I think I've found the most dangerous vehicle ever created

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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So I found this blog the other day. I don’t remember how. But it’s pretty cool. It collect old articles from publications like Popular Mechanics or National Geographic.

I was browsing through the old “Do it Yourself” plans and I found

This… Sled thing. It calls itself an “Ice Zipper” and I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen a more dangerous vehicle.

My first impression is “Hey Cool! That looks like a lot of fun!”

Then I think: Yeah… It’s cool looking, but think about sitting in the propwash on a cold day… You have a constant 90+mph wind going right in your face… Goggles are required. And if there’s any snow, you’re going to get plastered with it… Probably to the point where you can’t see.

So now, you’re frozen, completely blind and careening down a lake at 100kph, and if you hit something, you go in to the propeller… Which happens to not have any sort of protective measures surrounding it.

So you hit a thin part, the ice breaks and the front goes down. You go flying forward, in to the propeller, which severely injures you, then you go in to the sub-zero water.

Not to mention that the “steering” is a single wooden runner.

Oh, and according to the article: “Braking is effected by coasting across the ice against idling propeller”
… you think anyone actually ever built one of these?

… Should I?
Yeah… It’s cool looking, but think about what happens if you hit anything. You get thrown straight in to the propeller.

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Crap, that last line shouldn’t be there and I missed the edit window

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If you do decide to go for it and build one, make sure you have a videocamera nearby.

No, wait…make that dozens of videocameras. The more footage they have at the inquest, the better.

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:eek: Why the hell didn’t they put the prop at the back? Or reverse its direction of rotation and turn the seats around?

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It’s even more dangerous than pogo stilts!

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Of course.

I can’t believe you even had to ask. :stuck_out_tongue:

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I like the idea of 50mph across the ice with no suspension whatever - should be great fun.

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Imagine running into a skater with that thing. It’d be like an explosion in a deli.

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Lucky that Martin and Harry Sensenich had more get up and go than you guys.

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Rev 2 added a horn.

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That does look worse than a Corvair.

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There’s several roadgoing prop driven vehicles that have been built. Someone also built a rocket powered road going car. :eek:

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The illustration looks like it was drawn in 1935. They didn’t know about seat belts then. I think seat belts would resolve any safety issues. And a big skater-bumper on the front to safely bump skaters out of the propeller’s way. At 50 mph.

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The one where they only found the brake marks after, the rest of the vehicle was scattered across a mountainside? :eek: :eek:

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I think that one is an UL.

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Urban Legend? Your’e right, it was.

Now I’ve learnt something new today too. :slight_smile:

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Besides which, it is just plain slow when compared to those under sail in the same decade: Iceboat - Wikipedia

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It tickled me how this early 1930s publication instructs “take seats from an old style racing car or plane…” :smiley:

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Off by three years. The article was published in 1932.

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This reminds me of when I tried to make a hovercraft as a kid.

Even as a reckless little boy I knew I had call a halt to it after testing my “engine” with my “propellor”. It made a lot of wind, but trying to resist the torque of dad’s power drill with a sharp, 4-foot long piece of bent sheet steel clamped into it rotating at 3,000 RPM convinced even me to disconnect the whole thing, put it away, and pretend it never happened.