Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/05/14/can-you-substitute-bananas-for.html
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Those emergency replacements for engine oil. Just look at them!
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And it works in reverse too. If your doctor says you need more potassium, but you hate bananas, just drink a half-pint of engine oil each day.
Oh, and you probably want to stay pretty close to a bathroom for a while.
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Doc Brown approves!
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They’re not using the banana skins. According to the doctrine of signatures, they should be a better replacement for motor oil.
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This is the kind of futurism I want.
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Breathing in heavy water steam while Doc throws garbage in the car?
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Can you make banana bread when you change the oil?
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Okay, okay. This future but with better safety measures.
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The banana has never been so sexy.
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I’ll believe it when I can “just look at it” for myself.
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I wonder if the banana would’ve worked better if the engine was initially primed with some oil. The original idea was an emergency replacement after an (albeit) severe oil leak…but there’d still be some oil left in the engine.
I doubt those guys in the Atacama desert disassembled their engine to clean out all the oil before putting the bananas in.
I’m also reminded of that episode of MAS*H where they replaced the anti-freeze with some expensive wine.
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I imagine it must smell nice when you’re “burning oil.”
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It feels like they should test actual banana oil or banana peel oil like this: https://www.americanspice.com/banana-oil/?sku=20512&cmp_id=1597253938&adg_id=64408439910&kwd=&device=c&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIxterruCb4gIVDrnACh1hHwZ8EAQYAiABEgKBq_D_BwE Wouldn’t have the problems with water that the normal bananas would. Although to be fair it wouldn’t fulfill the myth in that you couldn’t easily extract oil in the field.
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Today I learned something new. Thanks!
Time to go eat some moth wings to strengthen my eyes.
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I don’t know about bananas but avocados don’t work for sure.
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with a little search you will find that crushed bananas have been used in place of oil in the french Citroën trip called " la croisière jaune", trying to redo " la route de la soie" in the 19th century, with Citroën " autochenilles" … It’s known in France for Citroën fans. Very pretty images. You will find a little treasure about that trip. Excuse my french.
Manu.
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Sorry. 1931.
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Interesting, but far from unexpected. Banana fruit is most abundant with starch (carbohydrate), that is, long chain sugars (C₆H₁₀O₅)n. What you want for oil is uh… oil, that is, for example, fat. The industrial revolution was initially run off the palm oil which has a much much smaller proportion of oxygen - and surprise, when you have two bits of metal rubbing together you’d like to keep oxygen to a minimum; because it promotes… oxidation. A commentor above may be on to something via: is there more oil in banana skins?
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Besides this one, we obviously spend time on vastly different websites.
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