Transportation

You’ve simply got to watch this entire video of a model Maglev train that’s powered by liquid nitrogen. It gets colder than 183 degrees C (361.4 degrees F) and encounters no resistance. Give it a push on a track and it’ll fly around it perfectly until the liquid nitrogen runs out. I just find it fascinating to watch a model ...

This past weekend, I spent my Saturday visiting the Philadelphia-based Simeone Foundation Museum, Fred Simeone’s personal collection of historic race cars. The museum is packed with cars from the early 1900s up to 1970 (with a few oddballs thrown in for good measure.) I took over 120 pictures at the museum, highlighting every detail. What a lot of people don’t ...

Everyone has dreamed of traveling to space at one time or another. The problem is, no one wants to spend a fortune forcing themselves into a marriage just so they can get into space. So the finest Japanese minds are collectively collaborating the construction of an elevator into space. This vision has spurred the inspiration of many scientists around the ...

Love to drive fast? Break the law? Good! Audi is aiming to get you into one of its cars in the next few years with a feature that should keep you seated. The Travolution system will communicate with traffic lights to let the driver know what the current state of the light is and when it’s changing colors. While most ...

Ever since that damn Transformers movie, car manufacturers just can’t get enough of displaying their new cars as dancing robots. Of course, it’s hard to forget Citroen’s line of commercials, which began in 2004 (prior to Michael Bay’s film) and since then has multiplied. The latest in Citroen’s line of cars-gone-robots is the C4. By C4, I don’t mean the ...

I guess enough money can make anyone talk. Ferrari custom-built this four-door 456 Venice Station Wagon for the Sultanate of Brunei. I guess oil-rich sultans need a place for their kids and soccer equipment too. It’s just so fucking ugly! Ah! I can’t look at it. If you must, there are more pictures after the jump. You’ve been warned.

Nothing beats driving 60 miles for one hour only to end up stopping for an 8 hour charge as you run up the electric bill of some random stranger. Not even Chevy can deny the satisfaction of only having to stop at a gas station once a month, so it’s officially announced the Chevy Volt due out on the streets ...

In a world of good-guy smugglers and noble Jedi, one Sith must instill fear any way he can. That’s why Darth Vader built this hot air balloon. Not just because the town fare is approaching and Vader wanted to make sure he’ll be soaring high next to the Yogi bear and Batman inflatables but because Vader wishes to scare away ...

We all love our cars. We’d go to extreme measures to protect our automobiles even during a hurricane as extreme as Ike because let’s face it: no one wants to drive through flooding waters when they can just tie their car to a tree and hope for the best. C’mon, what’s the worst that could happen? The tree could fall ...

Finding new ways to make eco-friendly biofuels is going to be crucial to surviving this whole global warming thing. That’s why it’s so exciting that someone’s figured out how to power jets with alga. A synthetic biology company named Solazyme has figured out how to make jet fuel using oil produced by caged marine microorganisms. Other companies are researching algal ...