Popular Mechanics September/October 2021

KYLE MIZOKAMI Contributing Editor Wherever you go, there you are. Current Passion Project My wife and I are stepping up to a singlefamily home, and I have the opportunity to plan out a garage workshop from the ground up—a lifelong dream. PRODUCTS I’M USING RIGHT NOW 1 Prometheus Design Werx Raider Field Pants I have a 4-year-old, so my pockets are pretty much garbage cans. Goodlooking pants with discrete pockets get a nod from me. Best Thing POP Ever Taught Me I’ve been reading Pop Mech for more than 30 years, and the one consistent lesson is I can do it—whatever it is—myself. IMPERIAL OR METRIC? I’ll admit metric is the better system for overall measurement, but Lyle Lovett sings about a girl who is “5-foot-2,” not “157.48 centimeters.” Attack Submarine or Fighter Jet? Your fighter jets are sexy, but when my submarine…

Fifty years ago my parents gave me an oversized pair of moccasin-toe work boots for my 12th birthday. The earthy aroma of fresh leather that came wafting out of their box is still with me. They were good quality, U.S.-built (of course), and were large enough for me to grow into. That one pair took me from childhood through buying my first truck, construction jobs, college, and into full-fledged adulthood. When, after more than a decade, they became outright disgusting, I used them as the boot of last resort for painting and driveway sealing. Once, lacking a pair of rubber boots, I even wore them while pouring the concrete slab for a crawl space. I just waded in and hoped for the best. The boots were fine; a thorough cleaning…

IN MARCH 2019, BOTTLE LOGIC BREWING, A cult maker of imperial stouts based out of Anaheim, California, visited Interboro Spirits & Ale in Brooklyn, New York. The plan was to brew a collaboration beer, but the Californians took interest in the copper pot still lurking in one corner of the brewery. “They said, ‘Sure, let’s make a beer but, more importantly, let’s make a whiskey,’” says Jesse Ferguson, Interboro’s cofounder, brewer, and distiller. This wouldn’t require much extra work. To produce whiskey or beer, you start by mashing grains: taking barley, corn, and the like, combining it with water, and then heating the mixture. Then things typically diverge. For beer, you add hops and yeast; for traditional whiskey, you add yeast and, once fermented into distiller’s wash, you distill it. While Interboro…

CHARBAY R5 | 49.5% ABV | $60 Now in its fifth bottling, Bear Republic Racer 5, a 7 percent IPA, is doubledistilled into R5. The nose is extremely bright and aromatic, piney and dank with hints of lemon zest. The palate leans more toward chocolate. INTERBORO STRAIGHT MALT WHISKEY | 50% ABV | $48 The first whiskey release from the five-year-old Brooklyn outfit, this is a blend of two barrels aged for three years in first-use American oak before spending their final year in barrels that had previously held Woodford Reserve Double Oaked bourbon. The result a heavier char flavor than a typical Scottish single malt, with notes of dark cherry, vanilla, and caramel. ARROGANT BASTARD WHISKEY | 48.5% ABV | $60 The Escondido, California, brewery produces their typical Arrogant Bastard wort (unfermented beer) and…

PICTURE THIS: WORLD WAR III IS JUST hours away. In the cold vastness of space, enemy robotic spacecraft are slowly adjusting their orbits and preparing to launch a surprise attack on the U.S.’s fleet of satellites. The uncrewed craft, with robotic arms strong enough to disable a satellite, are creeping up on American spacecraft, about to deal a knockout blow to the U.S. military. But down on Earth, U.S. Space Force guardians have been keeping track of the assassin craft, knowing that in order to present as low a profile target as possible, they have just enough fuel for one attack. At the last minute, after the enemy satellites have com-mitted to attack, the command activates the nuclear thermal propulsion (NTP) engines on the American satellites, quickly boosting them into a…

NERVA In 1961, NASA and the Atomic Energy Commission investigated the use of NTP with the Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Application (NERVA) program. Like DRACO, NERVA would generate thrust by using a nuclear reactor to heat and expel hydrogen. NASA envisioned using an NTP engine as the third and final stage of an otherwise chemical rocket. But NASA ultimately scrapped the promising program in 1973 due to lack of funding. PROJECT ORION In the early 1960s, Project Orion aimed to put a spacecraft into orbit and beyond by detonating a string of nuclear bombs underneath it—an idea made possible by shielding the spacecraft (and spacefarers) with a large graphite plate. The craft would ride the shockwave into the atmosphere on a pillar of successive nuclear explosions. However, the Partial Nuclear-Test Ban Treaty…