Thread: Black cars and hot weather

Guys, Guys, Guys, Stop being so practical! Live life for fashion Black looks cool ipso facto it is cool

We've got a black defender and wouldn't trade it for one of those boring looking white ones

We're the ones looking cool

and remember it's all about how you feel on the inside

Cheers,

Originally Posted by taff

black get's hotter quicker but also shed's heat quicker that's why a lot of house roof's are dark. it's better at night cos it loses the heat quicker and why polar bears are white cos it retains the heat longer.

Black only sheds the heat when the source of the heat has gone.

I think you will find that dark roofs are a result of fashion, the same phenomenon that results in black shaded cars, or the colour/shade of the material the roof is made of and not any scientific analysis of the problem.

What really annoys me is local councils in rural Australia who are now specifying the colour of sheds, particularly ones that require dark green. Have you ever worked in a dark coloured metal shed on a hot day, sauna would be a better term for it. By far the best colour for a roof would be a silver reflective colour (or is silver a shade?) and that was the traditional colour of the roofs in outback Australia. (Except that they also had the name of the station painted on the roof.) Our local council wanted our galvanised iron sheds which had been up for 20 years at the time painted. So we painted them with the colours of paint we had available white gloss mixed with pink primer and the roofs were painted with silver. The inspector came back some years later and required that we paint them again dark green. We suggested that the shed was a joinery and it would be impossible to work in a dark green shed. He said that local ordinances required that sheds on rural properties be painted in environmental colours, so we painted the sheds in pale yellow, the colour of the dry grass environment at the time. When the inspector returned and asked about the yellow he was informed the reason and he was stumped for any basis to paint his favoured dark green.

Originally Posted by JohnR

<snip> ...
We've got a black defender and wouldn't trade it ...<snip>

<snip> ... and remember it's all about how you feel on the inside

Cheers,

I'd be feeling hot and sticky. That would never be considered cool!

Originally Posted by Savanahkelpy

missquoted physics? and half equasions, again,,, i,ve always thought that polar bears were white to blend in with their environment, and it was fur and body fat, that retained their body warmth. Sure, house roofs get painted white or light colours, because it absorbs less heat, and reflected more, but the total physics of black is it absorbs better and sheds better. Still, if you want to dissagree, fair enough, as i,m only quoting what i was told and believe, as being relevent to cars.

aint that what i said? and...
why would polar bears need to blend into their environment - they dont hunt as such, they're prey is beneath the snow/ice so no need to blend in

polar bears are white cos it retains the heat longer.

Polar bear fur is translucent their skin is pure black, the fur allows the skin to absorb heat and reflects the white from the snow so they blend in.

Why would a polar bear need to blend into its environment,, to hunt seals on the ice, but i also suspect, its another one of mother nature mystries, and i still can,t explained why car radiaters are black as i don,t have the figues that would prove or dissprove the statement that black sheds heat better, for the need to paint car radiators, black, yet so many light coloured cars have back radiaters.

Originally Posted by Savanahkelpy

Why would a polar bear need to blend into its environment,, to hunt seals on the ice, but i also suspect, its another one of mother nature mysteries, and i still can,t explained why car radiators are black as i don,t have the figures that would prove or disprove the statement that black sheds heat better, for the need to paint car radiators, black, yet so many light coloured cars have back radiators.

Polar bears are white for the reasons of camouflage, i.e. so their prey, being the animals under the ice or those like seals and penguins above don't see them and escape. It would be a factor of evolution, the light coloured bears were more successful in the catching food, were more able to breed up and eventually the light coloured bears became white polar bears.

You may find that radiators became black when manufacturers wanted to hide the radiator so it wouldn't spoil the style of the outside. It then became the standard and no one thinks about it any more.

i think that Lotz-A-landies may be right as looking at it from a stye POV, is something i havn,t considered, yet i can, help feeling that there is more to it, (heat loss due to colour), than just that. I,m not dissagreeing, as i,m thankfull for all the input from all of you, as its all food for thought.

I used to have a 1937 Chrysler nine seat mourner's coach bought from a funeral parlour. Car was black of course, with very dark green interior. I reckon you could have cooked the Sunday roast inside it on a Qld. summer day. However with a scuttle scoop, and opening front and rear quarter windows the hot interior air was replaced with outside air in a couple of blocks at 30mph. I learnt early in my ownership to have thick towels to put on the dark green leather seats if the car was left in the sun. Leather seats in Qld sun are dangerous, get hot enough to give nasty burns.