Do we really go to the races for the visceral shiver a race car’s engine can give you, the aching memory frisson that the stink of castrol can trigger?
Formula One dominator Sebastian Vettel gave short shrift Saturday to the new, electric Formula E series, saying it would be far too quiet and was “not the future”.
Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2013-10-vettel-formula-future.html#jCp
Formula E car specifications
top speed: 220km/h A
Acceleration: 0 to 100 in three seconds
Power: 180KW
Weight: 780kg
Gearbox: Two gears
Batteries: Lithium ion
Voltage: 800V
Range: 25 minutes
Charging time: 90 minutes
Read more: The Engineer Formula E Chassis
beautiful engineering…can be a bit…blocky
Falcon 9 first stage burns an engine during a controlled descent to the Pacific Ocean. (Credit: SpaceX)
Falcon 9 first stage in a controlled descent toward the Pacific Ocean. At this point, the stage was about 3 meters (9.8 feet) above the water. (Credit: SpaceX)
“SpaceX then lit the center engine for a single engine burn. That relight also went well, however we exceeded the roll control authority of the attitude control thrusters. This particular stage was not equipped with landing gear which could have helped stabilize the stage like fins would on an aircraft. The stage ended up spinning to a degree that was greater than we could control with the gas thrusters on board and ultimately we hit the water relatively hard.
from the picture above it looks like it came pretty damn close! WOW!
October 15, 2013
Europe Is Burning, Slowly
WALTER RUSSELL MEAD
Nice to see a sensible piece and on a topic other than DC idiocy.
The i3 is BMW’s Ultimate Electric Driving Machine: BY DAMON LAVRINC 07.29.13
Wired question the “new age refrigerator” look but I like it.
Continues the trend showing that you need to design from the ground up…and know what you are doing…and what you want to emphasize when designing eCars.
Swifts stay airborne for six months at a time: by Andy Coghlan. 08 October 2013
It’s possible young swifts don’t spend much or any time on the ground for three years.
Some theorize sleeping on the wing or shutting down half the brain. But it’s known that dolphins and suspected other large marine mammals can be awake for weeks at a time with no harm.
WIRED: The Abomination of Ebooks: They Price People Out of Reading BY ART BRODSKY 10.02.13
An Orbital Sciences Cygnus cargo ship reached the International Space Station early Sunday and was captured by the lab’s robot arm. The successful rendezvous marked a major milestone for NASA and a program to fund development of commercial cargo carries to replace capacity lost with the space shuttle’s retirement. (Credit: NASA TV)
SpaceX successfully launches debut Falcon 9 v1.1. September 29, 2013 by William Graham
This World and Others 