SpaceX CEO Tweets Photo of Massive Mars ‘Starship’ Prototype Rocket

30. December 2018 · Write a comment · Categories: New Technology, Travel · Tags: , ,

Elon Musk shares some surprising details about the materials used to create the massive new rocket.

SpaceX managed the record-breaking 21 launches in 2018, but it has also currently been working on some bigger plans for the future. In the early morning of Christmas Eve, Musk released on Twitter a photo of prototype of his spacecraft, now known as Starship, and previously as Big Falcon Rocket. This is the ship that SpaceX plans to use to send people to the moon, to Mars and on other super-fast international flights to space.

SpaceX has said the spacecraft, being built at the SpaceX test facility in Texas, will be bigger and considerably more powerful than the Saturn V that took Apollo astronauts to the moon. The nose cone is multiple stories tall.  Musk tweeted that the massive rocket prototype has a stainless steel skin and its steel will perform better than lighter weight carbon fiber material at high temperatures.

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Rolls-Royce & Finferries Test Fully Autonomous Ferry in Finland

27. December 2018 · Write a comment · Categories: New Technology, Transportation · Tags: , ,

Finland’s state-owned ferry operator Finferries and engineering giant Rolls-Royce have demonstrated the first fully autonomous ferry in the world. The operation was conducted in the Turku archipelago between Parainen and Nauvo, in Finland. The return journey was carried out over remote control.

The 53.8m double-ended car ferry, named Falco, includes several Rolls-Royce Ship Intelligence technologies to navigate autonomously.

The ferry is equipped with a range of advanced sensors. They are used to build a detailed picture of Falco’s surroundings in real-time.

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South Korea to Fine BMW $10 Million Over Engine Fires

26. December 2018 · Write a comment · Categories: Transportation · Tags: , , ,

BMWs bursting into flames made headlines in South Korea earlier this year. The local media reported more than 40 cases in 2018 and some parking lots refused to accept BMW cars over fears of fire.

South Korea said Monday, December 24, it will fine German automaker BMW $10 million and file a criminal complaint with state prosecutors over allegedly dragging its feet in recalling vehicles with faulty engines after dozens of engine fires.

The auto giant apologized and recalled 172,000 vehicles of 65 different models in July and October with a faulty exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) cooler, which the company blamed for the fires.

In August, a recall of 480,000 vehicles with the same EGR cooler issue for Europe and some Asian countries, including South Korea, was announced — including South Korea — of 480,000 cars affected by the same problem. The recall was expanded to more than one million additional diesel cars two months later.

After a five-month review, South Korea’s Transport Ministry concluded that the German automaker deliberately tried to cover up technical issues and was slow to recall the cars. The ministry found the fires to be caused by faulty valves in the exhaust gas recirculation coolers (EGR). Combined with carbon and oil sediment the leaks could cause fires when the vehicle was driven at high speeds for long periods of time, but the carmaker said the problem would be solved by the exchange of faulty hardware.

Six out of 10 imported vehicles are from Germany in South Korea. BMW sold nearly 39,000 cars in the first six months of 2018, according to the Korea Automobile Importers and Distributors Association.

According to MSN.

SpaceX Launches its Biggest Crop of Satellites with Twice-Used Rocket

02. December 2018 · Write a comment · Categories: New Technology, Transportation · Tags: , ,

A single Falcon 9 rocket is about to fly for the third time.

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will launch Spaceflight’s SSO-A rideshare mission from Southern California at 1:31 p.m. EST. The launch was delayed from November 28 due to strong high-altitude winds.

On Monday, SpaceX will launch 64 small satellites at once from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California using a Falcon 9 rocket that the company has already flown twice before. It is a groundbreaking launch for SpaceX in numerous ways. Not only this is the first time the company will fly a rocket for a third time, but this will be the largest number of spacecraft that has ever taken off on a single flight. More »

Lexus Launches the World’s First Filmed Advert Scripted by AI

02. December 2018 · Write a comment · Categories: New Technology, Transportation, Travel · Tags: , , , , ,

The Japanese automaker has teamed up with the Oscar-winning director Kevin Macdonald to create the ‘perfect’ ad, which it is billing as the first commercial scripted by artificial intelligence.

The 60-second spot is entitled Driven by Intuition and directed by Macdonald, working from a script that was developed by IBM’s Watson AI system. Macdonald’s credits include The Last King of Scotland and the Whitney Houston biopic Whitney. The storyline itself along with the script was created using AI along with technical partner Visual Voice, IBM and Lexus’s creative agency The&Partnership. The agencies collaborated with the IBM Watson team to use AI to analyze 15 years’ worth of footage, text and audio for car and luxury brand campaigns that have won Cannes Lions awards for creativity, as well as a range of other external data. More »