There’s a guy out there called Robert Maddox who likes to describe himself as the Rocketman, and designer/builder of “the largest pulsejet engines in the world,” running on gasoline and rated at between 14 and 1,000 pounds of thrust. And one of his most iconic creations just popped up on an auction lot.
A pulsejet engine is a design where combustion happens in pulses that take place 70 times a second, and they can run statically. Because of that, the units do not need many moving parts, making them rather simple and highly effective, but also incredible noisy.
Back in 2010, Maddox released into the world such a twin pulsejet engine, slapped onto a custom tubular steel frame in turn based on a 1929 Harley-Davidson track racer. The engine in question is rated at 250 pounds of thrust (339 Nm), enough to push this thing from a standstill to 60 mph in 5 seconds.
All by running on 87-octane pump gasoline, although, to be fair, its builder claimed at the time the thing could run on any type of fuel (you’ll find a video of the first run of the bike which took place 12 years ago below this text).
Back in its day, the bike was meant to be ridden so fast as to push through the 200 mph (321 kph) barrier, but we don’t recall it having managed to do so.
The let's-call-it motorcycle is now listed by auction house Mecum as a special feature in an auction it will be holding in Kissimmee, Florida, in the first days of January 2023. No estimate is made as to how much the 1929 Harley-Davidson Pulsejet (also known as the Dragon or Sportjet) is expected to fetch, but Maddox himself says his pulsejet motorcycles often sell for $25,000, so that’s a fair starting point.
Daniel loves writing (or so he claims), and he uses this skill to offer readers a "behind the scenes" look at the automotive industry. He also enjoys talking about space exploration and robots, because in his view the only way forward for humanity is away from this planet, in metal bodies. Full profile
Would you like AUTOEVOLUTION to send you notifications?
Google News