previous post next post  

What's This Whatziss?

Do I show you the battery retention spring from a 1915 Austro-Hungarian piezo-electric trench lighter and ask you to identify the major component? No!

Do I show you an electron scan of half a bullet hole in a chewing gum wrapper and ask you to identify the bang-stick that made the hole? No!

Do I show you upper half the letter "H" in the manufacturer's stamp on the underside of the grate to the firebox of the sole-surviving example of an 1863 Hyrkano-Bueller steam-powered cartridge-straightener and ask you the sex of the cat that left the hair in the upper-left corner? No!

Okay, to be honest, John doesn't either.

But at least you get a decent view of the stuff I try to stump ya with, right?





Ta-daaaaaaa! Have at it, kids!

26 Comments

The top of some kind of flight helmet?
 
What Frank said.  What the pilot sees when he's looking at the gunner.
 
Oh, and if I *had* a 1863 Hyrkano-Bueller steam-powered cartridge-straightener I would *so* do that!
 
heh. I had a camera that used to distort closeup pictures like that. In fact, most digital cameras distort the edges of pictures anyway.  That must be a very close up close up to turn a square box into a round ball!
 
An abidrextrous self hooking bowling ball.
 
A bird's eye-view of Honda's new robot.  He obvioously has not been programmed to wash his "hair". ML
 
I also suspect you eventuyally answer the whatsis.

As for this one, I expect it's a helmet of some stripe, but the holes are a dead giveaway. Those are where you plug in the mind control beam receptors, of course.
 
My first thought was back of a flight helmet as well, but the holes were a bit strange.  Then I though, backside of a gimbal mount for a camera system like you see on police/tv station helo's ( I think police here because of the color).  Front side would be the open section for the camera.  The holes are for cabling, and coolant flow, the side protrusions are for the mounting on the universal joint.
 
Og - the whatzis got answered in the comments... early acoustic air warning gizmo.

Sheesh.  People go to all that work...
 
A prototype or model of the ricin pellet used to assassinate Georgi Markov.

Well, that or a bowling ball for very thin-fingered elves.

 
The ball out of a Dyson vacuum
 
The mounting base for a plastic flower arrangement from the chow hall in the sand box.
 
Russian helicopter flight helmet...

G
 
Another possibility is the sensor ball in the pod on those Iraqi Cessna 208's...
 
Isn't that one of those flying droids that Luke Skywalker was using in his blindfolded training?
 
Ooo!  It's one of those "hey bozo, this is a wire!" balls that get attached to evil helicopter-snagging wires.

Or a left-handed cromulator.  They are easy to confuse.
 
Cranial-rectal inversion prevention device?
 
It's a white ball with grey holes in it.

I win!
 

The protective cover for either an Oscillation Overthruster or a Flux Capacitor-difficult to tell the difference without proper reference, but the covers are essentially interchangable.

 
Greetings:

1918 Kaiser Wilhelm Death Star. 
 
I'm going to go with some kind of mine.
 
Air conditioned helo pilot helmet, those there are the exhaust vents......
 
primer coat of paint (white) on the helmet of the Great Gazoo....


 
 
Bill's an airdale so think high tech, expensive and probably unnecessary.

All flights are subject to having "oh no! we're all gonna die!!!" moments crop up all the sudden and unannounced, so...

My guess is that it's a Turd Preventer with Gas Relief Valves - Insert Device.

Can't be having our pilots land with a load. It'd be unseemly.
 
Darn late to the party.

And here I was going to guess it was the prototype for ChuckZ's new prosthetic.(Right one, 1 each
actual size shown), and final product in brass of course to match original equipment. ;)