Aquabike!
Created by Li Weiguo of Hubei Province, China, this amphibious bicycle has propeller vanes on its wheels and giant water bottles for flotation. [via reflectionof.me]
Drones & Vehicles
Professor Snape Car Seat Cover
Walking through a parking lot and coming across a handmade car seat cover that looked like this would totally make my day! Becky of Beck’s Blog crocheted this car seat cover of Severus Snape, one of the characters in the Harry Potter series. She explains that she was influenced by Neil Cicierega’s Potter Puppet Pals, […]
Helicopter with hydrogen-peroxide-rocket-powered blades
Shown above is a video of the Dragonfly DF1, an experimental aircraft under development by Swisscopter US. Instead of a traditional gasoline engine, the Dragonfly has peroxide-powered rocket engines on the tips of its main blades, with a mechanical take-off to drive the tail-rotor. Large tanks of high-test peroxide supposedly provide 50 minutes of flight at 40 mph.
Winners at the North American Handmade Bicycle show
Yesterday I took a Sunday Scroll over at the North American Handmade Bicycle show site, drooling over the bikes pictured with their enthusiastic creators. With categories like “best fillet brazing” and “best carbon fiber,” it’s clearly a maker’s kind of tradeshow.
Biking directions added to Google Maps
Biking directions added to Google Maps… here’s my route from Adafruit to NYC Resistor! Whenever I meet someone who finds out that I work on the directions team for Google Maps, the first question I’m asked is often “So when’s Google Maps going to add biking directions?” We’re big biking fans too, so we’ve been […]
Handmade bike show coverage
The North American Handmade Bicycle show was this past weekend, in Richmond, Virginia. The website for the event and their YouTube channel have some great coverage and some of the jawdropping bike builds that were on display there. Above, Sacha, from Vanilla Workshop, offers a tour of a bike he built for his young daughter. […]
How-To: Free motion cycling rollers
I just got one of those indoor bike trainers. You know, the kind that props up the rear wheel against a heavy, resistance-providing wheel. The front of the bike rests on the floor, the rear axle is pinned, and there’s no balancing required. I didn’t think of it at first, but that’s not really how […]