Slashdot Mirror
Landshark
An anonymous reader writes "This has got to be, or will be when they actually make one, the coolest amphibious vehicle around. It's a cross between a motorcycle and a jet ski, and it seats three. It can travel at 200 mph on land and 50 mph on water. Just what you need to get you from point A to point B."
If you drive into the water at 200MPH it will get messy
$ strings FTP.EXE | grep Copyright
@(#) Copyright (c) 1983 The Regents of the University of California.
Excellent design, cooler then the car in the parking slot next to you and of course forbidden to be used everywhere except on public roads and special water areas.
Candygram!
Wait, isn't this what Skeleton drove?
(knock knock on the door)
"Who is it?"
(mumbles)
"Who?"
"Unicef"
"Oh, why didn't you say that before!"
(landshark attacks woman who opens the door)
Skiers and Riders -- http://www.snowjournal.com
The reason three wheels we not popular in my opinion is that they are unsafe at high speeds. It certainly looks cool, but I travelling at such high speeds can get you killed faster in the water than on land.
A boat is designed to be a wing. You want the least amount of boat in the water that you possibly can, so you construct it to lift up and out the faster you go. But on land, you want the vehicle to press down onto the ground, the opposite direction as in the water.
Like the space shuttle, this "landshark" sounds like it was engineered for coolness and not from genuine requirements.
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
Lady: Who is it?
... you're.. that crazy shark aren't you?
Landshark: Plumber.
Lady: I didn't hire a plumber. Who is it!?
Landshark: Flowers.
Lady: What... for who
Landshark: Plumber
Lady:
Landshark: No maam, I am just a dolphin.. will you let me in please?
Lady: A dolphin! Ok!
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
This has got to be, or will be when they actually make one, the coolest amphibious vehicle around.
GNU/HURD developers say the same thing about their operating system!
If you celebrate Xmas, befriend me (538
...apparently this motorcycle/jetski thingie can't outrun the slashdot effect.
Reading that last line on Landshark's homepage, I can only think of the next round of Darwin awards and wonder if should inform Mr. Baker of his nomination. ;)
Here's the google cache if you need it
Who is going to use a motorcycle for the water?
Why do geeks always feel the need to shoehorn technology into purposes for which it wasn't intended? A motorcycle should be for use on ROADS. If you have the need to travel on water, people, _buy a boat_. Once again, our obsession for technology prevails in the face of reason. What will be next? Internet access for telephones? Where will this madness end?
The combined drive system is really clever, but I wonder how it will hold up... The impeller is mounted on the drive wheel, the wheel moves over the uneven surface of the road, and adsorbs shocks from all the bumps, so what I want to know is: how the heck are you going to build impeller seals that will hold up to that and still hold a tight tolerance?
"I'll have a Guinness, no wait, make that a Coors Light" -Grad student I work with, who shall remain anonymous...
If you just paint the thing black you will have a nifty Batman like toy. It looks like a veicle that only a supper hero would drive, not that that's wrong or eny thing. I think that the design would make an amazing remot controled veicle.
New thinkgeek blurb:
Do you want to scare your co-workers, destroy litle boats in park ponds, or just send mesages ashore from your house boat? Then this is the best thing that you'll ever want NEW MINI SHARK
... the last time that I needed to cross water and I didn't have a bridge.
42 - So long and thanks for all the fish.
Just what you need to get you from point A to point B.... via point "sea"!
Ok, bad pun...
Dan
For our non-english speaking readers, the letter "C" in English sounds like "Sea" (the large bodies of water).
Cheers,
Ian
I really can't see the point of this. It's not interesting or cool from a technical point of view, it's not cool in anything but a mine is bigger/faster than yours and my dick is really big enough, really ! kind of way. Just seems to me like another way to get yourself killed, in a way that might not be efficient but still very fast indeed.
beauty is only a light switch away
not passing us safety requirements. here's an article about that problem:
r .a sp
http://www.motorway.com/home/articles/amphibica
and a picture:
http://www.hemmings.com/images/amphicar.jpg
YES, there is a McDonald's in Hanoi Square.
I just patented "The use of a vehicle to avoid road congestion by resorting to amphibious methods".
My lawyers will be contacting you soon.
_ _ _ Go for the eyes Boo! GO FOR THE EYES!
That is about the most useful purpose of this thing is. :)
cutting me off at exit ramps because they couldn't see the sign.
Logically then, this should be called a Duckling. That's a far cry from a land shark.
Besides, what would you use to fence them in? :P
You can easily keep ducks in with chicken wire.
"I can't give you a brain, so I'll give you a diploma" - The Great Oz (blatently stolen sig)
Note to landshark guys: It aint a turbine unless you're extracting power from the flow. In your case it's just a centrigual pump. Mount a forward pointing scoop that directs flow down the axis of the pump, then collect _all_ the radial flow and direct it out the exit.
PS. You are driving this thing with the equivalent of the guts of an air-raid siren. How appropriate.
Ladies and geeks, we have a new bandwidth record...(I was only kidding about the ladies part, cross dressing does not count)
"Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tapes
> > hurtling down the highway." -- Andrew S. Tanenbaum - Computer Networks
Now becomes...
"Never underestimate the bandwidth of a Landshark full of DVD-R's hurtling down the highway at 200 Mph" -- twoslice Certifiable Geek (or just certifiable on most days)
From excellent karma to terible karma with a single +5 funny post...
Notice how there are no real pictures of this thing on the site? That's because the fine print says that it currently exists only as a "1/3rd scale clay model." The history page goes right up to the point (over a year ago) when they were trying to turn that model into a working ... 1/3rd model. Huh, I'll bet I know why the history stops there.
Most revealing line from the history: "Oct 2000, work put on hold as promised investment fails to materialise." That's because the investors realized this guy is smoking crack for all kinds of reasons.
Hey, I gotta clay model that'll do 60 mph on water and 240 on land. Really, honestly. It'll be roling off the lot just as soon as I get the funding. Can I get linked by Slashdot too?
In the UK we still use miles for road distances. But we are mainly metric now.
Nero-burning ROM for Linux!
is the trunk big enough to fit my Segway ?
Anyone actually look at the website, there are no real pictures of this thing. It's all vapourware, with some nice animations and things (i'm guessing the guy who started it was some sort of automotive designer (possibly laid off?). The rest of the site was so slow I couldn't check it out.
Lots of people are commenting on how this will actually work, since there are problems with lift/downward force, making the impellor stable enough to work both on land (with lots of shock) and in the water (keeping it sealed). Then there are things like Hydroplaning the thing with two big front wheels ( hydroplanes mounted in the mudguards??).
All a pipedream.. after all they have built amphibious cars in the 50's onward, and they are interesting to see but not a seller. You want either a boat or a car, each item does a specific job well.. not some mediocure item that does both.
Also, all those people saying 3 wheels are unstable at speed should have a look at Thrust SSC. OK, it had four wheels but the rear two were very close together like a trike, and also steered.
stty erase ^H
Mile: 5280 Feet
Nautical Mile: 6000 feet
This project will fail. Period. And I don't mean because of engineering problems (ie actually getting the damn thing to work). It will fail because of one simple rule that applies to almost all inventions of this type: Any device that attempts to do two completely different things will do neither of them well. Prime example: The "spork"- how many do you own?
I'd rtfa but the bugger's slashdotted.
.29 Cd vehicle, with a TON of aero work can do this pretty calmly. Take that exact same envelope to 195 or so and it's aerodynamics are no longer adequate to task, it's gets pretty hairy handling. (and takes 575 hp...more than the neon because it punches a bigger hole in the air, and there are differences in driveline efficency and gearing)
;)
be that as it may, it's _extremely_ difficult to make a vechicle do 200mph sustained. You can do it one of two ways:
a)Serious Cubic Horsepower
b)Serious Aerodynamic design
If you choose 'a' above, be prepared to generate 600+ hp, also be prepared to protect your occupant when the vehicle loses directonal stability.
If you choose 'b' above, you may be able to get along with significantly less hp (400-500), but be prepared to spend cubic dollars renting a wind tunnel, or hardware/software to perform a lot of number crunching.
Remember, HP goes up with the _cube_ of speed change. If your car does 150mph with a 215hp motor (Turbo Neon, this month's Road n track) and you want it to go 1.33 times faster, it'll take 1.33^3*215hp or 505hp to make 200 mph...
An additional datapoint: My vette has done 168mph with 350 crank hp (automatic, nevada, coupla thousand feet above sealevel, so figure some hp loss there.) So a
You go ahead, I'll watch from a safe distance.
"Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus."
It can travel at 200 mph on land and 50 mph on water. Just what you need to get you from point A to point B.
/dev/null.
Nope. That's the fastest way to get you from point A to
If you had read the article you would see that it has variable position mud flaps in the front that change the aero-hydro performance of the machine.
Even if it did not have that feature, it would be very easy to design a shape that, taking into account the fact that air and water have enormously different densities, would spoil lift for high speed land applications and still lift up out of the water at comparatively tiny speeds...
"I'll have a Guinness, no wait, make that a Coors Light" -Grad student I work with, who shall remain anonymous...
Clearly this is the "killer app" for drug smugglers... pack that baby full of coke and out run and out swim any DEA vehicles. All it needs now is a Stinger mount to deal with those pesky helicopters...
My goodness people, can't you see humour when it's staring you right in the face. Did you not read the line "What will be next? Internet access for telephones?". Come on now, get up from the keyboard, but the coffee/jolt down, spend an hour with your girlfriend/boyfriend/hand/other device, get some sleep, go outside (don't forget the sunblock) and enjoy a real life for a little while before you come back and reply to posts again.
As a guy who thinks the boat chase scene in 'Live and Let Die' is still one of the seminal movie chase scenes, I can't wait until this contraption shows up in a Bond movie. Hope they pay the stunt guy well.
have any of you ever done 200 mph on a bike? The fastest I've ever gone was upwards of 130 on a friends gsxr750 (hwy 1 doesn't have a long enough straight away in the 10 miles north of santa cruz so I couldn't get it going any faster), and let me tell you that it's no picnic. It's kinda hard to imagine exactly how fast that is. I mean we've all gone faster than that in airplanes, but when you're on the ground, and you realize that a squirrel running in front of you will turn you in to a meat torpedo. It's pretty fucking scary.
I can't even imagine going to 200 mph on a bike with tires set for water. that would just be insane
I doubt top speed will be 50. I've owned Jet Skis, and one thing you learn about is cavitation, and something call the Scoop Grate.
Basically, the stock setup that came with my KW-650SX goes barely 40Mph. But it was because at 40Mph, not enough water is going through the impeller. So, with the simple addition of an after market scoop grate, I added about 3Mph (All it did was lower the scoop about 1/4 an inch. I got another 2Mph out of a stainless steel prop, and anouth 2Mph out of a new ride plain.
Pulling in water as it passes alog the side of a wheel just won't work.
It's a really cool design though to have the wheels sucking in water to pump out, but he really needs to redesign. Basically, you need to scoop the water in.
Also, since it's a fairly heavy thing, it can actually go faster on water that 50Mph because of the added stability. My stand-up jet-ski weighs about 260lbs and at 46Mpg its a not a pleasure cruise, but on a heavier 550lbs waverunner it is a pleasure to cruise at even 50Mph.
Rethink the water intake to something more direct and it'll go more like 75-95 on water. Horseopower isn't the issue, fluid dynamics is.
volkswagen had a functional device like this in WW2, called the schimmenwagen -excuse spelling, that is probably close. It was a variant on their kubbelwagen, sold in the US as "the thing", but had a rounded floatation body and I think a power take off prop that lowered into the water in the rear. I've seen pics of them, they look rather normal in a dune buggy sort of way, and would probably sell if someone made them or a mod for existing beetles. I know I would like one, being a jeep driver, the ability to just keep trucking in deep water has a certain appeal to me, calm water anyway. My experience with modded bugs (bajas) is such that they can already go around 90% of the places (something like that) that a normal stock CJ can go, and if they were amphibious, slick! I'd love to be able to drive to the lake here and just keep going, go fishing and diving, etc, without towing a boat or hauling a canoe. If VW was to bring them back, and use their superior diesel tech, even better, as long as the cost was not too outrageous. Don't really care about the ability to go 200 land or 50 water, normal highway speeds are adequate, and ten in the water is adequate.
I kept expecting a green wall to appear behind it, and for it to make an instantaneous 90 degree turn...
If your bitterest enemies are people who hack the heads off civilians, then I would say you're doing something right.
While waiting for the Landshark to transition from 1/3 clay model to working prototype to production, you can pass the time tooling around in a Corbin Sparrow electric car. Or for pure brute speed order a Merlin Roadster from Corbin.
I don't know if I'd trust the delivery boy if he's bringing stuff over on a... Landshark!
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
*knock knock*
Lady: Who is it?
A motorcycle
Lady: I didn't order a motorcycle.
A jet ski
Lady: Oh, ok, come on in
AAAAAAAAA!!!
- Carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero.
From what I can see, this three wheel design looks less stable at high speeds in a corner. The non-steering wheels take more lateral pressure in a corner, so should be spread wider. This thing appears to have the front wheels stearing and the back not.
Tricycles (1 front wheel, two back) are quite stable because cornering puts pressure to the side and rear of the vehicle, on the non-stearing wheels. Front only has to apply lateral force to turn. The back has to hold it up.
There were some expriments with three wheel vehicles, two front one rear where the rear wheel steared, like a reverse tricycle. It was considered to be a good preformer but difficult to handle intuitively. The rear wheel gave to lateral force by steering, so was not supporting as much pressure as this thing will be. Various accidents gave it a bad name and the design was dropped. There are still some proponents, but the design has not returned to the main stream.
There is nothing so silly as other peoples traditions, and nothing so sacred as our own.
Somebody buys one of these and gets a horn that says "Candygram!" really loud
This sig no verb.
Isn't that like a VHS tape showing you how to setup your VCR? I mean think about this for a moment...
"They do not preach that their god will rouse them, a little before the Nuts work loose." Kipling, 'The Sons of Martha'
What does this have to do with lawyers?
illegitimii non ingravare
Due to the nature of their steering and braking, hovercraft SUCK on the road.
You'd have to put retractable wheels on it to handle even the most minor sudden turns (upping the complexity, weight, HP required, etc.)
Try stopping a hover from even 30mph when that little kid runs out in front of you. Or turning at 60 to avoid a deer.
The animation should give you a clue that the designers thought of this. Take a wing section that has no camber to it and point the front up in a breeze. The net force will be up and back. Point it down and the net force will be down and back. On land, the crafts nose points down due to the high rear suspension. In the water the craft hudroplanes out of the water, nose up, on the front nose flaps.
Your general physics knowledge should have you understand that the great difference between the working fluids would work to take care of things even if the landshark folks had not been as clever as you. The upward force created by displacing and accelerating water is orders of magnitude greater than those created by air.
It's funny that you worry about flipping right over as well. Boats that become airborn due to excessive lift and speed often do flip right over, as anyone who's ever watched a jet boat wipe out would know. I don't design high speed boats, but I'll question your overall premise. Oh yeah, 50 mph is not that high a speed on the water.
Like the space shuttle, this "landshark" sounds like it was engineered for coolness and not from genuine requirements.
Now that is a troll. The space suttle has performed very well as a reusable launch vehicle with very good turn around time. Figure out the cost of disposable rockets for each of the shuttle's missions and you might see the practicality.
Back to topic. The performance of the Landshark might be improved by not using the pump for land traction. I would suggest front wheel drive, retractable rear wheels and a seperate water pump. Ride quality is adversely effected by the non sprung pump weight, and three wheel suspensions are less stable than four wheel suspensions. 200 MPH is a little faster than I want to go on the ground, especially with a pump for a rear wheel.
Physics Genious should go do a practical thing or two.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
...is if they drop it out of a 747.
IT'S A LUMP OF CLAY!
Editors - "it can do this, it can do that..." NO IT CAN'T - it's a CONCEPT!
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
This has got to be, or will be when they actually make one, the coolest
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
I bet Reliant are dead jealous, imagine doing that in a Robin - or plastic pig as they are known.
:-)
I bet Delboy would by one ("Only Fools and Horses" UK TV show)
That the driver would be up to his neck in water before the skier.
But after 1967, no more Amphicars were directly imported to the United States because they failed to meet environmental and Transportation Department regulations on safety and emissions. Because of that, the manufacturer went out of business.
I suppose those are the same regulations that keep Mexican built VWs out of the US? The same ones that protect the US market from a $2,000 new car sticker price, hmmph.
This new ultra expensive toy will not be a threat and will more than likely find it's way into the US and sell even fewer than the 3,000 or so Amphibicars. But you never know, the big three automakers might change a law. Some people can't stand competition of any kind, can they?
My 1970 VW van works just fine, thank you. It would be nice for the Mexicans to make a few new ones and export them for $5,000 or so. Beep beep.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
that bit that I said earlier about becoming a meat torpedo if you fell off your bike at 130, it applies here as well. you'd go straight over the the bars and if you didn't catch your knees you'd probably become a relatively nice water-meat torpedo. Not that I'd ever want to try it.
Free and Low Cost CFD
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
I became a stone carver with English Heritage after leaving school and have worked with various other materials during my career
Damn! Those are some impressive credentials, that'll give credibility to those land 200mph...
Below is a glass-fibre full size (8 ft tall) bull Indian elephant that I helped to sculpt for Harrods
Unless that thing sports an automatic transmission, 250hp motor and floaters, I don't see how it in any way makes him qualified enough to make the landshark claims. Seriously, shouldn't this guy be at least associated with someone who is a mechanichal engineer with years of background in the industry? (I know that's what I expected to find in the "about me" section at least). As it is, this thing sounds like an ellaborate pipe dream to me (sweeet! this thing has a sleek shape, it should do about.... mmmhh.. 200mph? yes that's about right). I haven't been able to find a reference to someone who actually has a clue working on this on their site (i.e. not an animator, clay modeller or graphic designer).
--
Overcaffeinated. Angry geeks.
POKE 65495,0
READY?
Without cheating and looking it up, I'd say that changes one of the colors to black on a Commodore 64. I think it's the background color, but it might be the border color.
Don't label something "offtopic" unless you know the topic well enough to tell what's on topic.
The other thing the shuttle has going for it is the ability to carry a big payload. Yes, using the shuttle to launch a telecommunications satellite into orbit would be a waste of money - for much the same reason that using a 24-foot U-haul truck to go pick up milk from the store would be a waste of money.
Don't label something "offtopic" unless you know the topic well enough to tell what's on topic.
Good friction between tires and road is vital to a balancing two-wheeled vehicle. It is vital not just for turning and stopping, but also for simply keeping from falling over when going straight. The little subconsious adjustments you do to keep balance amount to a series of curves of very short duration and small magnitude. On a bike, if your tire slips for even just brief moment while trying to turn, your bike "lays down" and you have an accident. That is one small way in which a car is definately safer. On a car if you slip for a moment in a turn, you just end up going where you didn't want to (which could result in a crash, but isn't guaranteed to.)
Don't label something "offtopic" unless you know the topic well enough to tell what's on topic.
Wait, didn't Mr. Garrison invent something like this because he was pissed off at the airlines? Hopefully this one works without the anal probe.
Each year, I take a couple of weeks off and leave the madness of the rat race behind. I arrive at the beach early and setup my beach umbrellas and sand chairs. The goal is to do nothing but squish my toes in the sand and watch the puffy white clouds against the clear blue sky for a single day.
Every year as mid day approaches so do the loud annoying jet skis and their idiot riders who can't seem to follow simple rules like, stay out of the swimming zone and don't get drunk and ride your jet ski. Do they even put mufflers on these annoying devices?
My attempt to clear my mind turns to thoughts of "jet ski seeking rocket lauchers". I hate these things and now I find that they are just going to get bigger, louder, and even more obnoxious.
Next year I have to find a "jet-ski" free lake, if there is such a thing.