The Flybar 1200
As a kid, pro skateboarder Andy Macdonald loved to bounce around on a pogo stick. To replicate the fun of boingingly soaring through the air, he decided to create an Xtreme pogo stick specifically for adults. He hooked up with an inventor who had created a rubber thruster that, when stretched to full extension, can produce 100 pounds of thrust. They crammed 12 of these thrusters into a next-generation pogo stick, and thus was born the Flybar 1200 -- a device with a simply awesome amount of power. As a writeup on Gizmag notes:
The Flybar 1200 is like a pogo Stick on steroids, and was built to support the weight, strength, and demands of a world-class athlete. Fit co-ordinated humans can jump higher than five feet and people have been known to get nearly 8 feet of air using the aircraft-grade aluminium Flybar.
Eight feet? That's incredibly cool -- but honestly, you'd have to be irretrievably out of your goddamn mind to actually use one of these things. I mean, 1200 pounds of thrust shoving down on a region the size of a silver dollar? I can't possibly imagine a less stable kinetic system. I headed over to Amazon to look at the customer reviews for the Flybar 1200, figuring I would find a litany of ghastly injuries. Sure enough, here's a posting by one James Grissom, a father who won a Flybar 1200 in a radio-station draw and gave it to his kids:
About two weeks later I got to spend MANY hours in the Emergency room at the Trauma Center here in Seattle while I listened to my 14 year old son scream in pain as 4 doctors pulled on his leg to try and set the massive Open Fracture (Bones Protruding From The Skin) of his left Tibia and Fibula (Lower Leg) that he received when the Flybar slipped out from under him as he landed on it. It is now 2005 ... My son is off his crutches now but still walks with a cane for support and is always in pain by the end of the day. The $3500 worth of Titanium implants will come out soon.
Ow. He let his 14-year-old son ride on that thing?
Posted by Clive Thompson at July 10, 2005 10:31 PM
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Oh my goodness. How on earth do things like this get into the open market?! And what parent thinks this is a good gift for his kid?!
Now, if they made this kind of thing to strap on each of your feet, that might be pretty darn cool - and probably a bit (a teeny bit?) safer, too!
Posted by: Laura at July 12, 2005 10:34 AM
I swear to god the guy must have been smoking crack to give that thing to his kid.
As to foot straps -- I wondered about that too, but then I thought, maybe they'd actually make the situation worse: You'd jump up seven feet in the air, start to tilt dangerously sideways, and be unable to jump off the thing ... so you'd just slam into the ground at a 90-degree angle, sideways, attached to a metal device. Yiiiiiii
Posted by: Clive at July 12, 2005 10:40 AM
Dude, have you seen streetboard bloopers? Real men stay attached to their props!
Posted by: Bram at July 12, 2005 8:16 PM
Heh. Good point -- skateboarders have been getting that much air and surviving, if not necessarily in one piece, for a long time ...
Posted by: Clive at July 12, 2005 11:52 PM
Oh. Actually, I was thinking of two separate dealies strapped to the feet. Not a pogo stick at all, but more akin to that thing we did with old tin cans made into "stilts."
Of course, the term stilts gives entirely the wrong impression, because you'd want a much wider base and not much height or you'd really be screwed up.
No matter how you slice it, though, it's pretty brutal.
Now, what if you could combine the flybar with the safety of the Zorb?!
Posted by: Laura at July 13, 2005 10:58 AM
The Zorb!!
I'd never heard about that! Outstanding.
Posted by: Clive at July 13, 2005 11:20 AM
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Oh my goodness. How on earth do things like this get into the open market?! And what parent thinks this is a good gift for his kid?!
Now, if they made this kind of thing to strap on each of your feet, that might be pretty darn cool - and probably a bit (a teeny bit?) safer, too!
Posted by: Laura![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.collisiondetection.net/nav-commenters.gif)
at July 12, 2005 10:34 AM
I swear to god the guy must have been smoking crack to give that thing to his kid.
As to foot straps -- I wondered about that too, but then I thought, maybe they'd actually make the situation worse: You'd jump up seven feet in the air, start to tilt dangerously sideways, and be unable to jump off the thing ... so you'd just slam into the ground at a 90-degree angle, sideways, attached to a metal device. Yiiiiiii
Posted by: Clive![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.collisiondetection.net/nav-commenters.gif)
at July 12, 2005 10:40 AM
Dude, have you seen streetboard bloopers? Real men stay attached to their props!
Posted by: Bram![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.collisiondetection.net/nav-commenters.gif)
at July 12, 2005 8:16 PM
Heh. Good point -- skateboarders have been getting that much air and surviving, if not necessarily in one piece, for a long time ...
Posted by: Clive![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.collisiondetection.net/nav-commenters.gif)
at July 12, 2005 11:52 PM
Oh. Actually, I was thinking of two separate dealies strapped to the feet. Not a pogo stick at all, but more akin to that thing we did with old tin cans made into "stilts."
Of course, the term stilts gives entirely the wrong impression, because you'd want a much wider base and not much height or you'd really be screwed up.
No matter how you slice it, though, it's pretty brutal.
Now, what if you could combine the flybar with the safety of the Zorb?!
Posted by: Laura![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.collisiondetection.net/nav-commenters.gif)
at July 13, 2005 10:58 AM
The Zorb!!
I'd never heard about that! Outstanding.
Posted by: Clive![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.collisiondetection.net/nav-commenters.gif)
at July 13, 2005 11:20 AM