Gizmodo: Delorean

Lightning Power For Energy, Time Travel Another Story

Sean Fallon — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 19:20:52 EDT

Lightning. It just goes about it's business—mocking us. We have always known there is potential there for an alternative energy source, but harnessing that power has proven difficult. However, an inventor names Steve LeRoy may be on the brink of changing all that with a device that generates lightning then harvests the resulting energy. The prototype can generate bolts 3-feet in length, but that is only enough electricity to illuminate a 60-watt light bulb for 20 minutes. However, LeRoy notes that a full-scale version has the potential to power 30,000 homes for a day with just one lightning bolt. Impressive. With that kind of juice you could easily get a Delorean traveling through time. [Buisnessweek via Sci Fi Tech]

DeLorean Confirms: New Cars to Roll Out in '08

Charlie White — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 13:15:00 EDT

Just as we mentioned last month, the DeLorean sports car is indeed going back into production, and you won't even have to go back in time to get one of those vehicles so memorably featured in the science fiction movie Back to the Future. Our beloved blood brothers at Jalopnik spoke to one of the guys who's going to make this happen in 2008.

James Espey, VP of the DeLorean Motor Company, said work will begin on the first car in the third quarter, and delivery of that vehicle will be in the first quarter of 2008 at a price of $57,500. The good news is, it will still look like a DeLorean, with a stainless steel body, gull wing doors and squared-off front end. Let's just hope they double the horsepower, because those 130 horses under the hood weren't too impressive back in the day.

These cars will be handmade, so that $57,500 price sounds like a bargain. Follow the link for Jalopnik's exclusive report and gallery. [Jalopnik]

DeLorean Going Back Into Production

Charlie White — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 08:50:00 EDT

The DeLorean, the car from Back to the Future with the gull wing doors and gleaming stainless steel finish, has come back to the future, going into extremely limited production thanks to a group of greasemonkeys in Houston who like to refurbish cars. They have about 200 of the original DeLorean 2.8 L V-6 engines on hand, and will start making the cars from scratch next year.

There's no exact price attached to the exclusive cars, which will be built at a rate of around 20 cars per year. The last time a DeLorean was rolled off the assembly line was 1982, when the last model was built in DeLorean's Northern Ireland plant.

This new car company, which actually acquired rights to the name DeLorean Motor Company, didn't mention a specific price, but it's currently selling its refurbished DeLoreans for $42,500. [Wired]

The DeLorean Watch: It's Retro Time

Jason Chen — Wed, 02 May 2007 22:00:36 EDT

As famous as the DeLorean car is, you've probably never heard of the DeLorean Time watch—and for good reason. John DeLorean made this garish silver DeLorean-esque monstrosity for the sole purpose of raising funds for him to build a new sports car, the DMC2.

Each watch was to be $3,495, and by buying it, you were placed on a list for an exclusive early chance to buy a DMC2 when it was available. John unfortunately passed in 2005, so neither watch nor car made it to stores. However, you can still see what the planned watch design was going to look like, except that the dial was hidden in the picture on the left. – Jason Chen

DELOREAN TIME - The DMC2 Wristwatch [Watchismo]

Purdue University Develops Mr.Fusion, Finally

Travis Hudson — Mon, 05 Feb 2007 14:29:42 EST

A team of scientists and researchers at Purdue have developed a fully functional Mr. Fusion. (For those who have no idea what I'm talking about, go rent Back to the Future II asap.) This tactical biorefinery can munch up food, paper and plastic garbage and turn it into energy. This machine was commissioned for the U.S. military (so don't expect it on top of your DeLorean anytime soon) for use in the field to create energy. It is roughly the size of a small moving van, so there is still some work that needs to be done to make it a little more functional. This biorefinery can supposedly produce 90-percent more energy than it consumes, which is a damn impressive feat. Next step: flying cars, hoverboards and self-drying clothing. –Travis Hudson

Scientists develop portable generator that turns trash into electricity [Via SCI FI]

Top 5 Creative Uses for a Mac mini, Sort Of

Matt Buchanan — Sat, 20 Jan 2007 18:05:59 EST

TechEBlog's editors have put together a list of the top five creative uses for the somewhat underexposed Mac mini. While I suppose they're all creative, one of them is pretty useless, so it'd probably be more apt to call it the top four creative uses for the Mac Mini, since the word "use" implies that it has some sort of purpose.

The DVR setup is actually how I imagined the mini would catch on when it first launched, given its pint size and processing power, but it didn't exactly explode on to the scene the way I had expected, either. The list:

Mac mini DVR
Mobile mini (a mini on wheels and my nominee for totally useless)
Mac Prius (cool)
UMPC mini (awesome)
DeLorean mini (too geeky for me)

– Matt Buchanan

Top 5 Most Creative Uses for the Mac Mini[TechEBlog]

Back to the Future DeLorean Flux Capacitor on eBay

gizmodo.com — Fri, 05 May 2006 11:31:58 EDT

If you've got a DeLorean and a few extra hundred bucks lying around, get your bad self over to eBay and bid on this gorgeous flux capacitor. The seller/builder used real glass tubes, accurate to the one that appeared in Back to the Future and long out of production (i.e. rare), and the gold bases were machined out of aluminum to match the movie prop. It plugs into any car battery and is guaranteed to fit into a DeLorean. Oh, and there are no nasty strobe lights in this baby, only white LEDs that chase to the center.

The highest bid out of 46 so far is $450.00, with two days and twelve hours to go. If you're broke or just cheap, you can always just make your own, but we doubt it'll be this pretty.

Back to the Future Delorean Flux Capacitor [eBay, via productdose]
Flux Capacitor [Wikipedia]