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Steam Powered Underwater Jet Engine

Posted by chrisd on from the seaquest-dsv-without-the-dolphin dept.

Bob Vila's Hammer writes "An Australian engineer, Alan Burns invented a very efficient underwater steam powered jet engine. "Steam that is produced from a petrol or gasoline fueled boiler emerges at high speed from a rearward-facing ring-shaped nozzle into a cone-shaped chamber. Shock waves created as the steam condenses are focused by the chamber to blast water out of the back. Besides powering watercraft pretty efficiently, it can also be used as an extremely robust pump. Pretty Cool."

4 of 320 comments (clear)

  1. Neato by assaultriflesforfree · · Score: 5, Funny

    One thing I'm curious about is why they can only be scaled to 300 horsepower... Seems like if a 20 cm one can put out 30 HP, a big one could put out a lot more. It also might be fun to install a 20 cm one into a ketchup dispenser at McDonald's or something. And also, will it shoot potatos?

    1. Re:Neato by nounderscores · · Score: 5, Funny

      Maybe they only did safety factor calculations out to 10x? It might require a slightly different shaped engine for higher horespowers to avoid the KABOOM failure mode.

      Also, the article says that part of the engine was demonstration was to shove large amounts of lard and cardboard through it, so I would say Yes it is a machine potato gun... so long as your potatos start out underwater. (no water, no jet)

      hmmm. as an afterthought, have you ever heard about the Archerfish? It's a firefighting boat which uses a jet ski engine to get to the fire, and then reroutes the engine through the firehose to put out the fire. Secondary propulsion allows the boat to manouver in firefighting mode.

      If you fitted a grille over the intake of the super water jet engine, you could put out the fire with a more powerfull blast from a more reliable engine and not have any disadvantages like slugging the burning marina with underwater potatoes and sucked up fish.

      (one more thought)

      since the water is only 3 or 4 degrees warmer after it exhausts from the blast chamber, would trout that has been killed by being sucked up by the engine be in one piece and good to eat if you turned around and began to scoop up your trail of dead sucked up fish? It would be the simplest fishing trip since the invention of dynamite.

  2. from the article by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Todman shoved large quantities of lard and cardboard into the inlet without the pump suffering any ill effects.

    COWBOYNEAL NOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

  3. Re:Now there are two ways... by sickmtbnutcase · · Score: 5, Funny

    One question... What if they run into a school of tuna? ;-)

    Kinda makes me think of the "Bass-O-Matic" commercial on Saturday Night Live...