Whirlpool fountain
It’s called Charybdis, as in “between Scylla and.” Briton William Pye used a massive acrylic cylinder to give the appearance of a containerless volume of water. It’s installed at Seaham Hall, in Sunderland, England.
Made On Earth
Centuries of cranks vindicated by human-powered ornithopter flight
Although the Snowbird, made of carbon fiber and balsa wood and with a 105-foot wingspan, could hardly be described as “practical,” to me this seems like a major aviation milestone: Somebody, specifically University of Toronto PhD student Todd Reichert and co-workers, finally did it. All those old black and white “wacky inventor” blooper reels set to goofy music can eat it. [via Toronto Star]
Watermelon car
The biggest and best-quality versions of these watermelon car images I can find come from a members-only forum post on this South Korean site, which appears to be some kind of auto marketplace and/or enthusiast’s hub. Problem is, the plates on the car do not appear to be Korean. Can anyone identify their nationality, or […]
19th century Terminator arm found in hydraulic press
Well, OK, it’s actually a prosthesis. And I stole the Terminator joke from Minnesotastan over at Neatorama. This object is one of literally thousands of remarkable items in the online Brought to Life exhibit at the UK’s Science Museum, where it is labeled, apparently incorrectly, as a “right” arm. What is it with surgeons confusing left and right appendages?
Pizza oven/Hellmouth
Spotted at Marcello Pizzaria & Ristorante in Vancouver by Adam Lindsley of This is Pizza. [via Neatorama]
Reader-built laminar water jet
Mike Pantrey, aka Flickr user Mrsuperpants, saw Phil’s post on Friday about Dave’s homemade laminar water jet and “in two evenings of tinkering in the garage, and some time reading up the background over a couple of lunchtimes” produced his own version, shown here. Construction details are available on Mike’s personal site. He cites The Laminar Project Forum as a valuable design resource.
Airsoft minigun
Made almost entirely from machined aluminum by Kuba_T1000. It feeds plastic BBs from an electric ammo pack that holds 16,000 rounds. [via Hack a Day]
