Clever, and grounded enough in reality to make plausible sci fi.
this post was submitted on 29 Apr 2025
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Showerthoughts
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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.
Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:
- Both “200” and “160” are 2 minutes in microwave math
- When you’re a kid, you don’t realize you’re also watching your mom and dad grow up.
- More dreams have been destroyed by alarm clocks than anything else
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Bikes are the apocalypse ideal vehicle. They are immensely underrated on apocalyptic media.
Fuel I need to constantly scavenger? No thanks.
Noise that would attract the zombies? No thanks.
The highway is collapsed and my RV cannot go through? No thanks.
A bike would get you quite good through many apocalyptic scenarios.
Bikes have a limited lifespan in the sense that tires wear and degrade over time. Other parts can be replaced, repaired, welded. But tires will degrade within 2-5 years even when unused, depending on exposure to the elements.
Still much better than gasoline's fast degradation of 3-6 months of course.
I have rode the bike I had when I was a kid several decades ago. The tires themselves were good just had to change the air chambers.
Maybe they were not good for profesional cycling but for moving around I didn't notice anything wrong with them.
Rubber begins to degrade after 3-7 years depending on the compounds. Even if stored in ideal conditions to slow the degrading, you're only going to give it marginally more life.
Degraded tires risk side-wall blow outs and let will easily let through sharp debris (sticks, thorns, glass, sharp rocks) causing far more maintenance needs.
That's not to say bikes aren't beneficial and there's ways to get around this (stuff the tire with leaves, foam core [also has limited life span], etc), but it is something to be aware of.
This all reminds me... I need to replace the tires on my good weather bike.
Nemesis Games (Expanse Series) had bicycles. Not the strongest book in the series but Amos and Peaches learned how well bikes worked when the shit hit the fans. Very thoughtful authors.
This was Amos's preferred (planetside) ride for a while in The Expanse!
Or just use Heelys like a normal person.
Omg just imagine the war boys from fury road gracefully gliding down the road screaming 'witness me' 😂
Mad Max the musical now on Broadway
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What i learned from doomsday preppers is that you need guns and food and shelter. Apparently it doesn't matter that you're an unfit fuck that can't walk 20m without a car.
Or that you wouldn't last a year without your statin.
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Bigger problem is going to be old fuel. Gasoline degrades over time and becomes less combustible. It also gets gummy in small passages like fuel injectors, especially with ethanol. Wiring insulation gets hard and breaks, wires corrode. Animals intrude and eat wires. Brake and fuel lines rust through, brake hoses swell shut from the inside.
You want a carbureted small block Chevy or Ford. It might still be effort to make it run, but it’ll be far more likely to scrounge up the very generic spare parts and supplies needed.
You want a carbureted small block Chevy or Ford.
Nope.
Pre 1990 mechanically fuel injected, naturally aspirated diesels. 7.3 or 6.9 IDI, 6.2 Detroit, most Cummins industrial engines.
Diesel lasts significantly longer in storage (2+ years) than volatile gasoline (6mo max). I've even seen some non-mixed diesel last 10+ years when stored right.
But the biggest deal is that compression ignition engines can basically run on literally any vaguely flammable liquid substance. You can make biodiesel from a ton of stuff ranging from oil bearing crops to animal fat. They run way longer on oil changes because they don't dump as much thin gas into their oil. And there are no real consumables like spark plugs, distributor caps/rotors/points.
In a post-society situation real fossil fuels or petroleum lubricants or parts will not be available.
But the biggest deal is that compression ignition engines can basically run on literally any vaguely flammable liquid substance. You can make biodiesel from a ton of stuff ranging from oil bearing crops to animal fat
I'm always annoyed that you don't see more wood spirit(aka methanol) in the post-apocalypse. They'll make en ethanol still and then complain about a lack of fuel for their diesel generator as they're standing next to a forest.
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Diesel. Still same problems, but diesel will burn a lot more fuel sources, some that can be made far easier than gasoline.
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I think modern apocalypse movies should show someone grabbing solar panels off apartment balconies to recharge an abandoned electric car.
Not even close to enough energy to be practical in the real world, but close enough for movie logic.
Electric vehicles can charge from a standard outlet. I would imagine if you gather enough of those panels that actually plug into a standard outlet, you could charge a car (though slowly). Your average EV can put on about 10 miles to its “tank” every hour of charging at 120 volts. I don’t know what the amps of those panels are though.
The alternative would be if the protagonist found a home with solar panels and backup batteries. These exist today, and are becoming more common. I don’t know if sodium ion backup batteries have a longer life than LFP or lithium ion.
In a real apocalypse scenario, those BEVs would get scavenged to create electric ~~bikes~~ generators, grain mills, and water pumps. The original cars are not useful in a world without deliberately car-dependent economic systems, and it's just not a proper apocalypse if you've still got an automotive lobby.
Edit: BEV motors 2 big 4 bike
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Kinda wrong.
You can't get enough solar energy to directly drive a car any practical distance, but you aren't actually driving your car most of the time. When you look at weekly energy requirements, most drivers would be able to accumulate enough energy for all of their driving with just a few decent panels. You would need a battery to take advantage of this, or only drive at night.
Also, check out the solar cannonball run. A guy made a mobile rig of like 40 flexible panels and drove a Model three across the US using only solar charging.
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How about pulling the batteries from a remote control and using them to start an electric car? After all, it’s electricity and we all know batteries don’t go bad after sitting idle for 10 years, right? Movie logic. It just works.
>Survivor finds car
>plenty fuel
>pry open gas cap
>siphon
>go back home and run generator.
Fuel turned to varnish and is only good for smelling bad and being a pollutant.
> Its electric
Get it home and you've got the start of a pretty good generator!
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They'll be dragging classic cars out of people's garages and sheds.
If you were going to be realistic about this, it would be old, mechanical injection diesel engines still going long after the apocalypse. And bicycles, of course.
If you are being realistic, your best shot is probably EVs and having solar panels, those can maybe last about 20 years.
Diesel and Petrol will go bad in a year.
Either way you are on a finite resource, so the actual best bet is having horses
You think you’re going to drive anywhere 2 years after the apocalypse?
After a winter or two, between abandoned vehicles and lack of maintenance, the roads are going to be impossible to navigate for any distance that you couldn’t just walk or bike.
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Diesel lasts longer then a year. If you can get a commune going, you can grow diesel fuel from seed oil, but only with older diesel. Not that you'd want to direct too much food resources to transportation, but if you have enough farm land, diesel tractors are much more common then electric and easier to work on.
You can also run modified gas engines to run off of Wood Gas and wood could be scavenged from most places. Probably the best option for any fast scouting operations, although you would need to let the system idle. The start up process takes some time.
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this is like, totally out of left field.
but if you want to live out the whole apocalypse scavenger, doomsday prepper fantasy. Project Zomboid and its mods are a great game for that.
PZ is set in 1993 though. And for some reason their 1993 does not have bicycles.
a bicycle mod literally just came out a week or so ago
There's always been one. It's not a completely integrated experience though.
There's been a mod that adds motorcycles and ATVs too but it's clunky. I haven't bothered to test the new versions but it used to be that you could only get on and off the bike from one side
No idea if build 42 has bikes in them yet, but with all the work they're putting into the game I can imagine that they're eventually going to put in different forms of transportation.
Bikes, skateboards and motor cycles have already been modded in but official support would always be nice.
In writing this comment I thought about with the new metalworking and smiting coming in, building a handcar for railroad tracks would be awesome and would put use to the basically useless railway system they have on the map now.
B42 is sadly going in the wrong direction currently. It's addressing a lot of early and mid game stuff that allows you to basically just fuck off into the woods. But end game is still dull.
Yea true, not going to say you're wrong but I feel like they're making the bones of the game really solid and from there, branching out. The basements and the high rise buildings are going to be crazy imo, and the new skill tree and class reworks are going to give it a solid foundation, not to mention overhauling how weapons shoot. Them adding in NPCs is also a step in the right direction for making the game more interactive.
Let's hope the can pad out the end game. Because like you said it's kind of dull after a certain point. But I feel like with any sandbox game, you have to make your own goals and fun - and those experiences are always better with friends.
I do think they have the right ideas, it's just a matter of time and implementation.
Just gotta find a server with one of the mods...
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2988491347
The best part of PZ modding is how little you have to do. Boot the regular game and click multiplayer and just join a modded server. The game will download, install, and apply a few hundred mods without you doing anything.
I know, I got like 400 hours in it.
Keyless start using too much an issue. You can start card with dead key transponders. This new phenomenon of subscription will be an issue though.
Imagine dragging a Stellantis vehicle and using the satnav. You stop at an intersection to get your bearings and the screen same you to extend your warranty.
It still amazes me the number of people who think if the battery in their key dies they cannot get into or start their car. It will probably get to be that way some day because people don't demand more from automakers. But right now these fobs include physical keys for the door. Read the manual how to get to the key and lock before you're locked out of the vehicle.
You can also put the dead key by the start button or some other designated place in the car to start it with RFID.
These are the kinds of things you want to have figured out in the first few days of car ownership. See also how to open your Tesla from the inside when the battery is dead. That's a life or death situation in some circumstances.
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Even right now. Look at how people have to wait in huge lines to get some gas every time there is a natural disaster, or extreme weather. After a few days, or even hours, it's mostly gone.
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