Aluminium Makes for Great TV

aluminium toolboxesThere’s always that huge sense of melancholy whenever a reality TV show ends. People may say it’s silly, but they really do make you feel for people on those shows. They’re humans, and they feel like friends. When The Great Australian Trade-Off finished, me and the family just had to sit back in our chairs and take a moment, like how it is when you get to the end of a really good book. The journey has ended. It’s over…forever.

Unless you’re a total junkie and you start looking them up online, that is. You can find every single episode of ‘So You Think You Can Trance’ on Neat-Flicks, you know. That’s the short-lived one from 2002 where people competed to see who could make the very best trance music. Oh, and ‘The Aluminium Race’! That’s the one where teams of two are each given an aluminium toolbox with random contents, and they have to make their way through the middle of Australia to freedom. It only got one season after half of the contestants got lost in the desert and were never seen again, but it still left its mark on the genre. I particularly liked the whole aluminium theme, which was apparently a massive boost to the industry in Australia. Everyone was given a set of random tools in their toolboxes, all of them were made of aluminium, and SOME of them were totally useless…at first, anyway. We quickly found out that there were waystations along the trail where they had to do certain challenges, like changing tires and fixing under tray drawers on utes. When they got to Alice Springs, they were all given utes that were only half finished, with the idea being that they were supposed to use their acquired parts to fix them, toolboxes and all, for the great journey across the desert.

They THINK some of them were eaten by possums and dingos, but either way, they never found the bodies. But it was a great show while it lasted! Suppose the fact that the camera crews vanished as well really set the standard for the safety of these shows going forward.

-Charleine

Car Servicing, but it’s for Mech Suits

roadworthy certificate RingwoodYou know what would improve car servicing?

…robot suits.

That’s actually not true this time. Robot suits are, by their very nature, larger than human beings. Can you imagine trying to do services to a car, reaching into the tight spaces, whilst your arms are gigantic and robotic? It would never work. No, it would seem that car services must remain as they are.

I did have a thought yesterday when I was getting my own car serviced, though. My usual place shut down, so I had to find a place open for booking a car service in Ringwood, and I didn’t really know the area so I just sort of…hung around. And then I  thought about how wonderful the future would be, when car servicing places sat right next to mech servicing places. Not everyone would make the transition, and I understand that there are people who like cars almost as much as I like large piloted robots. Cars aren’t going anywhere, is what I’m saying. But one day, the roads shall be filled with cars (though slightly fewer) and the skies shall be filled with mech suits, and you’ll be able to do a double-degree at TAFE where you can study both automotive and mechanical engineering.

That will be a great future indeed. You need some sort of log book servicing, like you do with a car? They have you covered. Of course, log books will be of great importance to a mech suit. Got to keep that thing updated so you can accurately sell it second-hand. Of course, they’ll need roadworthy certificates, and also sky-worthy certificates because that’s where they’ll be spending a lot of their time. So right now I could go and get a roadworthy certificate. Ringwood has some of the best mechanics in Melbourne, it’s the reason I always take my car there. 

I wonder if there will ever be a day when I can bring my robot suit in for repairs. Maybe they could tighten up the hydraulics, give it some new suspension. I dream of the day when that is the norm. And it’s coming soon…right after we sell our first prototype.

-Lloyd