Hand-Powered Motor Boat Gives Real Watersport Thrills (Jul, 1931)
Hand-Powered Motor Boat Gives Real Watersport Thrills
A DIMINUTIVE motor boat powered not by a motor but by a hand crank operated by the swimmer has been devised by a clever home craftsman to provide watersport thrills at the bathing beach. The propeller of this odd craft is geared to a pulley which is in turn belted to the hand crank on the front, as illustrated in the drawing above. Buoyancy of the craft is increased by use of small pontoons fitted between the boards running lengthwise of the craft.
Its all fun and games until someone gets their heel stuck in the propeller.
She looks worried that they won’t let her stop cranking.
There’s a reason that’s not a photograph: No way in the world could she or anyone going to crank fast enough to raise that kind of roostertail, no matter what kind of illegal/military benzedrine/whatever she’s taken. At best you’d do slightly better than paddling with your feet…
I’m not even sure that would work with the crank in that orientation. Horizontal with two cranks would have worked a LOT better.
No, that’s the most efficient way to use a crank, as the Luftwaffe discovered.
Effective, in this context, is a different story.
No wonder the two men in the background are laughing. All that furious cranking, and she’d still be going nowhere.
She might go a little faster if she wasn’t dragging her lower legs and feet in the water like that. Also, if she’s running from the feds, she should throw the stash overboard to make the load a little lighter.
Besides, the propeller is about 70% out of the water. Sheesh
That’s not actually a crank in the normal sense. She grips it and raises her hand up and down quite quickly. It’s a pity most of the mechanizm is obscured by the ‘leg guard.’
I understand some woman could hit 10 knots.
I understand you could achieve a nitrous oxide boost effect buy consuming a can of van de camps beans just before launching