● GIGAZINE ~ 心が癒やされそうな春を感じさせる暖かみのある写真いろいろ

桜も満開なっているところも多くやっと春が訪れたと思わせるような気候になって来ましたが、日本以外のさまざまな国も冬が終わり暖かい気候になってきているようで、そんな春の訪れを感じさせるような写真を載せてみました。

このような暖かさを感じるような写真を見ていると、嫌なことを忘れてしまいそうになります。

詳細は以下より。


スイスのベルンにある国立公園でヒグマの子どもが遊んでいる様子。冬眠から覚めて体がうずうずしていたのかもしれません。

ウクライナのキエフでマルハナバチがミツを集めている様子。ミツと一緒にたくさんの花粉も運んでいるようです。

中国・安徽省の合肥郊外にある養蜂場の様子。

アメリカ・マサチューセッツ州で幼い姉妹が春の訪れを祝う「イースターエッグ」を探しに行っている様子。

アメリカ・オレゴン州のチューリップ畑。「一面に広がるチューリップ」と聞いただけで春らしさを感じます。

ワシントンDCにあるワシントン記念塔で咲く桜の写真。ここにある桜は日本から贈られたものなんだとか。

一方、こちらは東京の桜。桜も春を感じさせるものですが、一緒に移っている家族も別の意味で春を感じさせてくれます。

カナダ・オンタリオ州でバグパイプ吹きの横を通過する白鳥のパレード。

アラスカ・フェアバンクスで見かけたトナカイの親子。

ファーストレディーであるミッシェル・オバマ氏がホワイトハウスで子どもたちと一緒に植物の苗を植えたときの写真。大地から顔をのぞかせた芽がいかにも春といった感じ。

インドのカシミール地方にある菜の花畑の様子。一面が黄色いじゅうたんのようです。

以下からほかの写真を見ることができます。
Signs of Spring, 2010 - The Big Picture - Boston.com
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2010年04月06日 11時44分32秒 in メモ Posted by darkhorse_loge

⊙ 進口重車欣賞 ~ 25th Anniversary Suzuki GSX-R600 unveiled in the UK

The 25th Anniversary Suzuki GSX-R600. Only 25 units will be built...

After the 25th anniversary GSX-R750 that was unveiled at the end of last year, Suzuki GB have now released the 25th Anniversary special edition GSX-R600, just 25 units of which will be built. The bike’s paint scheme is a replica of a 1999 GSX-R600 and there’s a Yoshimura exhaust, a top yoke plaque and certificate, and £8,799 price tag.

The very first GSX-R600 was launched in 1997, and in 1999, Italian rider Fabrizio Pirovano won the World Supersport Championship aboard a GSX-R600. For more information on how you can get your hands on the 25th Anniversary GSX-R600, visit the Suzuki website here

Kevin Schwantz's Suzuki GSX-R1000 was auctioned for charity...

In the meanwhile, another very special Suzuki – a GSX-R1000 prepared for 1993 500cc world champKevin Schwantz (he rode a demo lap at the Isle of Man on this bike, in 2007) – was recently auctioned off for charity. Danny Palmer, of Palmers Motorbikes, was the winning bidder – he paid £9,500 for the machine, which will now be put up on display at the Palmers showroom.

GSX-R1000 Fonsi Nieto WSB Alstare 2008 replica

Weighs about 165kg, packs 171bhp and looks terrific!

The bike you see here belongs to London-based Danny Gladman, who seems to have put in a huge amount of effort (and a fair bit of money, we’re sure!) in preparing this Fonsi Nieto-replica GSX-R1000.

To start with, there’s stickers/decals on this bike – the Alstare paintjob, an airbrush job, was carried out byAltamura – and we think they’ve done an absolutely brilliant job! Apart from the special paintjob, Danny’s bike has been fitted with Twin Arrow Titanium Megaphone exhausts, AP racing exhaust hangers, carbonfibre front ram air ducts, carbonfibre hugger and chain guard, Arata rearsets, K&N air-filter, Power Commander III USB (with Arrow exhaust/K&N specific map loaded) and a Dynojet LCD dash mounted screen linked to Power Commander.

And there’s more. Suzuki tinted double bubble screen, R&G tail tidy kit and and crash protection bungs, and headlight protector with painted number board. The bike has been signed by Alstare riders Fonsi Nieto, Max Neukirchner and Yukio Kagayama, and it also features on the Alstare Suzuki official website.

Danny’s GSX-R weighs about 165 kilos and packs a certified 171 horsepower. Oooohhhhh…

And now the same bike, with added oomph courtsey Fast Bikes magazine

Kevin Schwantz replica: Lucky Strike Suzuki GSX-R750

Stamford Superbikes' Lucky Strike Suzuki GSX-R750. Sizzle...!

Pics: London Bikers

The UK-based Stamford Superbikes have commissioned a brand-new Schwantz-replica GSX-R750, which is painted in Lucky Strike colours and carries Kevin’s no.34 on its single-seat tail unit. Priced at £8,799 (about US$16,000), the K8 model Gixxer get a painted headlight cover and white painted wheels. A Yoshimura Tri-Oval exhaust is optional, costing an extra £595. More details on the Stamford website here

⊙ 進口重車欣賞 ~ Peugeot HYmotion3 Compressor concept unveiled at the 2008 Paris Motor Show

The Peugeot HYmotion3 Compressor concept, the coolest trike we've seen in a long time...!

For those who miss the BMW C1, Peugeot have designed the all-new HYmotion3 Compressor concept, a two-seater trike that features Peugeot’s ‘HYmotion’ hybrid/petrol technology.

With its glass roof and three wheels, the HYmotion3 Compressor is a car/scooter hybrid that’s fitted with 3kW electric motors in each of its two front wheels, and a supercharged, 20bhp, 125cc petrol engine that drives the single rear wheel. The HYmotion3 can be ridden in electric-only mode, petrol engine only mode, or hybrid three-wheel-drive mode. The HYmotion3 Compressor also gets stop-start, probably the first non-car application of this technology anywhere in the world.

Very sophisticated, very high-tech and proof that 'environment friendly' doesn't have to be boring

Two aluminium roll-over bars support the HYmotion3’s glass bubble roof, which provides a reasonable amount of weather protection to the trike’s occupants. There’s a rear-view camera in there, by-wire controls for everything, parallelogram type front suspension (which allows the front wheels to tilt) with a transversely mounted damper at its centre, tubular steel chassis, anti-lock brakes and a regenerative braking system that charges the batteries which power the dual electric motors.

The HYmotion3 will accelerate from zero to 100km/h in 11.2 seconds, do the standing quarter-mile (400m) in 17.6 seconds and is capable of hitting a top speed of 110km/h. Sure, it’s no road-rocket, but the numbers indicate that this trike should have enough performance for the city and it should be way more fun (and easier to park) than most cars. For us, this smart little three-wheeler from Peugeot proves that ‘hybrid’ and ‘environment friendly’ doesn’t necessarily have to be boring…

Peugeot RD: Electric three-wheeler concept unveiled at the Shanghai Motor Show

According to Peugeot, electric three-wheelers could be the future of urban mobility...

Pics: Autoblog

Right now, Peugeot seem to be big on battery-powered three-wheelers. The French company had shown the HYmotion3 Compressor concept at the Paris Motor Show in October last year. And now, it’s the RD electric three-wheeler concept, which was recently unveiled at the ongoing Shanghai Motor Show.

The RD, which won the 5th Peugeot Design Competition (from among 2,500 projects submitted by candidates from 95 countries), has been designed by one Carlos Arturo Torres Tovar, a 27 year old Colombian who grew up in the small industrial town of Tunja.

According to a press release from Peugeot, ‘The main operating feature of the Peugeot RD concept car is its ingenious system of articulation that provides irreproachable road holding allied with the ability the easily thread its way through urban traffic.’

The single-seater RD concept is powered by electric motors and has high-tech bits like a voice-message driver-assistance system and a heads-up display system. The vehicle is designed to provide the weather protection of a car, combined with the manoeuvrability and ease of use of a scooter.
For more details on the Peugeot Design Competition, visit their official website here

⊙ 進口重車欣賞 ~ Hawk: Honda RC51-powered trike concept

It's only a concept, but the Hawk does look rather cool...

Pics: AutoblogGreen

Based in New Zealand, 22-year-old industrial designer Alex Hodge has come up with this rather interesting three-wheeled concept – the Hawk. Hodge has designed the Hawk around the Honda RC51’s 999cc v-twin and with 120 horsepower at the back wheel, the trike’s theoretical top speed is 230km/h.

The Hawk runs on lightweight, 19-inch alloy wheels, is fitted with large disc brakes all around and features a fibreglass outer shell and alloy chassis. The aim was to achieve the outright performance of a sportsbike, combined with the comfort and weather protection of a car. Hmm… while it’ll never replace anR1, if it had at least two seats and some space for luggage, the Hawk could have possibly been a substitute for that VW Polo, which you shouldn’t be driving anyway…

⊙ 進口重車欣賞 ~ Honda 3R-C concept to be unveiled at the Geneva Show

The Honda 3R-C concept. We hope this is not what the future's going to be...

Honda will unveil the 3R-C electric three-wheeler concept at the Geneva Motor Show next month. The 3R-C has been designed as a single-occupant zero-emissions urban runabout and, according to Honda, it ‘draws on Honda’s vast working knowledge of vehicles utilising electric motors.’ Ahem.

The Honda 3R-C concept was created by European designers working at Honda’s research and design facility in Milan. We miss the days when Honda used to make bikes like the RC30 and RC45 and when its concept bikes used to be machines like the NR750…

As an engineering masterpiece, the Honda NR750 remains unrivaled to this day...

What’s the most amazing, stunningly magnificent street-legal sportsbike you can think of? A production machine, not a custom-built one-off. From recent years, the Ducati Desmosedici RR, MV Agusta F4 CC, Ducati 1198S, 2009 Yamaha R1, 2005/06 Suzuki GSX-R1000 and 2004 Kawasaki ZX-10R are some pretty special machines.

Going a bit further back, there would be dozens of other bikes that we can name. The first Yamaha R1, the original CBR900RR Fireblade, various 1990s Bimotas, the Kawasaki ZZR1100, Honda RC45 and RC30 and many, many others. But if we had to pick one single motorcycle which outdoes everything else – in terms of design and sheer engineering audacity – it would probably be the Honda NR750.

Introduced in mid-1992, the Honda NR750 was the world’s first production motorcycle with oval pistons. Based on Honda’s oval-pistoned NR500 racebikes, the street-legal NR750 was fitted with a fuel-injected 750cc V4, which utilised oval pistons, each of which used eight valves and two con-rods. Each piston was actually two pistons joined together, so the NR’s engine was really a V8 disguised as a V4…!

To quote a recent article that Superbike magazine did on the NR, ‘Honda effectively paired up the pistons in a V8 to make it a V4. In terms of valve to piston area, the engine was much more like a V8. Also, because the pistons were so much larger, the stroke could be kept shorter, allowing the engine to rev to well over 15,000rpm.’

By modern standards, the NR750’s power output is merely commonplace – 125bhp at 15,000rpm wouldn’t impress too many people today, when a stock GSX-R750 makes 150bhp (at the crank) at 13,200rpm. The NR weighed in at around 236 kilos and top speed was around 255km/h – again, figures that are easily surpassed by many contemporary sportsbikes.

Still, the NR’s PGM-FI fuel-injection, USD fork, carbonfibre bodywork, titanium-coated windscreen, underseat exhaust (that’s where the inspiration for the Ducati 916’s exhaust system came from…), magnesium wheels, digital instrumentation, single-sided swingarm and of course, that V4/V8 engine with its oval pistons made it pretty special.

‘When I look back at it, I'm not sure if we were experimenting with cutting-edge technologies or obsessed with foolish ideas,’ says Toshimitsu Yoshimura, who led the development of the Honda NR500's oval piston engine. ‘At least we were doing something that was beyond the realm of conventional thinking. I'm not just talking about us, who were designing the engine, but also those who were creating the body,’ he adds.

‘The reason was simply that we were all so young, we had nothing to fear. You could even say we had no preconceived notion that a piston had to have a circular cross-section. We didn't think much about whether the engine would actually turn over, or even whether it would be practical at all. We weren't worried about those things, since we just wanted to make it work!’ says Yoshimura.

‘To create anything, you must put your heart and soul to it. The development of oval piston engines impressed that upon me, as well as on the other young engineers,’ concludes the man responsible for designing one of the most remarkably innovative motorcycle engines in the world.

Priced at more than US$60,000 the Honda NR750 was hugely expensive and Honda only produced around 200 units (300 units according to some sources…) of the bike. Honda must have ultimately decided that oval piston engines are a bit too complex and expensive to produce, with not enough benefits to offset the cost, hence they seem to have abandoned the idea for good. But as an engineering masterpiece, the NR750 remains utterly, compellingly fascinating to this day.