Constructed on original chassis – in this case a Phantom II – and endowed with bespoke coachwork over a traditional ash frame, Petersen cars are made to measure, exactly like their Thirties predecessors. As such, they pick up where Walter Owen Bentley left off.
And this one looks every bit a W O design. Unlike many of the ungainly monster-engined specials cobbled together in the interwar years, this latest masterpiece – despite a length of almost 19 feet – possesses a rare synergy of line and proportion. It strikes precisely the right note.
You’d have to have your aesthetic sense surgically removed not to find the Meteor Bentley impressive. There’s that pristine, polished engine for a start, a 27-litre derivation of the legendary Merlin unit that once propelled Lancaster bombers and Spitfires. With 12 exhausts and 24 spark plugs, and turning out a leisurely 660bhp, the Meteor – in essence a Merlin without a supercharger – provided many British tanks with ample, dependable power. It’s equally unstressed here.
But, the eagle-eyed will ask, isn’t that a blower housing at the front? Well, yes – but in this case it’s an extra oil reservoir/cooler. Given the engine’s calorific output, it’s no surprise to find yards of heat exchanger tubes running full length underneath, and a discreet air intake below the number plate to tame transmission temperatures.
The very word “transmission” does scant justice to a system combining a four-speed Allison automatic with a Petersen-built, 3:1 step-up box designed to speed up the lazy power delivery to the Phantom II rear axle. Lazy, incidentally, means about 80mph per 1,000rpm.
Starting from cold entails letting the engine spin with the ignition off to get the vital fluids circulating (64 litres of coolant, 57 of lubricant for the engine, 16 for the gearbox). Then flick the twin magneto switches (ex-Lancaster) and push the starter button (ex-Spitfire).
A few distant whirrs as the transmission oil pumps respond, and the leviathan stirs a dozen pistons into life. The twin Brunellian tailpipes speak anything but softly, sounding like the Book of Revelations.
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Even with an engine needing more miles to loosen up, the car steps off the line with unlikely vigour. It would be very easy to pursue eye-watering 0-60mph times which do little except ignite the 7.00x21 Blockley tyres – and singularly pointless. You’re better off developing the levels of commitment the car requires to get the best out of it. As its creator demonstrates, the Meteor Bentley demands to be driven through bends, not just aimed at them, and steered on the throttle to get the rear end moving about. If you’re after authentic vintage-era exhilaration, look no further.
Step on the loud pedal in earnest and a giant ironclad fist launches you at the horizon with take-no-prisoners urgency. Keep that right foot planted into the green Wilton carpet and you enter a new big-stick dimension, a realm of towering performance and limitless adrenalin.
The soup is served in a 48 ounce bowl and includes no less than 12 different peppers from around the world. Although the mix changes with the season, it always includes bhut jolokia (also known as the "ghost chili"). The chilies themselves comprise about 16 ounces of the soup. The restaurant uses both Thai and Mexican techniques to draw as much heat out of the peppers as possible.Ally Valdez, who owns Nitally’s with his wife, describes how the dish was created: “My wife is from Thailand and my family is from Mexico...we always argued about who ate the hottest food. So, we went out of our way to find the hottest peppers we could use and made a soup that hardly any family members could eat.”
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Valdez says that since the challenge began in 2009, 116 people have attempted to finish the Inferno Bowl. The closest challenger came within two spoonfuls before throwing in the towel. Others throw in more than that. The Inferno Soup is so spicy that the restaurant requires challengers to eat it outside, since about 40 percent of the challengers have vomited while trying to finish the soup within the 30 minutes allotted.
A chef was stunned to find she was almost banned from buying two limes from a supermarket - because they could be classed as a weapon.
Marisa Zoccolan, 31, popped into the new Asda supermarket close to her home in Wallsend, North Tyneside, to pick up some groceries, including the citrus fruits.
But when she tried to pay for them at the self-service checkout, the message 'amount exceeded, authorisation required' flashed up.
An assistant then came over and told her that more than one lime was deemed a weapon - because the citric acid could be squirted in someone's eye.
Marisa, a self-employed caterer said: 'I thought they were taking the pip, but the assistant told me the same applied to lemons.
'I've heard of supermarkets banning people from buying things before, but this is just crazy.
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'I asked her why. Was it because they can be thrown?
'But no, it's because they contain citric acid which could be squirted in someone's eyes. How ridiculous is that?'
Thankfully for Ms Zoccalan, who lives with partner Jacqui Nicholson, 37, and dog Doobie, the assistant allowed Marisa to eventually buy both of the fruits.
'Yes, they vetted me and let me buy them.
'I clearly don't look like I'm going to carry out a drive-by fruiting any time soon.
'If that citric acid rule applies to lemons and limes, it must apply to grapefruits as well.
'Maybe oranges are safer because they're less acidic?'
SALES assistant Phil Newton could not believe his eyes when he saw a dog driving a 20-tonne, double-decker bus through Darwin's industrial zone.
"I thought, 'What the ... '!" he said.
"This was weird, even for the Territory."
Mr Newton, 30, said the dog was sitting in the driver's seat with its paws on the steering wheel.
He chased after the runaway bus, leapt through an open window and rammed on the handbrake.
"It ran for a couple of hundred metres, swerved across the road, went up on the footpath and was just about to run into a parked car when I stopped it," he said.
Woodley, a two-year-old German koolie, was unrepentant.
His owner, Richard McCormack, 62, said: "He sits next to me when I'm driving and in the driver's seat when I'm not.
"The handbrake is on the dashboard and he's seen me release it many times.
"He was just copying me. He's tried it on before."
As the oldest university in the English-speaking world with more than 20,000 students spread across more than 30 self-governing colleges, Oxford has a whole host of official and unofficial traditions. Perhaps one of the most bizarre is the Time Ceremony undertaken by Merton College students who in the early hours of the last Sunday in October walk backwards around the Fellows' Quad drinking port. The purpose is to maintain the space-time continuum during the change from British Summer Time to Greenwich Meantime.
The Merton Time Ceremony has no spiritual or recreational element like other Oxford ceremonies; nor is it an artificial ceremony conferring a status on those who participate. It is a purely temporal and practical ceremony, first held in its current form in AD1971, although it is suspected to have much earlier origins, possibly in the form of an ancient Celtic autumnal ceremony. It is designed to remedy the ill effects of modern man's abrupt interference with the diurnal cycle.
It is performed during the hour each autumn in which the clocks in the United Kingdom return to Greenwich Mean Time. Although this is normally referred to as the hour in which the clocks are "put back", those who perform the ceremony prefer to refer to the hour as that in which the clocks "stand still". For, although it is difficult to accept the notion that time can go backwards, and even more so to accept that it can suddenly leap backwards, it is quite natural to visualise time slowing down, eventually to zero.
During that hour, the participants walk anticlockwise, in relays, around some suitably large horizontal area, which has, for reasons of convenience, always been Fellows' Quadrangle in Merton College, Oxford. The purpose and effect of this is to create a localised area in which natural time stands still for one hour, in the hope that into this well of depressed natural time thus created will flow sufficient natural time from surrounding areas to nearly equalise civil time throughout the country within about 24 hours, thus reducing by many days the time it would otherwise take nature (including mankind) to re-adapt its diurnal cycle after an abrupt "stationary jet-lag".Merton College, Oxford (image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)
The ceremony is traditionally hosted by the Keeper of the Watch sending out invitations for the following Sunday "to take port around the sundial in Fellows' Garden at 1.30am for 2.00am passim". Accordingly, at about 1.30am on the Sunday, the participants congregate around the sundial, port is poured and introductions are made. There are traditionally three toasts, between about 1.40am and 1.55am: the first is "To a Good Old Time!"; the second, a joint toast to the sundial and the nearby ancient mulberry tree (morus nigra, f.), is "O tempora O more!"; the third is "Long Live the Counter-revolution!!"
Despite the wording of the invitations there is no circumperambulation in Fellows' Garden. After the third toast the participants leave the sundial and walk the 53 yards to the Tower of the Four Orders at the middle of the south side of Fellows' Quadrangle. At 2.00am precisely, according to the Keeper of the Watch, the participants walk backwards and anti-clockwise around the quadrangle. Initially everyone does so, each person completing at least two circuits, and the senior participants three or four, before stopping. Throughout the hour, participants make further circuits at their leisure, but ensuring that there are always at least two people maintaining the counter-revolution. Immediately before the end of the hour, those not already walking embark upon a final circuit so as to be walking when the hour is up.
It is not in principle essential to walk backwards. This is done partly to increase the solemnity of the occasion and partly because when one walks in a circle, one sees where one is going sooner if one walks backwards, but chiefly because it has always seemed the obvious thing to do.
Dress for the occasion is full academic dress: for men, that is dark suit, white shirt, white bow-tie, black shoes, and gown. Squares (or caps) should be worn. Graduates (other than doctors) wear hoods: this is indeed one of only four occasions on the University calendar on which hoods are worn.
Documents obtained by The Wall Street Journal open a rare window into a new global market for the off-the-shelf surveillance technology that has arisen in the decade since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
The techniques described in the trove of 200-plus marketing documents, spanning 36 companies, include hacking tools that enable governments to break into people's computers and cellphones, and "massive intercept" gear that can gather all Internet communications in a country. The papers were obtained from attendees of a secretive surveillance conference held near Washington, D.C., last month.
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Critics say the market represents a new sort of arms trade supplying Western governments and repressive nations alike. "The Arab Spring countries all had more sophisticated surveillance capabilities than I would have guessed," said Andrew McLaughlin, who recently left his post as deputy chief technology officer in the White House, referring to the Middle Eastern and African nations racked by violent crackdowns on dissent.
The Journal this year uncovered an Internet surveillance center installed by a French firm in Libya and reported that software made by Britain's Gamma International UK Ltd., had been used in Egypt to intercept dissidents' Skype conversations. In October, a U.S. company that makes Internet-filtering gear acknowledged to the Journal that its devices were being used in Syria.
Companies making and selling this gear say it is intended to catch criminals and is available only to governments and law enforcement. They say they obey export laws and aren't responsible for how the tools are used.
Trade-show organizer Mr. Lucas added that his event isn't political. "We don't really get into asking, 'Is this in the public interest?'" he said.
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Among the most controversial technologies on display at the conference were essentially computer-hacking tools to enable government agents to break into people's computers and cellphones, log their keystrokes and access their data. Although hacking techniques are generally illegal in the U.S., law enforcement can use them with an appropriate warrant, said Orin Kerr, a professor at George Washington University Law School and former computer-crime attorney at the Justice Department.
The documents show that at least three companies — Vupen Security SA of France, HackingTeam SRL of Italy and Gamma's FinFisher — marketed their skill at the kinds of techniques often used in "malware," the software used by criminals trying to steal people's financial or personal details. The goal is to overcome the fact that most surveillance techniques are "useless against encryption and can't reach information that never leaves the device," Marco Valleri, offensive-security manager at HackingTeam, said in an interview. "We can defeat that."
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The documents for FinFisher, a Gamma product, say it works by "sending fake software updates for popular software."
Anne McCaffrey wasn't just the inventor of Pern, the world where a whole society is based on dragon-riding. She was also an incredibly influential author who helped transform the way science fiction and fantasy authors wrote about women, and the way all of us thought about bodies and selfhood. She was the first woman to win a Hugo Award and a Nebula Award, as well as a Grand Master of science fiction.
Besides the Pern books, McCaffrey wrote the classic space-faring novel The Ship Who Sang, in which a severely disabled girl becomes the core of a starship, or Brainship, with her mind controlling all its major functions. McCaffrey's novel provided a startling new way to think about personhood and the nature of the mind/body connection, but also helped pave the way for a whole subgenre of posthuman space opera, in which heavily modified humans explore space.
At moderate levels, debt improves welfare and enhances growth. But high levels can be damaging. When does debt go from good to bad? We address this question using a new dataset that includes the level of government, non-financial corporate and household debt in 18 OECD countries from 1980 to 2010. Our results support the view that, beyond a certain level, debt is a drag on growth. For government debt, the threshold is around 85% of GDP. The immediate implication is that countries with high debt must act quickly and decisively to address their fiscal problems. The longer-term lesson is that, to build the fiscal buffer required to address extraordinary events, governments should keep debt well below the estimated thresholds. Our examination of other types of debt yields similar conclusions. When corporate debt goes beyond 90% of GDP, it becomes a drag on growth. And for household debt, we report a threshold around 85% of GDP, although the impact is very imprecisely estimated.
On my way out to at least partially fill in the trenches for the new sprinklers and lines I had to run, I stopped to change from my sandals to my boots. I learned a long time ago not to press on the top of a shovel with anything but boots on, and that includes an exclusion for sneakers. One ripped open ankle area is enough for most people.
I learned a new dance today, one never before performed by someone already hurting from several days’ work with a totally fused lumbar spine. And a lizard learned the experience of unadulterated sheer panic.
The U.S. has built, flown, pointed and triggered a missile designed specifically to carry a directed-energy weapon. That payload, expected to be operational soon, will be able to disrupt, shut down, spoof or damage electrical systems, but little has been revealed about the project.
However, various clues have provided substantive details about the design and concept of operations (conops) for the new missile and its exotic payload. They come from Boeing officials, industry specialists and U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory sponsors who are working on the Counter-electronics High-power Microwave Advanced Missile Project (Champ).
An illustration created by Boeing shows the missile being dropped by a B-52, which means at least some versions of the design are air-launched. However, the directed-energy, high-power microwave (HPM) payload also is designed for integration into land, sea or other air-based platforms for operational flexibility.
As to the warhead’s anti-electronics capabilities, “the whole radio frequency spectrum is viable as a target,” says Keith Coleman, Boeing’s program manager for Champ since 2009. The systems will be tailored to the target defined by the customer. The effects will depend on the frequency and effective radiated power (ERP). There are many options.
. . .The notional airframe shown in Boeing’s drawings is relatively small with compressed carriage wings that extend after launch. While Boeing’s artist concepts are not exact representations of the missile, they do resemble the company’s cruise missile designs that are similarly air-launched and have low-radar-signature designs to penetrate enemy air defenses.
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Champ was first flown on May 17 at the Utah Test and Training Range at Hill AFB. The missile was successfully pointed at a series of targets to confirm that it could be controlled and timed to fire a focused beam that would minimize—and perhaps eliminate—collateral damage to nearby electronic devices. The software used in the test was identical to that required to trigger the HPM weapon warhead.
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“Any unmanned aircraft would be a candidate for these types of systems,” Coleman says. However, “Boeing built the Champ system to be easily transitioned to [alternative platforms]. From the start we designed it with as many features as possible so that we would need minimum adjustments.”
Program officials will not address the question of whether Champ is associated with the Air Force’s Long-Range Strike (LRS) program. Air Force and aerospace industry officials have said that directed-energy weapons support and electronic attack will be supplied to LRS by adjunct, unmanned aircraft.
“Champ is a template for future HPM programs,” Coleman says. “There has never been this type of system with this kind of power out on any vehicle of any sort before.”
Coleman contends there would be little difficulty putting the HPM weapons technology on a smaller or larger airframe.
“The HPM system itself is a very flexible integration,” he says. If smaller, you get less ERP and if bigger you get more. But if you are smaller, you can probably get closer [to the target without being detected]. I absolutely think there is a desire to go to a bigger airframe. ERP is dependent on the size of the aperture. The bigger the aperture, the more power you can produce and the more standoff you get.”
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Raytheon’s newly acquired New Mexico-based Ktech division built the HPM warhead. The combination of airframe and warhead are to be demonstrated during a series of flight tests planned to cluster around the end of the current program in July 2012.
Raytheon recently acquired Ktech because it is making plans to build a series of HPM warheads for virtually all the missile models on its various production lines. A few years ago Raytheon planners said they were “betting the farm” on HPM pushing aside lasers as the most tactically useful and least demanding directed-energy weapon for next-generation combat operations. Boeing, in a complementary mode, has been designing its unmanned combat aircraft designs to carry reusable, multi-shot HPM weapons.
Whether it’s pirated software, poison-infused baby formula, cancer-causing drywall, luxury purses or fake medicines, if you need a knockoff, China has traditionally been the go-to country, with a counterfeiter always willing to oblige.
Now, with precious metals prices on the cusp of possibly the biggest price explosion in centuries, fake gold and silver products are becoming a booming industry say Global Piracy & Counterfeiting Consultants:
We have read about one Chinese counterfeiter openly bragging about producing 100,000 fake U.S. Silver Dollars per year, and that’s just one counterfeiter. At this point, we are telling all investors of gold, or silver coins and/or any type of precious metal bar to only buy from a reputable U.S. dealer, that has an established track record, and a money-back guarantee. We fear this Chinese counterfeit gold, or silver coins, or bars, could be a multibillion-dollar-a-year business, and we greatly fear many innocent investors could be taken to the cleaners…
Based on our research, some of the Chinese counterfeit coins are of such high quality, it is not uncommon for even experts to be deceived. We think its smart for every investor to have gold, or silver; our big worry is pretty simple: What if they invest 10% or 20% of their net worth in what are counterfeit precious metal coins that are basically worthless? We would call this a disaster for the investor, and our big fear is there are probably tens of thousands of investors in the United States who have been duped. Even worse, once again, for all intents and purposes, the U.S. federal government is a no-show — once again…”
The world needs to come to grips with the largest counterfeiter in the world, the fact that 10% of China’s GDP is a direct result of counterfeiting. If it’s not knockoff pharmaceuticals that can kill people, it’s high-tech smart phones, or electronics. Our new worry is pretty obvious related to Chinese counterfeiters bankrupting innocent precious metal or coin investors with what could be their life savings. At what point do consumers in the United States, Europe, Japan or the rest of the world say no thanks to any more Chinese products, given its uncaring attitude about flooding the global markets with counterfeits or fakes?
Sitting in the Wired office this morning was none other than this: a fully operational 3D-printed replica of a Stradivarius violin (because regular violin production methods are so 2008).
The components of this playable instrument were manufactured by EOS -- a German firm that specialises in 3D printing technologies -- and assembled by a professional violin maker. Whilst appearing to be built from wood, the material used to construct the body is actually an industrial polymer named EOS PEEK HP3, normally used for high-temperature medical and aerospace applications.
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Certain parts were not 3D-printed, however, such as the strings, fine tuner and pegbox. These were added by the luthier once the bodywork was finished by EOS.
A 3D printer that uses chocolate has been developed by University of Exeter researchers - and it prints layers of chocolate instead of ink or plastic.
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Lead scientist Dr Liang Hao told BBC News that chocolate printing, just like any other 3D printing technique, starts with a flat cross-section image - similar to that produced by ordinary printers turning out images.
"Then you do a 3D shape - layer by layer, printing chocolate instead of ink, like if you were layering 2D paper to form a 3D shape," he said.
Once a layer is completed, it solidifies, and the machine moves on to the next layer.
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Once the prototype becomes a finished product, it may find a role in the restaurant and food preparation industry.
And some companies are already expressing interest.
"Obviously, it's chocolate, so it is hugely appealing," said Joanna Grant from UK online gift retailer findmeagift.co.uk.
But what is even more appealing, she added, is that customers will be able to design any object on a computer before hitting the print button.
"We could do things like 3D faces, for instance - the possibilities are enormous on a commercial aspect."
Besides producing 3D chocolate, Dr Hao's team wants to go a step further - and take their printer into cyberspace.
He said the next step would be creating a chocolate-oriented website.
"Now we have an opportunity to combine chocolate with digital technology, including the design, digital manufacturing and social networking.
"Chocolate has a lot of social purpose, so our intention is to develop a community and share the designs, ideas and experience about it."
