I take issue with the Daily Beast article and this one as well. The NTSB initial factual findings basically state that the high-speed compressor broke. The report did NOT state the cause of the failure. Typically such a cause takes months to determine. Clearly, the high pressure compressor failed and such failure…

It sounds like the drums from a high school marching band.

Not specific to the topic of the Maxima, but if you’re going to give a car a CVT and paddle shifters, give me the option of doing something fun with it. Give me a manual RPM mode where I can pull on the right paddle to increase engine RPM and pull on the left paddle to decrease engine RPM.

Who’s driving these? I’m not sure I’d want to get into a car with 707 HP being driven by ???

It seems like a closed cockpit is the way to go. Why couldn’t a plexiglass bubble canopy be added to the existing design of F1 cars? Yes, there is the fact that you want the driver to be able to get out quickly in the event of a fire. However, designing a relatively simple latch for the driver to operate is a single,…

I view this as the advantage of the EcoBoost engines (and other turbocharged engines). For 90% of the time when you don’t need massive amounts of power, there is no boost and your mileage is pretty decent. For the 10% of the time when you need more power, boost kicks in and your fuel economy sucks. That seems like a…

Floorboards - let’s add something that does the exact same thing as something else on the bike (the foot pegs), but significantly reduces available lean angle.

I have to go with the Liberty Mutual commercial with the guy wondering how his car could have depreciated before its first oil change! Ummmm...that’s how new car depreciation works!

Let’s start a Kickstarter to buy this guy one of these:

I rented a house with some coworkers once (temporary work assignment - company paid for housing) with a stupid HOA that prohibited pickup trucks from being parked in driveways overnight. We had three cars and a two car garage, so our general rule of thumb was that the first two cars home parked in the garage and the…

I think the fundamental issue with shooting back-to-back is whether the franchise needs time between movies to reevaluate the direction of the story. Take the Matrix. I’m not as down on Reloaded and Revelations as many, but they are clearly weaker than the original. Could the third have been improved if there had been…

I am a Steelers fan and have a self-serving interest in seeing Brady suspended. That being said, I fail to see how Brady’s cell phone comes into play here. As I understand it, the text messages of the guys accused of actually doctoring the balls have been retrieved. Therefore, shouldn’t the league already have text…

Here’s a question for you - I have a home-built Windows 7 desktop. I recently installed a second SSD. Windows 7 is installed on my original, first SSD which is smaller in capacity and slower. When I built the machine, the size of the original SSD was fine, but now it is almost always full to capacity. I was planning…

I found one of those decorative buttons that you pin onto clothing when I test drove a used Chevy Cavalier at a dealership in Western PA back in 1997. By “found,” I mean the open pin stabbed me in the hand between two knuckles when I reached for the gear selector. The decorative part was kind of tucked up under the…

I think the molding process was fine. I can sometimes get a good fit and the sound damping is really good. I think the problem is that the plugs I ended up with were shaved down substantially from where they started. The first form for the ear plugs included a plug that extended out of my ear canal and basically…

I forgot to mention ear plugs above. I always wear them. Has anyone had custom-made plugs done? I had a pair made at an audiologist last year because I was sick of the disposable plugs. However, they’ve been a bit of a disappointment so far. They don’t block as much sound as reliably as I had hoped. This audiologist…

I am psychologically incapable of riding in less than full gear anymore. I can putter around in just my helmet if I just changed the oil and I’m just making sure all is right with the world at 5 MPH in my driveway. Short of that however, I’m wearing full face helmet, gloves, boots, jacket, and riding pants. For the…

Sorry to be so late to the party on this one. Another interesting option for re-engining the B-52 would be the Geared Turbofan (GTF) engine by Pratt & Whitney. The largest thrust version of that engine outputs 17,000 pounds of thrust - a direct replacement for the TF30’s and significantly more fuel efficient - the…

EDIT - meant to respond to xequar