Flying Car...again.

The Transition®

Every pilot faces uncertain weather, rising costs, and ground transportation hassles on each end of the flight. The Transition® combines the unique convenience of being able to fold its wings with the ability to drive on any surface road in a modern personal airplane platform. Stowing the wings for road use and deploying them for flight at the airport is activated from inside the cockpit. This unique functionality addresses head-on the issues faced by today’s Private and Sport Pilots.

Terrafugia’s award-winning MIT-trained engineers have been advancing the state-of-the-art in personal aircraft since 2006. Now you can streamline your flying experience with the revolutionary integration of personal land and air travel made possible by the Transition® Roadable Aircraft.

Performance
Cruise: 100 kts (115 mph)
Rotate: 70 kts (80 mph)
Stall: 45 kts (51 mph)
Range: 400nm (460 mi)
Takeoff over 50' obstacle: 1700' Fuel burn: 5 gph
Fuel tank: 20 gallons
Useful Load: 430 lbs
On road: 30 mpg, highway speeds
Light Sport Aircraft (LSA)
Convenience
Front wheel drive on the ground
Automotive-style entry and exit
Two place, side by side
Automated electromechanical folding wing
No trailer or hangar needed
Cargo area holds skis, fishing poles or golf clubs

Safety
Drive in case of inclement weather
Proven 100 hp Rotax 912S engine
Full vehicle parachute available
Modern glass avionics
Automotive crash safety features

Dimensions
Folded:
6’ 9” tall
80” wide
18’ 9” long
Airplane:
6’ 3” tall
19’ 2” long
Wingspan:
27’ 6” Cockpit:
51” at the shoulder
Training
Become a Sport Pilot in as little as 20 hours of flight time in a Transition®-specific course. For existing pilots, get comfortable quickly with the familiarization training included with every Transition® delivery.

Order Today
Place your fully refundable $10,000 airframe reservation deposit here. Anticipated purchase price: $194,000.

Still not quite what I was hoping for, but pretty cool! Austin

Revealed: The £1m bullet-proof SUV (but that's cheap compared to the vodka that comes with it) By: Emily Guthrie

Revealed: The £1m bullet-proof SUV (but that's cheap compared to the vodka that comes with it)

This is the world's most expensive SUV - but with three bottles of the world's most expensive vodka included in the price tag, it actually appears to be a bargain.
The £1million Dartz Prombron Monaco Red Diamond Edition has gold-plated windows, pure tungsten exhausts, and the speed gauges are encrusted in diamonds.
The seats are not for the squeamish. They are made of one of the softest materials around - leather from a whale's penis.
And, just to send the bling factor right through the roof, this SUV also comes complete with an exterior bulletproof Kevlar coating.
But that's nothing compared to the vodka that comes with it.

The car company has thrown three bottles of Russo-Baltique, the vodka brand it created this year to mark its100th anniversary, Motor Authority reported.
Last year, a bottle retailed for £790,000. It is not a meant to be drunk, the company's website explains - instead it should be displayed as art.
That's because the bling of the bottle frankly puts the SUV to shame.
According to the Dartz company's website, the flask, a replica of the radiator guard used for the Russo-Baltique cars, is made from gold coins minted between 1908 and 1912. This is around the time the company manufactured its first car.
The flask cap is made from white and yellow gold and contains a diamond-encrusted replica of the Russian Imperial Eagle.
And finally, the bottle itself is made of bulletproof glass 30cm thick - just in case.
The car - and vodka - were produced especially for the mega-exclusive Top Marques luxury motor show in Monaco next year.
The car is made by the company that produced armoured vehicles for Vladimir Lenin, Leon Trotsky, and Tsar Nicolas.
The seats are indeed of 'real whale penis leather,' says a spokesperson for Dartz Kombat.
'It is inspired by the original playboy Aristotle Onassis' yacht Christina O, which had bar stool seats made from sperm whale foreskin.
'Some people have called us crazy because of this, but we think we must make a luxury car till the end.'
Weighing four tons and powered by a V8 engine capable of 450 horse power, the Pombron's maker also claim the car is 'rocket grenade proof'.

In the past our customers have included Lenin and his revolutionary partner Trotsky,' explains the Dartz spokesperson.
'In fact we are launching a version of this new model in 2012, just for Latin America.
'This will commemorate the fact that Trotsky was killed in Mexico with an ice pick in 1940.
'As such, the Latin version will come with a gold ice axe to mark this fact.'
Keeping the exact details of the car secret, the Pombron's makers say the SUV will be unveiled to Prince Albert of Monaco at the Top Marques opening in April of next year.

Flexible OLED

ModisTech to commercialize cheap, flexible OLED lighting this year
By Donald Melanson posted Feb 20th 2010 at 6:51AM

It's far from the only one working on flexible OLED lighting, but it looks like ModisTech could be among the first to actually bring something to market, as its now announced that it will begin commercialization of its 150 x 150mm flexible OLED panels this year (seemingly ahead of its original 2011 schedule). Those will apparently be used for various indirect lighting applications including desk lamps and car lighting, and promise to provide a more natural light than LEDs while maintaining some of the same power savings. Still no word on any actual products using the OLED panels, unfortunately, but they will supposedly be inexpensive for companies to adopt (and very cheap to manufacture).

Austin Haidinyak
02.20.10

Flat pack Bicycle

This flat-pack bike and scooter by Designer Nicolas Belly, won second prize in the L’Argus Design Competition, which had the theme of "Less is More: Traveling in the Era of Simplicity."

posted by RobTodd

Nanofiber lighting

Nanofiber lighting promises to be better, safer than incandescent or CFL bulbs
By Donald Melanson posted Feb 12th 2010 at 1:35PM

Well, it looks like you can add another contender to the great light bulb debate -- a group of researchers from RTI International now says that nanofiber lighter is is more efficient than incandescent light bulbs, and safer than compact fluorescents. The secret to that, it seems, is a combination of nanofiber-based reflectors and photoluminescent nanofibers (or PLN), which together are able to form a lighting device that pumps out more than 55 lumens of light output per electrical watt consumed. That's five times more efficient than a regular incandescent light bulb, and since there's no mercury, the researchers say it's far safer than CFL bulbs. What's more, it's also apparently able to produce more natural light than CFLs, although there's noticeably no mention of potential pricing -- they do say that the first products using nanofiber lighting could be available in three to five years, though. Video after the break.

Austin Haidinyak 02.12.10

Colorado State University Grad Student Honored for Inovation

FORT COLLINS - A spherical robot that climbs stairs has won a Colorado State University mechanical engineering graduate student recognition as one of the "10 Most Brilliant Innovators of 2009" by Popular Mechanics magazine.

Greg Schroll also received the publication’s Next Generation Breakthrough Award for his machine that could one day explore extraterrestrial landscapes.

Schroll used whatever he found sitting around to construct his prototype. The top globe to a gumball machine makes up the robot’s polycarbonate outer shell while the red rubber tracking that helps the robot glide came from a rubber playground ball. Inside, remote-control car and helicopter parts comprise the distinctive machine.

The robot’s exclusive ability to easily navigate inclines and roam rough terrain is possible because of a set of gyroscopes that store momentum within the sphere. The prototype demonstrates the concept that accumulating momentum and releasing it on command can propel an object, even up a set of steep stairs.

The robot is enclosed within a rugged and resilient uniform shell leaving no obvious points of weakness. Its spherical shape prevents it from ever being turned upside down which would allow potential drivers to maneuver the robot in a variety of environments without becoming incapacitated. The robot also has the ability to be sealed for amphibious work.

Eric Layton / 4 Dec 2009

3D @ Home

The 3D home theater is catching up to the multiplex. Shutter glasses such as the Nvidia 3D Vision Kit ($200) work by blacking out one eye at a time, 60 times per second—so fast you don’t notice it. An infrared emitter syncs these flashes with a quickly switching screen, allowing each eye to effectively see a different image. The 3D effect comes from showing the same scene to each eye from a different perspective. Lots of current games can be played in 3D, and software from companies like DDD can convert any off-the-shelf DVD into 3D live, as it plays. Just make sure you have a 3D- compatible display.

Eric Layton
4 Dec 2009

How would nature solve building challenges?

Click the link
This whole website is amazing. Instead of extracting just one article of info to post, here is the whole thing.

posted by Helen

MakerBot: The 3D Printing Robot

Posted by: Erin Wheeler

20 technologies that changed the world

20 technologies that changed the world

We reveal the little things that made a big impact
By Gary Marshall

way too long to copy/paste. 'Fraid you'll just have to follow the link...



posted by Helen

In pictures: Microsoft's Mouse 2.0 concepts

Multi-touch mice times five
By Patrick Goss

Microsoft has shown off its concepts for Mouse 2.0 – and how it could bring the humble pointing device up to date with multi-touch technology.

A paper written by Microsoft's research department presents "novel input devices that combine the standard capabilities of a computer mouse with multi-touch sensing".

"The traditional computer mouse design, however, makes little use of [the hand's] dexterity, reducing our hands to a single cursor on the screen," explains the report.

follow link for whole article
posted by Helen

"Paper" thin laptop

Je Sung Park's clever concept design makes the upgrade process both inexpensive and guilt-free

Posted By: Jeremy Kerbs

Snowboarding in the Summer?

Meet the Snowtunnel - an indoor snowboarding experience!

Posted by: Jeremy Kerbs

Sticker It Up!

...would you have been able to resist?





Posted by: Lara Pageler