car will have it's own PEE rating
whether you drink beer or not. The fact that you don't drink beer does
not change the reality that a certain job expends the equivalent energy
of a fixed amount of beer - there's no short cutting the laws of physics
here.
- --
Ron Katona

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