Tesla’s Elon Musk has no plans to build his controversial Hyperloop transportation system, which promised New York to LA travel in just 45 minutes, instead seeing the proposed high-speed project as an “open source” design he hopes others will pick up. Musk made headlines last month when he teased details of the Hyperloop – described […]
Special editions with ridiculously expensive extras must be all the rage among well-to-do gadget fans — that’s the only real explanation we can imagine for Harrods’ new Olympus PEN Art Edition. The kit includes two PEN E-P5s (one hand-painted), but it also bundles prime lenses, accessories, a training session… and a customized Vespa scooter. You’ll have both the gear you need for amateur photography and the transportation to your photo shoots. Mind you, we’d expect nothing less when the Art Edition costs £16,000 ($24,814) — more than some cars. If you’re eager to acquire both a new camera and a new ride in one fell swoop, though, the limited-run PEN bundle is available from Harrods today. Check out a photo of the Vespa after the break.
Filed under: Cameras, Transportation
Via: Pocket-lint
Source: Harrods
If you’re planning on riding a jet ski, chances are that it’s going to be a sunny day, which is why we don’t understand why nobody would create a solar-powered jet ski, especially since they tend to guzzle up gas at an exceptionally high rate. British designer Ross Kemp has come up with an alternative vehicle to jet skis and powered surfboards that runs on the power of the sun. (more…)
Solar-Powered Jet Ski Created To Help Lifeguards Save Lives original content from Ubergizmo. 
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We’re used to seeing toughened glass on our phones and tablets, where it protects screens from chips and cracks. BMW, however, plans to use the substance on a much grander scale — the automaker just revealed that its upcoming i8 hybrid will be the first mass-produced car to use hardened glass. The currently unnamed material will reduce noise and weight in windows behind the windshield. As BMW doesn’t have to use thick glass to maintain strength, it can produce acoustically damped windows that weigh half as much as they would otherwise. We’ll have to wait until the i8’s arrival in 2014 to see how well this component choice works on the road, but it could lead to a future of lighter cars that still offer quiet interiors.
Filed under: Transportation
Via: Autoblog
Source: BMW
It surely isn’t the first time we’ve seen a quirky automaker look to the smartphone in order to add a bit of pizazz to the morning drive — Mini owners far and wide have plenty of inside jokes when it comes to the Mini Connected app. That being said, SmileDrive might just have the market cornered when it comes to all-out joviality. The free app, which was launched today by Volkswagen of America and Google, is presently only available for Android devices. (And yes, it’s a result of Google’s Art, Copy & Code project.) In a nutshell, it connects to any vehicle via Bluetooth (yes, Fiats and Ferraris as well) and runs in the background while a drive is ongoing. Once the wheels have stopped and the ignition has been switched off, it uses factors like location, distance, time and weather to deliver users their Smile Score and awards them with stickers — think of ’em as Foursquare badges for motorists.
On a longer road trip, SmileDrive offers the ability to create a Smilecast: a dynamic travelogue filled with the captured photos, maps of the trip, status updates, as well as other memories that are collected on a single URL. It all sounds pretty fantastic, if we’re honest, but allow us to offer up a tip: make sure you phone’s plugged into a charger. Wouldn’t want that background action to drain too much of your battery, now would you?
Filed under: Transportation, Software, Google
Via: The Verge
Source: Volkswagen, Google Play Store
Tesla’s four-door Model S has been trickling into North American garages for a couple of years now, and it seems that production has ramped up enough to finally begin deliveries internationally. Starting today, Model S buyers across various ponds will begin to see stock appear. As seen above, the action is starting in Oslo, Norway, where that guy in the driver seat looks particularly charged up about the parade that awaits. Sorry. It seemed funnier in the moment.
Filed under: Transportation
Source: Tesla (Twitter)
This automotive concept sketch from 1979 predicted a future where car interiors would resemble an airplane’s cockpit. But while this must have looked decidedly cutting-edge at the time, the inspiration, in a way, was pure nostalgia.
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There is always a first time for everything, and today, we have word that the first road-powered electric vehicle network in the world has just turned itself on in South Korea. What you see in the image above depicts an OLEV in South Korea, which is all set to drive over an electrified strip of road, now how about that? This particular network will comprise of specially constructed roads that come with electrical cables installed right below the surface, and it will be able to transfer energy wirelessly to electric vehicles using magnetic resonance.
Road-powered electric vehicles could be the future as they require small batteries, which means their overall weight and energy consumption is reduced sharply from a normal electric vehicle. Of course, there is also the benefit of not having to recharge your ride, which means distance should no longer be an issue. Right now, this road-powered electric vehicle network comprises of just 24km, and two Online Electric Vehicles (OLEV), namely public transport buses, are the only ones that will work on this road.
Many other factors will still need to be taken into consideration before it can be implemented worldwide – the cost of a government doing so would be astronomical, as all roads in the city would require an overhaul, and how many people are willing to change their rides to road-powered electric vehicles? It does seem that a Mass Rapid Transport system like trains would still be able to get the job done better at this point in time.
Road-Powered Electric Vehicle Network In South Korea Debuts original content from Ubergizmo. 
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Wireless charging might seem perfectly suited for smartphones and tablets, but the city of Gumi, South Korea is putting the tech to use with something a little larger: buses. A pair of Online Electric Vehicle (OLEV) motorcoaches, which recharge by driving over specially-equipped asphalt, are now running a public transportation route in the city, and it’s said to be the first network of its kind open for regular use. Rather than stopping periodically to jack in, coils on the coaches’ underside pick up power through an electromagnetic field created by road-embedded wires. Currently, the vehicles have a roundtrip journey of 24km (roughly 15 miles) when completing their stops.
Since the system operates so long as 5 to 15 percent of the path is electrified, there’s no need to rely on a completely rigged-up highway. What’s more, the solution is only triggered by passing OLEVs, which means that normal cars can share the same street. If this all sounds familiar, that’s because the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology has been hammering away at the technology for several years. Now that it’s made it this far, the city has plans to add ten more buses to its fleet by 2015.
Filed under: Transportation
Via: ExtremeTech
Source: PhysOrg
Fact: turbulence is no fun at all. Aside from the brief moments of bone-deep terror it can cause passengers, clear air turbulence (CAT) can also prove costly for airlines in terms of damages. To help pilots deal with difficult-to-spot areas where CAT is likely to occur, the German Aerospace Center (DLR) is spearheading a new joint European project known as DELICAT. Essentially, the DELICAT program calls for planes to be equipped with a light detection and ranging instrument (LIDAR) that emits short-wave ultraviolet lasers. Radiation then bounces off oxygen and nitrogen particles in the air, indicating fluctuations in air density that signal the presence of CAT pockets. Until the end of August, the DLR will run test flights in a specially modified Cessna Citation plane to both show off LIDAR’s capabilities and to give researchers invaluable data on CAT patterns. Though the system is still in its infancy, the folks at the DLR hope that the technology will one day become a standard part of commercial air travel.
Filed under: Misc, Transportation
Via: Gizmodo
Source: German Aerospace Center
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