#Remote vehicle diagnostics

[sports9885]

Europe remote diagnostics systems for heavy commercial vehicles market was valued at USD 320.40 million in 2021 and is expected to reach USD 1057.67 million by 2029, registering a CAGR of 16.10% during the forecast period of 2022-2029. In addition to the market insights such as market value, growth rate, market segments, geographical coverage, market players, and market scenario, the market report curated by the Data Bridge Market Research team also includes in-depth expert analysis, import/export analysis, pricing analysis, production and sales, and pestle analysis.

[hsmagazine254]

Unravelling the Brilliance: Exploring Smart Cars and Their Multitude of Benefits

Smart Cars: The Fusion of Technology and Mobility In a world that’s increasingly embracing innovation, the automotive industry has embarked on a revolutionary journey. Smart cars, also known as connected cars, have emerged as a remarkable technological advancement that is reshaping the way we think about vehicles. From intelligent features to enhanced connectivity, smart cars are redefining…

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Cleantech has an enshittification problem

On July 14, I'm giving the closing keynote for the fifteenth HACKERS ON PLANET EARTH, in QUEENS, NY. Happy Bastille Day! On July 20, I'm appearing in CHICAGO at Exile in Bookville.

EVs won't save the planet. Ultimately, the material bill for billions of individual vehicles and the unavoidable geometry of more cars-more traffic-more roads-greater distances-more cars dictate that the future of our cities and planet requires public transit – lots of it.

But no matter how much public transit we install, there's always going to be some personal vehicles on the road, and not just bikes, ebikes and scooters. Between deliveries, accessibility, and stubbornly low-density regions, there's going to be a lot of cars, vans and trucks on the road for the foreseeable future, and these should be electric.

Beyond that irreducible minimum of personal vehicles, there's the fact that individuals can't install their own public transit system; in places that lack the political will or means to create working transit, EVs are a way for people to significantly reduce their personal emissions.

In policy circles, EV adoption is treated as a logistical and financial issue, so governments have focused on making EVs affordable and increasing the density of charging stations. As an EV owner, I can affirm that affordability and logistics were important concerns when we were shopping for a car.

But there's a third EV problem that is almost entirely off policy radar: enshittification.

An EV is a rolling computer in a fancy case with a squishy person inside of it. While this can sound scary, there are lots of cool implications for this. For example, your EV could download your local power company's tariff schedule and preferentially charge itself when the rates are lowest; they could also coordinate with the utility to reduce charging when loads are peaking. You can start them with your phone. Your repair technician can run extensive remote diagnostics on them and help you solve many problems from the road. New features can be delivered over the air.

That's just for starters, but there's so much more in the future. After all, the signal virtue of a digital computer is its flexibility. The only computer we know how to make is the Turing complete, universal, Von Neumann machine, which can run every valid program. If a feature is computationally tractable – from automated parallel parking to advanced collision prevention – it can run on a car.

The problem is that this digital flexibility presents a moral hazard to EV manufacturers. EVs are designed to make any kind of unauthorized, owner-selected modification into an IP rights violation ("IP" in this case is "any law that lets me control the conduct of my customers or competitors"):

https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/

EVs are also designed so that the manufacturer can unilaterally exert control over them or alter their operation. EVs – even more than conventional vehicles – are designed to be remotely killswitched in order to help manufacturers and dealers pressure people into paying their car notes on time:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/24/rent-to-pwn/#kitt-is-a-demon

Manufacturers can reach into your car and change how much of your battery you can access:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/28/edison-not-tesla/#demon-haunted-world

They can lock your car and have it send its location to a repo man, then greet him by blinking its lights, honking its horn, and pulling out of its parking space:

https://tiremeetsroad.com/2021/03/18/tesla-allegedly-remotely-unlocks-model-3-owners-car-uses-smart-summon-to-help-repo-agent/

And of course, they can detect when you've asked independent mechanic to service your car and then punish you by degrading its functionality:

https://www.repairerdrivennews.com/2024/06/26/two-of-eight-claims-in-tesla-anti-trust-lawsuit-will-move-forward/

This is "twiddling" – unilaterally and irreversibly altering the functionality of a product or service, secure in the knowledge that IP law will prevent anyone from twiddling back by restoring the gadget to a preferred configuration:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/19/twiddler/

The thing is, for an EV, twiddling is the best case scenario. As bad as it is for the company that made your EV to change how it works whenever they feel like picking your pocket, that's infinitely preferable to the manufacturer going bankrupt and bricking your car.

That's what just happened to owners of Fisker EVs, cars that cost $40-70k. Cars are long-term purchases. An EV should last 12-20 years, or even longer if you pay to swap the battery pack. Fisker was founded in 2016 and shipped its first Ocean SUV in 2023. The company is now bankrupt:

https://insideevs.com/news/723669/fisker-inc-bankruptcy-chapter-11-official/

Fisker called its vehicles "software-based cars" and they weren't kidding. Without continuous software updates and server access, those Fisker Ocean SUVs are turning into bricks. What's more, the company designed the car from the ground up to make any kind of independent service and support into a felony, by wrapping the whole thing in overlapping layers of IP. That means that no one can step in with a module that jailbreaks the Fisker and drops in an alternative firmware that will keep the fleet rolling.

This is the third EV risk – not just finance, not just charger infrastructure, but the possibility that any whizzy, cool new EV company will go bust and brick your $70k cleantech investment, irreversibly transforming your car into 5,500 lb worth of e-waste.

This confers a huge advantage onto the big automakers like VW, Kia, Ford, etc. Tesla gets a pass, too, because it achieved critical mass before people started to wise up to the risk of twiddling and bricking. If you're making a serious investment in a product you expect to use for 20 years, are you really gonna buy it from a two-year old startup with six months' capital in the bank?

The incumbency advantage here means that the big automakers won't have any reason to sink a lot of money into R&D, because they won't have to worry about hungry startups with cool new ideas eating their lunches. They can maintain the cozy cartel that has seen cars stagnate for decades, with the majority of "innovation" taking the form of shitty, extractive and ill-starred ideas like touchscreen controls and an accelerator pedal that you have to rent by the month:

https://www.theverge.com/2022/11/23/23474969/mercedes-car-subscription-faster-acceleration-feature-price

Put that way, it's clear that this isn't an EV problem, it's a cleantech problem. Cleantech has all the problems of EVs: it requires a large capital expenditure, it will be "smart," and it is expected to last for decades. That's rooftop solar, heat-pumps, smart thermostat sensor arrays, and home storage batteries.

And just as with EVs, policymakers have focused on infrastructure and affordability without paying any attention to the enshittification risks. Your rooftop solar will likely be controlled via a Solaredge box – a terrible technology that stops working if it can't reach the internet for a protracted period (that's right, your home solar stops working if the grid fails!).

I found this out the hard way during the covid lockdowns, when Solaredge terminated its 3G cellular contract and notified me that I would have to replace the modem in my system or it would stop working. This was at the height of the supply-chain crisis and there was a long waiting list for any replacement modems, with wifi cards (that used your home internet rather than a cellular connection) completely sold out for most of a year.

There are good reasons to connect rooftop solar arrays to the internet – it's not just so that Solaredge can enshittify my service. Solar arrays that coordinate with the grid can make it much easier and safer to manage a grid that was designed for centralized power production and is being retrofitted for distributed generation, one roof at a time.

But when the imperatives of extraction and efficiency go to war, extraction always wins. After all, the Solaredge system is already in place and solar installers are largely ignorant of, and indifferent to, the reasons that a homeowner might want to directly control and monitor their system via local controls that don't roundtrip through the cloud.

Somewhere in the hindbrain of any prospective solar purchaser is the experience with bricked and enshittified "smart" gadgets, and the knowledge that anything they buy from a cool startup with lots of great ideas for improving production, monitoring, and/or costs poses the risk of having your 20 year investment bricked after just a few years – and, thanks to the extractive imperative, no one will be able to step in and restore your ex-solar array to good working order.

I make the majority of my living from books, which means that my pay is very "lumpy" – I get large sums when I publish a book and very little in between. For many years, I've used these payments to make big purchases, rather than financing them over long periods where I can't predict my income. We've used my book payments to put in solar, then an induction stove, then a battery. We used one to buy out the lease on our EV. And just a month ago, we used the money from my upcoming Enshittification book to put in a heat pump (with enough left over to pay for a pair of long-overdue cataract surgeries, scheduled for the fall).

When we started shopping for heat pumps, it was clear that this was a very exciting sector. First of all, heat pumps are kind of magic, so efficient and effective it's almost surreal. But beyond the basic tech – which has been around since the late 1940s – there is a vast ferment of cool digital features coming from exciting and innovative startups.

By nature, I'm the kid of person who likes these digital features. I started out as a computer programmer, and while I haven't written production code since the previous millennium, I've been in and around the tech industry for my whole adult life. But when it came time to buy a heat-pump – an investment that I expected to last for 20 years or more – there was no way I was going to buy one of these cool new digitally enhanced pumps, no matter how much the reviewers loved them. Sure, they'd work well, but it's precisely because I'm so knowledgeable about high tech that I could see that they would fail very, very badly.

You may think EVs are bullshit, and they are – though there will always be room for some personal vehicles, and it's better for people in transit deserts to drive EVs than gas-guzzlers. You may think rooftop solar is a dead-end and be all-in on utility scale solar (I think we need both, especially given the grid-disrupting extreme climate events on our horizon). But there's still a wide range of cleantech – induction tops, heat pumps, smart thermostats – that are capital intensive, have a long duty cycle, and have good reasons to be digitized and networked.

Take home storage batteries: your utility can push its rate card to your battery every time they change their prices, and your battery can use that information to decide when to let your house tap into the grid, and when to switch over to powering your home with the solar you've stored up during the day. This is a very old and proven pattern in tech: the old Fidonet BBS network used a version of this, with each BBS timing its calls to other nodes to coincide with the cheapest long-distance rates, so that messages for distant systems could be passed on:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FidoNet

Cleantech is a very dynamic sector, even if its triumphs are largely unheralded. There's a quiet revolution underway in generation, storage and transmission of renewable power, and a complimentary revolution in power-consumption in vehicles and homes:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/12/s-curve/#anything-that-cant-go-on-forever-eventually-stops

But cleantech is too important to leave to the incumbents, who are addicted to enshittification and planned obsolescence. These giant, financialized firms lack the discipline and culture to make products that have the features – and cost savings – to make them appealing to the very wide range of buyers who must transition as soon as possible, for the sake of the very planet.

It's not enough for our policymakers to focus on financing and infrastructure barriers to cleantech adoption. We also need a policy-level response to enshittification.

Ideally, every cleantech device would be designed so that it was impossible to enshittify – which would also make it impossible to brick:

Based on free software (best), or with source code escrowed with a trustee who must release the code if the company enters administration (distant second-best);

All patents in a royalty-free patent-pool (best); or in a trust that will release them into a royalty-free pool if the company enters administration (distant second-best);

No parts-pairing or other DRM permitted (best); or with parts-pairing utilities available to all parties on a reasonable and non-discriminatory basis (distant second-best);

All diagnostic and error codes in the public domain, with all codes in the clear within the device (best); or with decoding utilities available on demand to all comers on a reasonable and non-discriminatory basis (distant second-best).

There's an obvious business objection to this: it will reduce investment in innovative cleantech because investors will perceive these restrictions as limits on the expected profits of their portfolio companies. It's true: these measures are designed to prevent rent-extraction and other enshittificatory practices by cleantech companies, and to the extent that investors are counting on enshittification rents, this might prevent them from investing.

But that has to be balanced against the way that a general prohibition on enshittificatory practices will inspire consumer confidence in innovative and novel cleantech products, because buyers will know that their investments will be protected over the whole expected lifespan of the product, even if the startup goes bust (nearly every startup goes bust). These measures mean that a company with a cool product will have a much larger customer-base to sell to. Those additional sales more than offset the loss of expected revenue from cheating and screwing your customers by twiddling them to death.

There's also an obvious legal objection to this: creating these policies will require a huge amount of action from Congress and the executive branch, a whole whack of new rules and laws to make them happen, and each will attract court-challenges.

That's also true, though it shouldn't stop us from trying to get legal reforms. As a matter of public policy, it's terrible and fucked up that companies can enshittify the things we buy and leave us with no remedy.

However, we don't have to wait for legal reform to make this work. We can take a shortcut with procurement – the things governments buy with public money. The feds, the states and localities buy a lot of cleantech: for public facilities, for public housing, for public use. Prudent public policy dictates that governments should refuse to buy any tech unless it is designed to be enshittification-resistant.

This is an old and honorable tradition in policymaking. Lincoln insisted that the rifles he bought for the Union Army come with interoperable tooling and ammo, for obvious reasons. No one wants to be the Commander in Chief who shows up on the battlefield and says, "Sorry, boys, war's postponed, our sole supplier decided to stop making ammunition."

By creating a market for enshittification-proof cleantech, governments can ensure that the public always has the option of buying an EV that can't be bricked even if the maker goes bust, a heat-pump whose digital features can be replaced or maintained by a third party of your choosing, a solar controller that coordinates with the grid in ways that serve their owners – not the manufacturers' shareholders.

We're going to have to change a lot to survive the coming years. Sure, there's a lot of scary ways that things can go wrong, but there's plenty about our world that should change, and plenty of ways those changes could be for the better. It's not enough for policymakers to focus on ensuring that we can afford to buy whatever badly thought-through, extractive tech the biggest companies want to foist on us – we also need a focus on making cleantech fit for purpose, truly smart, reliable and resilient.

Support me this summer on the Clarion Write-A-Thon and help raise money for the Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers' Workshop!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/26/unplanned-obsolescence/#better-micetraps

Image: 臺灣古寫真上色 (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Raid_on_Kagi_City_1945.jpg

Grendelkhan (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ground_mounted_solar_panels.gk.jpg

CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en

[mecachrome]

pre-mclaren oscar piastri primer (ft. maxf, landoscar)

0. introduction

for a few months now i've been wanting to make both an oscar primer and a timeline of pre-mclaren landoscar moments, but i couldn't figure out which one to prioritize… then after some deliberation i finally realized i could just combine the two things together! so. here is an oscar-centric timeline that is mainly about his racing background, moving to the uk, and how he became acquainted with other members of the rfm pack—aka lando, maxf, and logan. i don't know whether any of this information is useful or even vaguely interesting, but i mostly just wrote it for myself and thought i'd share what i had in case anyone else wanted to check it out. please feel free to comment or shoot me an ask if anything here is egregiously incorrect; i've checked and linked as many sources as i could but it's of course possible that some errors remain :)

1. background, rc racing, early karting days (2007-2015)

oscar piastri was born on april 6, 2001 in brighton east, a suburb of melbourne not far from albert park circuit, as the son of chris and nicole and to-be oldest brother to 3 younger sisters. a love for all things automotive ran deep in the piastri family: both of his grandfathers were mechanics and his father had also co-founded his own vehicle diagnostics software company, hp tuners, aka oscar's sponsor throughout his racing career. thanks to his father's business, oscar's family was objectively well-off and managed to contribute a fairly substantial amount of support toward his junior career, but they also weren't swimming in cash by multi-millionaire motorsport standards either.

(L-R) edie, mae, hattie, and oscar, from nicole's twitter — each sibling is ~2 years apart (source)

while most drivers on the current grid were introduced to motorsport through go-karting, usually at or before the age of 7, oscar's path to single-seaters differed slightly. he first developed an interest in racing via remote-controlled cars at the age of 6, when his father brought him a monster truck as a souvenir back from a business trip in america. oscar began racing them that same year, eventually moving to safer electric track vehicles and even winning the second class of the national titles in 2010, at the age of 9. he was so small then that he often needed to stand on a milk crate to see the cars on track, and the next-youngest competitor at the time was twice his age. (source)

oscar on the podium at age 8 (nov 16, 2009)

oscar with his father chris, who often competed alongside him in a separate class (dec 21, 2010)

by 2011, oscar and his father were seriously considering his potential of pursuing rc racing as a viable career path, but things changed when he was introduced to karting via a friend's daughter in the rc community and his aspirations slowly shifted toward racing from inside a car. oscar was an unsurprisingly sporty and competitive child growing up; he'd played some cricket and aussie rules football and knew that all he wanted to do was race professionally, full-stop, at the time thinking along the lines of australian racing categories like v8 supercars. he was still competing in remote car racing as late as 2013, but he began karting seriously within australia in 2014, placing respectably in the junior categories of several regional karting series against relatively senior and more-experienced racers, and even going to france for a one-off event where he finished on the podium of the iame international junior x30 final. this outing affirmed his potential to his father and motivated the two of them to split time between australia and europe in 2015 as they juggled his karting future; plans for two more european events that year fell through, including the cik-fia world championship at the kfj level (which logan sargeant would go on to win), but at this point they were officially looking to take his career to the next level and commit fully to european karting in 2016.

this is when ricky flynn (and the hypothetical idea of lando norris!!!) comes in. before we get into rfm and karting professionally in europe, it's important to note that the defining aspect of landoscar's junior careers is that their pathways never once intersected. in fact, they don't even seem to have met properly before oscar entered the f1 grid as alpine reserve, although they'd spoken over social media and oscar was familiar with several people around lando's life—for example, maxf, logan, guanyu, and even lando's older brother oliver, who had also raced for rfm.

in short, you could say that landoscar's biggest hindrance was their parallel excellence. oscar was good enough to catch up and even surpass everyone else at lando's level, but lando remained untouchable throughout the years. oscar is only 1.5 years younger than him, but their f1 careers are offset by 4 years (2019 vs. 2023 debut) because of exactly two things: oscar's 2022 gap year in alpine and his two attempts at formula renault eurocup. on the other hand, lando sped through all of his junior categories in blistering fashion, falling short of the championship only once: the year he placed 2nd in f2 behind george russell. this is significant because many talk about the clinical nature of oscar's rapid single-seater ascension and three b2b2b victories (still very impressive, especially given his limited karting career!), but all of that speaks equally to the illustrious nature of lando's junior success and the sheer magnitude of faith placed in him as mclaren's "golden boy" coming up the ranks. to put things into further perspective, lando was teammates with maxf and jehan daruvala at rfm until 2014, jehan competing in the same class and max one below, yet by the time oscar was racing max and jehan—in f3 in 2020 and f2 in 2021, respectively—lando was already into his 2nd and 3rd years of f1. here's a chart that hopefully makes a bit more sense:

majorly simplified timeline showing lando, guanyu, maxf, logan, and oscar's junior careers + the karting classes they primarily competed in each calendar year. maxf did not complete his 2nd f3 season and many of them contested multiple/different formula renault series, but this is just a rough overview of their feeder series experience. 

2. moving to europe, rfm, regional formulae (2016-2019)

back in australia, oscar was a member of the oakleigh go-kart racing club and being actively mentored by james sera, a multi-time australian karting champion and fa kart dealer who worked with young karting talents alongside his cousin david. in late-2015, he presumably helped oscar and his father reach out to ricky flynn, who ran ricky flynn motorsport (rfm) and whose team was at the time enjoying exorbitant success in the karting scene; lando had won the world championship at the kf level the year prior, and logan would soon clinch the kfj title in 2015, results which further drew oscar's interest toward the team. ricky flynn agreed to take oscar on and have him and his dad move out to europe, and by november 2015 oscar announced on social media that he would be joining rfm the next year. in january of 2016, he and his father moved to hertford, uk, so that oscar could begin a 100-day karting program and travel extensively around europe to attend races. this is where he met logan sargeant, who was in his final year on the team but competing a class above, now at the ok (previously kf) level. oscar himself was only competing in the okj class.

not oscar-related, but as you can see guanyu, logan, and maxf were already acquainted before oscar and logan met, since the three of them and lando had been in rfm together as of 2014 — (may 11, 2014) & (feb 6, 2015)

oscar and logan in 2016

in an interview published on june 7, 2023, oscar reflected on leaving australia and committing to his racing dream, saying:

"i think if there was a turning point, it was probably when i started finishing towards the front in australia, and i started winning a couple of races here and there and finishing in the top three of championships and stuff, and then went to europe and fully committed to going down that route. [...] there's obviously a very big commitment at that point when you move halfway across the world without family and stuff. so i knew at that point that i really wanted to become a professional because, firstly, that's what i want to do anyway, but, secondly, now i'm sacrificing seeing my family, and stuff like that to be able to do this — which was a sacrifice i was more than willing to make."

like the majority of oscar's karting career, his time with ricky flynn can primarily be summarized as decent. none of his performances were particularly stellar, and in november 2016 he placed 6th in the fia world championship final behind the likes of victor martins and théo pourchaire (he mainly competed against guys like them, dennis hauger, caio collet, etc… once again logan was a class above and lando/maxf had already graduated to single-seaters), but he showed promising racing foundations and a great capacity for improvement, especially given that he'd moved to europe the same year and was still adjusting to life and racing on the opposite hemisphere. about 6 months into his new karting venture, oscar had settled in reasonably well and his father decided he would return to australia to continue on with his life, so they made the joint decision that oscar was to begin boarding at haileybury's uk campus and continue racing in europe entirely on his own. uk and australian school years are misaligned, so my personal understanding is he moved to europe after finishing year 9 in australia, attempted online school/took a few months off (he says he did online coursework here, but mentioned here that he was out of school, so it sounds like it must have been a very half-hearted effort…), came back to australia over the uk summer to do some more karting, then began boarding in september 2016 as a year 10 student. he spent ~4 years there and eventually received his a-levels in 2020, except his final year was disrupted by covid and he never sat his exams. (blog post mentioning his a-levels + btg transcript excerpt about his exams; his website says he attended haileybury from 2016-19, but i think this mainly encapsulates his boarding period, as he was still doing remote work in april 2020.)

oscar in f4 with his gcse revision guide, 📸 sebastiaan rozendaal (may 20, 2018)

2016 is also when oscar began his well-documented super-liking of several of lando's social media profiles. i think understanding oscar's time in rfm and his extremely british single-seater origins helps better paint his history with lando and maxf; my personal understanding of pre-mclaren landoscar is that while oscar never formally met lando or maxf during his karting days, he knew of them quite well through rfm and thus followed them on instagram/twitter after moving to the uk. of course, oscar has a fairly active social media presence in general, so young oscar quietly liked instagram posts and tweets from many different people, but i do feel compelled to note that in the early days he liked lando, maxf, and logan's posts with seriously impressive frequency compared to anyone else on the grid (or anyone in general, really); after creating his twitter account in may 2016, some of the very first tweets oscar liked were from maxf, and he also liked a multitude of mundane lando tweets from 2016 until… today, while on the other hand he didn't start liking george's tweets—another similarly-aged young british talent—until late 2017. (he does have some fun george-admiring moments though, but that can wait for another time!) outside of rfm, other people oscar was familiar with during his early racing years were british f4 teammate ayrton simmons, to-be series champion jamie caroline, and old australian karting friend christian pancione, who appears to still be one of his best mates (if not his best) as of today. fun fact is that christian raced for the carrera cup as a support event to the australian gp in 2023; here's oscar allegedly checking the quali live timing at lunch during his own media day. 

so, to conclude, oscar's early lando focus basically traces back to the motorsport path he took at the behest and guidance of his early rfm connections in the uk. the thing is that despite growing up in australia and vaguely admiring several aussie drivers in f1 as a child (read: mark webber and eventually daniel ricciardo), oscar has never had a specific driver he consistently mentions when pressed for his racing "idol," likely since his personality inherently resists idolatry and he instead views successful people more as actionable benchmarks or reference points for self-improvement rather than as unattainable paragons of accomplishment. as a kid forced to grow up almost entirely on his own, the majority of his racing aspirations were molded independently in the uk—he completed his karting career in the uk, boarded at haileybury for 4 years (fun fact: other drivers to attend include jehan, callum ilott, and clément novalak; callum was a few years above oscar and finished school in 2017, but the two would later become quite talkative over social media anyway), raced in british f4, became a brdc member, contested eurocup under a british license and therefore had the british flag raised and british national anthem played during his wins, stayed in the uk even at alpine since the factory is based in enstone, etc. oscar basically moved to the uk from australia without having really met anyone significant in the racing scene (other than jack doohan, or more importantly jack's father mick, but jack is younger and did an extra year of karting) and pretty much didn't have anyone specific to "look up to" at the time. oscar's first acknowledgement of lando's online existence was in december 2015, when he liked one of lando's instagram posts prior to moving to england, so it can be assumed that lando basically functioned as his most accessible reference point in the junior ladder as a 14 year old dipping his toes into the european racing scene for the first time. that is my highly subjective analysis of the situation!

select quotes re: oscar's inconsistent responses to his motorsport "hero" (or his favorite driver / a driver he looks up to in general):

(f1fs; mar 9, 2022) "i started watching f1 in… 2009 was the first season i properly watched. so when brawn came in, obviously mark was the only aussie on the grid at that point, so i was kind of naturally going for him. then joined by daniel, so obviously going to support the aussies, but i think watching lewis has been nothing short of spectacular, and a very good role model. [...] i think when i was first watching, i supported mark, but, you know, and i hope he takes no offense to this—vettel was winning everything at that point. so i was supporting mark, but vettel was doing most of the winning. i think now that i understand more about racing though, i would say [the driver i look up to the most is] lewis, mainly. the way he goes about things on and off the track is quite exceptional."

(mcl youtube; mar 29, 2023) sporting idols mentioned: ayrton senna, alain prost, michael jordan (see also ultimate athletes list)

(p1; aug 10, 2023) "i would say i never had like one specific idol. when i was growing up watching mark webber was at red bull, and obviously being australian, red bull being very quick at the time, i kind of naturally followed him. i mean—even like some of the guys in the junior ranks above me. like lando was always kind of two, three years above me, winning… most things on his way up. so i guess kind of him in some ways?"

(eff won; dec 4, 2023) "i don’t really have like one specific [idol]. i think what lewis has been able to do in terms of getting to seven world championships was incredibly impressive. i think what max is doing now is also very impressive…" 

the first lando post oscar liked on instagram (dec 21, 2015)

the first maxf posts oscar liked; instagram (feb 26, 2016) & twitter (may 9, 2016)

anyway, back to british f4! despite his initially unconventional foray into motorsport, oscar's journey progressed in a much more orderly fashion once he stepped up to single-seaters. his actual debut was in f4 uae, which he ran 3 rounds of between 2016 and 2017 (another fun fact: this is where he briefly acquainted himself with mclaren indycar driver david malukas, who would later recall him being very intelligent and whom zak brown allegedly spoke to oscar about before appointing to their indy team). after cutting his teeth on actual car-racing for the first time, oscar decided against moving up to the ok class as he felt confident in his ability to be competitive in single-seaters. his first full season was therefore the 2017 british f4 championship, during which oscar signed with arden while logan went to reigning champions carlin (lando had won with them in 2015, then maxf in 2016). oscar made his way to the top step 6 times in the season and placed just barely above logan for 2nd in the championship, finishing behind the considerably more experienced jamie caroline. arden was also founded and is currently owned by red bull team principal christian horner, so it was during oscar's time there that christian took note of and interest in his talent; oscar reportedly did a few runs in the red bull simulator but was passed over for joining the academy, which christian later voiced regret on. (source)

maxf, logan (center), and oscar (to max's right) on a day maxf was visiting the 2017 british f4 grid (april 11, 2017)

linus lundqvist, oscar, and logan on the podium at snetterton (jul 30, 2017)

jamie and oscar, who were… er, mathematically in the main championship fight. for some reason they made them take these photos (sep 30, 2017)

after a successful f4 outing with arden, oscar returned to the team for his first season of formula renault eurocup in 2018, a renault series that ran in its specific configuration until 2020 before merging with the parallel regional series frec to become what is today known as freca. this season proved to be less competitive for oscar, as arden was relatively inexperienced in this series and oscar's three teammates were afflicted with what can colloquially be referred to as a "skill issue," making it difficult to collectively develop the car throughout the season. (blog interview) the series was thus returning driver maxf's to lose, who at the time was racing for reigning champs r-ace with teammates that included oscar's fellow rookies logan and victor martins.

despite the unideal environment, oscar managed to prove his worth by placing a respectable 8th in the series, scoring 110 points as a rookie driver and capping the season off with 3 podiums and a top-finish of 2nd place—a jarring contrast to his teammates' joint total of 12 points. this result attracted the attention of r-ace and granted him a seat with them for the 2019 season, at which point maxf and logan both graduated to f3. thankfully that wasn't too much of a concern for oscar since he'd always intended to do two seasons of eurocup, and now he finally had a chance to win the first serious championship of his racing career with an established racing outfit.

oscar, max, and yifei ye on the hockenheim r2 podium (sep 23, 2018) [full gifset]

oscar's second season of eurocup is when he truly started proving himself as a driver, or at least to the people whose names, money, and opinions mattered around the paddock. his main competition in 2019 was again victor, who was now racing for mp and had been made a member of the renault sport academy back in 2018 after a strong performance in french f4. despite a close title fight, oscar managed to hold him off for the championship in the final race of the season, kicking off what would soon become an impressive string of consecutive single-seater series titles. even sweeter was the fact that all eurocup champions were awarded a renault sport academy spot that could be left or taken as they pleased, and of course—while the finances weren't nearly as impressive as alpine would later proclaim in their baseless smear campaign—oscar's connections in the racing world were limited as an australian driver almost exclusively managed by his father, so he gladly accepted the offer for the many venues of support renault presented to him.

see also: bby oscar briefly mentioning lando after winning eurocup in 2019 (@ 1:10)

oscar being lifted by his team (r-ace) after placing 4th in the abu dhabi finale and winning the title by 7.5 points

3. renault sport academy, lockdown, f3 (2020)

many things happened in 2020. one: oscar became an official member of the renault sport academy, joining the likes of max (who'd been picked up on merit after winning british f4 in 2017), guanyu, christian lundgaard, caio collett, and fellow new recruit hadrien david (victor had been strategically demoted after oscar's win because renault is a notoriously unserious organization, but again this is not the post). two: by the time oscar was ready for f3, moving up the ladder proved to be exorbitantly expensive, and he realized he needed better funds and managerial support to sort his career out. he'd been offered a spot in prema's f3 team by team-owner rené rosin at the end of his eurocup season, who'd named him for the post-season test before the championship was over and stressed that the spot was his no matter where he finished. (source) prema is unquestionably one of the top—if not frequently the top—teams one can drive for in most junior series (though there is also somewhat of a self-selection bias; if you ask oscar he is not a significant beneficiary of prematax!), having absolutely demolished the f3 competition that same year and achieved a clean sweep of the drivers' standings with rob shwartzman, marcus armstrong, and jehan at 1-2-3 consecutively. oscar completed post-season testing with them in spain alongside to-be teammates logan and fred vesti in october (source), before confirming on jan 26, 2020 that he would be joining them for the f3 season as a renault junior.

so, where does mark webber come in here? apparently mark's trainer from red bull and wec had also been oscar's trainer since 2016 (i'm pretty sure this is australian physiologist simon sostaric), and it was through their joint connection that oscar was introduced to mark. according to mclaren's 2023 season preview, "the pair hit it off, and webber took his countryman under his wing," signing oscar to jam sports management, aka the management agency he runs with his wife ann. mark's support would become a major factor in helping oscar progress through the feeder ranks and establish himself in f1, mainly because he had actual connections and could help oscar network with sponsors and negotiate his way during future signings. of course, more on this later.

as an aside, here are a few things mark has said about oscar:

"he’s got that white line fever when he puts his helmet on and turns into a different character, which is sensational." (mar 1, 2020)

"one of oscar’s biggest strengths by a mile, compared to everyone he is competing against — and this will be a huge string to his bow when he makes it to f1 — is his composure. he has immense levels of composure. [...] if you are weak mentally you won’t make it. he was on his own from an early age. he did brilliantly with his studies. but the racing disease would not go away, he wants it very much." (sydney morning herald; dec 11, 2021)

"he’s a prost, mate. he’s such a thinker and so calm. at first i thought i needed to inject a bit of urgency in him, but actually no, he’s got his own frequency. that’s just where he is." (the race; oct 7, 2023)

estimates provided by chris piastri on the cost of oscar's junior career, stressing the million-dollar commitments of running a single season of f3 or f2 (source)

anyway, back to the chaotic events of 2020. i think something that's good to keep in mind when discussing oscar's time in the renault sport academy is that he was actually a relatively new recruit, as in he only participated in a single training camp with the other juniors in 2020 and most of them (max, christian, guanyu, the temporary ghost of victor) already knew each other before. oscar essentially met with renault's factory team in early 2020, filmed promotional material with other juniors in january before attending the season opener together in february and then heading to winter training camp later that month, after which he and max left early for f3 pre-season testing in bahrain on march 1—a blessing in disguise, seeing as caio, hadrien, and christian remained behind and would soon be stuck quaranting in a hotel in tenerife—then briefly spent a week at school before returning home for what was meant to be a quick pit stop at the australian gp, which at the time had yet to be canceled.

then, of course, lockdown happened.

simplified breakdown of renault junior stints, notably showcasing the academy's struggles to meaningfully promote any of its juniors

oscar at the 2020 renault season opener alongside then-academy director mia sharizman, then-tp cyril abiteboul, alain prost, f1 drivers esteban ocon and daniel ricciardo, and the other academy juniors: fewtrell, lundgaard, zhou, david (feb 12, 2020)

oscar and maxf behind the scenes of the same event (feb 12, 2020)

stuck in australia for three months, oscar would end up participating in two fia virtual races, one for f2 and another for f1 (jun 7, 2020). a fun landoscar tidbit is that he finished 5th in the virtual gp right behind lando, so they technically had raced each other before 2023, depending on... well, whether you count a 2020 sim race wherein george russell and alex albon lead the pack as a real race. nevertheless, this was a time when drivers were becoming much more active online, seeing as streaming was the best way to keep their images relevant and connect with fans, and despite oscar expressing little interest in streaming on twitch he would still experience a considerable uptick in his online activity and twitter reach that year.

racing resumed on july 4 at the red bull ring in austria; oscar had been granted an exemption to travel to the uk and complete a 2-week quarantine back on may 27, a reassuring indicator to the motorsport world that the f3 season would run after all. now that he no longer had to attend school, having received 2 b's and 1 c for his maths, physics, and computer science a-levels, oscar relocated from hertford to oxford in june to be near the renault facilities, which he visited nearly every day to train at, and began living independently (as in in a flat) for the first time since 2016, rooming with fellow renault junior caio collet.

as i said before, this season is when oscar's online presence and "memeability" began to really conceptualize, enabled primarily by the fact that he was a) finally living outside of a school dormitory, and b) now, of course, signed at prema, a team notorious for its social media visibility, literal family atmosphere, and frequent youtube pandering. according to this f3 article, his twitter followers jumped from 795 at the start of the season to 11.6k by the time he won the championship, an audience built significantly off the self-deprecating string of jokes he used to tweet regarding drs and general reliability issues faced throughout the season.

what i guess i want to touch on here is how oscar's online presence has always been concentrated around the bare fundamentals of his personality: dry humor, candid words, sparing emojis, a few humorous photos detailing the mundane reality of his everyday routines, and at most the occasional inopportune meme or reaction gif (#thepiastri 🤷‍♂️, f2 in baku, jetpack guy, so on). he's bantered frequently with callum on twitter and near-obsessively liked memes, videos, and other updates lando shares with his audience, but he also has seemingly little interest in building up his own "brand" the way lando so smartly has with ln4 and quadrant, and quite frankly seems viscerally incapable of wanting to engage one-to-one with fans or otherwise leveraging the popularity of his material image. basically what i like to say is that oscar enjoys being adjacent to "lad humor" and will happily enable it, but he really has no interest in being the one to initiate it himself!

"there's some things you want to share, some things you don’t. in today's age and sort of having the profile that us drivers do, we kind of just have everything shared,” piastri said. “but (social media) can be used for good, certainly within the profiles that we have. but in some ways, it can be negative, and there's always going to be people out there that don't like you for being you.” piastri tries to write as many of his posts as possible, and he checks those written by his team to be sure they sound authentically him. (the athletic; jun 29, 2023)

along these lines, oscar does enjoy the spotlight, only he seems to prefer it concentrated in a specific lens toward a specific productive end. he's endlessly capable of seeing the objective upside of a situation, joking after he was made a meme in baku following his f2 sr1 collision that he was all for it if it got him popularity. after his eurocup championship he also said: "i think everyone loves a bit of spotlight on them. i think that's just human nature, so a bit of attention's always nice." which is interesting to me!

but back to racing. this season would unexpectedly become two things: maxf's last competitive season in motorsport—especially disappointing considering that he'd gone into the championship expecting to put on a second-season title charge, instead failing to gel with the hitech team to the point that each increasingly poor weekend made him spiral mentally—as well as oscar and logan's last season racing against each other before f1, since logan would later encounter financial difficulties that left him stranded in f3 as oscar catapulted himself to f2 victory. 2020 was obviously a weird season in general because of covid and the gap from pre-season testing, so it also meant that oscar had gone into the season fairly rusty; he managed to win the first race of the season, but on top of his drs rollercoaster he did struggle with middling results in qualifying and was met step-by-step throughout the championship by logan.

maxf's last race in f3 was the barcelona sprint race on august 16, with three rounds left to the end of the season. he dnfed in an unfortunate first-lap incident mere moments after oscar charged his way up from 5th on the grid to the front of the pack, where he would eventually breeze his way to victory and pull himself near-level with logan for the championship lead. i recognize that this is an oscar post and not a maxf post, but i think their time in f3 during an extremely isolated and covid-affected period speaks to both an interesting dynamic between them (the little kid who always lagged a series behind you suddenly beating you on merit) and their respective temperaments toward racing. while at renault, max reportedly lived with jack aitken during the week but would return to his family home on weekends, so it makes sense that he struggled to adapt when covid hit and drivers were collectively forced into very regimented sporting bubbles. mark webber, who worked for channel 4 as a commentator and had access to the f1 paddock, basically couldn't see oscar in person and instead spoke to him over the phone every day on race weekends. maxf said of his decision to quit:

"normally [...] i’m able to stay calm under pressure and i don’t let many things get to me but when you have a bad qualifying result and you see guys up there that you know you’re capable of beating, it definitely takes a dig at you inside and it’s been a lot to process throughout the year." (source)

while then-academy director mia sharizman, who worked closely with the renault juniors, spoke of oscar's inherent propensity for independence and how he adapted well to the pressures of living on his own:

"if you look at oscar piastri, he has been living on his own, [away] from his family who are in melbourne for the past five to six years. because he has been living on his own in boarding school, he learns how to live on his own, and he thrives in that. we have to force him... 'have you spoken to your father?!' it's just things like that, but he thrives in that. that's why he thrived in those weekends racing. he loves being on his own without anybody. on the other hand, we had max fewtrell, for example, who can't – he couldn't survive the 11 weekends racing, because he always needed his family to be around him. so those are the things that suddenly you see and, i think that that we see now, after a few years a driver who is quick, a driver who has the talent, and then the driver who is stable." (source)

2020 is also when lando and oscar spoke to each other on twitter for the first time. yay! after lando went semi-viral for having a meltdown over a hornet on three separate social media platforms, oscar first joked with him about it on august 24 (this was incidentally also the day maxf announced his functional retirement, which oscar liked as well 😭), before referencing the incident again a few weeks later in september.

(aug 24, 2020) / (sep 10, 2020)

outside of drs tweets and trying desperately to banter with lando norris, oscar's popular tweets at the time included several food-related mishaps and home appliance tragedies. while this isn't actually a lando moment, he was also slandered by the LN4 twitter account a month later on october 17 for reasons that remain a mystery, resulting in this set of interactions:

(oct 17, 2020) / (oct 19, 2020)

bonus: maxf's tweets @ oscar (when you aren't close enough to just text him.......)

but back to f3. similarly to his second season of eurocup, oscar would go on to clinch the title in only the final race of the year, this time even more stressfully—he never got pole that season and won arguably off of consistency, benefiting from errors and unfortunate collisions involving his primary competitors. after a hectic qualifying and string of contentious grid penalties set for the before-last round in monza, he began the feature race 15th on the grid but put on an impressive performance to finish on the podium, buffing his points lead after logan was tapped by clément and put out of the points. he, logan, and fred all dnfed in race 2 (read: the novalak pendulum swung away from oscar's favor to maintain stringent cosmic equilibrium, while logan and fred threw away a points opportunity with a teammate4teammate love tap), and oscar went into mugello with only an 8-point lead over logan and a 24-point lead over pourchaire. this weekend proved equally hectic, as is frequently the case with f3 racing standards, but in short oscar and logan entered the final sprint race level on points, with théo approaching terrifyingly near in their rearview mirrors. logan was unceremoniously taken out of contention on the first lap after contact with zendeli, and oscar managed to squeak his way to 164 points in the championship by placing 7th in the race; théo finished 3rd, with 161 points, two positions away from claiming both the race and the championship title.

a succinct summary of an eventful season! (posted jun 30, 2021)

despite winning the f3 championship in far-from-dominant fashion, oscar's career was now steadily on an upward trend. on october 30 he was rewarded with a private test in the r.s.18 at bahrain alongside christian and guanyu, and a month later confirmed that he would be racing for prema again in f2 (december 1, 2020). as a rookie f3 champion there was a moderate amount of interest in him, but no one really expected him to carry home the f2 title on his first try and so one of the main favorites going into the next season was his second-year teammate and 2019 f3 champion rob shwartzman.

4. f2, alpine reserve duties, #piastrigate (2021-2022)

at the start of 2021, fernando officially took daniel's place at renault and the team rebranded itself as alpine, parting ways with team principal cyril abiteboul and functionally replacing him with new ceo laurent rossi—part of a no-tp management structure, frankly a self-evident infrastructural faux-pas from a million miles away. the renault sport academy was then also renamed to alpine academy; again i know that this is an oscar post so i won't get too into the details of Alpine Being Alpine, but understanding how the academy functioned does help better contextualize the inevitable unfurling of piastrigate.

the main issue, really, would always be laurent rossi, or at least the values laurent rossi had been hired to represent and which he willingly peddled during his controversial tenure at alpine. after rossi's appointment it was reported that "the renamed alpine academy was now being tugged in two directions between director mia sharizman's ideal as a creator of future f1 drivers and alpine's chief executive officer laurent rossi's commercially-led preferences." (source) mia directed the academy from january 2016 until may 2022, and had been the one to restructure its recruitment process by demanding better funding and robust testing programs to cyril:

"when we first restarted the team in 2016, it was, we didn't even have a two-year-old car program at that time. we had to use a 2012 program using the [lotus] e20. [...] then in 2018, i went through it, and i said to cyril abiteboul, "look, let's try and do this." we needed financial resources. i needed a head start with financial resources to kick start the program whereby you entice drivers, and you offer [a place] to the academy drivers. it was more to see how they are... it was more of an evaluation process... that was what the first idea was. then we developed the program to develop the drivers to suit their formual 2 program." (source)

(note: mia also believed that 2020 was a disappointing year for all of his juniors save for oscar's performance in f3, which is a whole other thing. but rossi's greatest shortcoming was that he had singular, insulated vision, and he resisted any external input to the detriment of reactionary business decisions, a fact that alienated alain prost and soon led to his exit from the outfit in 2022. not a good look!!! prost would later call rossi "the best example of the dunning-kruger effect, that of an incapable leader who thinks himself able to overcome his incompetence with his arrogance and lack of humanity toward his troops." 🤌)

so basically, the cracks of mind-boggling incompetence within the team's leadership structure were long evident. on a brighter note, oscar's 2021 f2 season would quickly become his strongest single-seater contest ever (f1 youtube has a good summarizing video of his season, if interested); because of covid, f2 was experimenting with a three-race format this year in which quali set the reverse grid for sr1 and sr1 results then set the reverse grid for sr2, which essentially meant high qualifiers were rewarded for simply maintaining composure in the first sprint and running cleanly in the top 10 in order to secure a favorable grid spot in sr2. oscar adapted well to this format, building off his reputation of smooth, consistent driving on top of slowly improving his qualifying results over the course of the season, finally breaking through with his first feature-race win in monza. 

oscar with mia sharizman

this is also around the time when lando mentioned oscar in official f1 media for the first time, reading off a question about him to daniel in an interview posted in october:

"this one's not even about formula one. it's about oscar piastri. oscar pias-tree! [...] he's been on it this year." — (full video) (oct 1, 2021)

of his own f2 campaign, oscar said:

"i thought that i could challenge for race wins, but i probably wasn't expecting to be so consistently at the front. consistency is something that i’ve had as a trait throughout my career, and i was expecting to be consistent in my results this year — but maybe a bit lower down!" (source)

not only did he end up being consistently at the front, he became virtually unstoppable in the second half of the season. on december 11, oscar clinched the title in abu dhabi with two races to spare, ending the season with 5 consecutive poles and 4 consecutive feature wins, 60.5 points above his previously-favored teammate in the standings. #notbadforashitqualifier!

by now oscar was a hot commodity in the paddock; the only problem was that alpine didn't really care, mainly because rossi had enthusiastically re-signed ocon to a three-year deal in 2021 and held zero intention of actually promoting any of its juniors to one of the race seats, plus the one open spot at alfa romeo had instead gone to guanyu and his considerable financial package (though oscar has always been vocally defensive of guanyu's appointment to his detractors). instead of moving to another series, such as indycar or super formula, oscar recognized that he'd proven everything he needed to prove within the feeder system and opted to remain on the grid as alpine's reserve driver, mainly so that he could embed himself in an f1 team environment and—most crucially—avoid being left "out of sight, out of mind," because once you go to america you usually don't come back.

i'll keep the rest of this post brief since i feel like everyone already knows What Went Down, but a quick highlight for fellow landoscar enjoyers was the 2022 australian gp on april 10, during which oscar accompanied rosanna tennant for the post-race show and awkwardly participated in a chaotic lando & alex interview. as far as i know, this was landoscar's first time interacting on-camera!

o: "i haven't raced either of them, no." l: "not yet!" o: "not yet. hopefully soon." — (full video) (apr 10, 2022)

then silly season started, and everything was thrown into disarray when sebastian vettel announced his imminent retirement and fernando subsequently took his place at aston martin; alpine scrambled to recover from this blindsided move and prematurely promoted oscar to an f1 seat, to which oscar eventually posted The Tweet—claiming he'd never signed a contract with alpine and would not be racing for them in 2023, thus kicking off #piastrigate. or the piasco, or whatever you prefer to call it.

here's a good article that properly summarizes the crb ruling, but tl;dr: mclaren and alpine had come to an agreement back in march to loan oscar to mclaren's stable of reserve drivers after daniel contracted covid; mark webber, who was close to andreas seidl from their time at porsche in wec, quietly negotiated a contract with mclaren for 2023 that oscar would then sign on july 4, which was reportedly initially a reserve deal with an upgrade clause to a full-time drive given a dr buyout; alpine's legal team turned out to be essentially one overworked legal director who mishandled the situation thanks to a lack of organizational support, while a concrete williams deal never actually existed no matter what people continuously allege, and any proprietary right to oscar's services that alpine purported to have for the 2023 season would soon be voided by crb rule on september 2. in other words, they dun goofed.

because tumblr dies when i try to include it in this post, here's a link to a condensed chronological timeline version of this post.

that's it for now. i'm sure you know how the rest goes!!!

[eretzyisrael]

Good News From Israel

Israel's Good News Newsletter to 26th May 24

In the 26th May 24 edition of Israel’s good news, the highlights include:

Israeli technology helps Irish doctors early-diagnose potentially fatal diseases.

Another female designer of Israeli missile defense systems.

200 Israeli hi-tech engineers donate their time to develop life-saving solutions.

An Israeli startup removes a greenhouse gas far more potent than CO2.

The first Israeli auto-industry company to set up a factory in India.

A world record is broken during an Israeli soccer match.

2000-year-old Jewish emblems discovered in a Palestinian-Arab village.

Read More: Good News From Israel

One of the traditional International ways to show respect to someone is to remove your hat on greeting them. So the expression "Hats off to Israel" is very appropriate for those who appreciate what Israel has contributed to the world. 

In this week's Positive newsletter are reminders to the President of Ireland that Israeli technology is saving many lives in a Dublin hospital. The President of Brazil should note that an Israeli blood testing machine is early diagnosing fatal diseases in his country.  And the President of Syria need only ask his Israeli neighbor to treat his wife with one of Israel's many remedies for Acute Myeloid Leukemia.

Meanwhile the UN, ICJ and ICC should bare their heads in shame, knowing that Israeli companies last week announced new treatments for liver cancer, electronic patches to kill bacteria infections, electromagnetic brain rehabilitation after strokes, implants to repair the spine, and remote medical diagnostics in thousands of schools.

Then there are the Israeli innovations for ultra-fast charging of electric vehicles, real-time CCTV security systems, lab alternatives to overfishing, and the removal of a greenhouse gas far more potent than carbon dioxide.

The photo (TY Sharon) shows the respect to Israel given by the many International military officers who attended the Diplomatic reception at the Jerusalem residence of the President of Israel on Israel's Independence Day.  Their message was certainly "Hats Off" to Israel!

[lonestarflight]

"View of the Columbia's remote manipulator system

The darkness of space provides the backdrop for this scene of the plasma diagnostics package (PDR) experiment in the grasp of the end effector or 'hand' of the remote manipulator system (RMS) arm [aka Canadarm], and other components of the Office of Space Sciences (OSS-1) package in the aft section of the Columbia?s cargo hold. The PDP is a compact, comprehensive assembly of electromagnetic and particle sensors that will be used to study the interaction of the orbiter with its surrounding environment; to test the capabilities of the shuttle?s remote manipulator system; and to carry out experiments in conjunction with the fast pulse electron generator of the vehicle charging and potential experiment, another experiment on the OSS-1 payload pallet. This photograph was exposed with a 70mm handheld camera by the astronaut crew of STS-3, with a handheld camera aimed through the flight deck's aft window."

Date: March 22-30, 1982

NASA ID: STS003-09-444

[michaelbracewell11]

Driving Savvy: Saving Large with Kia Connect Promo Codes from SuperShopperHub

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[sports9885]

Global remote diagnostics systems for heavy commercial vehicles market was valued at USD 320.40 million in 2021 and is expected to reach USD 1057.67 million by 2029, registering a CAGR of 16.10% during the forecast period of 2022-2029. 

[awesome-casuallyfamouscollector]

It looks like a regular Tesla Wall Connector, but like the Magic Dock, it can become an integrated J1772 adapter:

Otherwise, it has all the same specs as Tesla’s regular home charging solution:

Up to 44 miles of range added per hour at 11.5 kW / 48-amp output

Integrated J1772 adapter to conveniently charge any electric vehicle

Auto-sensing handle to open a Tesla charge port

Monitor and manage your charging schedule and usage from the Tesla app

Wi-Fi connectivity for over-the-air updates, remote diagnostics, and access controls

Versatile indoor/outdoor design

Variable amperage configurations depending on installation location

Power-share with up to six Wall Connectors

24-foot cable length

Four-year warranty for residential use(..)

P.S. Tesla is making another very well-thought-out strategic move to strengthen its position in the US car market, offering a cheap and efficient solution for all electric car owners to charge their cars at home. It is quite clear that the legacy automakers with their technically outdated, moreover rather expensive ICE vehicles and compliance EVs are rapidly losing the battle against Tesla...

[airsolutionscanada]

Receive the Benefits From Preventative Maintenance

Air Solutions Canada believes in preventative maintenance programs.

Neglecting to maintain equipment can lead to it breaking down. The most expensive repairs are usually caused by neglect. It doesn't even take into consideration the costs of your plant going down, or the rental equipment needed during repairs.

We encourage clients to think about preventative maintenance as they do vehicle maintenance.

Do you change your tires when they start to wear or wait until you have an accident on the highway to do so? Do you change your oil every 5,000 kilometers or wait until you have a car that is leaking blue smoke?

However, nobody enjoys having to pay for something they don't really need. This is what we understand. Sometimes maintenance plans can seem expensive and unneeded. Even if your machine is running well, why invest in it?

Air Solutions Canada is a provider of turnkey industrial compressed-air solutions since 1997. Since 1997, we have provided turnkey industrial compressed air solutions to thousands of customers in the GTA as well as throughout Southwestern Ontario. Regular preventative maintenance has many benefits. Neglecting to maintain your system can lead to serious problems.

How can I save money on my company's preventative maintenance program?

You can save money when preventative maintenance is done on time and by qualified staff using quality parts, lubricants, or air tools in Canada. While you may need to spend some money on labour and parts, this is a reasonable investment that will reduce downtime, which can often be exponentially more costly.

Here are some specific results from an air compressor break down:

Lost production

Compressor rental fees (including hook up)

Inconvenience

Refuelling

Rush shipping

Emergency repair costs

Fast decision making

Catastrophic failure that goes beyond economic repair

Unplanned or unbudgeted replacement costs

Panic and Stress

Although it is difficult to place a dollar value on them, you are well aware of the toll they can take.

Is there technology to predict maintenance issues?

We are authorized to sell and install Kaeser's Sigma Air Manager 4.0 system (SAM) as a Kaeser dealer. SAM integrates all the components of your compressed gas system, monitors and analyzes performance in real time and provides alarms and warnings.

Remote diagnostics combined with need-based preventative management ensures maximum reliability in compressed air supply. Permanent availability of compressed system process data and the resulting analysis makes it possible to determine the best time for your compressed air system to be maintained and serviced.

What specific businesses preventative maintenance plans work well for?

Preventative maintenance plans are available for any customer, no matter how large or small. No matter how small the company is, it doesn't really matter whether they are a 1-person operation with a 3HP piston compressor, or a 1,000 person plant with a 5k HP compressor.

Our customers include all industries that use compressed air, including food, beverage, dairy, pharmaceuticals, automotive, paper, electronic, etc.

Air Solutions Canada 29 Innovation Dr, Dundas, ON L9H 7L8 +1-647-691-5694 https://airsolcan.com/

[orlandoequipment]

The Evolution of On-Site Heavy Equipment Repair: Trends and Innovations

In the world of construction and heavy machinery, efficiency and uptime are paramount. The evolution of on-site heavy equipment repair reflects the industry’s growing need for rapid, cost-effective solutions to keep machinery running smoothly. As technology advances and demands shift, several trends and innovations are reshaping how on-site repairs are performed. This blog explores these changes and highlights how they’re transforming the heavy equipment repair landscape.

The Shift from Traditional Repair Methods

Traditionally, heavy equipment repair involved transporting malfunctioning machines to a service shop, which often resulted in extended downtime and increased costs. The process was time-consuming, and any delays in repairs could impact project timelines and productivity. Recognizing these inefficiencies, the industry began shifting toward on-site repair solutions, allowing technicians to perform maintenance and repairs at the equipment's location. This shift not only reduced downtime but also minimized transportation costs and logistical challenges.

Emerging Trends in On-Site Heavy Equipment Repair

1. Integration of Advanced Diagnostics

One of the most significant advancements in on-site heavy equipment repair is the integration of advanced diagnostic tools. Modern machinery is equipped with sophisticated sensors and diagnostic systems that provide real-time data on equipment performance. Technicians can use these tools to quickly identify issues, analyze performance trends, and determine the root cause of problems. This data-driven approach allows for more accurate and efficient repairs, reducing the likelihood of recurring issues and improving overall equipment reliability.

2. Mobile Repair Units

Mobile repair units have become a cornerstone of on-site heavy equipment repair. These specialized vehicles are equipped with a full range of tools and parts necessary to perform various repairs and maintenance tasks. Mobile units are designed to be self-sufficient, featuring onboard inventory, diagnostic equipment, and repair tools. The convenience of having a fully equipped repair shop on wheels allows technicians to address issues promptly and effectively, often resolving problems in a single visit.

3. Enhanced Training and Certification

As the complexity of heavy machinery increases, so does the need for skilled technicians. Training and certification programs have evolved to keep pace with technological advancements. Technicians now receive specialized training in the latest diagnostic tools, repair techniques, and safety protocols. This continuous education ensures that on-site repair professionals are well-equipped to handle the sophisticated systems found in modern heavy equipment. Enhanced training also contributes to improved repair quality and reduced service times.

4. Remote Monitoring and Support

Remote monitoring has revolutionized on-site heavy equipment repair by allowing technicians to monitor equipment performance from afar. Through the use of IoT (Internet of Things) technology, machines can transmit data to a central system, where it is analyzed and used to predict potential issues before they become critical. Remote support services enable technicians to provide guidance and troubleshooting assistance without being physically present. This proactive approach helps in scheduling maintenance activities and prevents unexpected breakdowns, ultimately improving equipment uptime.

5. Sustainable Practices

Sustainability has become a significant focus in the heavy equipment industry, and on-site repair services are no exception. Innovations in repair practices emphasize the use of eco-friendly materials and techniques. For example, the recycling of parts and the use of energy-efficient tools are becoming standard practices. On-site repair services are increasingly adopting sustainable practices to reduce environmental impact and align with industry regulations aimed at promoting greener operations.

The Future of On-Site Heavy Equipment Repair

Looking ahead, the future of on-site heavy equipment repair promises even more exciting developments. The continued evolution of digital technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning, will further enhance diagnostic capabilities and predictive maintenance. As these technologies become more sophisticated, they will enable even greater efficiency and accuracy in on-site repairs.

Additionally, advancements in augmented reality (AR) may provide technicians with real-time, interactive support, overlaying digital information on physical equipment to assist in repairs. These innovations will not only streamline repair processes but also enhance the skill set of technicians, ensuring they can handle the complexities of modern machinery.

Conclusion

The evolution of on-site heavy equipment repair in Orlando, FL reflects the industry's ongoing efforts to enhance efficiency, reduce downtime, and adapt to technological advancements. From advanced diagnostics and mobile repair units to remote monitoring and sustainable practices, these innovations are transforming how repairs are performed. As the industry continues to evolve, on-site heavy equipment repair will remain a critical component in maintaining the functionality and productivity of heavy machinery, driving progress and success in the construction and heavy equipment sectors.

[oliviajane0208]

How Will VR Training Transform Automotive Training and Maintenance? 

In the fast-evolving landscape of automotive technology, virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) stand poised to revolutionize the way professionals are trained and how maintenance tasks are carried out. As these immersive technologies become more accessible and advanced, their integration into automotive training and maintenance procedures holds the promise of enhancing efficiency, safety, and effectiveness across the industry.

Enhancing Training Through Immersive Experiences

One of the most significant advantages of VR/AR in automotive training lies in their ability to create immersive learning experiences. Traditional training methods often involve textbooks, lectures, and hands-on practice on real vehicles. While these methods are effective to a certain extent, they may fall short in providing comprehensive understanding and practical skills development.

VR offers trainees the opportunity to interact with virtual automotive systems in a realistic environment without the risk of damage to vehicles or equipment. Trainees can explore the intricacies of engine components, electrical systems, and diagnostic procedures in a simulated setting. AR, on the other hand, overlays digital information onto the physical world, allowing trainees to receive real-time guidance and instructions while working on actual vehicles.

By immersing trainees in lifelike scenarios, VR and AR training modules can accelerate learning curves, improve retention of information, and foster better decision-making skills. Moreover, these technologies can be tailored to specific training objectives and skill levels, catering to both novice technicians and experienced professionals.

Streamlining Maintenance Procedures with Augmented Reality

In the realm of automotive maintenance, AR holds the potential to streamline workflows and enhance efficiency. Maintenance technicians often face complex tasks that require referencing technical manuals, schematics, and diagnostic procedures. Traditional methods of accessing this information, such as printed manuals or digital screens, can be cumbersome and time-consuming, leading to delays and errors in the maintenance process.

AR solutions address these challenges by overlaying relevant information directly onto the technician's field of view through smart glasses or heads-up displays. Imagine a technician wearing AR glasses while performing a diagnostic check on an engine. As they inspect various components, relevant data, such as service manuals, diagnostic codes, and step-by-step instructions, are displayed in real-time, enabling the technician to work hands-free and with greater precision.

Furthermore, AR can facilitate remote assistance, allowing technicians to collaborate with experts located elsewhere in the world. Through live video feeds and AR annotations, remote experts can guide on-site technicians through complex repairs and troubleshooting procedures, reducing downtime and minimizing the need for expensive travel.

Driving Safety and Quality Assurance

Beyond improving efficiency and effectiveness, the integration of VR/AR into automotive training and maintenance also has implications for safety and quality assurance. By providing trainees with realistic simulations of hazardous scenarios, VR training modules can instill safety protocols and emergency procedures in a controlled environment, minimizing the risk of accidents and injuries in real-world situations.

Similarly, AR-enabled maintenance procedures can ensure that technicians adhere to standardized protocols and best practices, reducing the likelihood of errors and oversights. Digital overlays can highlight critical components, indicate proper torque specifications, and flag potential safety hazards, thereby enhancing the quality and reliability of maintenance work.

The Road Ahead

As VR/AR technologies continue to evolve and become more accessible, their impact on automotive training and maintenance is poised to grow significantly. From immersive training experiences that accelerate learning curves to augmented maintenance procedures that enhance efficiency and safety, these technologies hold the potential to revolutionize the automotive industry.

However, realizing this potential will require collaboration between technology developers, automotive manufacturers, training institutions, and maintenance professionals. By embracing innovation and investing in the adoption of vr automotive training solutions, stakeholders can equip the workforce with the skills and tools needed to navigate the complexities of modern automotive technology, ensuring a safer, more efficient, and more sustainable future for the industry.

[millysoft]

EV Billing Platform with OCPP Business Plan Template EV Billing Platform with OCPP Business Plan Template Revolutionize your electric vehicle charging business with our cutting-edge EV Billing Platform integrated with the Open Charge Point Protocol (OCPP). This comprehensive solution empowers you to streamline operations, enhance customer experiences, and unlock new revenue streams. Designed to meet the evolving demands of the electric mobility industry, our EV Billing Platform seamlessly integrates with OCPP-compliant charging stations, enabling seamless communication and data exchange. Leverage real-time monitoring, remote diagnostics, and intelligent load management to optimize your charging infrastructure's performance and efficiency. Unlock the Power of Intelligent Billing and Payment Processing: - Flexible pricing models: Implement dynamic pricing strategies based on time-of-use, energy consumption, or customized tariffs to maximize revenue. https://millysoft.com/product/ev-billing-platform-with-ocpp-business-plan-template/?utm_source=tumblr&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=STARTERKITS