Honoring a Classic
If you need more proof that 3-D printing is going mainstream, look no further than this classic Shelby Cobra, printed, yes, printed, at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Manufacturing Demonstration Facility. The Big Area Additive Manufacturing (BAAM) machine used in making the 1,400-pound car can fabricate components larger than one cubic meter. A recent improvement enabling smaller print bead size allows the BAAM to make pieces with smooth surfaces. Displayed at the 2015 North American International Auto Show in Detroit in January, ORNL researchers aim to use the Shelby as a “laboratory on wheels,” allowing them to test new automotive technologies like wireless charging systems, fuel cell technologies and hybrid system designs.Source: AZO Materials
Better Back-Seat Driving
Unsolicited driving advice from the passenger seat tends to frustrate, but a gamified driving app monitors habits behind the wheel and offers feedback that’s truly useful. Available free to Android users with a planned iOS release in early 2015, Flo tracks all trips using GPS data and smartphone motion sensors. Flo rewards drivers with points for safe practices like steady speed and smooth acceleration, while deducting points for taking corners too fast and abrupt braking. Changing driving habits as a result of Flo’s findings brings measurable savings in maintenance costs and fuel consumption, as well as reductions in emissions.
25 Number of exabytes (1 exabyte equals 1 billion gigabytes) of mobile data the world will use per month in 2019, compared to 2.5 exabytes a month in 2014. Much of the growth will come from new device users in developing countries. |