Turbine powered Go-Kart

[video=youtube_share;IND3eAI3YZk]https://youtu.be/IND3eAI3YZk[/video]


JD

Pretty neat. My mom's cousin put a small jet engine on his handicapped scooter. It goes over 50 mph. It's basically the starter turbine motor for a larger jet engine (I forget which aircraft). He was doing the initial test run behind his shop in town at 10:30 pm and got the neighbors all wound up and they called the cops on him. There he sits, on his handicapped scooter trying to look innocent, but the cops noticed the extra bit of NOT battery powering his scooter and gave him a stern warning (after asking him for another pass ). And yes he is handicapped. Lost a leg in a factory accident.

Adrian

I've made a similar turbine engine from a turbocharger before. Makes for lots of fun building! I designed a small bit of software called "JetSpecs" which helps with the calculations for designing such engines (albeit it offers quite conservative numbers). There's a lot of people here in the U.S. as well as the UK (among many other places) who build and even 'race' them. Nothing like the smell of burned kerosene/JetA! My largest personal turbine was an early model T53 (from a Huey helicopter) that made 863shp. Never got that running, but there is a vid of my Boeing 502-6 test-run on youtube.

That is awesome. Now, just need an engine from and f-15.


Mark Koelsch
Sent from my iPhone using Rocketry Forum

I do not see the point of this. The performance is marginal at best. This seems to be a waste of effort.

JMZawodny said:

I do not see the point of this. The performance is marginal at best. This seems to be a waste of effort.

Click to expand...

Frankly, nothing in any hobby has a point other than it is fun. One could argue that it is all a waste of time and effort. Let's face it- nothing we do in rocketry has not already been done by various space programs with performance far exceeding anything any of is will do. So, all of the hobby is a waste of effort so maybe we should all quit?



Mark Koelsch
Sent from my iPhone using Rocketry Forum

I agree with Mark..right away I was cringing about his back tires..(and the fronts for that matter!0..but i appreciated his building it and making a fairly decent exhaust..this is his "Boiler plate'..he could modify this or move on or lose interest completely..remember also that he wasn't out at Bonneville Salt Flats!

Saw a turbine-powered outhouse perform at a local airshow. But what may have practical appications is a jet-powered shopping cart. I swear that some shoppers are trying to set an indoor land speed record.