Street Legal Jet Powered Beetle (2006)

http://www.ronpatrickstuff.com/

by jmonegro • 17 years ago

76 23 17 years ago

Adam503• 17 years ago

I still prefer the engineer who lights a charcoal grill in 30 seconds with a piece of flaming paper and 4 quarts of liquid oxygen.

http://gizmodo.com/5360234/lighting-a-grill-with-liquid-oxyg...

pvg• 17 years ago

Both are neat to look at but lighting the charcoal grill is a cool chemistry demonstration, not really 'engineering'. Putting a working jet engine on your VW beetle is pretty serious engineering.

alex_c2• 17 years ago

The sloppy layout made me think "blog spam"... quick Google search turned this up.

http://www.ronpatrickstuff.com/

jmonegro• 17 years ago

Nevertheless, it's pretty amazing.

alex_c2• 17 years ago

Oh I agree, that didn't stop me from reading the entire thing :)

dfischer• 17 years ago

This is so full of epic win. The scooter is better than the VW. lol

dryicerx• 17 years ago

I think a face-off is needed between this, and the Jet powered Minivan

http://hackedgadgets.com/2008/03/03/jet-turbine-van/

dfranke• 17 years ago

I was thinking of putting it into an import car show but the promoter told me that it looked too plain and recommended that I put some decals on it, lower it, and put on some aftermarket wheels.

/me boggles. This is either a joke or an incredibly sad commentary. "I built a jet car!" "Yawn. Where's the bling?"

movix2• 17 years ago

I'm thinking interesting project, but beauty of design points = fail.

For the ultimate in elegant, jet powered simplicity, I think Mr. Maddox and his pulse jet bicycle is leagues ahead:

http://thekneeslider.com/archives/2009/06/02/pulsejet-bicycl...

billswift• 17 years ago

I didn't vote on your comment - your fail claim I would have downvoted, but I loved your link. Maybe you should have commented them separately if you wanted better feedback.

movix2• 17 years ago

The point I was making was about beauty of design, not on the technology, which is where I think the Beetle/jet combo fails, and the handmade, beautifully crafted bicycle/pulse jet excels.

Although you could propose that the Beetle follows the Corbusian 'form follows function' ethos, the end result taking it's shape from it's purpose so elegantly illustrated by the original Beetle itself, strapping a whopping great jet to it does not.

The bicycle on the other hand, has obviously been lovingly crafted to be an aesthetic whole, even though two disparate technologies have been employed - therefore = win.

You could of course argue that Corbusier didn't follow his own ethos and 'fie rules' either though.

I actually think that the Beetle/jet combination is a very appropriate metaphor for many types of technology we use.

"Here's thing A, which only does X, if we add thing B to it, it now does XYZ, just not very efficiently, and it looks awful"

jrwoodruff• 17 years ago

I just want to see this thing pass me, full after-burner on.

PStamatiou• 17 years ago

This guy was on David Letterman some time ago. He did a test run and I believe caught some of the grass near the track on fire. :-)

edit: found it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJyAA0oPAwE

Hexstream• 17 years ago

This really puts the Bat-mobile to shame.

onreact-com2• 17 years ago

It's a penis!

pbhjpbhj• 17 years ago

I have to say the shot of him in his Hawaiian shirt with the huge phallic turgidity of the engine held erect against him does look rather like an example from a Freudian textbook.

onreact-com2• 17 years ago

So you agree that it's a penis? ;-)

_ivan• 17 years ago

Sooo many photos and no video? Weird :)

I_got_fifty2• 17 years ago

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=831375

I_got_fifty2• 17 years ago

I'd like to have that scooter. That one looks cool.

gscott• 17 years ago

Jet Powered Porche on Ebay http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Porsche-928-Boeing-Gas-Turbin...

Street Legal Jet Powered Beetle (2006)

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