OT: What are your thoughts on this?

Have to agree with Leon. Followed a topic in a Landcruiser forum. One of the reasons manufacturers specify high octane is that is what they did their mileage tests with to get the best performance. You will get fewer miles per gallon with regular fuel.

Mike M

I have not driven an RV, but have pulled a 21" boat with an Astro van several times up and down the interstates. I always try to be courteous to the truckers, helping them in traffic, helping them change lanes, etc. I must be successful as many times I have found they were helping me do the same thing. =========================================================================== A 21 inch boat? Must be rather easy to tow.

A small nuclear unit was sent into space many years ago to supply power to a satellite.

RTGs are fairly common in deep space probes. Nuclear reactors, much less so and Mr. Fusions are never used. ;-)

I believe everyone is or should be taught to pass on the left. If someone is behind you going faster than you and you are in the leftmost lane, you move your ass over, plain and simple. If you don't you're a inconsiderate douchebag, period. :-)

My first car was a '53 Mercury Monterey, so yes.

I don't know, I also had a Corvair. I could tell you a story about the front seat of a '59 Chevy though.

Engine efficiency is limited, but there has been much progress in other areas. I'll take any car today over anything from the '50s and a few decades with way. Aside from style that is. I'd like a '55 or '58 Chevy body on a 2013 chassis. Come to think of it, my new car is Pacific Blue Pearl Metallic. The color is not all that far from the blue of a '58 Impala that I liked. I've had quite a few nice comments about the color.

Drivers in Europe are much more respectful of that. Hang out in the left and you will have a tailgater flashing his lights.

I do that. :-) How else are these morons going to learn. Not moving over for passers on the autobahn will get you a hefty fine.

Trail, King Center, or the Hempstead Drive-in ... the latter in high school.

One of my favorite places to drive is Italy. Most drivers are fast, but slow drivers move over and let them go by. On the Autostrade, if you are in the left passing a slower car, another driver will patiently wait until you do, but as soon as you get past, you are expected to move over and let a still faster car go by. It works. The left lane is heavily used by Mercedes, BMW and Audi going well above the speed limit.

On side roads, I've seen plenty of passing over the solid line and both lanes move over to make room for the guy in the middle straddling it.

You don't see people having breakfast while driving.

Some people drool over the 57 Chevy, but my favorite has always been the

The Russians have about 30 in orbit. That's reactors--cores, reflectors, neutron chain reaction, the whole nine yards. Apollo put a number of nuclear thermionic power cells on the Moon--those use isotope decay rather than a neutron chain reaction. Curiosity, recently landed on Mars, uses a similar power source. So do Pioneer 10 and 11.

All relatively low power though--SNAP-10 provided about 500 watts of electric power for example. The reactors make lot of heat--about 40 horsepower worth in the case of SNAP-10, but conversion is another story.

Incidentally, at one point the Soviets brought a model of the TOPAZ reactor that they were then using to a conference in the US. The Strategic Defense Initiative Office saw this and decided to see if they could buy a couple of those reactors to study. The Soviets, surprisingly, were willing to sell them. The subsequent actions of the various agencies of the US government read like the plot for a Marx Brothers movie.

And if that doesn't move you over, then he will likely start flashing his _other_ lights and then you will be very unhappy.

WellI my parents had a couple of RV's and a CB radio in those vehicles and their cars. You know how you really don't notice a particular vehicle on the road until you become interested in a particular one, then you see them every where?

They never noticed the comments truckers were making about RV'ers until they started driving one. Very often they heard the RV's being referred to as "S*it Houses on Wheels". I would say that probably 80 percent of RV drivers do not drive them very long and or have very little experience driving them. The truckers see them the most.

I believe that the NRL (which never sponsored the research, but rather one of the NRL researchers was advocating it) has completely given up on the soi disant cold-fusion research to which I suspect you are referring.

The only viable tabletop fusion is muon-catalyzed fusion which was known before pons-fleichman and it takes more energy to produce the muons that is obtained from the subsequent fusion.

Curiosity is powered by an RTG (Radio-isotope thermal generator) which generates electricity from the decay of Plutonium.

Plutonium RTG's also power the Voyager spacecraft and all outer-solar system craft.

This is neither fission nor fusion.

The soviets did place a fission reactor in orbit in the 60's.

scott

Apparently you confuse power with liberty ?

Again, some states are "drive right" and others allow driving in all lanes. As long as people aren't passing right, everything works. The problem is that people don't pay attention or don't care.

If that's the case, they're no better than the worst of the car drivers. Worse, in fact.

Explain?

Squirrels are rodents. Thanks, but I'll pass.