The Spitfire is starting to take shape

I posted about this airplane a while ago, but it was still pretty bare at the time. Now its starting to look like an airplane.

Guest blogging at Ace of Spades

If you haven't noticed, I've been doing some guest blogging at Ace's joint. A lot of the same sort of stuff I've been doing here, but it gets a lot more exposure over there.

What's wrong with this picture?

We have here a photo from AFP of an Iraqi woman who claims the bullets she's holding "hit her house".

H/T Confederate Yankee

...the greatest thing I have ever done

MNF-I

Baghdad Soldiers rescued a 2-year-old Iraqi boy from a dry well in which he fell Aug. 9.

Soldiers with Company B, 2nd Battalion, 5th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division responded to the pleas for assistance from the father of a 2-year-old boy who had fallen into a dry well near the family’s residence [PA's note: this was a serious 25' deep well].

The company commander, Capt. David Powell of Newport Beach, Calif., was about to begin a scheduled security patrol when the boy’s father approached the gate of his Coalition outpost on foot. Using an interpreter, Powell quickly assessed the situation and sent the patrol to assist with the recovery of the child[...]

[...]"In my 18-years in the Army," Powell said, "this is, by far, the greatest thing I have ever done."

H/T North Shore Journal

Amy Winehouse - "(drug) Rehab is a cop-out"

This girl needs a bit more than rehab. She needs a 7x24 keeper.

Daily Mail

[...]The 23-year-old, who is notorious for her wild partying, was treated in a London hospital last week after taking a cocktail of heroin, ecstasy, cocaine and the horse tranquiliser ketamine[...]

[...]Rehab is a cop-out[...]

Very cool -- jet engine simulation from NASA

While stumbling through a bunch of links researching pulse jets - specifically the Lockwood-Hiller design that has no moving parts (Lockwood eliminated the petal valve...the only moving part in a traditional pulse jet) I ran across this sim for a turbo-jet engine.

Its a Java applet, so you'll need to enable Java on your browser.

NASA Glenn Research Center

With this software you can investigate how a jet (or turbine) engine produces thrust by interactively changing the values of different engine parameters[...]

Pelosi "earmarks" for bioweapons

Wassup with the biowarfare WMD shit Nan? The nutroots ain't gonna be down with that at all girl.

Bloomberg

The California Democrat has won funding for six companies in a 2008 defense funding measure. One is a $4 million request to develop a ``novel viral biowarfare agent'' for Prosetta Corp., based in her San Francisco district.

UPDATE -- NRO is saying they talked with the reporter who wrote the story and the guy screwed up. He says the work was to treat viruses used in biowarfare.

Chinese torture/kill "corrupt" officials in online game

I wonder how well such a game would do here in the US? Being able to shove a virtual red hot poker up a few politicians asses might prove very compelling.

Middle East Times

BEIJING -- An online game in which players can torture and kill corrupt officials that a Chinese local government set up to teach people about the perils of graft is proving a roaring success, state media said Thursday.

"Incorruptible Fighter," developed by the government of east China's Zhejiang province, was launched just over a week ago and is already so popular that it is being redesigned to accommodate more players, the China Daily said.


"I feel a great sense of achievement when I punish lots of evil officials," one gamer surnamed Sun was quoted as saying.

The game, which lets players get ahead by killing officials by means of "weapons, magic, or torture," has been downloaded more than 100,000 times, the Southern Metropolitan Daily said[...]

Airplane porn - Boeing 777 wing destruction testing

Nice. I think the 777 will stay together. Now if they'd just get rid of that fly by wire crap, they might get me to fly on a commercial airliner again.

Wild and crazy Scandis - fly R/C plane through tunnel

Whoever was piloting that rig has some mad skillz

Retard BMW driver video

Ha, ha, ha. Moron.

The Ball Screw

This isn't a post about porn...well sort of -- metal machining porn perhaps. Every so often I come across some bit of technology that is so perfectly suited to a particular task its worth mentioning. The notion of the ball screw is one of those.

One of the problems with high precision machining operations is play in the machine tool itself. Things like threads are used to advance cutters and such, but ordinary cut thread screws have a certain amount of slop in them and can wear over time resulting in imprecision creeping into the machine. For a lot of run of the mill machining operations, this slop may not be a big deal, but for some things that need to be precise to say 1/10,000th of an inch (ex tiny internal combustion motors like the old Cox .010 cubic inch model engine which isn't much bigger than a $.25 cent piece), slops of any amount make producing the part virtually impossible.

Enter the ball screw. The interposed between the male/female "threads" of the ball screw are small ball bearings -- the male and female ride on those miniature ball bearings and remove virtually all the mechanical slop in the feed screw mechanism and reduce friction during traverse operations.

A wonderful thing the "ball screw idea" is -- much of the high precision small components of today's world would be almost impossible to make without it.


Jose's machining info

The screw itself uses a special spherical thread. That is, it is not made with a pointed angular cutter, but it appears to be made by rolling. The surface is very smooth as you can easily see in the photo[...]

eBay's patent problems with "Buy It Now"

As much as I despise eBay (for a host of reasons), SCOTUS got this one wrong. The MercExchange patent should have been voided. There are very real problems at the USPTO these days when it comes to "technology" type patents. There's a vast amount of crap being awarded patents falling under the category of "obvious" or when there is prior art the patent filer failed to disclose or direct real world analogs making a technological implementation of same trivial and obvious.

I had two software patents awarded while at IBM. Neither of which was obvious, and neither of which had meat world analogs.

Seriously, "buy it now" is pretty much the same thing as the listing price on a house where several buyers will be making offers (i.e. bids). The first guy who offers the seller's listing price is going to take it. To patent something as obvious as this, that has clear real world analogs, that have been in practice for thousands of years in fact, is a travesty.

Next we'll find out that some jackass has patented "the idea" of a door knob.

AP

A federal judge Friday denied a request from a small Virginia company to stop the online auction powerhouse eBay Inc. from using a feature that allows shoppers to purchase items at a fixed price[...]

[...]Last year, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that although eBay infringed upon MercExchange's patent for the service, it was up to the lower court to decide whether eBay had to stop using it[...]

Cox/Estes PRC made model airplanes recalled

Bogus lithium batteries. IMO, lithium batteries are bad news and I won't buy anything using them. The CPSC is one of the few Federal government services we pay for that is actually worth something.

CPSC

WASHINGTON, D.C. - The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, in cooperation with the firm named below, today announced a voluntary recall of the following consumer product. Consumers should stop using recalled products immediately unless otherwise instructed.

Name of Product: Sky Rangers Park Flyer Radio Control Airplanes

Units: About 21,000

Distributor: Estes-Cox Corp., of Penrose, Colo.

Hazard: The airplanes are launched by hand and can explode near the consumer’s head, posing a risk of temporary hearing loss and injuries to eyes, face and hands.

Incidents/Injuries: Estes-Cox has received 45 reports of airplanes exploding, including 22 reports of consumers experiencing temporary ear pain or hearing being affected; five reports of minor burns to hands, faces or eyes; two reports of chest impact from debris; two reports of eye injuries; and one report of a cut hand. One consumer sought medical attention for burning eyes.

Description: This recall involves Model 4116 Sky Rangers Park Flyer radio control airplanes, which come with a black battery charger. The airplanes have a wingspan of about 14 inches, a light blue, white and orange polystyrene foam fuselage, and a copper coil on the rudder. Airplanes with a warning sticker on the fuselage near the on/off switch are not included in the recall.

Sold at: Hobby stores and other retailers nationwide from September 2005 through December 2006 for between $20 and $40.

Manufactured in: China

Remedy: Consumers should stop using the recalled airplanes immediately and contact Estes-Cox to verify that their plane is being recalled and for instructions on returning the airplane for a replacement product[...]

Al-Qaeda dropping dimes on...Al-Qaeda

Heh, they're losing the general populace, and now they're losing themselves as well. Harry and Nancy of course are desperate to put a stop to these treasonous AQ defections before it causes irreparable damage to democrat electoral aspirations in 08'.

I suspect general Petraeus is a lot smarter than Harry and Nancy though and will have undeniably shaped up the Iraq situation before the democrats can turn it into a loss. It will be shaped up so undeniably that even the MSM won't be able to carry democrat water anymore. The only ones at the end of this year who will still be denying this obvious progress are going to be the hard core deadender oblivions who can't stand to see an American success.

Times Online

Fed up with being part of a group that cuts off a person’s face with piano wire to teach others a lesson, dozens of low-level members of al-Qaeda in Iraq are daring to become informants for the US military in a hostile Baghdad neighbourhood.

The ground-breaking move in Doura is part of a wider trend that has started in other al-Qaeda hotspots across the country and in which Sunni insurgent groups and tribal sheikhs have stood together with the coalition against the extremist movement.

“They are turning. We are talking to people who we believe have worked for al-Qaeda in Iraq and want to reconcile and have peace,” said Colonel Ricky Gibbs, commander of the 4th Brigade, 1st Infantry Division, which oversees the area[...]

More here at TigerHawk

Harry Potter takes United Arab Emirates by storm

I can't even imagine a book like Harry Potter even being allowed in an Islamic country 30 years ago. The west's "secret weapon" is blue jeans, McDonald's, Sony's, and now...Harry Potter.

Khaleej Times

[...]Hundreds of fans began lining up outside bookshops across the UAE from early Friday evening with some dedicated fans, like 13-year-old Abdulla Moaswes, travelling from Sharjah to Ibn Battuta Mall where some of the biggest celebrations were held.

As Potter aficionados joined the serpentine queues, a magician conjured card tricks and stilt walkers amused the visitors, while at other malls, coffee after coffee was served, wizard quizzes completed and wands and witches' hats created[...]

July 22 2007 Yankees: 21 Rays: 3

Game isn't even over yet...

Gotta be the worst drubbing I've listened to in quite a while. At least Shields, who gave up 10 of them can't be blamed for giving up the majority of the runs anymore ;->