The Christian Science Monitor (CSM) has reported on two business partners in Gaza who have converted a 1994 Peugeot 205 into an electric car capable of going 110 miles on a single charge using 34 standard lead-acid car batteries.
After more than a year of being blockaded by the Isreali government, Gazans find themselves facing out-of-sight prices for fuel.
Instead of letting that get the better of them, civil engineers Waseem Khazendar and Fayaz Anan claim to have developed an electric motor that is different than other electric motors and allows for improved efficiency.
The converted Peugeot has 15 horsepower and can travel at a top speed of 60 mph. To most Americans this may seem underpowered, but on the 25 mile long and 7 mile wide Gaza strip this amount of power and speed is more than satisfactory — and in reality, it’s probably more than satisfactory for most Americans too [and Aucklanders].
The business pair say that they already have a few thousand orders to convert gas cars into electric cars, but due to the blockade they only have enough supplies to convert 30-40 more vehicles.
The conversion purportedly costs a mere $2,500 dollars to accomplish. As reported by the CSM, US experts are baffled as to how the conversion could be done for so little money and that using even the cheapest parts available in the US it would cost 3 times as much to do the conversion here.
Kahzendar and Anan are in the process of trying to patent their invention and hope to work together with Israelis to create a multimillion dollar business.
A quote in the CSM from an Israeli businessman after considering the possibility of working with the Gazans sums it up nicely: “I believe that business creates peace, and any peace project is good for everybody.”
One of our FilmGuide reviewers, Josh Bowlin has been quoted in the latest Warner Brothers media release for the upcoming DVD release of Bucket List. So next time you see Josh, don;t forget to ask for his autograph, 'cause he's more famous than you!
I took the day off work to look after Mrs Suburban Mayhem who is feeling rather poorly. On the way home from dropping the kids off at school I picked up breakfast for the two of us from McDonalds Manurewa. When I got home and unwrapped my BLT bagel it looked somewhat empty.
On further exploration I discovered it was indeed a rather empty bagel.
Pushing what little lettuce aside I finally found the bacon, hiding under a drop of mayonnaise.
I don't think I'll be returning to Manurewa McDonalds anytime soon.
Concept cars give automotive designers a chance to let their imaginations run wild, often with outlandish results. But even by that measure, BMW has come up with something as strange as it is innovative -- a shape-shifting car covered with fabric.
Instead of steel, aluminum or even carbon fiber, the GINA Light Visionary Model has a body of seamless fabric stretched over a movable metal frame that allows the driver to change its shape at will. The car -- which actually runs and drives -- is a styling design headed straight for the BMW Museum in Munich and so it will never see production, but building a practical car wasn't the point.
Chris Bangle, head of design for BMW, says GINA allowed his team to "challenge existing principles and conventional processes."
"It is in the nature of such visions that they do not necessarily claim to be suitable for series production," company officials said in unveiling the car Tuesday. "Rather, they are intended to steer creativity and research into new directions."
Giving Bangle and his team that latitude to design so radical a car "helps to tap into formerly inconceivable, innovative potential" to push the boundaries of appearance and materials as well as functions and the manufacturing process, BMW says.
Bangle and is team actually built GINA -- which stands for "Geometry and functions In 'N' Adaptions" -- six years ago, but BMW kept it under, er, wraps until Tuesday. It's built on the Z8 chassis and has a 4.4-liter V8 and six-speed automatic transmission. BMW says the fabric skin - polyurethane-coated Lycra - is resilient, durable and water resistant. It's stretched over an aluminum frame controlled by electric and hydraulic actuators that allow the owner to change the body shape. Want a big spoiler on the back? Wider fenders? No problem. "The drastic reinterpretation of familiar functionality and structure means that drivers have a completely new experience when they handle their car," BMW says.
GINA has just four panels - the front hood, two sides and the rear deck. The doors open in jack-knife fashion and are completely smooth when closed; access to the engine is through a slit in the hood. BMW says the shape of the body can be changed without slackening or damaging the fabric. The fabric is opaque so the taillights shine through, and small motors pull the fabric back to reveal the headlights.
The interior is equally innovative. The steering wheel and gauges swing into place and the headrest rises from the seat once the driver is seated, making it easier to get in and out of the car.
BMW says GINA is built on a space frame that provides all the safety of a conventional car, but we suspect people - not to mention BMW's lawyers and government regulators - wouldn't embrace fabric bodies. Still, the company says GINA could influence the design of future Beemers.
More than half the world's 100 un-contacted tribes live in Brazil or Peru, and recent aerial reconnaissance has uncovered proof that Roald Dahl's fictional orange-skinned Oompa-Loompas are in fact real.
$21,169,000,000 is the ‘Profit for the year’ 2007 according to BP New Zealand’s Annual Report. That is a rather large profit for a New Zealand company I would have thought. A profit that might indicate that they’re over valuing there services maybe? What’s more, $20,845,000,000 got paid to shareholders. That’s $5,000 for every single person, man, woman, child, in New Zealand, being paid to the shareholders. That’s obscene.
As a family we would probably go through at least $6,420 in petrol each year. If only half the money going to the shareholders got put back into the community – like our Power Company does – that would be around $2,500 each, for a family of five it would come to a total of $12,500, more than enough to cover all our petrol costs, WOF, Rego and other running costs and allow us to purchase cheese once in a while.
And lets not forget that BP is only one of the players in the New Zealand petrol market.
But hey, if the international price of crude oil has gone up, then it’s only fair to put up local petrol prices right? Of course, as Frank pointed out yesterday, when the crude price falls, the pump price seldom follows suit.
Sergio Leone’s dollars trilogy: Fistful of Dollars, For a Few Dollars More and The Good, The Bad and The Ugly has been called 'one of the most influential film series of the modern age,' and as part of a series of special screenings (in Europe) comes a new set of limited edition posters, including this cool trilogy for The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.
Butane Oven schmutz is usually encased in a nearly impenetrable charred-carbon crust, which is best breached by an organic solvent. Enter butane. Also an aerosol propellant, liquid butane loosens carbon molecules that conglomerate when other elements evaporate at high temps. One of the most commonly abused inhalants, butane poses severe health risks. But that's not a worry here: Huffing fumes from the other ingredients would almost certainly kill you first.
Monoethanolamine Exhibiting properties of both an alcohol (mixes with water, has a high boiling point) and an amine (has a high pH, absorbs water, smells like ammonia), MEA can undergo reactions common to either group of compounds. It breaks down the gunk on oven surfaces, neutralizing some fatty acids and turning others into grease-cutting solvents. Another reason to not inhale this cleaner: MEA is a volatile organic compound, which can cause confusion, nosebleeds, and cancer in humans and animals alike.
Diethylene Glycol Monobutyl Ether A major component of brake fluid, hair coloring, and floor sealer, DEGBE's job here is to delay evaporation of monoethanolamine, letting it work longer to vanquish baked-on mess. But like any good wingman, DEGBE has skills of its own: It helps dissolve some of the fats and grease loosened by MEA. Breathing DEGBE vapors while consuming excessive alcohol can lead to kidney and liver problems. So remember, friends don't let friends drink and clean.
Sodium Hydroxide You know that scene in Fight Club where Brad Pitt explains what happens when you mix lye with melted animal grease? That's exactly what happens when you spray this stuff into your oven. Butane and MEA soften the hard organic coating, allowing the sodium hydroxide to attack the underlying fatty triglyceride molecules. That reaction gives off heat and results in a simple form of soap. Incidentally, don't use Easy-Off on aluminum — the metal serves as a room-temperature catalyst, breaking down the NaOH and releasing flammable hydrogen gas.
Diethanolamine Manufacturer Reckitt Benckiser will neither confirm nor deny this, but the patent information for at least one version of Easy-Off indicates that diethanolamine can be used in place of up to 60 percent of the monoethanolamine. This makes sense because Easy-Off is foamy when it comes out of the can, and DEA is much more foamalicious than MEA. And this isn't just to create the impression of a sudsy, effective cleaner; the foam smothers the other ingredients and prevents them from evaporating, forcing them to slave away at making soap and dissolving grease. The problem is that while DEA is technically not a volatile organic compound, it has been shown to limit brain development in the fetuses of pregnant laboratory mice. Just don't use Easy-Off to clean your kid's Habitrail.
Instead of Mr Sew-Funky, I got Miss Sew-Funky #3 to do the draw...
TAH DAH!
Frank wants to inform you about the awful situation in Darfur, and good on him. Go visit his humanitarian site. For me however, I'm more of an interactive experience kind of guy, so I like the Darfur Is Dying game as a away to being to understand the enormity of what is happening. Give it a whirl, then click through to see how you can help.
I didn't think this would be appropriate for FilmGuide so i decided to post it here.
One of our FilmGuide reviewers, Josh Bowlin has been quoted in the latest Warner Brothers media release for the upcoming DVD release of Bucket List. So next time you see Josh, don;t forget to ask for his autograph, 'cause he's more famous than you!
I took the day off work to look after Mrs Suburban Mayhem who is feeling rather poorly. On the way home from dropping the kids off at school I picked up breakfast for the two of us from McDonalds Manurewa. When I got home and unwrapped my BLT bagel it looked somewhat empty.
On further exploration I discovered it was indeed a rather empty bagel.
Pushing what little lettuce aside I finally found the bacon, hiding under a drop of mayonnaise.
More than half the world's 100 un-contacted tribes live in Brazil or Peru, and recent aerial reconnaissance has uncovered proof that Roald Dahl's fictional orange-skinned Oompa-Loompas are in fact real.
$21,169,000,000 is the ‘Profit for the year’ 2007 according to BP New Zealand’s Annual Report. That is a rather large profit for a New Zealand company I would have thought. A profit that might indicate that they’re over valuing there services maybe? What’s more, $20,845,000,000 got paid to shareholders. That’s $5,000 for every single person, man, woman, child, in New Zealand, being paid to the shareholders. That’s obscene. 
Sergio Leone’s dollars trilogy: Fistful of Dollars, For a Few Dollars More and The Good, The Bad and The Ugly has been called 'one of the most influential film series of the modern age,' and as part of a series of special screenings (in Europe) comes a new set of limited edition posters, including this cool trilogy for The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.
What's Inside: Foamalicious, Vaporlicious Easy-Off Oven Cleaner
