Mechanical Engineering students at Yale have managed to create a Spokeless Bicycle. The bike uses a wheel that has teeth around the inner side of the rim that mesh with gears attached to the bicycle. By offering a spokeless set of wheels the space can be used for other functions such as a generator to be attached to the bike.
You might have noticed that only the back wheel is spokeless. This was done for a number of reasons some of which are cost in developing a wheel without spokes as well as the time to create the bike. The students only had one semester to work on the prototype. [click to continue…]
A long time ago back in September of 2007 we mentioned a technique on how to get scratches out of a phone screen which was comprised of using a bizarre concoction of an egg and a cloth soaked in a heated egg and then warmed up in the oven to create a substance that will fill the scratches... I have no idea if that technique works, and I'll admit now that I have no idea if this new technique for fixing CD's and DVD's will actually work, but as all you need is a banana and a few other household substances then I'm sure it will be fine and easy to test.
The tutorial was created over at Unplggd and allows you to fill in scratches on DVD's allowing them to be played again in a DVD. We assume it will also work on other optical media although that's your choice if you test it. [click to continue…]
The Wireless Page to TV Magnifier is a mouse sized device that is capable of transmitting close up images of text to your TV. The mouse has a 655 x 488 pixel scanner attached and wirelessly connects to a box stored behind your TV. When scanning the mouse over a page of text the text is magnified up to 25+ times to allow easier viewing.
On a 14 inch screen the magnification starts at 10X with a larger 32 inch screen showing a 28 times image. [click to continue…]
Battle of the Fork Lifts is a game that requires you use your fork lift truck skills to move miniature pallets around. Now, full sized fork lifts are fun for some reason, but these little ones just seem to take the fun out of it.
The idea of the games seems that you need to move a pallet around to another location and successfully stack the pallet on top of other pallets while the other player tries to ram you off the road and make you spill the contents of what you are carrying. [click to continue…]
If you feel your toddler needs a voice on the Twitter micro blogging service then this gadget should be on their Christmas list (not like we think there is any point to it, but we thought we'd mention it anyway). The gadget is called Twoddler and uses sensors to capture a toddlers activity on a twoddler board that is internet connected. Each sensor has pre-defined text that is transmitted to twitter as of when needed.
It's a bizarre idea if you ask me, but I guess there might be some who think their children need to be heard on twitter. [click to continue…]
This gadget falls in to the category of crazy gadgets due to me not quite understanding why it's really needed. The Kingjim Pomera is a note taking device that has a full sized keyboard along with a 5 inch VGA screen. What it does is allows you to take notes and send emails if connected to a mobile phone.
The strange thing is that if you need a mobile phone to connect it to, then why bother with the screen on the device... perhaps a bluetooth keyboard for your current smartphone with an application installed could achieve the same goal. That aside, it looks easy to type on and for basic notepad it appears to do it's job well. [click to continue…]
The Simulator company Cruden has built an F1 simulator that costs a hefty £120,000. The simulator is called the Hexatech and is capable of providing what Cruden call 6DOF (six degrees of freedom).
The simulator is said to provide g-Force simulation of multiple G's as well as realistic steering that is 100% accurate.
'Let's be clear: this is not a video game linked up to a steering wheel, race seat and pedals. Although easy to operate, this is the exact same equipment used by the top racing drivers and engineers to improve their race craft and evaluate new tracks and car settings. Our simulator and the software it uses cannot be bought in a store.
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Walyou has created an amazing list of pumpkin carvings ready for Halloween that is happening soon. The ultimate pumpkin collection includes pumpkins carved out with Wii Logos, Internet Explorer logos along with Pacman, Space Invaders and on to Starwars characters.
The list goes on and on. If you are looking for a bit of inspiration for this years Halloween time then go check them out for some ideas. [click to continue…]
The Handycooler is a Personal Air Conditioner that allows you to stay cool when away from your chilled air conditioned office.
The device lets you take cool air with you by the way of evaporative cooling. All you do is drop a few ounces of water on to a sponge and squash the sponge in to a hand held unit a little larger than a mobile phone and switch it on to enjoy some cooled air. [click to continue…]
A number of you probably have a standard boring grey scanner sat on your desk. This mod aims to make it look a bit more fun and presentable by stashing the scanner inside of an old looking book.
Datamancer is responsible for this scanner above and has modded his scanner so that it fits inside a book. As craziest gadgets put it "the scanned becomes the scanner". [click to continue…]
The Nintendo Wii has a number of bizarre wiimote attachments to make it in to the likes of some maracas, a golf club, tennis racket, steering wheel etc... The latest is an actual controller unit shaped like an American football.
The patent shows a football controller that is designed to assist in a "real-world" football experience. The problem with it is that to get the real-world experience you need to throw it, run in to things and generally have a rough time with the ball... somehow I can't see this happening in a living room where a nice 42" plasma screen sits. [click to continue…]
We have already mentioned the Star Wars Force Trainer a few months back, but as it's now available at ThinkGeek we thought we'd mention it again.
The Force is all around us. It flows around and through us. It is between us and that tree and the rock, around our sunken X-Wing, going through our wallet, tickling our armpits, and flowing between our ears. You think we're joking, but the only way to guide the Force outside your body is to guide the Force inside your head. Yoda told us that once when we had stew over at his house. The stew was ok (if you like licking swamp creatures), but the advice was invaluable.
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