Posted by jerry on August 18th, 2006 — Posted in DIY, Journal, Steam, Technology
Ever imagined an alternative future in which steam powered remote controlled centipedes walked the streets, or a steam-powered six-wheel-drive mars rover? Well Japanese artist I-Wei Huang has not just imagined – he has built them!
From a radio controlled walking robot to a trilobite steam tank to a truly amazing steam centipede, there seem to be no limits to I-Wei’s imagination – and ingenuity. His site crabfu.com is filled with his award-winning creations. Watch the videos – I love the one where his six-wheel-drive rover tows him on a skateboard 🙂
Imagine someone from a distant planet sending this to Earth!
A kind of Jules Verne meets Bruce Sterling – check out his site – and check out Makezine for more of this guy’s amazing work
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by jerry on July 25th, 2006 — Posted in Journal, Technology, Travel
I had always thought that people with travel irons were over-packed until I went on a business trip and found that the hotel had only one for 40+ conference delegates – all of whom wanted to look presentable to their European colleagues. At that point I decided that for certain destinations I would pack an iron, and not be waiting until 0600am on the morning of the conference to get my turn with the iron.
Enter the dual-voltage Korjo travel iron. This is a compact iron with a near-full-size teflon coated plate. It has a folding handle which doubles as the reservoir for the water – yes it is a fully functional steam iron – ideal for those creased cotton shirts.
The handle clicks securely into its upright position without any play so it has a positive feel. The steam function has no separate button – if you fill it with water and have the high heat setting selected, then you will get steam. It takes only about a minute to warm up. Do stand it on a towel though – as the steam commences it will push out a little water first and you probably don’t want that on your white shirt.
The water lends weight to the iron, and it smooths the toughest creases like a bought one.
The cons: The rubber stopper at the end of the iron does not like to stay in place so there can be some water leakage from there if you are a bit rough with your technique. My second minor gripe is that the sole doesn’t taper as much as a full sized iron, so it can be difficult to get between the buttons.
Sum up – if you are a business traveller in Europe (where irons seem more scarce than elswhere) then this is an indispensible item to pack. It is light and compact and does the job very well.
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Posted by jerry on June 25th, 2006 — Posted in History, Journal, Steam, Technology
One of the little-known museum gems in Paris is the Musee des Arts et Metiers – the museum of technology. Among the amazing objects there is Nicolas Cugnot’s steam tractor – the Fardier a vapeur. This is the first steam propelled vehicle – from which the development of the modern automobile began.
Back in 1769, when Captain Cook was preparing for his voyage to Australia, a French military engineer was considering the merits of using steam to propel a vehicle. With the backing of the Minister for War, the Duke of Choiseul, Nicolas Joseph Cugnot (1725-1804) developed a prototype steam tractor for towing artillery without horses. The prototype was built under Cugnot’s direction by Army mechanic Brezin at the Paris Arsenal. The first protoype showed some limited promise, and he went on to build a second vehicle in 1770. His idea was to use a three-wheeled cart, with a high-pressure boiler placed in front of the driving wheel, and a two-cylinder piston engine to push on a notched disc each side of the wheel. The whole driving assembly was mounted so it could pivot on a vertical axis for steering – with a steering lock of about 15-20 degrees in either direction. It seems very front-heavy, but it was designed to tow a heavy artillery piece.
The machine has a reverse gear and could move its five-tonne load at up to 4 km/h. It was only partially successful, however. The fire-box was small, and the machine could sustain steam for only about 15 minutes before it ran out of steam pressure. And the lack of brakes and and slow steering (by geared rack and pinion) made the machine unwieldy. On an early test run it failed to make a sufficiently sharp turn and crashed into a stone wall, and the project was scrapped – after the first motor vehicle accident in history – in 1771.
The test vehicle was long thought to have been destroyed during the French Revolution, until it was discovered in Napoleon’s time. It has been preserved in the Musee des Arts et Metiers since 1800.
I am happy to report that the machine is still in an excellent state of preservation, and the workmanship of the mechanic, Brezin, was very professional in its approach. The two single-acting cylinders are 13 inches in diameter, and the structure is robustly constructed on massive timber beams. Cugnot himself received a pension of 600 francs, which was revoked in 1789, forcing Cugnot into exile in Brussels. He was brought back to France and his pension reinstated by Napoleon shortly before he died in 1804 at the age of 79 years.
The museum website has an excellent video presentation on how the engine worked
The vehicle’s scale is impressive as you can see in the following photos I took 2 weeks ago.
Cugnot’s steam carriage – the Fardier a Vapeur 1770
Cugnot’s boiler assembly
Cugnot’s steam wagon – left view
Drive gear on Cugnot’s steam carriage
Cugnot’s engine valve gear – detail
Cugnot’s drive train
This picture is included just to provide a sense of scale to Cugnot’s steam wagon
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by jerry on May 10th, 2006 — Posted in Journal, Music, Technology
Are you a high-tech folkie? How about taking the complete O’Neill’s Music of Ireland in your pocket to a folk festival! Here’s where Bryan Duggan’s TunePal comes to the fore. I first encountered this wonderful software when I found an early version for my Psion 5MX. Since upgrading to an HP iPaq2750 I have been on the lookout for something that would play .abc format tunes, so I can take an aural reference with me to festivals. Enter Bryan Duggan again – with an updated version for pocket PC (pocket windows 2003+).
The software is easy to instal, and, once you pay the €10 registration fee (ten euros)you can then install a MIDI instruments package that lifts this software into a truly useful package. So you can play the tunes with a fiddle-like sound, and control the volume, and more importantly, the speed of play. That is, you can vary the speed without varying the pitch – so you can slow the tune down to learn it, then speed it up as you get more confident with the tune – or to hear it at session speed.
This will play any .abc tune, and runs very stably on the iPaq. So now I can go armed with literally thousands of tunes, and when I hear one I like at a session, I can retire from the fray and play it over a few times to get it stuck in my head and ready to play for real 🙂
As you can see from the screen shots above (the bulge is an artefact of the camera lens) the interface is simple, clear and easy to navigate. The only further development I would like to see is a means to display the tune as sheet music – but this has a big thumbs up from me – well done Bryan 🙂
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by jerry on March 22nd, 2006 — Posted in Journal, Technology, Travel
One of the more interesting items on this evening’s Beyond Tomorrow TV program was the air car – two versions: one made in France, the other in Australia.
In Nice in France the air car is about to enter production – capable of up to 110kph, and runs for two hours on AU$2.50 worth of compressed air. So it’s completely non-polluting (at least no more polluting than the electricity grid), exhausting only air back into the atmosphere. You can fill the tanks in about 20 minutes, or four hours using the onboard compressor by plugging it into your domestic power supply.
The Australian air car uses a specially designed rotary engine, rather than the conventional piston engine of the French one, and was designed by Italian-born Australian Angelo DiPietro – a former Mercedes rotary engine designer. His engine is designed for use in buggies, forklifts, and even scooters!
I wonder if by using a variable valve cutoff this could be converted to steam – that way the engine could use the expansive properties of steam to get even more power for the size 🙂
Cheers
Jerry
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