Google’s latest Doodle goes for the fences to celebrate the start of the MLB World Series, between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Toronto Blue Jays. It’s a visual nod to baseball’s biggest stage and like a well placed fastball, hits the mark.
Ben Heckendorn is the man behind some of the wildest and most creative retro gaming mods out there, but now, he’s turned his talents to a much more mundane challenge: feeding his cat, Bud, who due to a health issue requires prescription wet food. His latest invention, an autonomous cat food dispenser, is a work of genius, using 3D printing, precision engineering and clever programming to serve canned meals with military grade reliability.
LEGO has released a plethora of ships over the years, everything from pirate galleons that scream adventure to ghostly vessels from spine-tingling tales. None of them, though, have quite got the allure of the Inferno, that decidedly unsavory old hulk from The Goonies – now a sprawling 2912-piece set, number 21363, that drags the whole underground escapade right into your living room. This build, released under the Ideas banner, where fan ideas are transformed into legitimate products, is a tribute to an 80’s film about youngsters seeking pirate plunder through booby trap-filled caves.
Nissan engineers studied the everyday activities of electric vehicle drivers. Most days consisted of brief visits to the grocery store or school, and to be honest, plugging in still feels like a hassle. Their solution is a solar setup called the Ao-Solar Extender, which sits atop of the Sakura, Japan’s most popular little electric car. This prototype converts the idle hours of the day into extra range, thanks to the sun. It will make its premiere next week at the Japan Mobility Show, with the promise of making charging as simple as parking your car.
Elias Hountondji gripped the wheel tighter than usual as he steered a BMW M2 through the massive halls of the Munich facility. This was no ordinary track. Hountondji, one half of the Red Bull Driftbrothers, had spent years perfecting slides on circuits and streets but here he drove a 1,100 horsepower beast through BMW’s birthplace.
YASA, a small company in Oxford, England, has turned electric car performance on its head. Their latest prototype, an axial flux motor, produces 750kW – over 1,000hp – from a 12.7kg package. That’s 59kW/kg, the highest power density of any electric motor. To put that in perspective, it’s like packing a fighter jet engine in a carry-on bag.
Your smartphone might be great at taking sharp footage under normal circumstances, but try taking a run through the park or a car ride over some rough roads and those built-in camera tools are going to start to struggle. That’s where the DJI Osmo Mobile 8 smartphone gimbal comes in – to sort out all that shaky footage.
Robert Gcode unveiled a 3D printer few months ago that is roughly the size of a kitchen appliance – tiny enough to just place on a shelf if desired. Now the Quark has arrived, marking yet another attempt by Gcode to truly push the bounds of compact. This one measures only 100 millimeters on each side, making it small enough to fit in a pocket or balance on an open hand.
Power banks have accumulated in desk drawers over the years for numerous reasons, whether they are too heavy for pockets, too slow for deadlines, or too plain to justify the space they take up. Then along comes the Anker MagGo, priced at $56.99 (was $89.99), a 10,000mAh brick that’s Qi2 certified and snaps onto the back of an iPhone like it always belonged.
For more than two years, Beijing-based Noetix Robotics has been developing human-like walking robots, and they have now priced one cheap enough to fit into ordinary life. Bumi is three feet tall, weighs as much as a medium suitcase, and costs less than an old high-end laptop from a few years back. At $1,400, this little gadget walks, dances, and responds to directions while powered by a battery that lasts around an hour or two.