A curious weapon

bobbysocks said:

anything falling from several thousand feet is going to severely hurt, kill, or make a mess. I wondered what it was like to be on the ground after all the brass from fighters came tumbling down.....

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It's come up several times

http://ww2aircraft.net/forum/ww2-general/stray-bullets-17081.html

http://ww2aircraft.net/forum/aviation/people-ground-killed-bullet-casings-17035.html

British drank warm beer because George Lucas made their refrigerators.

Out of only curiosity, what has George Lucas got to do with anything in here?

I think they were referring to Lucas electric systems on cars and motorcycles, famous for their unreliability.

Wrong Lucas though, the company was founded by Joseph Lucas.

I have owned British things from Triumph sparked by the King of Darkness and understand THAT reference.

I also owned several real-life Motodinosaurio items (Montesa ignitions) and liked them better. Had a Cota 247, Cota348, and two Cota 349s among other trials machines (Honda, Ossa, Bultaco, Beta, Gas Gas, and Aprilia. All were reliable and tough. Can't say that for the Lucas Electrics bikes.

It always baffled me that the British, who live with more rain than many other people do, should have trouble coming up with an ignition that seemed to malfunction frequently ... when wet. You'd THINK it would be them who came up with the one that always ran when wet. Maybe they have, but it wasn't from Lucas Electric, that's for sure.

Had an Austin-Healey Bug-Eye Sprite that also had some difficulty when wet until we stuffed a bridge-ported Mazda 13B Wankel in it. Then it came alive and ate Corvettes for breakfast. We also used Mazda brakes and spindles. Had to make a homemade transmission mount and ran the exhaust under the rider's seat. So the rider's floorboard would melt his or her heels while I was just toasty warm instead of having melting shoes. It was mostly a single seater ... needless to say.

I had a triumph spitfire and an mgb ... still have a triumph motorcycle ( bonneville ). as long as you carry a can of smoke with you to replace the stuff that leaks out lucas was ok....lol. any time I did work on lucas systems I added more ground wires and used a lot of dielectric grease.

I just rewired it with wire of sufficient gauge and actual insulation over the conductor.

That helped a LOT. Putting some heat shrink over the thing also helped to where I had almost no more issues with wire.

But just as I got it working right, I sold it, went to a non-British motorcycle, and all my problems were GONE ... only to be replaced by other problems. I can say this, when I was riding them, I came to the conclusion that Spain could NOT make a good O-ring. I settled for replacing the O-rings with domestic ones of a proper type and everything was fine. In fact, ALL the rubber from Spain was terrible. Maybe they bought it from North Korea and it was made from bad kimshi. I had no issues with the Del Orto carbs, but replaced all my Amals with Mikunis, and was never sorry even for second ... except for while writing the check.

To comment on a forum topic, here is am American trying to disarm a remote control German bomb.



And we think our modern RCs are fun and are higher tech! We seem to have little on this one!

I'd love to have that old Duck, too. Of course, it was a NEW Duck at the time.

come to Pittsburgh.....there are a couple tour companies that drive you around the town then cruise the rivers in ducks.

GregP said:

*SNIP*

Had an Austin-Healey Bug-Eye Sprite that also had some difficulty when wet until we stuffed a bridge-ported Mazda 13B Wankel in it. Then it came alive and ate Corvettes for breakfast.

*SNIP*

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Sorry, to make a blanket statement like that I'll need more specifics, were these C5's running the LT 1? Or C6's and if so were they using the LS 2 or the uprated LS 3? Surely not the top line LS 7? What was the temperature and humidity at the time of this said breakfast eating? Was the Corvette running the proper fuel/air mixture, and speaking of that did the Vette's run the correct fuel? We'll assume these were SL matchups for the sake of simplifying the issue.

Also were the drivers of equal caliber/experience? Too many factors here that are unanswered, please also cite some source material for this.

OK, I couldn't resist, just a little levity for the afternoon. Actually sounds like a fun ride, was it a real sleeper or could a decent motorhead tell he was about to get his A$$ kicked, especially from the sound?

P.S. Which is what I like about you guys, no one gets away with dumb statements around here, it is QUITE refreshing.

P.P.S. Not that I'm calling Greg's statements dumb mind you.