Posts

When the field for the first Indy 500 left the starting line 100 years ago this month, a big, white Stoddard-Dayton touring car led the way. At its wheel was a man now forgotten by most Americans, but in his day he was a regular in the sports and business pages of newspapers from coast to coast. Carl Graham Fisher drove the pace car in the first five installments at Indy, and for good reason: Fisher spearheaded the creation of both the 500 and the Indianapolis Motor Speedway....

View full post on YoutubeThe Navy just completed an operational demo of a new ship-based Laser Weapon System (LaWS) in the Persian Gulf. The 30-kilowatt prototype system, mounted on the USS Ponce transport ship back in August, is meant to take out enemy drones or attack boats that might swarm a large vessel.LaWS has already aced maritime tests in 2011 and 2012, but the Navy wanted to see how it would perform at sea under the kind of harsh conditions it could encounter in battle....

Media Platforms Design TeamAny time new technology hits the market, some growing pains are sure to follow. In the case of the Chevy Volt, those growing pains have come during testing done by the National Highway Transportation Administration (NHTSA) showing a possibility of fire in extreme crash scenarios. Back in May, NHTSA conducted a severe side-impact crash test that smashed a Volt against a pole-shaped barrier. NHTSA found the Volt to meet its five star crash rating....

View full post on YoutubeA Polish LEGO builder by the name of Jeff recently cobbled together an impressive custom railway lift bridge. The two-pound middle section you see above? That moves up and down.The moving portion of the custom build is based on a significant chunk of the LEGO Technic Crawler Crane set, and it includes its own motor and batteries to get the job done. There are no counterweights involved—gears keep the track in place when it’s fully up or fully down....

The creature appears to be impossibly floating across the surface of water when, suddenly, it whips its four hair-thin legs toward its belly in one smooth sweep and rockets upward. Leaping with the force of 14 g’s, it is airborne faster than you can blink, easily jumping as fast and as high as it could have on solid land, having never so much as pierced the surface of the water. But this is no water-strider, Jesus lizard, or any other brilliant bug....

Media Platforms Design TeamMedia Platforms Design TeamFirst automakers were standing tough. Then they caved in. But after the Senate voted tonight on the stickiest part of the new energy bill, here’s the reality: America is looking at its first big rise in fuel economy standards in decades. After contentious debate on Capitol Hill and lobbying from the industry, new Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards will jump to 35 mpg for all cars and SUVs by 2020, up from the current 27....

Q: I have a webcam on my PC. Is it possible for a hacker to hijack it and see me?A: I hate to be the bearer of creepy tidings, but it is possible. Anything that is connected to a computer on the Internet is at risk of being compromised, whether it’s a file sitting on a hard drive or a peripheral device such as a webcam or microphone. A computer programmer was arrested in Madrid, Spain, in 2005 for writing a virus that allowed him to take over webcams to record pictures and videos of his victims – while he was also stealing their bank account passwords, among other things....

“A box? Just for mail? Criminy.“Mule Mail: 19th Century to PresentA mule train making the daily 16-mile round trip through the Grand Canyon to the Native American village of Supai.Steve Northup//Getty ImagesAnimals have always played a major role in delivery services—from the Pony Express to horse-drawn carriages—but only one beast is still hauling mail today. A handful of mules still pick their way through the Grand Canyon six days a week to deliver mail and other supplies (mostly food) to the residents of Supai, Arizona....

Media Platforms Design TeamWhy are humans the only species capable of having a verbal conversation? New research indicates the answer may involve more than the presence of specialized vocal cords. Neurobiologist Genevieve Konopka and her lab group at the University of California–Los Angeles examined a gene called FOXP2, which is linked to human language. But FOXP2 is also found in other animals, and the human version of the gene produces proteins that differ from the chimp’s in only two out of 715 locations....

Media Platforms Design TeamEight years and many millions of digitized pages later, a federal judge has declared that Google Books is legal under U.S. copyright law, throwing out a lawsuit by the Authors Guild, a writers’ union, that wanted to recoup potentially billions of dollars of damages from Google. U.S. Circuit Court Judge Denny Chin decided that the search giant did not break the law by digitizing excerpts of 20 millions books and making the full text of those books searchable online....

Media Platforms Design Team(Photo Credit: Grant Cornett)The Ford Mustang just celebrated its 50th birthday. Over the years Ford dallied with a turbocharged four-cylinder (the ’80s SVO) and an independent rear suspension (the 1999–2004 SVT Cobras). But if you wanted a hot Mustang, the essential recipe was the same last year as it was in 1964: V-8 in front, solid axle dancing around out back. But after a half-century the Mustang was due for some modernization, and the redesigned 2015 model sends the franchise in a new direction....

Apple unveiled the new iPhones today, and one of the most exciting bits of news to come out of the event involves one of the most-used parts of an iPhone: the camera. Obviously, by upgrading its main camera from 8 to 12 megapixels, the new camera will allow for even clearer photos. But what’s even more impressive is how they did it without sacrificing image quality. To explain, let’s talk about how camera sensors work....

Send Your Ex Straight to VoicemailWe’ve all got a few people we’d rather not talk to. Rather than manually screening every call, set up your phone to do the dirty work for you. Load up the culprit’s contact card, select Edit, and then scroll down to Additional Info. Select “Send straight to voicemail” from the list to have every subsequent call from that person bypass your ringer entirely.2. Screen Calls More PolitelyOkay, you’re not always sending people to voicemail because you can’t stand them....

From the start, it was envisioned as part sporting event, part skunkworks: Indianapolis millionaire Carl Fisher sought to build a proving ground for new cars and ideas, where automotive reliability, speed and strength would be tested. A century later, the Indianapolis 500 has been true to Fisher’s dream, and your everyday ride—from the drivetrain to the road and rubber on which it rolls—owes much to the race. “It’s made American cars perform a lot better,” says Indy legend A....

Media Platforms Design TeamWhat Is It? 2010 Subaru Legacy The Specs Until now, Subaru Legacy has largely snuck underneath the radar of Camry and Accord buyers. Why? Well, like the previous-generation Mazda6, no matter how sporty and fun the car may have been, it was, apparently, just too small for mainstream America. Subaru has fixed that with the 2010 Legacy. The new one it’s over 3-inches bigger in length, width and height....

Media Platforms Design TeamOn Sale Date: Late summer 2013Base Price: $51,995Powertrain: 6.2-liter V-8, 455 or 460 hp, 465 lb-ft; 7-speed manual or 6-speed automatic; RWDFuel Economy (city/hwy): 17/29Rolling through the streets of Detroit, the new Corvette Stingray gets the kind of attention usually reserved for minor celebrities. At every red light pedestrians whip out smartphones and squeeze off photographs, while drivers in neighboring cars unleash a flurry of questions, such as when does it come out (late summer) and how much does it cost ($51,995)?...

ELECTRICAL TROUBLESHOOTING CHECKLIST:Finding the real source of electrical trouble should be a process that starts at the most obvious solution and progresses from there. Before beginning any electrical repair, you should look at some of the most evident potential trouble spots.1. General power outage. Take the time to check lights and appliances throughout the house.2. Specific circuit tripped. Go to your fuse or breaker box to make sure the problem doesn’t lie with blown fuse or tripped breaker....

It’s not just generals and soldiers who keep the The Art of War in print. Businessmen, coaches, and lawyers all seem to get something out of Sun Tzu’s 6th century military tome — memorizing and repeating passages that speak to the tactics and strategy of success, whether that’s on Wall Street or in a war zone.But for all its long-lasting cultural influence, the book is limited by its lack of specifics....

Media Platforms Design TeamMedia Platforms Design Team1838Newspaper editor Horace Greeley’s advice: “Go to the West; there your capacities are sure to be appreciated.” Media Platforms Design Team1845 Fed up with consumerism and industrialization in “civilized society,” Henry David Thoreau settles in at Walden Pond for a 26-month experiment in self-reliance, to “live a primitive and frontier life … if only to learn what are the gross necessaries of life and what methods have been taken to obtain them....

For the second day in a row, astronauts aboard the International Space Station are trying to track down the problem with the station’s failed computer systems. The Russian crew pulled an all-nighter working on the glitch, managing to get one power channel online before finally giving in to sleep. NASA officials remain optimistic about the situation and stress that the astronauts aren’t in any imminent danger (a press conference with the astronauts is scheduled for tomorrow)....