You can get motorcycles that are faster, better handling, better designed, and better built than the Baodiao BD150 Sport. But I defy you to find a production motorcycle that’s more greeeeen!
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Source: Chinahao.com
How is it that I’ve been alive since the 1960s, but I’ve never heard of a Transporter Bridge? (One that shuttles a little gondola across a channel, suspended from a great truss.)
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9c7f0a705f522bb5f2be849b56ac1cc1ad5c16576f15383389eb6b2d0f587437.jpg
Well, that’s probably because there’s only two in the New World, only one of which is in North America, and it’s in Duluth and it’s been converted to a Vertical Lift bridge. In fact, there’s only about 7 of these still functioning in the whole world.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transporter_bridge
Maybe because it’s almost exclusively a European thing?
(I got called away before I added the second paragraph)
Yeah, there’s one in Argentina that still works, but that’s it outside Europe.
Now I want to take a ride on one before they all disappear!
Seems like they could double as container loading cranes, otherwise, you save the expense/engineering/space required of the approach to the crossing at the cost of operating complex machinery and throughput so slow that it would only work in low volume areas. Total cross per crossing has to be astronomical compared to a bridge.
Small transporter bridges are still pretty common where usage levels and costs make it the best option. There’s one near my house in Oregon crossing the Deschutes River at Benham Falls. The gondola holds 2 people and it’s government use only. The state only uses it for water sampling midstream since there is a full sized foot bridge 100 yards downstream.
Is it human powered or does it have a drive motor, like a ski lift? If they can sample the water, is it really a suspended gondola or a rope ferry, with no overhead truss?
suspended gondola with a cable between towers, I guess I missed the overhead truss taxonomy requirement
I think that qualifies. I’m no expert, I just found out they existed at all, on Monday night.
Tubular steel swingarm….how quaint.
That’s even worse than Kawasaki Ninja green.
Speaking of too much, I parked in front of a late-model Acura RLX this week and was surprised at how large the grille emblem had become. It seemed softball-sized at least, and grossly out of proportion with the dimensions of the car. It wouldn’t have looked out of place on a Dodge Ram. I almost wondered if it was hiding the radar emitter for the adaptive cruise control. Regardless, it looks kind of tacky.
https://www.acura.com/-/media/Acura-Platform/Vehicle-Pages/RLX/2019/overview-page/01_Hero-and-Parallax/04-exterior-design/thumbs/2019-acura-rlx-front-s.jpg?mw=243&hash=7970AF971FCAD821CB640F9DAEC6892032A827D6,%20/-/media/Acura-Platform/Vehicle-Pages/RLX/2019/overview-page/01_Hero-and-Parallax/04-exterior-design/thumbs/2019-acura-rlx-front-s.jpg%202x
I think using the badge to hide the radar has become pretty commonplace, and I guess it makes about as much sense as the glossy fake grille they used to use on the MDX. On the other hand, I think Toyota’s done similar, and yet manage to use a much smaller logo to do so (not sure if it causes less capability than Acura’s systems though).
https://pictures.dealer.com/b/balmoralparkacuratc/0747/63baeac1a96c66692164ec2e54eb332bx.jpg?impolicy=resize&w=650
The first couple of times I saw cars with the flat, glossy badges instead of the usual 3-dimensional pieces, I couldn’t figure out why, especially since the flat, “fake” ones were only on the higher level trims — felt backwards, since they looked cheaper to me. Understanding their purpose made it make sense, but I’m not a big fan of the look.
That said, I think using the badge to hide the cruise control’s radar system usually works better than the alternative. I find the Genesis G70 a particularly egregious case, mostly because I think it’s quite a good-looking car otherwise. I can’t shake the feeling that it would be much more handsome with that radar insert gone and the winged badge moved down into its place (as opposed to being “on top” of the nose, right by the leading edge of the hood).
http://picolio.auto123.com/auto123-media/articles/2018/5/64644/Genesis-2.0T-Elite-AWD-2019%20(3)fr.jpg
Maybe a push – white tail panel for red swingarm…
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/72fc7ae5fbac3e091466f72dd96c184198b301227309dc70c310232e8fe5a0b7.jpg
I had one of these as a kid.
https://motocrossactionmag.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/kawasaki100centurian.jpg
Nice. I had one of these as my first bike.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/vib-LjPGlw0/hqdefault.jpg
I had an orange 175 scrambler .
My first bike was a Candy Emerald Green KZ650.
I crashed the bejeezus out of it and never went near another green motorcycle again.
(There’s an old superstition among Harley Davidson riders that green bikes are bad luck. The story I heard was they used olive-drab WW2 surplus bikes for the first post-war year of racing and had a disastrous season.)
Very first motorcycle I ever rode was a lavender GPz550. So yes.
On my unrelated note, the Trans Am came home last week with shiny new aluminum cylinder heads and a functional a/c and heating system. It still has malaise era highway gears, so probing into the extra power gets illegal pretty quick as one indulges in the whooshing secondaries of the Q-jet as they open, but it reports nothing but happy sounds from the engine compartment. Now, to prioritize the next mod…
Maybe diff gears? 3.00 or 3.25 depending on how much highway time it sees
I have all kinds of delusions of grandeur involving overdrives. The GM 8.5 diff takes 3.23’s, 3.42’s, and 3.73’s commonly. A 3.23 would probably be plenty, which is probably why I will go with a 3.73.
Ah yes, an overdrive opens up a lot more options
Green Motorcycle?
Fast Motorcycle?
Fast green motorcycle?
The answer is always Kawasaki. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/7ffff75d74605f3fcc6decd12739d82a509f8d23a83c8a2c3a20f151c99ff2e4.jpg
Yes, but the Baodiao’s paint job is a bit more shocking.