Jet engine technologies for interested amateurs
Last Updated: 9 May 2008
US viewers of Junkyard Wars will, on Tuesday February 3rd, will have seen the episode titled "DragBoats" in which a pulsejet-powered boat beat the V8-powered craft of the opposing team. 
Although you didn't see me onscreen, I was there, providing RDF with technical consulting services behind the scenes. I designed the large pulsejet engine that was used but, for several reasons and despite winning, that engine was only running at about 25% of its potential power and was lacking the all-important thrust augmentor. Never the less, if you put the Scrapheap and Junkyard Wars results together, I'm two for two :-) And The Experts' CD has a little bit of "behind the scenes" video that was shot during the making of that episode of Junkyard Wars.
Get The Experts' CDROM If you missed the series or don't get it in your part of the world, then I see someone has uploaded it to YouTube...
Lisa Rogers, co-host of the series, described the jet cars as "Just the most astounding bit of engineering I've ever seen on the 'heap".
Lisa's sidekick Robert Llewellyn, when asked what his favourite challenge was,
replied that it "has to be the one in which the teams built jet engines
from scratch. It's the loudest thing I've ever heard on Scrapheap. Amazing."
Now the men who designed those engines and the vehicles they powered have created an information-packed CDROM. Through this CD, you can find out a whole lot more about these cars, the jet engines that powered them, the people involved, and exactly what went on behind the scenes of this very popular episode. There's even a blow-by-blow illustrated constructional guide and plans to help you build your own powerful pulsejet or turbojet engines capable of propelling your own jet-kart to exciting speeds.
There's also a special video item in which we hunt down Col. Dick Strawbridge from The Brothers in Arms team. We caught up with Col. Dick out in LA and you'll find out exactly what he's doing there -- plus you'll get quick peek at some "behind the scenes" action on Scrapheap's sister-program, Junkyard Wars. Bruce Simpson (expert for The Destroyers) and Nick Haddock (expert for The Gingangoolies) have filled this CD with over 600MB of of pictures, videos, plans, and their personal diaries documenting the events of a very hectic few days. If you saw those outrageous jet-powered vehicles and wanted to learn more about how they work, or would like to build your own, then this CD will provide you with all the information you need -- and more.
Build your own jet-powered vehicle We've priced this CDROM at US$39 (plus $7.50 airmail P&P), a real bargain when you look at how much you're getting and what you can do with this information. And, in the meantime, check out the rest of my Jet Engine Website.
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