Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

quadzilla
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by quadzilla »

Well said, James. OK - this really is off topic....Let's also not forget that the 'job' of forests isn't to only sequester carbon (there are other ecosystems, like peat bogs, that do a much better job of that), they also contribute to the biodiversity of our province. Forested habitats of all age classes provide habitat for birds, mammal, insects, amphibians and reptiles, plants, fungi, lichens, etc. etc. and without the mix of age classes and stand sizes that make up the matrix of forested and non-forested land, the number of plants and animals that live here would decrease. Biodiversity can live with responsible forestry management; however, claiming that clearcuts are not ecological disasters sounds like propaganda, to me. Take, for example, the growing body of literature that identifies the adverse relationships between human-induced habitat change and decreasing biodiversity, or reduction of population size, or reduction of habitat quality, some of which can be attributed to clearcut logging, and it will become obvious that clearcut logging does not always occur in a responsible way, or in a manner that can't be referred to as anything but a disaster.

With respect to the world record attempt - I am not sure how this will raise awareness for alternative fuels and do anything meaningful to incite change. If the objective is to simply get people talking about it, then your job is done and you can come home. If WVO or biodiesel is being promoted as an alternative to the status quo, we need to think about the impacts that the acquisitions of those fuels will have on our local and global forests, let alone the size of our guts. Should we eat more McDonalds so we can access more WVO? How about Fish'n'chips tonight or some lovely deep fried chicken.. Did anyone read the latest issue of National Geographic and check out the devastation in Boreno related to the clearing of forests to plant palm for cooking oil and biofuel production? Alternative fuels may be an interim solution to a longer-term problem, but they are certainly not the end-all and jumping on the bandwagon of biofuels is having immediate impacts not only to our global food supply through the creation of monocultures and conversion of mutil-crop fields to single-cash crop fields, but also on our local and global biodiversity, and possibly more importantly, on the earth's ability to sequester carbon.

This thread is getting a tad philosophical, and the various views expressed all have their merits, and if you read between the lines you (I mean I) will see that all of us are trying to do the right thing for our local environments, its just that we see things through a slightly different lens and where we lack the data to support our arguments, we will probably have to agree to disagree, at least for the time being and until such time that we can support our own arguments, or accept another.
Last edited by quadzilla on Wed Nov 19, 2008 11:24 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by jessef »

Ditto.

WVO/SVO/Bio-fuels and eco-sustainability is not new and has been around for quite some time.

If you wanted to promote 'true' natural, eco-sustainability, you would be traveling on your own body power.

Not that of a vehicle that does pollute. Delica's are wonderful machines. But when it comes down to it. They are a machine and they do pollute.

http://www.delica.ca/forum/testing-emis ... -3594.html

I think the idea that you guys have is a good one, but it's not new and I can't see anything in your video clips regarding eco-facts aside from a good road-trip and some forest being harvested/logged.

If your initial startup/video clip had some oomph and facts to it, I would follow it.

Just looks like a road trip to me. Show me otherwise and I shall humbly remove this post. :-D
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by after oil »

the vid in d2s's post shows a single machine, owned by the bosses, doing the work of
3 or 4 workers. the bosses dont care about more jobs
docsavage wrote:And yes, there are cob, straw, rammed earth, tire, bottle and all kinds of other building material, but what would be the effect on the earth if all that material was used to build the millions of houses required for people. There just isn't enough of it, and it will always remain a very small percentage of houses built for those who like to live outside the box. I have even considered building with one of these other materials (timber framed bottle house). In the end they all still use wood, be it for the timber frame, window frames, trim, floors, etc.
trust me, theres plenty of clay and sand and old bottles in the world. and most people dont have to go very far to find it. if the only wood used is for framing windows and doors, then our industry would be sustainable and there would be more jobs locally. i can frame the windows and doors of a cob house just with the wood people throw in the landfill where i live. (i could probably frame a 600 sq ft house for that matter)
docsavage wrote:The slash left behind from logging is an issue especially up here with dry pine stands, but there are several benefits to the slash. As it decomposes it releases nutrients back to the soil to help the future stands grow. It provides food for millions of organisms, provides cover for small mammals, and many others. In terms of slash use, there are several areas where roadside slash is processed and hauled to facilities to be used as pellets for wood heat, burned in power plants, used to create heavy diesel, and so on.
where i live they burn slash
docsavage wrote:If they took the billions they waste on protecting oil and gas interests and invested in research on alternative fuels (all kinds) then perhaps there would be a change.
that is very true
docsavage wrote:Sorry to get off topic, but until everyone stops reading papers, living in wood houses, and wiping their bums, the forest industry in Canada will be around to provide wood for consumers.
youre not off topic, i think this is a great place to discuss this stuff, and i quite enjoy discussing it with you! i think maybe D2S would be stoked that we're talking about it!
quadzilla wrote:.Let's also not forget that the 'job' of forests isn't to only sequester carbon
i agree quadzilla. i live in an industrial forest, and i can see with my own eyes that the clearcuts are irresponsible. island timberlands (weyerhouser, interfor etc)doesnt give a rats ass about biodiversity, or about the people who live in the community where they work for that matter. they care about their quarterly returns and the stockholders in new york or where ever.
quadzilla wrote:With respect to the world record attempt - I am not sure how this will raise awareness for alternative fuels and do anything meaningful to incite change.
i agree too. D2S admits they dont know very much. i think they are moving too fast to learn anything for that matter.

jfarsang wrote:I think the idea that you guys have is a good one, but it's not new and I can't see anything in your video clips regarding eco-facts aside from a good road-trip and some forest being harvested/logged.
D2S needs a new publicist or something :roll:


this is a good discussion we got goin' here! respect to all of you!
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by jrman »

After Oil,
I think you missed the point. People should not have to "bring the science to you" - you should have the interest and motivation to find it yourself before you voice you clearly strong opinions. I and a few others have only spoken out based on our own experience and knowledge - not suggesting it is infallible, but the best information at hand given the experience and knowledge gained. However, you prefer to poke holes in this body of experience without any evidence of information of your own to say anything different. You cause may be noble, but your foundation is clearly weak. There is no single "correct" answer sadly, and I know you clearly don't believe that to be true - but all choices in this world have trade-offs / compromises. I wish we could all live in adobe and mud huts and ride only bikes...but that just isn't reality.
So....again I say that we should all do our part to save the earth and follow China....one child...maybe 2 if the first one didn't deter you....

With regards to BC specifically - I agree with Docsavage - BC is a world leader in forest practices yet rarely gets the credit for it. There at things going on in other parts of the worlds forests that are truly tragic yet they don't come close to making our news cover pages.

I applaud the people in the forest industry who know first hand what is required before a saw can be put to a tree in our province, and wish those that doubt it would go do their homework and then maybe wake up to the reality of how well managed our timber resources are.
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by Golf Cart »

Yano,

It looks like Tyson & Cloe achieved what they set out to do, especially with the Delicans. :-)
By the time you realize that my signature has no real message or life altering words of wisdom, you're too far into it to stop reading until you are finished
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by after oil »

thing is, Jrman, that theres so much information on the web, its hard to know whats real science, whats corporate opinion science, and whats junk. so i was interested to see what exactly you guys are reading.
i do have strong opinions, and im open mined. i do my best to "be the change i want to see in this world" (ghandi) i wont stroke my ego by showing off the things i do to reduce my footprint, but i lead a low impact lifestyle to say the least.

i am sure BC has high forest standards, and ive seen what they do in other countries. but i guess i am unsatisfied with the way the forests are managed. both in the environmental department and in the labor department. i think the forests can be manged differently and the market managed differently, so that there are fewer cutblocks and more jobs.
jrman wrote:I wish we could all live in adobe and mud huts and ride only bikes...but that just isn't reality.
it will be someday... one thing alot of people agree on is the whole neoliberal market mechanism is failing us, and the way the corporations and their government ministries devalue and slay our forests and jobs, while at the same time encouraging us to buy buy buy...

jrman, docsavage, and all the others "chiming in" i respect all of you and consider us brothers and sisters in this little delica world. i value your opinions and enjoy healthy conversation.

:-)
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by jessef »

Did any of you get a look at their WVO system ?

They said they will be running a 100% WVO system (ie. not start the engine on diesel and then switch to WVO/SVO)

Wondering how it works if the lines, IP, etc... are heated to compensate for the WVO sitting in the fuel system.
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by jrman »

Well - I think the more I read, the more I understand we are all closer to wishing for the same end result - and only have different ways of approaching it. I too wish to feel that I have an open mind, but at the same time reasonably strong opinions, and most are directly related to the hard work I see of colleagues in the forest industry who every day do their best to manage our timber resources with very little recognition but alot of rhetoric thrown against them time and time again.

Regardless - I do appreciate your (and everyones passion) as it can only help to impove the dialogue and ulitmately to the benefit of the world our children inherit.

With regards to the entire "clearcut" issue - mother nature has beat us all to the punch by making the single largest monoculture of over aged lodgepole pine in the world right here at home in BC. This has been created by naturally occuring lightning induced wildfires which allows the Lodgepole Pine cones residing on the forest floor for years to open up (by fire induced heat) thus releasing their seeds and creating massive monocultures unrivalled by any reforestation effors by humans. The lack of cold weather events in recent years has set the stage for a population explosion of the naturally the occurring Mountain Pine Beetle - which in turn will kill 25% of all coniferous timber in BC by 2013 or sooner.....this is "death of trees" is on a scale that even the most aggressive forest harvesting could never ever ever possibly acheive.

Some call it devastation - while I prefer to call is "mother nature doing what she does best" - that is renewing the forest. It is NOT an ecological disaster, though it may in fact be an economic disaster once those trees are no longer able to be processed due to their degraded state (the industry cannot get to enough of them fast enough before they are falling apart from cracks and decay).

The forest industry and BC's economy is in for a very bumpy ride as a result.

Best wishes to all of us who enjoy the life we currently lead...as it may not be there tomorrow as a result.
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by docsavage »

Well, if everyone is amenable, then lets carry on this conversation.

With respect to clearcuts. They do have a place in certain forest types in the province. As Sean said, the forests of the interior are remnants of past fire history. By clearcutting in these forests, we have the best opportunity to create a successful new forest using natural disturbance patterns similar to what nature provides. When planting, we plant a mix of species in a percentage similar to what was removed. Admittedly in some area we have planted all pine and created the monoculture that existed before the beetles came, but it will be interesting to see what comes of these stands. Part of the reason I went into forestry was a Nature of Things show where David Suzuki went and looked at the Bowron area that was heavily logged in the 80's to address insects. The show was very critical of the practices there and showed what a huge clearcut looks like (it was visible from space). Now, over 20 years later, the Bowron is one of the few bright spots in the future timber supply around Prince George. The new forest is coming back very nicely as long as the beetles decide not to go for the young pine they have in other areas.

Debris management will continue to be a contentious issue for some time. We also burn most of our logging debris. We have had people come in the past looking to buy the waste and make poles, fence posts, bundle it for shipping to pellet of power plants, or many other products. All of them have never come to fruition as the cost of picking through the piles, transporting and processing are always to high. After Oil (or anyone else, not to pick on you), if you have a good idea that is economical for using the slash, bring it to your local forest company and they would love to discuss how they can help.

I am not as familiar with the coast and the forests there. I would tend to agree that most coastal stands can be harvested using selective methods which can maximize value from the stand and are more labour intensive. However, terrain and economics also play a part in the management regimes chosen. Perhaps the executives at the forest companies operating in the Powell River area don't care much about the biodiversity of the area, but the people on the ground and making up the logging plans (professionals like me) do care. There are constraints placed on us as to what management methods are acceptable, but we try hard within these constraints to do the best job possible.

In terms of biodiversity, it exists in many forms. There is still a lot of biodiversity in a regenerating forest, it is just a different group of organisms. There is more browse for moose, deer, small rodents, a different population of insects and soil organisms, but biodiversity none the less. Some of these creatures would not exist in the same numbers (if at all) in mature/old growth forests. That is why trees die, burn, blow over etc to ensure that there is a constant mix of seral stages in the forest to support all the life that exists in forests.

The forest industry is currently in a very precarious state in BC. Every day at work we wonder which mill will be the next one down - is it going to be ours. In my office we have worked hard to reduce our costs to help us survive this downturn, but it isn't easy. Do I think that we should get government help - definitely no. This province has had an overabundance of sawmill capacity for many years. I have been saying for many years that the industry is far to big, and the right sizing is coming sooner rather than later. Well, it is happening now. Many of the mills that have shut down will be permanent. It is painful to watch the forest dependent communities in the North struggling to survive after the mill has shut down. Many people are stuck with worthless property, and are working in camps or other towns to keep the family in the town they love hoping the mill will reopen. Unfortunately, many of those people will be forced to leave their homes to areas where there are jobs. In the end though, the industry will come back smaller, more efficient (read less people), and more profitable. As long as the executives are wise and do not try to grow the capacity again, the long term future could be good.

On the topic of sustainability, we are getting closer. With the smaller industry in the future, we will harvest less wood (in the interior there will be a lot less wood to harvest due to the accelerated cut of beetle damaged stands), and I am hoping make smarter choices as to the products produced. There is a lot of opportunity for some of the smaller producers to get into different products beyond dimensional lumber. For me, the mill I work at is going to be a dimension lumber producer forever, but we will make products that the market wants, not just spit out 100's of 1,000's of board feet of wood that nobody will buy. The reality is that we have to, the old economic models just don't work. Every month I challenge my managers to provide rationale as to why we produce what we do, and whether we can do things with a different log profile than what we currently harvest (ie: go to smaller, drier, deader pine). We have production targets that have to be met in order for us to continue operating. If the targets are not met, we will lose too much money and close. With the smaller trees, my mill is not optimized to hanle this wood. But I continue to push for change so we can use the resource we manage better.

After Oil, the alternative building materials also have a cost. Cob ( correct me if I am wrong) is a mixture of sand, soil, and straw (or other fiber). In most cases there is an opportunity for all that material to be sourced on ones property, but most city lots may not provide enough raw material. In that case it will have to be shipped (cost), processed (cost) and so on. I would like to see a subdivision made of cob houses where applicable, or maybe straw houses on the prairies, where local products that are available. But again, most people want to live in traditional stick built houses in traditional styles on traditional city lots.

I think most of us will agree that there is a huge change taking place in the global economy right now. Hopefully the decision makers will take a hard look at classical economics and toss all those theories aside and start accounting for the true costs of their decisions on everything from from the raw materials to their disposal, and the environmental impacts associated.

Anyways, for those of you who made it this far, thanks for reading. It is time for me to go back to work.

James
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by quadzilla »

Your clearcut argument is misleading because what you are discussing is the death of a forest caused by an insect - not the resultant large-scale clearcuts that have been created in certain parts of our province. The issue goes far beyond our inability to use the wood because of its degradation, or the fact that people aren't necessarily sold on the blue wood, which in turn leads to reduced profitability in the forestry sector, which ultimately can lead to job loss, economic downturn, etc. etc. I am not arguing that we should not be logging. I like wood and the products made from wood. However, there needs to be some context put to the relationship you are trying to make between mother nature, the pine beetle, large volumes of standing wood, and the resultant clearcuts.

Removing dead , but standing trees from the landscape on the scale that has occurred, say, in the vicinity of Quesnel, can significantly alter the water budget of the watershed(s) in question. The inability of the land to retain water, both in the soil, and in the trees themselves, can cause massive amounts of erosion. When large volumes of sediment and debris end up in our headwaters, or in our 2nd, 3rd, and 4th order streams, we are no longer only talking about the effects of logging on the landscape. The relationship between trees, water budgets, healthy streams, and salmon populations is real. These massive clearcuts (which were not produced by mother nature - people cut those trees) also affect the ability of the landscape to sequester carbon - not only in the trees, but also in the soil and peat that occurs on those landscapes.

There are hard questions being addressed right now about whether or not to remove those dead but standing trees - at the crux of the problem is not necessarily economics, or the monumental effort required to remove the trees, but the overall impacts that the removal of those trees will have on the ecological processes that are connected by trees. I have said it before - I think that logging and biodiversity (and ecological processes) can co-exist. The fact that there will be a substantial part of our province covered by dead trees does not inherently mean we need to remove them. "Mother Nature's" way would be to leave them there for the woodpeckers and cavity nesters, and other wildlife. Take a look at fire ecology studies - burned forests are important for the maintenance of biodiversity. Those burned-out stands will serve several functions - they will help maintain the water budget of watersheds, thus ameliorating the potential adverse impacts on streams and on salmon and the wildlife (and people) that rely on slamon, they will provide habitat for wildlife, and they will also provide shade for newly growing seedlings, which will grow back. They will also provide kindling for those fires that naturally occur on the landscape, and yes, those fires will promote the growth of ponderosa pine, which over time, will grow back to form monocultures - which is generally what pine forests do. Not many other species of trees can persist in those dry, typically acidic environments...

Despite the fact that life may not be as we know it tomorrow, the possibility of change is what keeps most of us going. In some respects, this is why D2S need to do what they are doing, even it is only for the possibility of change. That doesn't mean I am no longer skeptical of their ability to get the message out there. In my opinion, there are too many confounding issues related to WVO, biofuels, and our overall use of natural resources that need to be addressed before we can start making modest changes to our consumption of fuels.
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by Fanny Bay Delica »

To all,

I still think as I originally stated, this trip is a fun trip for those involved (D2S) and nothing more (no higher purpose, no educational thrust, just a jolly)!! The rest of the conversations are very interesting though!!

:shock: :shock:
Cheers!!

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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

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:M
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by after oil »

this is a great place (delica.ca)
it is wonderful to know that many many other delica drivers are forward thinkers.
jfarsang wrote:Did any of you get a look at their WVO system ?

They said they will be running a 100% WVO system (ie. not start the engine on diesel and then switch to WVO/SVO)

Wondering how it works if the lines, IP, etc... are heated to compensate for the WVO sitting in the fuel system.
ive emailed D2S several times to inquire about their WVO system and on the road filtration techniques. they havent posted it anywhere, except a photo of tyson pouring WVO into a bag filter. i gave them 200 liters of filtered and dewatered WVO in a nice clean barrel with bung lids. they were at my home just long enough to load up the barrel into their trailer and then rush to catch a ferry. so i didnt get to see what their conversion is like.

ive been doing tons of research lately into on the road wvo refinement. im worried a bit that chloe and tyson are pitting their injection pump with water in the WVO they collect and process on the road. im worried a bit that that might happen to me on the road too.
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by docsavage »

Quadzilla,

I agree that we do tend to forget about water in our planning. I have definitely noticed the impact of the pine beetle and logging on the water cycle in the forest. In the stands most heavily affected (ie grey and red) the water in the soils is very close to the surface. With no trees taking up this water, it sits in the soils resulting in saturated soils. Also, with less forest cover both after harvest and in the older greyer stands (less branches, no shading) the melt occurs much faster, and in saturated soils will run across the surface increasing erosion potential. In the industry we have been slow to react to warnings that this would happen as we have been struggling to harvest everything that is affected. In many parts of the province where the infestation is older there will be large tracts of pine that are no longer usable for lumber manufacture. This fiber could be utilized in pellet or power plants, but the capacity of those are limited and although there is lots of talk about new cogeneration plants, the reality is none have broken ground and it would take at least 5 years that capacity on line. These stands should be left unharvested, perhaps burned for understory removal and release some natural pine, and then underplanted with some species mix. Again the only problem is money, who's responsibility is it. The governments or industry. If industry had area based tenures (such as Tree Farm Licenses) then it would be our responsibility to ensure that our area is managed to maximize productivity, and some of these activities would occur. With the vast majority of tenure in volume based licences there is no incentive for industry to do much beyond establishing a free growing stand.

As for the Driven to Sustain people, I hope the final video product will be more professional and informative than the clip provided. I'm sure their sponsors also have expectations from this trip. I too would be interested in the details of their WVO system. Unfortunately I was away when they came through this part of the world, but they did manage to get a photo op and short article (again few details) in the local paper. Jesse hit it right though, walking or cycling across the country would be much less impact and more sustainable. However I am not one too judge, although I own three fairly efficient vehicles with a total of 9 cylinders (2, 3, and 4), I put the most miles on in my work truck with a gas guzzling V8.

I look forward to more video and more discussion on this topic. Maybe we should move it to a new thread?

James
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Re: Guinness World Record with Delica October 1st Mile Zero

Post by konadog »

Great thread! Some really thoughful comments, - love it!
Looks like a fun trip, for sure, and good for them. "Drive-to-sustain" though, is a contradiction in terms - better "Stay-home-to-sustain", or "walk-to-sustain"... Crazy this assumption we all have that we need to find a way to keep doing what we are doing rather than do something else. We've only had automobiles for 100 years yet go on like the sky will fall with out them. Like jrman points out, everything has a price. And the price of automobiles is high! Even if we could run our beloved delicas on air and create no tailpipe emissions one need only have a look at the mines, smelters, refineries and factories required to make them (bicycles too, for that matter) to see the cost :shock: Yikes.
Bottom line is that humanity is a train-wreck - no escaping it. It's what we do. Our greatest triumphs have also caused our greatest problems. And I mean all of us everywhere throughout all time - It really got going a million years ago, give or take, when that Homo erectus somewhere took the chance and picked up that burning stick - FIRE! - we've been burning stuff ever since. Cooked food, comfort, stories around the fire, delicas and trips to the moon, but strip mines and global warming too. Ah well.
My favourite micro story that sums us up is Easter Island. Nice little island covered with trees when that boat-load full of intrepid Polynesian explorers first washed up there. One thing lead to another and the descendants divided into factions. Then they started getting onto making those crazy rock heads in honour of their great chiefs or some such. Only thing is they needed logs to roll those big rock heads around. Doubtless there were concerns voiced about the devastation of the limited forest (very small island, after all...) and doubtless those concerns were greeted with "But the heads - we've just got to have a better head display than those other guys - it's the bottom line!!" Fast forward a couple of hundred years and the Great Navigator himself, Capt. Cook stops in for a visit only to find the few remaining scruffy specimens sitting on the beach waiting to see what the tide might wash in for dinner - no trees left at this point so no boats to fish (or leave) with. No one could really recall what the heads were all about anymore... Ah well... But as pointed out earlier, the beat goes on. We're a disaster to ourselves and a bunch of other species, but to mother earth it's business as usual. We're just creating new niches for as yet to evolve creatures to inhabit. We sure have made a big splash though...
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