Mega Storm Trucks

[ZONE 51]

Some of these beasts look like armored military vehicles, incredibly powerful engines, and they just look great! we take a look at some of these trucks and some info on them.

Storm Chasers adds super GMC Sierra to tornado chase fleet

"A winch with 8,000 pounds of pulling power and an air compressor are also mounted up front.

Sitting on top of the hood is a hail research plate that was custom designed by Tim Samaras. It utilizes carbon composite sample and piezo impact blocks to collect data on hail impacts. The lights mounted up the A-Pillars are used to illuminate the impacts, which are captured on high-speed cameras.

In the back of the truck, behind flip-up side doors of the specially constructed bed cap, sits an assortment of data logging devices, auxiliary batteries,VHF radios and the extremely important tornado probe. The tornado probe weighs 400 pounds and is accessed using a 1,500-pound capacity lift. That weight comes from the six cameras, five anemometers, smoke generators and 3D wind profile instrumentation that's all attached to a steel base. The hydraulically-powered rear lift deploys and recovers the heavy probe.

Besides making room for research gear, one's safety must also be considered. Tim Samaras needed to protect not just himself and his team, but the truck as well. Regular paint wouldn't do, so Samaras turned to Line-X for protection he sought."

http://www.autoblog....ado-chase-flee/

Some trucks have stabilisers so they don't take off, some research equipment is actually plugged into the ground, for good reasons! usually for tornado research.

"It’s the collection of this data that helps the science community learn more about these storms, enabling more efficient early warning systems that can save lives."

That is for giant hailstone capture and research? no, but its an amazing piece of kit! usually a radar is a sat dish shape though, i can see some small door on the side there, do the chasers get in this?

http://www.extremewe...-luck-next-year

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Lyndon is the temporary home to a state-of-the-art weather radar system, Doppler on Wheels (DOW). The Center for Severe Weather Research in Boulder, Co., operates three DOW units. They consist of a truck mounted with doppler weather radar dishes, a support vehicle, and a second fully instrumented pickup truck or SUV which deploys instrument pods in severe storms.

Students and faculty in our Atmospheric Sciences department will use the instrument from January 31 to February 18 to collect data on winter storms and learn more about how weather radars operate. Students will design experiments to sample storms and find sites to deploy the radar. The unit will be stationed adjacent to the entrance to the ATT and News7.

DOWs have observed over one hundred tornadoes at close range, and intercepted the eyes of many hurricanes. DOW data revealed the most intense winds ever recorded, and the largest tornadic circulation ever documented. Television viewers may already be familiar with Doppler on Wheels—they have been featured in the Discovery Channel’s “Storm Chasers,†National Geographic Channel’s “Tornado Intercept†and “The True Face of Hurricanes,†and PBS’s Nova episode “The Hunt For The Supertwister,†among others.

http://alumni.lyndon...ciid=976&crid=0

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Edited May 22, 2012 by ElectricSnowStorm

[Coast]

One of the tougher problems of chasing these storms is finding a vehicle strong enough to withstand the onslaught of wind and debris created. The Tornado Attack Vehicle (TAV) is the first ever truck to be driven into the eye of a funnel cloud. Green understood that even a heavily modified road-legal pick-up would not be able to withstand the storm, and so decided to build a truck for himself.

The TAV has a steel tube skeleton, covered in sixteen-gauge steel bodywork. Windows and wheel-covers are constructed from bulletproof plastic, and the windshield has a triple layer of DuPont Mylar. Apparently, just a single layer of it is enough to stop a .38 pistol round.

To shift all this weight, a ZZ502 engine from Chevrolet was used to power all four wheels using a custom made Turbo 400 auto transmission. Good luck to the winning bidder is all I can say!

http://www.mwvc.co.u...le-on-ebay.html

[ZONE 51]

Coast i think that machine is cool and it looks like something from Touring cars!

This one here has some height, bet thats shifts! another mean machine.

I have read that some trucks use a special type of paint for the hail impacts.

http://www.f150onlin...nsas-page2.html

Edited May 23, 2012 by ElectricSnowStorm