Model Airplanes

Up the road a ways, on S.C. 21 between Blythewood and Ridgeway, is place of uncanny curiousness.

I have passed by it more times than I can count, and finally, on a recent day, I decided it was the day to stop and see what was behind a sign by the side of the road which sported most of a 1932 Chevrolet coupe on the top half and the words, “Branham’s PRECIOUS METALS – We Find Vintage Iron” on the bottom half.

Boy howdy was I glad I hit the brakes.

I poked around a bit, then met 69-year-old Rodger Branham. He directed me to take a seat on “the boss’ bench” in a garage overflowing with every kind of piece, part, component, crank, scrap, bracket, handle, attachment, accessory and oddity. He turned on an industrial shop fan the size of the planet Saturn and it churned up the bottom-heavy summer heat.

“I’ve been in business since 1972,” Branham said. “I have always loved old cars. This is my hobby. Old parts and cars and stuff. The garage business. The parts business. The fix-it-up business. The whole thing.”

“The whole thing” spreads out across several acres of sandy ground shaded by towering pine trees.

“The whole thing” is home to some 300 cars in varying stages of antiquity, maturity and marvel. A 1924 Ford Model T. A 1937 Packard coupe. A 1950 Hudson.

“The whole thing” comprises astonishing collections of gas caps, hubcaps, car-door handles, drive shafts, tail lights, grills, fenders, car

Article source: http://www.thestate.com/living/article97560657.html

GIFU, Japan — Kato Manufacturing, based in the blue-collar enclave of Gifu prefecture, in central Japan, is a microcosm of the country’s industrial evolution.

The family-run metal shop, started 128 years ago, originally made simple farming tools. When Japan morphed into a manufacturing giant, churning out automobiles and electronics for the world, Kato supplied the sculpted frames and housings that gave products their shape.

Now, as Japan aggressively tries to regain some of its manufacturing might in the face of competition from lower-cost countries like China, Kato is producing parts for airplanes. The company recently installed new metalworking machinery and hired a half-dozen workers to accommodate orders from domestic aircraft makers.

Article source: http://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/japan-bets-on-aerospace-as-it-seeks-to-regain-manufacturing-might/

Stratasys Ltd. unveiled new technologies and partnerships with heavyweights Siemens, Boeing and Ford Motor Co. in a move that could accelerate the 3-D printer’s prominence in lightweight auto and aerospace parts manufacturing, company officials said.

Stratasys CEO Ilan Levin told investors and trade writers from eight countries Tuesday at the Crowne Plaza Bloomington that from now on Stratasys would rely on partnerships with industrial customers to help solve manufacturing problems, drive innovation and grow the company.

To that end, Levin introduced what he called “game changers” — technologies that can make industrial-strength but lightweight parts for cars and planes and can print parts in extremely large sizes for the first time.

The Infinite-Build 3-D Demonstrator — made to satisfy specifications from Boeing and Ford Motor — can seamlessly print large lightweight components that are the size of a building or the length of an entire airplane.

The new Robotic Composite 3-D Demonstrator combines Stratasys’ advanced 3-D printing composite materials and extrusion capabilities with Siemens’ motion control hardware and product management software.

The new machines also speed up the painfully slow 3-D printing process by about tenfold. Officials emphasized that the new technologies introduce a new phase of “additive manufacturing” for the auto and aerospace industries, but declined to disclose development costs or say when or how much revenue will be generated by the new technologies.

Article source: http://www.startribune.com/stratasys-partners-with-boeing-siemens-and-ford-on-new-3-d-printing-technologies/391182171/

Large parts of the IR spectrum are inaccessible in observations made from ground-based telescopes because of absorption by water vapor in the atmosphere.¹ For this reason, the Stratospheric Observatory for IR Astronomy (SOFIA)—a joint project between NASA and the German Aerospace Center (DLR)—was designed and has been operational since 2010.² The observatory consists of a gyro-stabilized telescope (with an effective diameter of 2.5m), mounted within a Boeing 747SP (special performance) aircraft (see Figure 1) that flies at altitudes as high as 45,000 feet (13.7km). At such altitudes, the atmospheric water vapor overburden typically has a column depth of less than 10μm, which is 20–100 times lower than at good terrestrial sites. Indeed, the average atmospheric transmission is 80% or more across SOFIA’s wide wavelength range (0.3μm to 1.6mm), as shown in Figure 2. Although some strong water absorption lines remain in the spectra, high-quality spectroscopy and broadband photometry can be achieved between the telluric (i.e., atmospheric) lines. SOFIA has thus become a key facility for several astronomy investigations, e.g., for studying regions of star formation, observing objects obscured by interstellar dust, and making time-critical measurements of transient events.

SOFIA also presents several other advantages compared with ground-based or space-based (e.g., the European Space Agency’s Herschel Space Observatory) IR observatories. For example, unlike space telescopes, SOFIA can be upgraded continually and can be used as a test bed (with conditions similar to those encountered during space flights) for state-of-the-art and high-risk technologies. SOFIA also serves as an excellent ‘training ground’

Article source: http://spie.org/newsroom/6685-making-unique-ir-observations-with-an-airborne-25m-telescope

Your (Article, Chart, Blog) was successfully saved to your folder My Default Folder

Don’t forget you can visit My Briefcase to manage your folders at any time.

Article source: http://www.dailyreportonline.com/recent-news/id=1202765757003/Taylor-English-Advises-Russian-Airline-Group-on-8B-Boeing-Deal?mcode=1202616187678&curindex=1