My Black Brick

I just added Google Ad Sense to the site and am amused that it’s pulling up a bunch of ads for paving stones because of the word “brick”.

How much can you hack a Brick to make it aerodynamically sleek before it ceases to be a rolling refrigerator box and becomes a 1999 Honda Insight, or a masked Luchadore? That’s an inquiry some posters at Ecomodder were exploring back in 2008.

While the “Kammback” wagon above, with 5 feet of extra car, existed only in the owners imagination, the spoiler on the right is the real deal. From hypermiler “brucepick”:

You can see the taped joint at upper right were top piece meets side.
Had to be untaped and retaped every time I opened the tailgate. Plus
duct tape residue all over the place. As with other mods, no
confirmation that it actually helped. But if using a good clean design I
think it has to help.

I can only imagine what it’d be like with the kammback. You might as well forget about opening the trunk. Perhaps it’d be a hack similar to the “Aerorabbit” pictured below.

These were drawings done while I was bored with something else. I was probably daydreaming about some exhaust repairs.

I have a few sets of drawings on flickr, but not many of the brick. Much more interested in nudes!

Best. Movie. Credits. Ever. I like how they roll their cars over the Citroen DS. I bet you could do the same thing on a Mercedes CLS.

via things magazine

Truth About Cars finds a space in his heart for older cars that new cars just don’t make.

An old car that is well kept through the years shows a level of loyalty and priority that is rare in this day and age. I always enjoy meeting these folks in my travels and should I pick up their car at a sale, I make sure they end up in a good home.

One of the benefits of working at MTV was the free music. Every few months someone in the music department would throw a bunch of promotional CDs in a box and leave it in the hallway for us to pickover. I managed to pick up music from The Used, Mastodon, Coheed & Cambria and Death Cab for Cutie. The premiere EP for Ok Go was an enjoyable listen, and had the cool cover above. Of course, they’ve gone on to make some ground breaking videos, becoming the masters of the one-shot mini film.

According to commenters  on the news site where this footage was posted, this particular stretch of road on route 129  in Tennessee is very curvy. But I don’t think that’s any excuse for this FAIL.  If you’re coming around a sharp curve and “wondering what the heck the police and news crews are doing at that moment” your best bet would be to proceed with caution and slow down. Instead our driver notices the massive rock slide blocking the road only at the last minute, when it’s too late.

Or maybe he thought he was Luke Duke and could just jump the rocks with a good “Yee Haw!”

Ah, ain’t the internets grand? Before now the world was lacking an audio version of the endless discussions that scroll on-and-on within the various brick message boards. No more! The Volvo Ninjas have been pumping out their audiotory observations for the past year to anyone with a pair of earbuds. Check ‘em out!

Fascinating video shot from a proto-dash cam in 1905 on Market Street, San Francisco. The chaotic mix of pedestrians, horses, trolleys and cars is pretty cool.

I imagine that Drivers Ed in North Korea includes a section on interpreting the odd signals of the counter-clockwise turning traffic cops at some intersections in Pyongyamg. See the Flickr set.

BONUS: Nothing explains the moves of this dork in Rhode Island. At least Officer Johnson’s moves somewhat resemble traffic direction for a pedestrian intersection at University of Pennsylvania.