Bill’s Reals Blog - Scuba, Travel & Gadgets

5.8 earthquake and a dozen after shocks were felt down here in San Diego

Photo from today’s dive.

Getting ready for the scuba dives tomorrow on my rebreather.

Microsoft exchange emailcom the Iphone is way better than the current Blackberry models. Full HTML email rocks.

Getting my Guitar Hero mojo back.

I just saw this on Rebreather World and it’s called the Open Revolution rebreather. Typically, rebreathers range from $5,000 to as much as $20,000, it’s a niche market with boutique manufactures. However, the Open Revolution is looking to upend that model and come to market with a manual closed circuit rebreather (mCCR) that will retail for approx $1500 USD.

For your $1500 you get an injection-molded mCCR with back-mounted counter-lungs, integrated diver alarm system in a heads up display (HUD), integrated carry handle, harness and first-stage regulators.

The catch? It’s not on the market, it’s unproven, currently has no CE rating and is being manufactured by a 3rd party company.

Link to RBW

It’s just a concept car, there is no plans to produce this vehicle. But this is pretty cool. The regulators are Scuba Pro G250s which means that they didn’t skimp on the details. Its  brainchild of concept car designer, Founder and CEO of Rinspeed Inc

The petrol engine with three electric motors, one to power the rear wheels and two for the specially designed propellers. They are capable of taking it to 75mph on land, a more sedate 4mph while cruising in “boat” mode and a positively tranquil 2mph while underwater.

Once under water, its occupants breath air coming from an integrated tank of compressed air similar to that used by scuba divers. The vehicle can stay under water “until you run out of air or battery power,” which is about two hours.

I was thinking about this on the way to work today. It would be great to see videos of bands playing their songs on Rock Band. And today, I find that one of my favorite bands has already done this.

It’s an ad for HowStuffWorks.com. The cat looks miserable but then again that’s how most cats look most of the time, so who knows. I’d really like to see how they got the cat into that contraption.