Sweden’s AB Volvo has unveiled a truck equipped with an engine powered by DME—an alternative fuel produced from biomass that is used today as gas in spray cans.

The truck is a standard Volvo FM model equipped with a 9-liter diesel engine adapted to run on DME. “We know that in 20 years, alternative fuels will successively become increasingly commercially available,” said Volvo CEO Leif Johansson. “Energy efficiency will become decisive and DME is truly an energy efficient fuel.”

Volvo said DME is energy efficient and produces low emissions of carbon dioxide and particles.

Technorati tag: Transport, Biomass, DME

Another day, another blogging challenge. This time to earn over $100,000 from a blog in a year. Maybe being on a daily income that is equivalent to $100k at the end of the year would be a more realistic target.

My self imposed targets are much simpler. Adsense’s payout limit is $100. It took six months to reach that figure for the first time, and it looks like it’s going to take three months for the second time. If I can keep halving the time it takes to reach $100 at least to the end of the year I’ll have a nearly viable income.

Technorati tag: Blogging

It wasn’t quite as busy as Market Street going up Sca Fell Pike yesterday, but the hundred or so Three Peaks’ers made it feel almost crowded. There’ll be even more people on the land from next week as “Freedom to Roam” begins

Technorati tag: Rambling

A woman’s guide to cycling.

Local governments tell feeble lies

All local councils claim to want to encourage cycling. They read in a book somewhere that this is what you ought to say once you ascend into local office, like, “I’ve lived in this community all my life, and have a real commitment to the area.” To this end, they put out measly leaflets telling you pig-obvious things like, “Avoid getting trapped between two articulated lorries.” If you didn’t know that, you’d already be dead.

The truth is, they hate cyclists with a passion. That’s the only way you can possibly explain all the things they do to endanger us, like inventing giant buses that bend in the middle, and laughingly encouraging us on to cycle paths so badly maintained they look like a trap set by Wile E Coyote. When you hear anything from any official on this matter, never forget they lie. They lie, they lie, they lie. It’s even possible that Steven Norris is lying about the helmets.

…..

A social observation

The kind of person who routinely prefixes “cyclist” with “kamikaze” is exactly the kind of person who prefixes “asylum seeker” with “bogus”

Technorati tag: Cycling

Two clips of cars going sideways.

The General Lee doing it perfectly.

A brand new Ferrari doing it very badly.

both via Jalopnik

Technorati tag: Drifting, Dukes of Hazzard

Planetdiorama

Also- Planetfigure, Planetarmour and Planetaircraft.

Planetarmour linked a lot to Prime Portal a resource for reference photos.

Technorati tag: Scale Models, Reference

To answer my own question, yes you can get ejector seats in 1/32nd scale. However I think I’ll pass and build something for myself.

I have received the Aston Martin and Packard Victoria. The Victoria’s going away until I get or make a gangster figure, so I’m looking at the Aston as my next project. I’m going to get the Secret Agent in the next few weeks but I’ll work out what his vehicle contains in the mean time.

It was an EBay purchase and only cost 74p (postage was over twice the final price) so there are a few problems. The rear axle is missing and the front pillars are bent, one broken, from some abuse in a past life. I might be able to find a new axle from the parts bin, but I’m considering enclosing the whole drivetrain as if it’s been protected against mines.

There’ll be no back seat passenger space in this DB5. I’m going to build my own ejector seats and the launch tubes etc. are going to take up a bit of space. There’ll probably be some rear firing weaponry as well. This is where I can get away without buying specific weapons. As a product of Q division the guns on this car will be unique. I have some etched parts for switches and extra gauges and I’ll drill out the glove box so it can be open with a handgun inside.

The first job, however, is probably going to be gluing the glazing in as a way to straighten the pillars and get the roof line fixed.

Technorati tag: Spy Car, Scale Models

With the exception of some very good fight scenes about three quarters of the way through this film is challenging Catwoman for a special place on the bottom of the pile.

Jason Statham is Frank, a retired soldier who now plies a trade as a getaway driver/ courier of illegal goods in the South of France. During the opening chase sequence his robotic insistence on sticking to his special set of rules, supposed to drive home his hard edge, actually makes him look like an anal retentive queen. And it only gets worse from there. Finally breaking one of his rules, “Never open the package”, he gets involved in a nonsensical confusion of double crosses, shoot outs and people smuggling culminating in a fight on a moving lorry reminiscent of Indiana Jones.

The car chases want to be Ronin, and fail miserably. The acting is terrible. And this little corner of the Riviera is populated by people who speak English, with only their stupid accents to hint where they’re from. Given that it was co-written and produced by Luc Besson, the man behind the excellent Leon, I was expecting so much more.

Technorati tag: DVD, Review

Leo Hickman, who has practical experience of nappies having spent a year “elbow deep in excrement” picks apart yesterday’s report about disposable nappies.

The fact is that, to my eyes at least, this report is full of holes. Why are its findings based on an assumption that washable aficionados use 47 nappies, whereas we had easily got by on 20? Why did the Environment Agency survey 2,000 parents using disposable nappies compared with just 117 using washables, meaning that (taking into account the weighting towards those using older-style nappies which use more cloth), many of the assumptions are based on the habits of just 32 people? Why does the report include the energy used to iron nappies? Who on earth irons their nappies? Why was it assumed that people environmentally conscious enough to be using washable nappies would automatically want to tumble dry them?

Technorati tag: Nappies

This week’s Photo Friday subject is Green.

Technorati tag: Technorati

The Environmental Agency has reviewed the relative ecological impact of disposable and washable nappies and found that, when water and energy used in washing has been factored in, they’re equally as damaging. However larger, colder washes could reduce the environmental impact of reusable nappies.

Technorati tag: Nappies, Waste