by jaredwestfall on Sep.23, 2010, under Randomness
Jeep J8 gets shot up to earn ballistic protection certification
by Zach Bowman (RSS feed) on Sep 23rd 2010 at 6:57PM
Jeep J8 undergoes ballistic tests – Click above for high-res image galleryIn its ongoing quest to return the Jeep name to its military roots, Chrysler has just put the J8 through ballistic and blast certification. The company says that its using a new manufacturing technique by hot-forming steel to create a protective shell for the vehicle. Sounds fancy, and evidently it’s tough enough to take the kind of abuse necessary to be awarded BRV 2009 VR7 ballistic protection certification. What does all that mean? No matter what your daily commute throws at you, chances are this beefed-up Wrangler will get you to work in one piece.
The J8 is currently being marketed to military, government and private security operations that require the kind of vehicle that can drive through a hail of small-arms fire without getting perforated. There are also a number other configurations available – everything from well-armed patrol vehicles to troop and cargo transports.
We wouldn’t mind having one of each to play around with for a weekend… how about you? Thanks for the tip, Joe!
Gallery: Jeep J8 Ballistic Tests
[Source: Jeep Facebook]
by jaredwestfall on Sep.23, 2010, under Randomness
Iron Man 2’s Deleted Alernate Opening
Posted on Thursday, September 23rd, 2010 by Peter Sciretta
Many of you probably noticed that Iron Man 2 was missing a sequence that was prominent in the trailers: a moment on an aircraft where Pepper kisses Iron Man’s helmet before throwing it off board and Tony dives to retrieve it as he makes his entrance into Stark Expo. Director Jon Favreau has said that the sequence was removed because he wanted to give Robert Downey Jr a big entrance, and the reveal of Stark on stage after landing worked better without the opening bit of comedy. There is actually a bunch more to the sequence that we didn’t see, including Iron Man and a toilet. For those of you who are interested in seeing the three minute opening scene, hit the jump.
via: tdw
by jaredwestfall on Sep.23, 2010, under Randomness
How-To: Build an official BBC Dalek, ca 1973
Apparently if you wrote to the BBC in the 1970s or early 1980s wanting to know how to build your own Dalek, they sent you this fantastic set of official plans, which are now preserved for posterity in the cloud-mind at Tom Rathborne’s site. [via Neatorama]
More:
by jaredwestfall on Sep.21, 2010, under Randomness
Top Gear Season 15 hitting BBC America Sept. 27
If you’re like us, you’ve been catching bits and pieces of Top Gear Season 15 on the Interwebs with few complaints. We’ll take what we can get, after all, but the world’s greatest automotive entertainment show is best watched on a pristine wide-screen television set. Beginning September 27, we won’t have to interface our Macs and PCs to check out Clarkson, Mays, Hammond and the Stig, as the show will air uninterrupted on BBC America on September 27. How can you pass up the opportunity to watch Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz (mostly Cameron Diaz) rock a Kia Cee’d on the TG test track in high-definition? The show will run on Mondays at 9 p.m. Eastern time.
With TG hitting BBC America next week, we will soon have two shows to watch this fall containing the words Top Gear. Top Gear USA starts airing on the History Channel in the Fall, with Tanner Foust, Adam Ferrara and Rutledge Wood replacing the UK’s big three. Good luck on that assignment, fellas.
[Source: BBC America]
by jaredwestfall on Sep.21, 2010, under Randomness
Leave a Comment more...by jaredwestfall on Sep.20, 2010, under Randomness
2011 Dodge Challenger SRT8: 475 HP And An Unbelievable 0-to-60 Time
Leaked documents from last week’s dealer product event claim power output on the newly-6.4-litered 2011 Dodge Challenger SRT8 is a whopping 475HP. Dodge brand CEO Ralph Gilles even claims it’ll break the three second range in the 0-to-60. Umm, how?
The SRT and new 392 (special edition) versions of the 2011 Challenger will see a power output of 475 HP and 460 lb.-ft. of torque thanks to the new 6.4-liter Hemi. Although an appreciated boost, the car seemed to receive an even bigger, and seemingly impossible, performance boost from Dodge brand CEO Ralph Gilles.
Apparently, according to Ontario Street Car, during last week’s dealer presentation, Gilles was quoted as saying the cars would hit 60 MPH from 0 in the 3-second zone. But how, considering the gearing will be the same as on the 2010 model that only breaks the 5.0-second barrier by a tenth of a second? Wouldn’t it need a significantly boosted horsepower number than 475? Does this mean the Challenger’s downrated — or that Gilles misspoke?
Setting aside the power penis size debate, the thing that’s getting us to nerd out from an industry point of view is that Dodge is pitting the new Challenger, specifically the lower-powered versions, directly against the Chevy Camaro rather than the Ford Mustang. That makes sense as the Camaro’s now stolen the pony car sales lead from FoMoCo — but it’s interesting seeing other car companies take note and align their offerings against the General.
Want to know the rest of the details — including the numbers on the V6 Challenger? Click on the images below (and on top) to embiggen them:
Send an email to Ray Wert, the author of this post, at ray@jalopnik.com.
Ray Wert just posted the upcoming Dodge Challenger specs on Jalopnik.com for me to drool over, well not just me but anyone who is a Mopar fan. I have been waiting to see what updates they would make to the cars to make them competitive against the new Mustang and Camaro offerings.
If handling has improved then competition will be fierce as Dodge has already made a commitment to upmarket their interiors from the rough plastics of the past to soft touch materials. Something that Chevy has failed to do.
by jaredwestfall on Sep.16, 2010, under Randomness
Bearded Lady Reunites With Long-Lost Son
Updated: 4 hours 37 minutes ago
(Sept. 16) — Every adopted child wonders who his biological mother is. Movie star? Rock star? Maybe a big-shot CEO? For Richard Lorenc, she turned out to be the last thing he ever imagined: a sideshow bearded lady.The 33-year-old Kansas man had always been curious about his birth parents, but with a wife and two young daughters, he was busy making a life of his own. After a recent back injury led to multiple medical exams and many questions about his family medical history, he decided it was time to start digging.
His search began this past spring, when he filed a request with the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services to find his biological parents.
Courtesy of Richard LorencAfter 33 years, Richard Lorenc has reunited with his biological mother, a bearded woman named Vivian Wheeler, in Bakersfield, Calif.Six weeks later he received a letter from the department saying it had the identity of his mother: Vivian Wheeler, now 62.
It also informed him that both his mother and his maternal grandmother had hypertrichosis, known as werewolf syndrome. Each had facial hair, even as children. The letter further stated that his mother was born a hermaphrodite, with both male and female reproductive organs.
Wheeler’s facial fuzz had appeared at birth with an inch and a half of light hair covering her cheeks and chin. She says her mother wanted a daughter, and doctors were instructed to remove the male parts.
Wheeler claimed her father was humiliated by his bearded little girl, but it didn’t prevent him from capitalizing on her condition. She began working in sideshows at an early age, earning money to send home to her family.
Between tours, she would return home and reach for a razor.
“My dad said to shave because people wouldn’t understand why I had facial hair, saying, ‘This is what you’ll have to do to fit into society,’” Wheeler told AOL News.
As she grew older, she would shave sometimes to placate the men she dated, “because of their low self-esteem. It didn’t bother me.”
Wheeler stopped shaving her beard entirely in 1990 shortly after the death of her mother.
“I let it grow back to be myself,” she said. “Without my beard, I’m not me. I’m pretending to be someone I’m not.”
Since then, her beard has grown to 11 inches in length, leading to appearances in Ripley’s Believe It or Not! and in the Guinness World Records book.
Courtesy of Biff YeagerVivian Wheeler keeps her beard trimmed at 11 inches, though it has been longer in the past.According to Wheeler, doctors examining her for Guinness said she has a male bone structure, with half her hormones being male. Doctors thought it would be impossible for her to give birth, but she became pregnant, and baby Richard was delivered by cesarean section in 1977.
For Wheeler, a Seventh-Day Adventist, it was a miracle. But she says the father, a carnival ride operator she had met in Nebraska, took the baby away from her soon after the birth.
Lorenc didn’t learn all this until later. After learning his birth mother’s name, he set out to find her. He started by looking her up on the Internet.
“I knew it was her as soon as I saw the picture online,” he said. “We have a resemblance.”
He still didn’t have an address for her, but his online search revealed his mother had a sideshow background. Lorenc then turned to me and some other members of the sideshow community for help in tracking her down. I featured Wheeler in my book “American Sideshow,” and I’ve been in touch with her on and off for the past seven years.
I gave Lorenc the phone numbers I had for her, including one for a friend of hers where I often reached her in the past, but none of the numbers was still in use. I even contacted others who had worked with Wheeler, but they had lost touch with her.
Fortunately, Lorenc had luck on his side.
He had also reached out to George “The Giant” McArthur, who at 7 feet 3 inches is the world’s tallest sword swallower. McArthur lives in Bakersfield, Calif., where as far as I knew Wheeler also resided.
Several weeks after we began the search, Wheeler just happened to turn up at the same local park where McArthur was performing fire manipulation for a music video shoot.
For Wheeler, it was a spiritual moment.
“The Holy Spirit told me to go. He told me George had something to tell me that was very important,” she explained. “I hollered at him from behind, and he turned around and told me my son was looking for me.”
With Wheeler located and contact information in hand, it was time for Lorenc to introduce himself. Of course, after 33 years, that’s no easy task. So he enlisted the help of his wife, Jessica, who made the first call and put Wheeler on a speakerphone.
Courtesy of Richard LorencVivian Wheeler has exhibited her beard in sideshows for most of her life. Her income supported her family — even paying for her mother’s bypass heart surgery. Photo circa 1992.“She said she might be married to my son, Richard William Chambers Jr. — that was the name on his birth certificate,” Wheeler said. “He wanted to find out if I was his mother. I told her I had a son named Richard William Chambers Jr.”
She considered the chance meeting with McArthur and the sudden connection with her son another miracle.
“I told God I wanted to know if I had grandchildren and if my son was alive. Then, like snapping your fingers, his wife called me,” Wheeler said.
Encouraged, Lorenc called her himself the next day. Each wanted to verify the relationship. “Once that connection was made, we had a good idea we were in fact mother and son,” he said. “There are still tests that people want to do, like a DNA test and such, which I’m fine with.”
A DNA test would prove that Lorenc is in fact the Richard William Chambers Jr. born in Nebraska in 1977 — the same Richard William Chambers Jr. who was taken away by Richard Sr. shortly after Wheeler gave birth.
“We got into an argument, like people do, and he took my son and vanished with him,” Wheeler said.
Wheeler says she spent years searching for her son but never contacted the authorities about the disappearance. “I wanted to believe he was with his father,” she said.
Yet she desperately wanted her son back. The mental toll it took on her caused her to collapse onstage during one of her sideshow performances. After the nervous breakdown, she says doctors recommended she stop thinking about her son or “I’d lose my mind completely.”
But Wheeler’s hope that her son was living happily with his father was far from the case.
“I was found in a motel in Atlanta, that’s all I knew of my life,” Lorenc said. “I think I was maybe 3.”
He moved into an orphanage before his father regained custody of him and headed to Kansas. Teachers noticed abuse marks on his body, and young Richard was placed in foster care. At 7, he was adopted and became Richard Kevin Ryan. When he married, he took his wife’s surname, Lorenc.
At the end of June, Lorenc flew out alone to Bakersfield for two days to finally meet his mother.
He found her living in the industrial part of town at an old motel converted into Section 8 housing for people drawing Social Security or Supplemental Security Income. Wheeler meets with counselors, takes classes at the complex and stays active in the community with her church.
Rather than have their long-awaited reunion in her small room, they met on the other side of town at the apartment of one of Wheeler’s friends. There, they began the long process of becoming acquainted and discussing the past.
“A lot of my questions were answered,” Lorenc said. “I think one of her biggest wishes was fulfilled that day.”
Now he hopes his newfound mom will move closer to his family in Kansas. Wheeler suffers from osteoporosis, doesn’t have a primary physician and needs better living conditions.
“She was not given opportunities we take for granted,” Lorenc said. “She wasn’t given an education or a healthy environment, and it shows. I feel for her, and I want her to know that there’s a place for her here near us where we can give her the things she was never given.”
Wheeler is apprehensive about disrupting his family life, but she is considering moving to Oklahoma, right near the Kansas border, where her maternal grandparents were born. There, she hopes to learn more about her own past.
Since their meeting, Lorenc and Wheeler have spoken every few weeks and plan to see each other again soon. Wheeler hopes their next meeting will be on “Maury.” She hopes host Maury Povich will help her obtain a DNA test to prove Lorenc is her son.
“I want to share the story, and I want to know for sure if it’s my son,” she said. “Even if not, I still love him.”
Sponsored LinksAs for Lorenc, he’s accepting the entire situation and looking forward to developing a stronger bond.
“My whole life growing up, I thought my mom was Grace Slick from Jefferson Airplane, but that was just my fantasy. This is kind of better,” he said.
“Whatever happens, I want to be there with her. It’s a great adventure. It’s an unbelievable story, and I just want to be there for the ride with her and spend time with her.”
by jaredwestfall on Sep.15, 2010, under Randomness
Leave a Comment more...by jaredwestfall on Sep.15, 2010, under Randomness
Leave a Comment more...by jaredwestfall on Sep.15, 2010, under Randomness
This Is Not A Road
This may look like a rural gravel road, but it’s not. It’s the surface of a Louisiana waterway covered with hundreds of thousands of dead fish, crabs, eels and stingrays — even a dead whale.
Fish kills are common along the Gulf of Mexico, where “Dead Zones” now pop up every year. But these fish kills, especially around the mouth of the Mississippi river, have usually been limited to a single species of fish — not a broad die-off of dozens of species like redfish, flounder, trout and, if a local Louisiana news station is correct, a whale.
That’s raising alarms with local Louisiana governmental officials like Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser, who distributed the photo up top to local media. He thinks the die-off may be related to the BP oil disaster this summer.
Many scientists fear we’ll see more dead zones like these as an influx of oil-eating microbes would lead to more Gulf Coast dead zones, as the microbes produced by chemical dispersants use heavy amounts of oxygen when consuming oil particles.
There’s no proof that the BP oil spill is to blame for this particular fish kill, but frankly, no matter what the cause, it’s still a horrific sight to see.
Send an email to Ray Wert, the author of this post, at ray@jalopnik.com.
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