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The DIY Tank
Will Foster, a Kettering University student, has built his own half sized Panzer tank. It took Will 2 years and around $10,000 to build his mini-tank and he says the process has been "a lot of trial and error...I'd buy a $200 part that didn't work, then go to a $300 part that didn't work before finding a $50 part that did." The tank is about as big as a small car, and can reach speeds of around 20 mph with its three-cylinder diesel engine. It runs on treads, has a cannon powered by compressed air from a scuba tank and parks wherever the hell it wants.
In case you didn't catch it, he built it all for paintball! THAT'S AWESOME! For $2000 total that's not bad if someone were to built another one. Although call me crazy but with gas prices, I'd wanna build a more fuel efficient pod racer instead lol. Btw I love where he says all you gotta do is put a slow moving vehicle sign on it or an orange triangle and it's technically a tractor.
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This kid has a gold mine at his hands!
If he could mass produce this and modify the cannon a bit, he has the makings of the ultimate Paintball game.
The heck with these light-infantry paint ball games! I wanna be Patton!
- dj
Well, even if it were full size it'd still be smaller than any of the "Ford F-Off" (tm Achromatic1978) giant-sized trucks and SUVs that you're apt to see people driving in Flint. (The Panzer was about a foot shorter than a Suburban/Yukon XL/Escalade ESV.)
I don't think the meter maids would complain so much as the road commission. Treads aren't nice to asphalt, and Michigan already has the worst-maintained roads in the nation...
First rule of trauma: Bleeding always stops.
He probably could make some of the money back by selling the plans. An ad for "Build Your Own Mini-Tank!" in the back of Popular Mechanics might actually be the most legit kit ever advertised there.