******* The Car Talk Puzzler Psychic Friends Network******* >From The Desk Of
Maury Maille Puzzler Tower Car Talk Plaza Hahvahd Squayah Our Fair City A note from Car Talk Plaza: The puzzler, exhausted from another strenuous puzzler season, is now on a well-earned summer vacation. During this time, he has left us with what he claims are a number of "classic" offerings from years past. We hope you enjoy them. This Week's Classic Puzzler: Saving the Royal Air Force RAY: This puzzler comes from none other than Colonel Larry Hildebrand, USAF, retired. It was a dark and stormy night at a secret airfield somewhere in England during WW II. The Royal Air Force had summoned one of England's most noted mathematicians to help them solve a problem. German anti-aircraft fire based on the ground was inflicting heavy losses on the Brits. Their planes were being shot down right and left. The RAF had to do something to diminish their losses. Clearly, they could put armor plating on the bottoms of the fuselages and the wings, but there were several problems with that idea. Their range and their ability to carry bombs would be considerably reduced because of the additional weight. TOM: They had to be very selective! RAY: A nameless mathematician crawled underneath the planes and looked at where the bullet holes were on the underside. They were all over the place as you might expect -- in the wings and the fuselage, and seemingly distributed randomly on the undersides. He studied hundreds of planes, took pictures, drew a number of sketches -- and then he made his recommendation. The question is, what armor plating, if any, did he recommend putting on these planes -- and why? Think you know? Drop us a note via http://www.cartalk.com/email/email.html If you're right and we select your answer, we'll ship you a $26 Shameless Commerce Gift Certificate. Want to listen to Raymond obfuscate the puzzler in person? Listen anytime, at http://www.cartalk.com/content/puzzler/ ************ Remember last week's puzzler? A Tale of Two Malaysians... And a Kid RAY: There are two Malaysians standing on the street corner. TOM: I can see it now. "Murray... So, Mario..." By the way, are they in Kuala Lumpur?" RAY: Sure. They're having a conversation. One of them is the father of the other's son. My question isŠ How could this be? And here's the answer... http://www.cartalk.com/content/puzzler/ So, did you figure it out? Yours in weekly puzzler torment, Maury Maille Puzzler Dissemination Specialist Car Talk Plaza ******************* Doing some car research? Via our lousy, little homepage you can... *Check important safety recalls *See what your car is worth right now *Check rebates and incentives on new cars *Search your town for new or used cars for sale *Place an ad to sell your car that'll actually be seen by people in your area *Research and compare new vehicles *Get the latest car news *Kill time until 5:00 p.m. rolls around and you can pack it in It's all at http://www.cartalk.com *********************************** Got more time to kill? This past weekend's new, lousy Car Talk show is now on the web site, at http://www.cartalk.com/Radio/Show/ ******************** Help Ray lose the night sweats he's been getting, trying to come up with a decent puzzler each week. E-mail him your suggestion any time, via http://www.cartalk.com/email/email.html ******************** Puzzled out? You can unsubscribe to the Car Talk Puzzler Psychic Friends Network anytime at http://www.cartalk.com/ct/maillist.jsp?puzzler_list=subscribe#psychic We'll forgive you.
