Benny Kirk
1,648 ARTICLES
Vulcan Centaur: United Launch Alliance's First All-New Rocket Launches Christmas Eve 2023
15 Nov 2023, 20:22 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / As of November 2022, two American aerospace contractors have new spacecraft raring to go up into low-Earth orbit at the first sign of an opportunity in Boeing's Starliner capsule and Sierra Space's Dream Chaser space plane. But until thei...
Embraer E-Jet: The Brazilian Narrow-Body Airliners That Made Boing and Airbus Sweat
15 Nov 2023, 14:06 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / If it weren't for a handful of smaller international aviation firms, chances are good the world's civil jetliner sector would be a complete two-horse race between the monolithic titans of Airbus and Boeing. There are a couple of different...
This ’44 Beech D-17S Staggerwing Is the Ancestor of All Modern Private Jets, It’s for Sale
13 Nov 2023, 20:35 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Let us paint the scene for you. The year is 1944, and you're fresh back at home in the U.S. after a tour in the Pacific theater of World War II as an F4F Wildcat pilot during the Battles of the Coral Sea and Guadalcanal. Lucky enough not to co...
This Ford B-150 Carryall SUV Conversion by Centurion Spent Its Life South of the Border
13 Nov 2023, 16:41 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / A short while ago, we looked at a highly modified four-door Ford Bronco conversion by Centurion that blurred the line between a Bronco and an F-150 in more ways than one. Well, it turns out that not only did Centurion customize a Bronco to look lik...
Turbo Cosworth-Swapped '82 Toyota Starlet Is an English Take On a JDM Restomod
12 Nov 2023, 19:31 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Is it an E70 Corolla in a hatchback blob suit? The Yaris' long-lost ancestor, or something in the middle? Whatever it is, the Toyota Starlet was nothing but a blip on the radar in North America. But over in Europe, Asia, and Australia, where t...
Small Block 302-Swapped '55 Ford Tudor Is Reagan Underneath, Eisenhower on Top
10 Nov 2023, 23:07 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / The name Tudor has its origins in a couple of different places. It was the name of a prominent English royal dynasty for a time; it's the name of one of Europe's most fascinating historical styles of architecture and is a realtively commo...
Hubble and James Webb Telescopes Team Up to Snap Amazing Compound View of the Cosmos
10 Nov 2023, 18:50 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / It's easy to get the impression that NASA's James Webb Space Telescope was built to outright replace what's perhaps history's most important space telescope, the Hubble Space Telescope. But because JWST operates primarily on the...
Jeremy Rice's LSX-Swapped Chevy C10 Rides Lower Than Most SAT Scores
10 Nov 2023, 15:32 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / If there's one thing we love around here, it's small, independent tuning shops turning out quality restomods with the same quality and craftsmanship as more notable, sponsor-backed shops twice their size. That's why it's with al...
Contest Yachts Teams Up With Bentley To Design the World's Most Luxurious 67CS Interior
9 Nov 2023, 19:48 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Bentleys and yachts go together like beluga caviar and a bottle of Chateau Lafite. But a bespoke yacht interior designed and signed off on by Bentley themselves? Now, that's bound to have a wider appeal than just trust fund socialites. There&#...
One-of-One WorldStar Pickup Prototype Is a Classic VW Golf in Light Truck Clothing
8 Nov 2023, 04:39 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Have you ever spotted a funky-looking car parked somewhere and thought to yourself, it has to be a kit car? Well, what if we told you that sometimes, what looks like a kit vehicle is actually the long-forgotten ambitions of a start-up company that ...
All-New Peugeot E-Rifter Is Here As Europe's Favorite Electric MPV for the Masses
8 Nov 2023, 02:21 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / More than a few questions surrounded Peugeot as it entered the multi-national automotive conglomerate and new corporate masters at Stellantis. In a sea of automotive brands from Dodge to Jeep and Lancia to Vauxhall and Alfa Romeo, was there breathi...
Indian Motorcycle’s 2024 Lineup Asserts Its Dominance With Two Special Editions
8 Nov 2023, 01:56 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / As America's oldest and arguably most revered motorcycle brand, the 2024 lineup has colossal shoes to fill. Thankfully, the future looks pretty bright at your local Indian dealer. With a lineup of V-twins targeting every faction in modern Amer...
NASA's Two Most Important Space Telescopes Team Up To Find Record-Breaking Black Hole
7 Nov 2023, 20:39 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / The Chandra X-Ray Observatory and James Webb Space Telescope occupy polar opposite ends of the electromagnetic spectrum. When blindspots in one telescope's field of vision lead to a lack of definition, it's often a smart idea to use a dif...
Ultra-Rare '95 Celica Convertible's Ghostly Shell Awaits 2JZ-Swap in Washington State
7 Nov 2023, 03:30 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / It's no big deal to find a derelict husk of some long-dead hunk 60s or 70s of steel lying in a junkyard somewhere. We've almost been conditioned as petrolheads to praise the virtues of pulling vintage clap-traps from the grasp of a crushe...
Ford Flathead-Swapped 1978 Corvette C3 Rejects Modernity, Returns to Monkey
6 Nov 2023, 19:39 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / In the seven-decade story of America's most iconic sports car, the late 1970s are something of a black hole period. A time when primitive emissions restriction equipment in the wake of the 1973 oil crisis turned what was once a car as quick as...
NASA Can't Make its Mind Up Over Who Builds the Next Lunar Rover, Delayed Four Months
6 Nov 2023, 18:30 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / People tend to forget how much R&D went into designing and building the Apollo-era Lunar Roving Vehicle. Several different proposals came across NASA's desk before the iconic Moon buggy we all know and love was chosen. But even by Apollo s...
Sierra Space Completes Construction of Dream Chaser Tenacity, First Launch Due Next April
6 Nov 2023, 16:30 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / After more than a decade of research, development, and engineering challenges galore, Sierra Space has proudly announced the completion of its first Dream Chaser reusable space plane. With the promise of swift, reliable crew and cargo transportatio...
James Webb Space Telescope Snaps Newborn Star Throwing Cosmic Temper Tantrum
6 Nov 2023, 15:35 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / The birth of a newborn star is just as loud and dramatic as a newlywed couple waiting in the delivery room. The only difference at the end of the day is a matter of degree. Don't believe us? Well, the latest findings from the James Webb Space ...
This Culver PQ-14 Radio Target Plane Was Too Nice to Shoot Down, Now It Can be Yours
5 Nov 2023, 18:37 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / A short while ago, we told the story of the Culver PQ-14 Cadet, a long-forgotten Second World War target practice plane designed to be easy for a trainee pilot to empty their ammo mag into without feeling too badly about blowing up tax-payer dollar...
EcoBeast-Swapped Merkur XR4Ti Makes Restomod Lovers Across the Atlantic Joyous
5 Nov 2023, 04:45 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Ultimately, Ford's experimental Euro-import brand for the U.S. market was only saved from being its statistically worst brand by a single model year. Merkur's existence had a lot in common with the story of Edsel in hindsight, but that do...