planetf1.com

mac_d wrote:

MistaVega23 wrote:Got married in an ice chapel in Finland last Wednesday. Was pretty cold, but the whole experience was amazing!

You can imagine my mood dropped when we touched down in the UK to the same pathetic weather it was before we left....

Congrats on the wedding.

Argentum wrote:I have no idea if people outside the UK can view this video, but for those who can, this helicopter pilot is pretty impressive,


http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03lwnyv

mac_d wrote:

Argentum wrote:I have no idea if people outside the UK can view this video, but for those who can, this helicopter pilot is pretty impressive,


http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03lwnyv

Brilliant video, I think actually being on that helicopter would be simultaneously utterly awe-inspiring and pant-wettingly scary. The guy that filmed it should invest in a decent quality camera though (or my interent connection sucks and put it into something that looked obviously lower than 720p).



Anyway, for me it's that time of year again. Since early in high school, my buddies and I would watch Wrestlemania. Back then, we used to watch it every week. These days, we pretty much just watch this. But it's always fun, and I love the events where we all stay up late eating stereotypical american foods. Don't really care about the show. Plus one of my pals is coming at 15:30 to watch the GP too.

minchy wrote:I'm about to do something that may possibly change the current direction of my life. It's either going to be amazing or devastating with not much in between. Safe to say that I'm absolutely bricking it and I'm just glad I've not had a heart attack already today the speed my heart has been beating for the past 6 hours or more!

Asphalt_World wrote:

minchy wrote:I'm about to do something that may possibly change the current direction of my life. It's either going to be amazing or devastating with not much in between. Safe to say that I'm absolutely bricking it and I'm just glad I've not had a heart attack already today the speed my heart has been beating for the past 6 hours or more!

Are you about to become an F1 Fanboy?

minchy wrote:I'm about to do something that may possibly change the current direction of my life. It's either going to be amazing or devastating with not much in between. Safe to say that I'm absolutely bricking it and I'm just glad I've not had a heart attack already today the speed my heart has been beating for the past 6 hours or more!

painless wrote:

minchy wrote:I'm about to do something that may possibly change the current direction of my life. It's either going to be amazing or devastating with not much in between. Safe to say that I'm absolutely bricking it and I'm just glad I've not had a heart attack already today the speed my heart has been beating for the past 6 hours or more!

Marriage?
Joining ISIS ?
Leaving ISIS ?
Full body waxing ?
Vasectomy ?
Skydiving ?
Gender re-assignment?

Inquiring minds want to know

Siao7 wrote:

painless wrote:

minchy wrote:I'm about to do something that may possibly change the current direction of my life. It's either going to be amazing or devastating with not much in between. Safe to say that I'm absolutely bricking it and I'm just glad I've not had a heart attack already today the speed my heart has been beating for the past 6 hours or more!

Marriage?
Joining ISIS ?
Leaving ISIS ?
Full body waxing ?
Vasectomy ?
Skydiving ?
Gender re-assignment?

Inquiring minds want to know

Marriage and family related but I won't go into detail.
I thought it would be the first one. The rest are like childs play compared!

Asphalt_World wrote:Getting home from work and finding a very posh package in the postbox from Alfa Romeo. Inside is a leather and chrome USB memory stick and more excitedly, an invitation for me and my wife to spend a day at the Millbrook Proving Ground later this month to spend the day being taught how to drive the hell out of the Alfa 4C Coupe and Spider!

Result........

RaggedMan wrote:

Asphalt_World wrote:Getting home from work and finding a very posh package in the postbox from Alfa Romeo. Inside is a leather and chrome USB memory stick and more excitedly, an invitation for me and my wife to spend a day at the Millbrook Proving Ground later this month to spend the day being taught how to drive the hell out of the Alfa 4C Coupe and Spider!

Result........

I've never had to put anyone on the ignore list here before, but I might have to after hearing this.

mac_d wrote:It's sunny. I'm walking home. Got my happy playlist on.

painless wrote:

Argentum wrote:Dog was fascinated.
[/quote

Can dogs hear bats? Is this similar to u/sonic whistles?

huggybear wrote:

painless wrote:

Argentum wrote:Dog was fascinated.
[/quote

Can dogs hear bats? Is this similar to u/sonic whistles?

It's too high a frequency for dogs to hear. But only just. Dolphins though, that's another story.

minchy wrote:

huggybear wrote:

painless wrote:

Argentum wrote:Dog was fascinated.
[/quote

Can dogs hear bats? Is this similar to u/sonic whistles?

It's too high a frequency for dogs to hear. But only just. Dolphins though, that's another story.

Depends on the bats, there a load that live under one of the bridges near me and you can definitely hear them with human ears!

huggybear wrote:

minchy wrote:

huggybear wrote:

painless wrote:

Argentum wrote:Dog was fascinated.
[/quote

Can dogs hear bats? Is this similar to u/sonic whistles?

It's too high a frequency for dogs to hear. But only just. Dolphins though, that's another story.

Depends on the bats, there a load that live under one of the bridges near me and you can definitely hear them with human ears!

Oh no, bats make sounds, but the echolocation sound they make to better see things is not audible because you would get too much distortion of the signal coming back from everything in the general area making noises.

As for Moby's hear it through the phone, it's at least theoretically possible, but it would depend on the mic being sensitive to such high frequencies. You could absolutely do it with a high threshold mic and a laptop running something like GarageBand where you can pitch shift the sound sample.

And now I have a project for my summer holidays...

minchy wrote:I clicked on the link for the bat detector. Now I'm getting constant Maplin banner ads for the bat detector on the forum!

moby wrote:

minchy wrote:I clicked on the link for the bat detector. Now I'm getting constant Maplin banner ads for the bat detector on the forum!

You get adds on this forum?
Have a read of the how to geek

Depending which browser you use, click it on blocksite.


Sorry about that. There is a way to clear your preferences on google adds, but I dont know it, I never get any, I kill em all

SDLRob wrote:I am insane...

https://flic.kr/p/LgxuFE

minchy wrote: You mind me asking what you need a use a wheelchair for? Whatever it is, nice job man! Did you make it to the top?

SDLRob wrote:

minchy wrote: You mind me asking what you need a use a wheelchair for? Whatever it is, nice job man! Did you make it to the top?

never made it past the ledge just above my head. did four climbs, one on the far left rope, the other three on the rope I'm on in the image. this is the first time I've done something like this and my body is aching like mad today in response. I will be doing back ASAP though and my goal is to touch the top of the climb.

I have a genetic condition that left me with deformed legs and shortened limbs. I can't walk more than a few metres unaided without problems, mostly involving lots of pain.

this was a bit of a challenge to myself, 'lets see if I can do it' kinda thing. now I know I can I wanna do it again.

painless wrote:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6rBK0BqL2w

Perhaps it's because my musical education fizzled at the triangle and rythm sticks stage that I'm easily impressed but this kid is truly awesome

mac_d wrote:If any of you happen to know of any easily cleanable, relatively safe science experiments that are fun and doable from the suburbs of Glasgow, let me know

painless wrote:

mac_d wrote:If any of you happen to know of any easily cleanable, relatively safe science experiments that are fun and doable from the suburbs of Glasgow, let me know

I've got a couple. The flaming handkerchief with water/alcohol mix. No clean up, just a warm, damp hankie! And maybe the Cartesian diver.

Ooo and the crushed can. Take a large can (like an olive oil can) with a sealable spout. Put a little water in and boil until the water has nearly all gone. Bung in the stopper and cool. Steam condenses, pressure drops and can collapses.

mac_d wrote:Finally got clearance from the powers that be (my folks and my brother really) to show my nephews some fun little science experiments. I'm a science geek, I love it from this level to the level I do professionally. I think all this stuff is really pretty cool and I'm 28, so hopefully they'll dig it to (age 6 and 3). Educational and fun is what I'm going for.

Going to show them:
1) Baking Soda Volcano
2) Non-Newtonian fluid (the old corn flour and water thing - liquid when you touch it softly, jams into something that feels solid when you put a bit of force on it). If my dad has a decent subwoofer I'll do the dance party in hell version too
3) cloud in a jar
4) hot air balloon (won't release it but hopefully get off the ground)
5) Matchbox rocket (basically a match head in some tinfoil, heat it and it pops off with a fair bit of speed. Add some fins etc for a giggle)
6) Growing crystals (takes a while but kinda cool)
7) The old Diet Coke and Mentos thing

Pretty sure I have favourite Uncle locked down by this point, but I think they'll get a kick out of these little experiments. If any of you happen to know of any easily cleanable, relatively safe science experiments that are fun and doable from the suburbs of Glasgow, let me know. My mother complaiend I wasn't doing this at my place. I pointed out I live in a tiny flat with no garden space. Plus, I don't want to clean any of this stuff up.

moby wrote:
I used to love doing things like that under the pretense of showing my brother

Some however went far beyond what should be shown in schools.

mac_d wrote:

moby wrote:
I used to love doing things like that under the pretense of showing my brother

Some however went far beyond what should be shown in schools.

I remember when I was probably 7-9 years old my brother nailed a sheet of polythene to the pack of the shed and set it on fire. When the plastic melts and drops off it makes a cool noise. I also remember him showing me you could buy a couple of boxes of matches (not safety matches), cut the heads off and stick them in a tennis ball with some gravel. You throw the ball, they all go up and it's pretty vigorous. I've subsequently seen folk do it with thousands of matches on youtube. My gran also used to let us play with WD40 and matches. Thinking back, I'm kinda amazed I survived childhood.

I must say, since the diet coke and mentos thing became a viral video thing, I've really wanted to see it in person. Looking forward to it. Think my nephews will like that a lot, and will love the tinfoil rockets (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WFyKgmnCF-8)

I actually did some of the STEM outreach stuff from my Uni. From primary school age up to about 13/14. We did some pretty cool experiments, though some I felt were really rather crappy. The workshops with the really young kids were probably the most interesting. We had balloons to show states of matter, used charcoal to take the colour out of cola and irn bru and stuff like that. Plus, whenever we did it we'd finish at like 3:30pm at the latest then all just go home.

One thing I always found funny - some of the chemicals I got to use in my Advanced Higher Chemistry in 2005/06 school year (I think thats about A-Level for those in elsewhere in the UK - usually final year of school before Uni if that's the route you were taking) we'd have to fill out a lot of Health and Safety stuff to use at Uni. In a decade of so total at Uni I've never used a naked flame (though a few people in the labs did) but at school we used them all the time. I remember using 22 mol/litre Sulphuric Acid that someone dropped and it was starting to dissolve the concrete floor. I wonder if they still let silly 17/18 year olds have access to that stuff or if Health and Safety have stopped it (and that would not be a case of H&S gone mad imo).