Technology, Innovation & Outdoor News

Genius accordion camper pod spreads wings into panoramic retreat

June 14, 2026 | C.C. Weiss
Many campers love a compact trailer for towing but a space that lives like a small home at camp. The new Ortsan Mini House Caravan does both, towing small but blossoming open upon arrival to nearly triple its living space.

VW T7 camper van is a California-style rig with a toilet and a twist

June 10, 2026 | C.C. Weiss
Trakka has a long history of turning Volkswagen's various vans into Outback-ready expedition machines. Now it focuses attention on turning VW's newest van into a more versatile, rugged, comfortable camper with an options sheet that trumps VW's own.

Domesticating AI – It's not coming, it's already here

June 14, 2026 | Howard Armitage
From AI-generated garden makeovers to a voice assistant that actually remembers context, take a look at how local AI is transforming home automation. Privacy-first, open-source, and edging closer to Tony Stark territory.

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In a historic first, two US Army crew members from an AH-64 Apache helicopter forced down near the coast of Oman were rescued within two hours by a US Navy Saronic Corsair drone boat operated by the 5th Fleet's Task Force 59.
The Berenstein Bear is an extra-wide tiny house that's firmly focused on maximizing comfort. It provides a spacious interior that includes a large living area, a generous kitchen, ground-floor master bedroom, and even a bathtub.
Airstream expands its most affordable camper van series with the new 21PL. The newest member of the Rangeline family features a floor plan that's every bit as capable and comfortable for 4 people as it is for 2, without any need for a pop-up roof.
A crewed aircraft named the Helios Horizon has flown on solid-state batteries for the first time, logging a 60% energy density leap over lithium-ion that could finally make commercial electric aviation a reality.
Lightship became one of the first self-powered trailer pioneers to market last summer. Now it's launching a different type of self-driving electric trailer, one that could have an even bigger impact on how the world tows than the original AE.1.
Just when most of us thought the era of two strokes was over, Japanese bikemaker Kawasaki has released its first big two-strokers in more than two decades – the KX327 motocrosser and the cross-country-focused KX327X.

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Health and Science news from our sister site: Refractor
Researchers at the University of Warwick in the UK, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and McMaster University in Canada have shown that the structures of dust rings surrounding young stars can be used to estimate the masses of hidden planets.
What if the best-tasting morsel isn’t on your plate, but the one you steal? New research suggests “forbidden food” really may taste better.
One of the world's oldest turds has been given the royal science treatment, with ancient Arctic ground squirrel droppings offering a smorgasbord of DNA from other animals and plants dating back up to 700,000 years.
Mental health content has not just risen in volume, it's changed significantly in just a few years. Some conditions have increasingly attracted the spotlight, while others have receded from view, and the relationships among them have also changed.
In a breakthrough study, researchers have found that the world's most common type of arthritis – osteoarthritis (OA) – actually has a single core driver with clean-cut molecular pathways. It paves the way for much better treatment.
Grabbing that late-night kebab or pizza slice after a few drinks may not be a sign of poor willpower, but a biological drive that once would have seen us seek protein but now leads us straight into the comforting arms of savory ultra-processed foods.

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Editor's Picks

Hybrid commuter bikes generally aren't known for being all that exciting. That's why some cyclists are taking old speed-oriented lugged-steel road bikes that would otherwise go unused, and converting them into zippy, retro-cool city bikes. Here's how you can do it, too.
Despite the headlines, there’s limited evidence that using large language models – like Claude and ChatGPT – is rotting the brain. But there’s enough cause for concern.
Dinosaurs may be long extinct, but 2025 made it clear that they’re anything but settled science. New fossils, reanalyses of famous specimens and increasingly sophisticated tools have helped us learn more about how they lived, moved, fed and evolved.
This year Fender is celebrating the 75th anniversary of the Telecaster, and Nashville was chosen to host the Tele Town birthday party. We caught up with the CEO and Chief Product Manager before rocking the Tele's big night out at the Ryman Auditorium.
As it heads out of the solar system never to return, the deep space probe Voyager 1 is headed for yet another cosmic milestone. In late 2026, it will become the first spacecraft to travel so far that a radio signal from Earth takes 24 hours, or one light day, to reach it.
For the last couple of years, Cixi has been working on a three-wheeled vehicle called Vigoz that's based on its chainless pedaling system. A skeletal prototype has been tested to 100 km/h, and now the company has revealed the latest production design.
It may surprise some to learn that Polaris has a serious research, development, and testing facility. I got a full tour of the place, along with a dedicated test track that I got to use later.
From raw eggs at the crack of dawn to whey shakes after workouts – there's a whole lot of advice about the best way to optimize your muscle growth. Has new research settled the debate once and for all, or will it spark even more?