Camper Thermal Engineering for Extreme Cold & High-Altitude: Arctic Antarctica Tibet

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4. Foremost Industries


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A rather surprising number of the large vehicles at McMurdo station, both tracked and wheeled, appear to be made by Foremost Industries.

In addition to Ivan the Terrabus, there's the Foremost "Nodwell" and what appears to be a Foremost "Chieftan" -- see http://www.foremost.ca/products/tracked-units , http://www.foremost.ca/products/nodwell-110-0 , http://www.foremost.ca/sites/default/files/images/nodwell_110.pdf , http://www.foremost.ca/products/nodwell-240 , http://www.foremost.ca/sites/default/files/images/nodwell_240.pdf , http://www.foremost.ca/products/nodwell-320 , http://www.foremost.ca/sites/default/files/images/nodwell_320.pdf , http://www.foremost.ca/products/chieftain-c , http://www.foremost.ca/sites/default/files/images/chieftain_c.pdf , http://www.foremost.ca/products/chieftain-d-0 , http://www.foremost.ca/sites/default/files/images/chieftain_d.pdf , http://www.foremost.ca/products/chieftain-r , http://www.foremost.ca/sites/default/files/images/chieftain_r.pdf , [video]http://www.antarctica.gov.au/living-and-working/travel-and-logistics/ground-transport/field-support-vehicles/nodwell-and-foremost-pioneer-tracked-vehicles[/video] , and http://mikeontheice.blogspot.com/2012_05_01_archive.html :







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Foremost Industries also makes the very strange-looking Delta II, originally developed for the oil-exploration industry in northern Alberta -- see http://www.foremost.ca/products/wheeled-units , http://www.offroadvehicle.ru/AZBUCAR/Foremost/foremost-wheeled-4x4-6x6-8x8-pdf.pdf , http://www.foremost.ca/products/delta-2 , http://www.foremost.ca/sites/default/files/images/delta_2.pdf , http://www.offroadvehicle.ru/AZBUCAR/Foremost/veh_d2.pdf , http://www.foremost.ca/products/delta-3 , http://www.foremost.ca/sites/default/files/images/delta_3.pdf , http://www.offroadvehicle.ru/AZBUCAR/Foremost/veh_d3.pdf , http://www.offroadvehicle.ru/AZBUCAR/Foremost/Foremost txt.html , http://picc.com/c/general/pictures/album/machines_36381/sorted/hot/page/24/?style=blog , http://www.modelcarsmag.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=19413 , http://route-this.blogspot.com/2012/01/and-automobiles.html , and http://www.caranddriver.com/photos-...ksen-national-science-foundation-photo-396253 :







Here are some videos of the same:


[video=youtube;v1S9GkcYz20]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1S9GkcYz20 [/video]


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Here are some pictures of the Delta II and III, as used more conventionally in oil exploration in northern Canada:




For the full range of Foremost oil exploration equipment, see http://www.offroadvehicle.ru/AZBUCAR/Foremost/explorer_small.pdf , http://www.akdrillinginternational....illing_detalle_album.aspx?id=9&album=Foremost W750 Buggy , http://www.foremost.ca/products/exploration-drills , http://www.foremost.ca/products/discoverer-mpd , http://www.foremost.ca/products/support-vehicle , http://www.foremost.ca/products/explorer-1500 , http://www.foremost.ca/products/prospector-w750 , http://www.foremost.ca/products/wheeled-units , http://www.foremost.ca/products/commander-c , and http://www.foremost.ca/products/commander-tri-axle .

Scanning these web-pages, it seems abundantly clear that Foremost is a true "off-road, all-terrain" specialist, and not just a fabricator of construction vehicles. What's more, Foremost is a specialist in off-road, all-terrain medium and heavy wheeled trucks designed for extreme climates, as well as high-altitude (Antarctica is a high-altitude ice-plateau). So Foremost might be well worth calling or emailing....


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5. The Lessons of Antarctica


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The climatic conditions for land vehicles in Antarctica are well-summarized in the Car & Driver article titled "Polar Motion: A Look Inside Driving in Antarctica" . The following is a lengthy quotation, because the article contains so much good, first-hand information. Notice how favorably George Blaisdell, the USAP"s operations manager, talks about Foremost vehicles in particular.

How long do cars and trucks survive at the South Pole? What does it take to get around in a land where the sun sets in late April and doesn't rise again for months? Above all, is it any fun?


[Car & Driver interviews George Blaisdell, the USAP's operations manager]


McMurdo is the continent's primary logistics hub. What are the driving conditions like?

Well, we run three permanent stations on the continent, two of which are on bedrock. The average snow thickness is about 8000 feet, and just two percent of the continent's mass is exposed—everything else is covered by ice and snow. So almost all our vehicles are designed to operate off-road. There are some gravel roadways suitable for pickups with oversized tires, but they're the exception, not the rule.

For the rest of what happens at McMurdo and everything at the South Pole, vehicles have to be capable of operating at ground pressures of less than 20 psi—ideally less than 5 psi, which usually means big tundra tires like you see on oilfield rigs. We have a few improved trails on snow and ice, but a lot of what we drive on is completely untouched terrain. The snow there isn't like the powder that falls in Colorado—it's windblown, with really low moisture content, and quite hard. If you kick it with your boot, you're likely to hurt yourself.

Most of our vehicles are for moving materials or, to a lesser extent, personnel. We primarily move people by air, so we have a lot of vehicles for runway maintenance—large tractors on rubber tracks that tow large compactors or snow drags, that kind of thing. We move a lot of snow.

We have a [Foremost Terra Bus] that we use as an airport shuttle. It was originally built for the northern oil fields, with balloon tires seven feet in diameter and six feet across. We have customized, lifted 15-passenger vans running 40-inch bead-lock tires at 10 psi during the summer months when snow roads are at their weakest. The rest of the year they run at about 18 psi to reduce tire wear. We have 130 snowmobiles, 33 bulldozers, 52 tracked over-snow vehicles, 45 wheeled loaders, 30 rubber-tracked agricultural tractors (used for heavy over-snow towing), 28 heavy trucks, and 90 light trucks and vans…


What's the average life span of heavy equipment there? The cold and conditions have to take a toll.

Nearly everything lasts longer than you'd think. There are two reasons for that: First off, we work intensely with a lot of equipment during the summer, but it's all parked for the winter. At the South Pole, a really high temperature might be 60 or 70 below, or it might be 80 or 100 below. A bulldozer sees about three months of intense use, in two 12-hour shifts. Then it sits idle for nine months.

The second part is the exceedingly clean environment. There's no sea spray, no smog, no bizarre chemicals in the air, no dust to speak of. You can have a bulldozer pushing huge quantities of snow—the resistance and the density are so much less than soil—without tapping into the capability of the dozer. Our dozers have specially designed blades that are 70 percent larger than normal blades. We're still running two bulldozers built in 1956. They're long in the tooth, and we have to manufacture parts, but it's common for us to get 20 to 25 years out of a vehicle that the manufacturer would list at 12 to 15.


What about vans and big stuff like the Foremost Terra Bus? Same principle?

Pickups and vans wear out closer to normal. They get the most use of anything we have—our light-vehicle fleet sees 3500 miles per year and averages 4 mph. They're used pretty hard, the way you would expect a contractor to use a truck, and we replace them roughly every seven years. For the rest of our fleet, we range between 400 miles for our ambulance to 13,000 miles for our civil works foreman's truck. You can't get around the environment. Winds get pretty high, and open doors can get caught in the wind and bent. Big stuff tends to move around in storms, garage doors and heavy things, and containers tip over and smash vehicles. There are times when everyone is contained indoors and the vehicles take a pounding.

The Foremost stuff was built for oilfield use in Canada and northern Alaska. There's still plenty of life left in those things. We've redone engines and such, but for the most part, it's plug and play—two long box beams for the chassis and giant Eaton axles hooked to it. It's a giant Lego [set].


So the vans are lifted, the oilfield vehicles are sturdy, and the production-based pickups are basically on the world's biggest, nastiest job site. Any Antarctic-specific modifications?

Well, we have extra heaters in a lot of things, for one. Permanent stations, where vehicles primarily hang out, get battery heaters, coolant heaters, transmission heaters, differential heaters. We have heavier vehicles that are drawing a kilowatt while plugged in because of the heating needs. For the bending doors, we use seatbelt material to create a strap from the door jamb to the door itself so they can't come close to the stops in high winds. Exhausts get covers to keep snow from blowing in. Heavy equipment gets custom air breathers and preheaters. We install manual parking-brake disconnects—there are manual locking valves in all the vehicle cabs—because it's far too easy for parking brakes to ice up and jam. Everything gets radios, obviously, as it all has to be prepped to survive on its own and let you call for help.


At those temperatures, fluids have to be a problem.

The light trucks and snowmobiles use Mogas, a military-grade, low-moisture gasoline; everything else runs on JP-5—similar to Jet A1—or AN-8, a unique kerosene with a low gel point of minus-53 degrees Fahrenheit. Every piece of equipment, from aircraft to generators to heavy equipment to snowmobiles and chain saws, operates on one of these three types of fuel.


Diesels aren't exactly the cleanest things out there, and that's a pretty sterile environment. Any plans to greenify the fleet?

We're working pretty hard to convert our vehicle fleet to electric power, at least where it makes sense. We already have two electric trucks down there—light vehicles built by Minnesota's E-Ride Industries. You see them a lot on university campuses. Fuel is a commodity, and our V-8s spend a lot of time idling. As mid-size trucks start to show up with electric or hybrid powerplants, USAP will be paying close attention to their potential. For each unit of fuel we burn in our powerplant, we get back 33 percent of that fuel's energy as electricity. We use heat exchangers to recapture as much of the remaining energy as possible to help heat a number of our buildings. At McMurdo, we capture a total of 85 percent as useful energy; at the South Pole, we believe we are closer to 95 percent. With our light-vehicle fleet, I estimate we only get back 10 to 15 percent of the fuel's energy content. With an electric truck, the power comes from batteries that are charged by our powerplant, which is harvesting eight times as much energy from our fuel as the internal-combustion engine does. For light electric vehicles, McMurdo's environment is ideal.

See http://www.caranddriver.com/features/polar-motion-a-look-inside-driving-in-antarctica-feature .

So, the upshot for ICE vehicles in Antarctica seems to be heaters on everything, not just the engine: "....battery heaters, coolant heaters, transmission heaters, differential heaters." Furthermore, all McMurdo vehicles are powered by special military-grade low-moisture gasoline or jet-fuel, i.e. fuels that can withstand extremely low-temperatures -- see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jet_fuel , http://generalaviationnews.com/2011/03/16/10-mogas-myths/ , and http://www.bp.com/en/global/bp-air/aviation-fuel/aviation-gasoline/about-mogas.html . So a vehicle designed to withstand extreme temperatures needs to have an ICE ("Internal Combustion Engine") suitable for such fuels.

Alternatively, it could just as well be a hybrid with a microturbine range-extender, because turbines tend to be very fuel-flexible, able to burn jet-fuel at one end, and biodiesel at the other.


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6. An Engine for All Seasons, All Altitudes, and All Fuels


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Reflecting a bit, Mr. Blaisdell's position as USAP"s operations manager is substantially different than the typical overlander's, for the simple reason that Mr. Blaisdell can exert tight control over fuel type and quality. Whereas overlanders enjoy no such luxury.

The problem of fuel quality came up a number of times in the "High Altitude Heating" thread, and seems increasingly troublesome, because new trucks sold in the First-World will have the latest engines designed to cut down on emissions, engines that use ultra-low-sulphur diesel (ULSD) not yet widely available in the Third World -- see http://www.trucknetuk.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=105341 and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-low-sulfur_diesel . Whereas a hybrid with microturbine range-extender might cut through this gordian knot, enabling an overlander to fuel up with JP-5 or AN-8 when traveling in the coldest parts of Canada, Alaska, or Siberia, but switching to local low-quality diesel when traversing the Altiplano in Bolivia. Elsewhere, such a vehicle could go "green", filling up with Biodiesel.

In effect, microturbines would give such a hybrid vehicle the fuel-flexibility of an M1A1 Abrams' tank, whose AGT1500 turboshaft is designed to run on just about any type of fuel -- see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_turbine-electric_locomotive , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_turbine#Tanks , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M1_Abrams , http://www.honeywell.com/sites/serv...t?docid=DBFF4ECEE-AF8F-8ABE-F6D2-0E2E8F6A88FB , http://wryedge.com/portfolio/agt1500-engine/ , http://www.turbokart.com/about_agt1500.htm , http://www.turbokart.com/gasturbine.htm , http://www.aoi.com.eg/aoieng/military/overhaul/overhaul.html , and http://transupport.com . For instance, the Abrams can guzzle the cheap stuff coming out of the refining process, like kerosene, as opposed to highly refined gasoline. You could probably run the Abrams off Russian vodka or nail polish:

The turbine in the Abrams can run on diesel, gas, kerosene, JP 1,2,3,4, alcohol, furnace fuel, just about any distillate of oil but not crude oil or bunker fuel except in areas were it is hot 24 hours a day.

This meant that Tank units could take any fuel source captured on the battle field and use it for there own units, something that they learned in WW2 would be a major advantage.

See http://www.quora.com/What-advantage...her-than-diesel-engines-like-most-other-tanks .

Here are some images of the Honeywell AGT1500 turboshaft that powers the Abrams:


...... .....




The following are some good Youtube videos about the Abrams, followed by some playlists: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OFN79wuuTy8 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=97lBxGPppW0 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZlGt7m1392g , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nF_HQFmHpg8 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0uWcFpCi28 , https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL30AE97AB7267E17C , and https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL81C433794B9CE823 .

Reading Mr. Blaisdell's comments about the importance of fuel choice in Antarctica's extreme cold-weather climates, it's exactly the Abram tank's fuel-flexibiliy that a truly "world-class", go-anywhere, extreme-altitude-capable expedition vehicle needs.

Of course, I am not suggesting that a small 4x4 expedition vehicle should be fitted with and AGT1500 turboshaft. Rather, I am thinking more along the lines of a Capstone microturbine, a C30 or C65, as fitted in the recent Peterbilt/Walmart concept truck, or as used in the Langford Performance Engineering Ford S-Max Crossover concept car:


[video=youtube;NER9X4_gtYk]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NER9X4_gtYk [/video] [video=youtube;bwG3ZF5ktjI]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwG3ZF5ktjI [/video]


See http://www.capstoneturbine.com/news/story.asp?id=512 , http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rc...2BRZDjIwMwte_nNphpoRFPg&bvm=bv.73231344,d.bGE , http://www.lpengines.com , http://www.lpengines.com/about_us.php , http://www.lpengines.com/news_detail.php?id=10 , http://www.thechargingpoint.com/opi...The-Whisper-turbine-charged-electric-car.html , and http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=74000225 .

It's noteworthy that Mr. Blaisdell is very much open to exploring the possibility of such vehicles for Antarctic applications, for the reasons he gave in the last paragraph of his interview with Car & Driver. For further discussion at great length of turbines and microturbines as used in land vehicles, please see the posts beginning at #495 in the "Fully Integrated Man or Tatra" thread, at http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...pedition-RV-w-Rigid-Torsion-Free-Frame/page50 . There you will find literally pages and pages of discussion, some of it quite heated, addressing the possible application of microturbines in an expedition vehicle.


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7. Traversing Antarctica's High-Altitude Ice Plateau: McMurdo to the South Pole


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The one thing that the Car & Driver article does not mention, is altitude. This is most curious indeed, because central Antarctica is actually a high-altitude "ice-plateau". Antarctica has the highest average elevation of any continent -- see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Pole . The South Pole's elevation is 2,835 m above sea-level, or 9,300 feet, and the East Antarctic Ice Sheet reaches a maximum altitude of 4,091 meters, or 13,421 feet, at "Dome A". See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dome_A , and see post #27 in this thread, at http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...BEST-High-Altitude-Solution-for-Heating/page3 , for further discussion of the implications for a gen-set.

So one wonders how ICE vehicles in Antarctica not only cope with extreme cold, but also cope with extreme cold combined with high-altitude. Vehicles used to explore the plateau, or ferry supplies from McMurdo to the South Pole station, must be equipped to handle both; and handle both well.

For images and information about McMurdo, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McMurdo_Station , https://www.google.com/maps/@-77.848101,166.69693,9009m/data=!3m1!1e3 , http://www.nsf.gov/geo/plr/support/mcmurdo.jsp , http://antarcticsun.usap.gov/features/contenthandler.cfm?id=2947 , http://www.usap.gov/videoClipsAndMaps/mcmwebcam.cfm , http://icestories.exploratorium.edu/dispatches/big-ideas/mcmurdo/ , http://ds-lands.com/mcmurdo-station.html , http://www.coolantarctica.com/Community/mcmurdo/mcmurdo_base_antarctica.htm , http://astro.uchicago.edu/cara/vtour/mcmurdo/ , http://astro.uchicago.edu/cara/vtour/mcmurdo/ , http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/antarctica/background/NSF/mc-stay.html , http://www.antarctica.gov.au/__data...9/ml_385474997916667_atcm28_att067_rev1_e.pdf , https://www.facebook.com/pages/McMurdo-Station-Antarctica/395623660500811 , http://www.theguardian.com/travel/2003/jan/24/travelnews , http://www.slate.com/blogs/quora/20...on_how_warm_are_the_indoor_living_spaces.html , http://www.timeforkids.com/news/life-mcmurdo/140131 , http://newswatch.nationalgeographic...n-ice-arriving-in-mcmurdo-station-antarctica/ , http://www.nbcnews.com/id/15834019/#.U_UQSXmSf6k , http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/science/cold-science/life-work/mcmurdo-station.htm , http://mcmurdotimes.com , http://news.discovery.com/adventure/antarctica-opens-for-a-ne-season.htm , http://peterflaig.blogspot.com/2010/12/semi-random-series-of-around-town-shots.html , http://news.discovery.com/adventure/antarctica-opens-for-a-ne-season.htm , http://approach.rpi.edu/2010/06/06/if-antarctica-were-music-it-would-be-mozart/ , http://polarsoils.blogspot.com/2010/12/about-mcmurdo-station.html , http://goingsouth2009.blogspot.com/2010/10/mcmurdo-station.html , and https://southpoledoc.wordpress.com/tag/mcmurdo-station/

Here are some images of McMurdo Station:






These are two of the better videos I found:





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Here are some images and some videos about the new station at the South Pole; also see https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLM4tNEb7HduhkP8zzlBCBb-U-Xo69aZUK , http://www.today.com/video/today/21707157#21707157 , http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/livingsouthpole/video_pop08.jsp , http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/livingsouthpole/video_pop05.jsp , http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/livingsouthpole/video_pop10.jsp , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amundsen-Scott_South_Pole_Station , http://www.southpolestation.com/newpole/newpole.html ,http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/livingsouthpole/station_new.jsp , http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/livingsouthpole/photos_newstat.jsp , http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/livingsouthpole/pdf_files/Centennial_Poster_Front_1sm.pdf , http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/livingsouthpole/pdf_files/Centennial_Poster_Back_1sm.pdf , http://www.nsf.gov/geo/plr/budget/08_budget/fy08_southpole.pdf , http://www.usap.gov/videoclipsandmaps/spwebcam.cfm , http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/obop/spo/livecamera.html , http://www.southpolestation.com , http://ferrarochoi.com , http://ferrarochoi.com/portfolio_page/amundsen/ , http://ferrarochoi.com/portfolio/ , http://ferrarochoi.com/publications/master-plan-for-the-south-pole-redevelopment-project/ , http://ferrarochoi.com/portfolio_page/ferraz-station/ , http://ferrarochoi.com/portfolio_page/india-research-station/ , http://www.tropolism.com/2008/01/south_pole_gets_new_building.php , and http://beyondthebackyard.com/2013/12/10/the-new-south-pole-station/ .

These are photographs of the South Pole station before it got its new cladding:






And these are images of the station with its new cladding being put on:






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And here are some videos of the South Pole station:



[video=youtube;KEvwB7G8CUo]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEvwB7G8CUo&index=54&list=PLM4tNEb7HduhkP8 zzlBCBb-U-Xo69aZUK[/video] [video=youtube;vmBmxjRCAz8]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmBmxjRCAz8&list=PLL2JLrseXAsNRekIK7jFhhMF G9gGmLWtK&index=199[/video]


So it would be interesting to know how the supplies used to build the latest version of the South Pole station were ferried there from McMurdo. How did they get from A to B?

Sure, much of it was airlifted in, and the videos above describing the construction of the new South Pole station only seem to mention the airlifting of materials and supplies. But surely not everything? Surely not the heaviest construction materials? If heavier supplies were ferried to the South Pole over land, then the design specifications of the vehicles used would be very relevant to this thread, because they would be vehicles able to handle both extreme cold as well as high altitude. Furthermore, because driving from McMurdo to the South Pole takes about a month, such vehicles would have heated campers for sleeping, eating and general living.


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8. Heating in Antarctica's High-Altitude Polar Explorers?


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For instance, one wonders how Foremost's "Nodwell" and "Chieftan" tracked vehicles described above are heated, and how their heating systems adjust with altitude. The associated pdfs whose links were provided in post #86 above go into some degree of detail describing Nodwell and Chieftan engines and power trains. Their cabins are described as "fully insulated", and as either "Arctic Gear Standard", or optional "Arctic Package". But no specifics about how heating works.

The Haaglunds BV206 tracked vehicle shown in the images in post # 85 above also seems worth further investigation, as well as its technology-successor, the BAE Systems "Viking" BvS 10 M2 (Hagglunds was bought by BAE Systems) -- see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bandvagn_202 , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bv206 , http://www.bv206.co.uk , http://www.bv206.co.uk/index.php/models-available/personnel-carriers , http://www.bv206.co.uk/index.php/models-available/cargo-carriers , http://www.bv206.co.uk/index.php/what-is-a-hagglund-bv206 , http://www.bv206.co.uk/index.php/engine-choices , http://www.bv206.co.uk/index.php/specifications , http://www.bv206.co.uk/index.php/videos , http://www.hagglund-hire-scotland.co.uk/spec.php , http://www.army-technology.com/projects/bv2065/ , http://www.one35th.com/attc/attc_variants.htm , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BvS_10 , http://www.baesystems.com/product/B...frWindowMode=0&_adf.ctrl-state=1dhtx6qhur_142 , http://www.deagel.com/Tracked-Armored-Fighting-Vehicles/BvS10_a000588002.aspx , http://www.military-today.com/apc/bvs10_viking.htm , http://www.armyrecognition.com/unit...ical_data_sheet_specifications_pictures_.html , http://www.army-technology.com/projects/viking/ , http://www.army-technology.com/news/news81144.html , and http://www.army-technology.com/projects/viking/viking8.html .

The Hagglunds BV206 is a Swedish vehicle, originally developed for the Swedish Army to cope with boggy terrain in northern Scandinavia. It's interesting that two of the most popular and beloved tracked personnel carriers used in Antarctica -- Foremost and Hagglunds -- were developed by nations that have significant Arctic territory.

The Hagglunds is fully amphibious, which means that when it falls through thin ice in Antarctica, not all is lost. Here are some rather incredible videos :




Also see https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9931701A7C97F694 , http://www.bv206.co.uk/index.php/videos , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE_wAuBMv1I , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnZ0CEd_qx0 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BDmdP6jNKs , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-l5xiMvMlBU , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwr8Xy9FrzU , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRuYUZmhQUQ , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTrinY76bco , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZrzkmNfOqc&list=PL822403B9015AAF02&index=12 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ji6uk0RKupM&index=13&list=PL822403B9015AAF02 , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UVwslNMoWM , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGiPRI1l73s , and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqdJRFfHSYs

To be researched further.....


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9. Foremost Snow Coaches


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Here it's worth returning to the Terrabus, and noting that its used in at least one other application.

Most commonly, the Terrabus is sighted as the "Snow Coach" shuttle, taking tourists on 80-minute runs to see the Columbia Ice Field, located on the border between Banff and Jasper national parks in the Canadian Rockies:






These images provide good views of where the engine locates, in back; the Terrabus is a diesel "pusher":







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The great futuristic styling and paint scheme of the Terrabus exterior is not matched by the seating and driver's station in the interior, which are decidedly utilitarian:





But the ceiling full of skylights is pretty incredible, and even more visibly so in the videos below.

The fourth video starts out slow; just skip ahead. It includes narration by the driver, as well as some spectacular footage of the very steep road that the Terrabus drives to get to the Athabasca glacier (3:40 into the video, onwards):


[video=youtube;gNp0ywYRcNk]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNp0ywYRcNk&index=5&list=PLOYaaFYFPlPRgbL9 cYfvj3QCwHoduMJ5s[/video] [video=youtube;XFQAsh7eF_M]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XFQAsh7eF_M&index=7&list=PLOYaaFYFPlPRgbL9 cYfvj3QCwHoduMJ5s[/video]


This is not an "extreme altitude" application: the Terrabus Snow Coach in effect shuttles between 7,000 and 8,900 feet, or 2210 m and 2700 m, i.e. between the Columbia Glacier Discovery Center, and a turn-around on the Athabasca glacier.

For information about the Columbia Ice Field, the Athabasca Glacier, and Jasper National Park, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbia_Icefield , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athabasca_Glacier , http://www.earthsciencescanada.com/geovista/PDFs_en/vistas8_agci.pdf , http://bivouac.com/ArxPg.asp?ArxId=1012 , http://www.icewalks.com/page7.html , http://www.todocanada.ca/columbia-icefield-discovery-centre/ , http://www.pc.gc.ca/eng/pn-np/ab/jasper/index.aspx , http://www.pc.gc.ca/eng/pn-np/ab/jasper/activ/explore-interets/glacier-athabasca.aspx , www.jaspernationalpark.com/trekking-the-columbia-icefield-in-jasper-national-park.html , http://www.jaspernationalpark.com/a...the-icefield-centre-at-columbia-icefield.html , http://www.icefieldsparkway.ca , and https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLOYaaFYFPlPRgbL9cYfvj3QCwHoduMJ5s.

For information about the Brewster Sightseeing tour, see http://www.sightseeingtourscanada.ca/images/BrewsterSightseeing_2007.pdf, http://www.brewster.ca/rocky-mounta...tivities/columbia-icefield-glacier-adventure/ , http://www.brewster.ca/rocky-mounta...ia-icefield-glacier-adventure/the-experience/ , http://www.brewster.ca/rocky-mounta...ies/columbia-icefield-glacier-adventure/faqs/ , and http://www.brewster.ca/rocky-mounta.../columbia-icefield-glacier-adventure/gallery/ .

And again, for information about the Terrabus and Foremost Industries, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snow_coach , http://www.foremost.ca/about/company-background , http://www.foremost.ca/products/vehicles , http://www.foremost.ca/products/vehicles?field_construction_locations_tid=All&page=1 , http://www.foremost.ca/products/terra-bus , http://www.foremost.ca/sites/default/files/images/terra_bus.pdf , http://myntransportblog.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/terra_bus.pdf , http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_Bus , http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foremost_Terra_Bus , http://tractors.wikia.com/wiki/Terra_Bus , http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Terra_Bus , http://www.kevinsbusrail.com/brewster-foremost.html , http://myntransportblog.com/2014/04/22/buses-foremost-canada/ , and http://www.offroadvehicle.ru/AZBUCAR/Foremost/Foremost txt.html .

Unfortunately, the pdf about the Terrabus from Foremost industries has no information about the heating system.

One thing is certain, however: the heating system in the Terrabus can work well at 9,000 feet, and so too at Antarctic temperatures.


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10. "Clifford", the Big Red Kress Truck


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In closing, it's worth noting that Ivan the Terrabus is no longer alone in Antarctica. Around 2011, another polar-people-mover joined Ivan, a long articulated vehicle made by the Kress corporation of Illinois.

Like Foremost Industries, Kress is a company specialized in mining vehicles, mainly coal-haulers -- see http://www.kresscarrier.com/index.html , http://www.kresscarrier.com/diversifiedproducts.html#.U_WbznmSf6k , and http://www.kresscarrier.com/DiversifiedPersonnelCarrier.html#.U_WWQnmSf6k .

Here again are some images culled from various websites and blogs -- see https://earthref.org/drupal/gallery/golf-4-3-9-antarctica-expedition-2012/kress-people-mover , http://bigblueglobe.blogspot.com/2011/02/kress-vehicle.html , http://photolibrary.usap.gov/Portsc...&catalog=Antarctica&template=USAPgovMidThumbs , http://photolibrary.usap.gov/Portsc...&catalog=Antarctica&template=USAPgovMidThumbs , http://www.frozendentist.com/cool-polar-transports/ , http://supertigerldb.blogspot.com2012/11/satellite-test-november-20-2012.html , http://gregontheice.wordpress.com/tag/antarctic-vehicles/ , https://gregontheice.wordpress.com/2013/10/ , http://antarctica.geog.tamu.edu/blogs/islandtoice/2012/journal/3Dec.html , http://turfinantarctica.blogspot.com/2011/12/week-of-few-firsts.html , http://antarcticarctic.wordpress.com/category/antarctica/stations/mcmurdo/ , http://dave--kelly.blogspot.com/2012/11/the-start-of-mainbody-daves-birthday.html , and http://ciresblogs.colorado.edu/antarcticuavs/ :







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Although the Kress truck looks impressive enough, it did not immediately win over "Polies", i.e. Antarctica residents. The Kress truck seems to be comfortable enough to ride in, but one can't see out of the windows when sitting down (!!), and apparently it is very slow:

Of course one of the other vehicles that is beloved by all is Ivan the Terra Bus..... Made by Foremost – a Canadian company – it’s most often used for transporting up to 56 passengers to and from one of the three runways near McMurdo. They use Terra Buses in other Arctic climates as well, but I doubt they are as beloved. Especially now that [Ivan has] got competition, although we avidly debate the asine background of his competition. I’m relating the story as I understand it, so understand this is from the rumor mill.

They were looking to augment and probably replace Ivan so they put a request out and put it through the bidding process. Kress bid and won the contract on some criteria, perhaps the lowest bidder, and then proceed to create and build a one-off articulated vehicle. From the start it was fubar’ed. When it was delivered on the vessel the tires had to be shaved so it could fit across the bridge from the Ice Pier (just this year we got new ones to replaced the shaved ones). I seem to remember this being followed by major mechanical issues (as this was tested in Kansas, as if that’s similar to Antarctica).

Then they realized that even with articulation it was too wide to turn in town, so they had to move power poles (and the power lines on them), to allow it to go through town.

Sometime after that they found out you can’t turn the heater on in the back as it can cause carbon monoxide poisoning, as it’s too air tight.

Having ridden in this thing, I can tell you it's a sea sickening ride. It absolutely feels like they put a box on top of a flatbed truck without air-ride and sold it for several hundred thousand. All this for an extra 3 passengers, when they should have gone out and bought another Terra Bus. Nothing we can do about it now, we have two tractors, two flat beds, and a passenger module.

If they retired Ivan though, I think people might revolt.

Oh, and it's known as Clifford the Big Red Truck....

I was actually pleasantly surprised at how nice the Kress is inside with one exception. For some reason, the windows in the Kress are all located about a foot above everyone’s heads when you’re sitting. Not to mention that they ice over in about 5 minutes. It makes for a fairly boring ride as far as the scenery goes.

This time, instead of climbing into Ivan the Terra Bus, we loaded into the back of Kress Trailer. The Kress is a long, heavy duty trailer and cab. Like everything down here, it’s big, expensive and has a USAP logo on the side. I was informed that each Kress has a sticker price of about $1 million. That officially makes it the most expensive land vehicle I’ve ever traveled in.

See http://blog.wonderfullyrich.net/2013/04/my-favorite-ice-movers-sometimes-shakers/ and http://philsterwebster.wordpress.com/2013/10/11/leaving-antarctica-again/ . The entrance stairway to the passenger cabin on the Kress truck certainly does not look even half as user-friendly as the entrance stairway on Ivan the Terrabus. In the Kress truck it's more like a ladder than a staircase.

Can't resist suggesting here that if one wants a vehicle built properly to haul passengers in extreme Arctic or Antarctic climates, perhaps best to go with a Canadian company like Foremost.:victory: ...
At the very least, there's no question that the Canadian-built Terrabus has engendered strong end-user loyalty, as evidenced by the first quote above. There is even an "Ivan the Terrabus Song", that's actually pretty good -- see http://www.antarcticphotos.com/mcmff-08/mcmff - 04 Ivan.mp4 .

On the other hand, some "polies" like the new Kress vehicle:

Yesterday, when I got off the A-319 Airbus, there were two vehicles ahead of me. Ivan the Terrabus; an old, sometimes trustworthy friend which was full of people, and The Kress Vehicle. It turns out that Ivan was full of folks that were headed north to Christchurch. I would be taking my first trip on the Kress.

I first wrote about the Kress a couple of years ago when it was delivered via the cargo vessel. It's actually a pretty impressive vehicle.

Inside, it seats 59 passengers and feels like a movie theatre. The ride was one of the smoothest I've had from any of the runways here. I was even able to have the ability to have a nice conversation with a past fellow winterover I hadn't seen in many years. Count me as a big fan of the Kress!

See http://bigblueglobe.blogspot.com/2012/10/riding-in-kress.html .

There is even less technical information about the Kress vehicle available on the company's website, than information about the Terrabus on the Foremost website. Apparently the Kress a bit of a one-off, unlike the Terrabus which has been built in multiple iterations and, as discussed in the previous two posts, is used in places other than Antarctica.


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11. Insulating for Extreme Climates, Pressurizing for Extreme Altitudes, and Heating


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The sentence high-lighted in red above, about the allegedly messed up design of the Kress truck's heating system for the passenger-cabin , really caught my attention:

Sometime after that they found out you can't turn the heater on in the back as it can cause carbon monoxide poisoning, as it's too air tight.

Elsewhere on ExPo it has been discussed whether or not an expedition vehicle's cab/camper cabin should be pressurized at extreme altitude (above 12,000 feet), in order to combat anoxia - see posts #410 , #412 - #425, #427 - #428, #431, and #435, at http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...pedition-RV-w-Rigid-Torsion-Free-Frame/page41 , http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...pedition-RV-w-Rigid-Torsion-Free-Frame/page42 , http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...pedition-RV-w-Rigid-Torsion-Free-Frame/page43 , http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...pedition-RV-w-Rigid-Torsion-Free-Frame/page44 , and http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...pedition-RV-w-Rigid-Torsion-Free-Frame/page45 . But clearly, if a cabin/camper were sealed well enough to sustain significantly higher pressure inside, then no heaters or stoves that produce carbon monoxide could be used inside the vehicle. Otherwise they would suffer the same problem as the Kress truck. This completely rules out LPG stoves, and perhaps also LPG and diesel heaters, although I am not sure about this.

Perhaps a heater or heaters could be located in a compartment completely separate from a well-sealed cabin/camper? A hydronic heater only produces hot water circulating through pipes, so this seems at least conceivable. Perhaps the heater in the Kress truck is forced-air, and that's why it allegedly proved such a potential danger to passengers inside the vehicle?

Note that the Doleoni MAN-KAT discussed in the "High-Altitude Heating" thread has a "pressurized cabin", even though the Doleoni uses both a Webasto DualTop and AirTop heater -- see http://www.doleoni.com/wp/en/man-kat-1-a1/ , and see post #263 at http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...BEST-High-Altitude-Solution-for-Heating/page7 . In the kitchen, the Doleoni has both induction and diesel-fired hobs. So perhaps what Doleoni website means by "pressurized cabin", is simply the cab of the MAN-KAT, and not the camper box as well?

It's debatable whether a cabin/camper should be pressurized for extreme altitude, and for various reasons I am inclined against. It's interesting that Bombardier, a Canadian company that builds both snowmobiles and jet aircraft, early on decided that the passenger cars on the Qinghai-Tibet railway would not be significantly pressurized. Again, for further discussion see posts #412 - #425 at http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...pedition-RV-w-Rigid-Torsion-Free-Frame/page42 and http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...pedition-RV-w-Rigid-Torsion-Free-Frame/page43 . Instead, Bombardier decided that supplementing the oxygen content in the air was sufficient to combat anoxia on the railway, up to an altitude as high as 5,068 m, or 16,627 feet -- see post #420 at http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...pedition-RV-w-Rigid-Torsion-Free-Frame/page42 .

Now the Kress truck allegedly encountered a problem with heating not because the passenger cabin was sealed tightly to sustain pressurization at extreme altitudes, but rather, because the passenger cabin was sealed tightly to keep out the Antarctic cold. Sealing a cabin/camper tightly to keep out the cold certainly seems a worthwhile objective, whether pressurized or not. As NeverEnough suggested earlier in the thread, for a vehicle to withstand the Arctic or Subarctic cold of Siberia, northern Canada, interior Alaska, and the Tibetan plateau, it needs to be extremely well insulated:

.... the most important concept is knowing what your heat loss is for any given living space, then come up with enough heat to compensate for that. As long as you know the properties of the enclosure and the worst case external conditions, you can do the math. But you're going to need either an extremely well- insulated shell or a very high output heating system to deal with the conditions described. And I'd be most worried about my truck starting.

Granted, this is not such a strong consideration for the Altiplano, whose climate is not as extreme -- see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altiplano and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography_of_Bolivia .

So the lesson of the allegedly poorly designed heating system of the passenger-cabin in the Kress truck is that any truly adequate "high altitude heating solution" needs to prove compatible with an extremely well-insulated cabin, sealed for pressurization or not.

All best wishes,



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Here are two posts by dwh in response to the previous series:

When I worked as an aviation fueler at LAX, our trucks, both the tankers:

And the "hydrant carts":

Had diesel engines. We just ran them on JetA, which is kerosene. The only real difference is that diesel fuel has some oil in it and JetA doesn't. So we'd have to dump a quart of oil in the fuel tanks whenever we filled them up with JetA.

Before each use, we'd have to open a petcock to drain out any water condensation. I used to bring a 1 gallon Coleman fuel container and fill it up with JetA. My Dietz Hurricane Lanterns loved the stuff, and I had to clean soot from the chimneys less frequently.





A jet can be rigged to run on anything. Military jet aircraft have manuals which list alternative fuels that they can run in their engines in a pinch.

But if you are building one from scratch, you can set it up to run on anything that will burn. Hydrogen, petroleum gas, kerosene, gasoline, alcohol - whatever.

Also that stairway setup has been done quite a few times. All Terrain Warriors has done in on a few trucks:

Darrin Fink did it on his Mog: