It's a good solution for de-orbiting larger (read, mostly intact satellites) that are in sensitive orbit zones, and not likely to de-orbit on their own for long periods of time, or are likely to collide with other objects and become a loosely aggregate expanding cloud. That, however, isn't really a 'roomba' kind of…

Number of junk objects in orbit over 10cm in size: ~20,000

The antenna issue was the plastic toothed strip used to raise and lower it would break

The torque issues are all at lower RPM - plenty of it available once the Revs come up (and the FD is helped with the turbos - higher compression gets more torque)

OK - I'm either biased, or I'm experienced, you pick. Which one are you talking about 20B? Right. 13B? Renesis (also really a 13B)? It's a great engine, the only complaint from a *performance* standpoint is that it lacks torque at the low end. It is nice with a turbo or 2 (FD RX-7 mmmm...) - the Renesis would be…

So what's the vehicle in the lead in picture - my work monitor is so dark, I can't really see it very well...

It all comes down to range of motion - while a wreck might not end up with skull impact hard enough to be fatal, the head is really heavy, compared to the neck support, and if the torso is restrained, it is not difficult to stretch the attachment point (the spinal cord) to failure. Finding that 'just right' spot…

Reverse - Dead bang on that Kia/Hyundai need some handling prowess. I think getting into some motorsport would be a great move for them. They have gone from the bland '88 Excel econobox that I drove to something much more interesting in the Genesis and turbo Veloster. Get your Mazda on, boys!

Yes - They will both be using 'PDK' type gearboxen... a 'semi-automatic'. No torque converter (and the accompanying weight and parasitic losses), no planetary gearsets and friction bands (?). but still no clutch pedal and direct control. The question that I have is if input from the paddles is a 'suggestion' to…

Yeah - I know that we can get rather strong plastics... but they don't seem to age well, I guess is more my concern... You're probably right about the ball joints - probably a good idea to put a 'fuse' kind of component in there that will fail gracefully before the main part fails catastrophically. I suppose I'm also…

and from the Alfa article: "Autocar has also learned from Fiat Group sources that the 4C will only be offered with a dual-clutch automatic gearbox with paddle shifters. There will be no manual option."

I love these suspension walkthroughs - very glad they added an animated gif to this one, as it is so much easier to see the suspension when it is in motion. This linkage looks kind of like a trunk hinge where they are trying to rotate the lid upwards without crashing the rear glass...

R3: I'm surprised that we've got plastic suspension parts - I suppose that they are strong enough when the car is new, but I can't imagine them lasting as long as a steel equivalent... and failure is going to be a brittle all at once affair, rather than deformation... might be interesting in 10 years or so.

For anyone interested in a little more detail on how camless engines can work, there's an article here: [autospeed.com] that goes into some more detail on how they work and why you would want to do it.

You know - they obviously aren't the same... and most people can probably distinguish between 'power to all four wheels' and 'power to any one (or sometimes two) of the four wheels on the vehicle'... but what are the real world implications of that? How do you drive differently depending on which you have? What…

Some SF-based jalop - Go talk to this man! Take pictures of him and that insanely beautiful car. Talk to him about the love he has bestowed upon an inanimate chunk of metal and chrome and vinyl. Why is he selling this thing after almost 50 years? Why is he only asking $25K? I want a suit and a skinny black tie. …

In profile, it looks a lot like an old CRX, if you raised the hood/roof line about 8-10" with a vertical line connecting down to the bumpers. I say this not as a bad thing - Loved driving an old '91 CRX within an inch of my life, and it didn't have 250 ponies under the hood. I know of lots of people who would buy…

They show a couple/three races on FOX every year - I think that counts. (I only realized it when my DVR didn't record them on SPEED, and I had to catch them on the SPEED re-airing, which I think was Tuesday night or something. And the FOX versions don't have the pre-race or post-race interviews)

During Confined Space Entry training at work (basically, how to safely work in spaces that were not intended to contain a live human being, but may need to for maintenance or cleaning or inspection reasons - think large tanks, the interior of industrial machinery and such), a big deal is made about how most of the…

4th gear - Used cars. I have a neighbor who owns a used car lot, and he's been having difficulty obtaining cars to sell. He says that Cash for Clunkers certainly is a contributing factor, but he wouldn't be selling those type of vehicles, anyway. One of the main contributors that he mentions, that I haven't seen is…