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Jet-Powered Wheelchair
gpmcdermott writes "What does a man with too much time, a jet engine, and his mother-in-law's wheelchair, do?
The BBC is reporting on the results on the Beeb."
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It makes me think of a movie (some dumb teen movie, sorry !!) in which the fool main character has a girlfriend who's on a wheelchair, and does wheelchair-jet-propulsion as a hobby too... Anyone with the title ? :)
Or he's Wah-Hu reincarnated
Nearly all uses up to this time were for warfare or fireworks, but there is an interesting old Chinese legend that reported the use of rockets as a means of transportation. With the help of many assistants, a lesser-known Chinese official named Wan-Hu assembled a rocket- powered flying chair. Attached to the chair were two large kites, and fixed to the kites were forty- seven fire-arrow rockets.
On the day of the flight, Wan-Hu sat himself on the chair and gave the command to light the rockets. Forty-seven rocket assistants, each armed with torches, rushed forward to light the fuses. In a moment, there was a tremendous roar accompanied by billowing clouds of smoke. When the smoke cleared, Wan-Hu and his flying chair were gone. No one knows for sure what happened to Wan-Hu, but it is probable that if the event really did take place, Wan-Hu and his chair were blown to pieces. Fire-arrows were as apt to explode as to fly.
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
http://www.corestore.org/turbine.htm
and the obligatory
http://marineturbine.com/motorsports.
http://slashdot.org/~GuyFawkes/journal
I have seen him interviewed on the BBC, and the reason he didn't wear the lid was so he could hear if the jet was going to go wrong and if so abort. This is what racing drivers used to do in the 50s and 60s when engines were prone to seizing mid-race. He's plainly nuts, but I salute his cojones.
seany
Reading stuff like this brings tears to my eyes. On july 15 I was cut off while riding my 2000 r6. I was wearing a helmet (damn now its all scratched up), but that was all. I didnt get much road rash, so leathers wouldn't have helped much. I spent 2.5 weeks in the hospital (80k in med bills, anyone know of anyway to get help on uninsured med bills?), my pelvis is both shattered and broken, as is my wrist. I have 10 pins, and 2 external fixators. I will be out of work for atleast another 2 or 3 months. Lots of pain and stuff, lots of general badness, and lots of money troubles.
Then i see people riding with out helmets, on tv, on the internet. Soon Virginia will get rid of its helmet law. I am really saddened when i see this kind of thing
http://www.firstcallpaintball.com/
For those also interested in trying to get rid of their mother-in-laws, check out Nye Thermodynamics. This guy has made turbine engines out of automotive turbochargers, put helicopter engines into boats, and just plain done some cool stuff with turbines.
Life is the leading cause of death in America.
some pics here:
o n/
t ml
http://www.outsideconnection.com/gallant/hpv/visi
an article:
http://www.agunn.com/work/seaweek/sw010215-zoom.h
And there's a pic of a conventional bike with a jet attached here:
http://bikerodnkustom2.homestead.com/rQr2.html
Mostly people who are really into flying remote controlled (RC) airplanes and have a lot of money. Check out this site: http://www.bairdtech.com/bmt/ for an example of what you can get.
Early racecar drivers didn't wear seatbelts either as the fuel tanks were so prone to catching fire that it was better to be thrown out of your vehicle than to be strapped into it. With the development of the fuel cell, it is now much safer to be in a harness, of course but back then, 7/10 motorsport deaths were due to fire.
$#!^ happens, but why does it always have to happen to me???
Decent leathers contain shock absorbing armour - the modern stuff is very effective and would almost certainly have helped reduce your injuries.
The mind boggles...
,et al, because we don't have to worry about this kind of insanity.
80 FREAKING THOUSAND DOLLARS?????
How can any normal, middle of the road, average income human being expect to pay this?
It's cases like that (EXACTLY like that, in fact), that make me thankful I'm Canadian. Universal health care. Yes, the profiteers are chipping away on it, but I know that if I get creamed crossing the street tonight, I won't have to sell my house, my car, and take out a loan to pay for the resulting damage (to me, not the car).
How can any civilized society look at numbers like that, and rationally argue against universal health care? Yes, we pay more in taxes, but (theoretically) we pay less in insurance premiums
80 freaking thousand dollars. You'll legislate helmets, bumpers, airbags, seatbelts, "Caution! Coffee Hot!" labels, helmets for children riding bikes, and a million other things to protect the innocent and the idiotic, but you have a hard time deciding whether or not preventing stuff like this is a good thing.
Sheesh.
If I knew the wedgies I gave you back in 6th grade would have resulted in this . . . I might have taken a moments pause.
I wrote off a CBR400 T-boning a car that pulled a U-turn right in front of me. I was probably doing about 25mph at impact (because I was able to break some before hitting), and flew over the back of the car. I was wearing full Dainese racing leathers, helmet gloves & boots.
The gloves took a lot of damage, I slid into the gutter & hit my shin very hard on the curb and the bike ended up on my foot. my only injuries were a bit of bruising on my foot - the shin armor in the leathers spread the curb impact over my whole shin, so I didn't get hurt at all by that - but it would have broken my leg without the armor. The arm, shoulder area and & hip also took a bit of abrasion, and I was also a bit bruised on my hip, but again the padding there helped absorb a lot of the impact, so I reckon the $1000 investment in the leathers was definitely worth the money.
Here's some info on abrasion resistance of different materials:
Reprint from a
Sept 88 "Cycle" magazine article "Abrasion Testing: Torn in the USA".
Drag Test
"For the Drag Test, samples were stitched to a bag that held a 75-pound
sandbag inside a milk crate, then dragged behind a pickup truck..."
New, 100% Cotton Denim Jeans 3' 10"
Senior Balistic Nylon 3' 10"
Leather, Lightweight, Nude Finish, 2.25 oz/sq. ft. 4' 3"
Leather, Fashion Weight, 1.75 oz/sq ft. 4' 4"
Two-year-old 100% Cotton Denim Jeans 4' 5"
Cordura Nylon Type 440 18' 3"
Kevlar 29 Aramid Fiber, Style 713 22' 1"
Leather, Competition Weight, 3 oz/sq. ft. 86' 0"
Taber Test
"For the Taber Test, the specimen was mounted on a rotating platform and
scuffed by two rubber-emery grinding wheels." The numbers represent the
number of revolutions until the fabric totally fails. A vacuum clears
debris.
Two-year-old 100% Cotton Denim Jeans: 168
New 100% Cotton Denim Jeans: 225
Kevlar 29 Aramid Fiber, Style 713: 506
Cordura Nylon, Type 440: 559
Leather, Lightweight, Nude Finish, 2.25 oz./sq. ft.: 564
Leather, Fashion Weight, 1.75 oz./sq. ft. 750
Senior Ballistic Nylon: 817
Leather, Competition Weight, 3 oz./sq. ft.: 2600
More to consider...
"Finally, protection from road abrasion cannot be guaranteed by a
materials abrasion resistance alone. A jacket may have panels of
highly abrasion-resistant materials, yet if low-quality stitching joins
those panels and the seams come apart upon impact or during a slide, then
the abrasion resistance of the panels could count for nothing.
Furthermore, an ill-fitting garment may ride up in a slide, contorting
the body and exposing the skin. And the best jacket in the world, left
unzipped and/or unsnapped, won't give riders the protection they pay
for. When it comes to safety, the issues are more complex than just the
abrasion resistance of materials."