Jay Leno Drives the Amazing Prototype Aircraft-Powered 130-HP Meyers Manx

On a recent YouTube upload, Jay Leno hosted Meyers Manx, new owner, and chairman Philip Sarofim, and featured a Meyer Manx Dune Buggy powered by an aircraft-inspired radial engine.

The story of the Meyer Manx started in the early 1960s. During this time, Bruce Meyers was an artist, painter, musician, boat builder, and world war II veteran. According to Philip, Bruce spotted these tube frame chassis gliding over sun dunes in California and, at that point, hit a lightbulb moment to develop the dune buggy.

"He thought. I would love to create a body kind of in the same way that I make boats. He wanted it to look like Marilyn Monroe's dress blowing up in that famous photograph. That was the inspiration," Philip revealed.

Bruce Meyers used his experience building boats to make the Manx Dune Buggy

Bruce used his experience building boats to develop a fiberglass tub bolted onto a shortened Volkswagen Beetle chassis – and the rest was history. He'd created a new beach buggy automobile segment without even knowing.

Unfortunately, the story takes a sudden twist. Despite Bruce being an excellent innovator, he wasn't a businessman. With the car's rapid fame in pop culture, his brilliant innovation was taken over by the replica industry, and soon cheap knockoffs by illegitimate companies tore down the company.

"He didn't get rich off this game. A lot of other people did, but he was an innovator, and he was an interesting character," Jay Leno said about Bruce Meyers.

So, what did Bruce Meyers do to cause ripples in the beach buggy segment? Using his experience building boats, he applied the same general concept to the VW concept. The result was one of the most capable off-road buggies of its time.

The Meyer Manx won the inaugural Mexican 1000 in 1967

The Manx was a 100% authentic innovation and unlike any replica. According to Philip, the best way to differentiate it from other imitations and knockoffs was by sitting on the fender or placing a beer can on top of it (it wouldn't slide off). Bruce believed in quality, and as a result, the Manx was developed with extra thick fiberglass.

As simple as it looks, the Meyers Manx had a relatively sophisticated setup. It consisted of a fiberglass body, with the structural architecture embedded in steel. This setup was bolted onto the suspension, and at the heart of it was a Volkswagen Beetle powertrain.

In 1967, Bruce's buggy won the inaugural Mexican 1000, an initial version of the Baja 1000 trashing mainstream bikes, off-road cars, and trucks.

But the 70s are done and dusted. What's left of that beautiful era is nostalgia. Fortunately, Meyers' dream wasn't a total loss. Under the new stewardship of Philip Sarofim, the Meyers Manx is making a comeback. This time with the classic conversion kit and, more interestingly, a new recipe to the old formula in the form of an electric Meyers Manx.

According to Philip, the company is selling the electric car as a complete car. They are also selling remastered kits for the classic buggy – all to retain the spirit and heritage of the brand.

Original Manx was powered by a Type 1 VW engine

The original Meyers Manx came with a water-cooled four-cylinder engine out of the Type 1 VeeDub engine. The Prototype at Jay Leno's Garage is an improved Radial-powered variant developed by the new Meyers Manx team in California in collaboration with Australian-based Radial Motion.

As Leno soon discovered, the prototype Manx runs a three-pot radial engine designed for airplanes. As if that's not enough, the company first tested the engine on a VW – making it the perfect fit for the Manx considering its Beetle underpinning.

Powering the 1,600 lb (726 kgs) modern Manx is a 2-liter three-cylinder detuned engine good for 130 hp (132 ps) and 130 lb-ft (176 Nm) of torque. All that power is transferred to the rear wheels via a 4-speed manual transmission. It has a very flat torque curve, making it very thrilling to drive.

According to Philip, Radial Motion is getting 200 hp (203 ps) on their naturally aspirated versions and well over 300 hp (304 ps) with forced induction.

Uses off-the-shelf LS1 internals

From the exterior, it's designed to look like an air-cooled engine (finned), but if you look keenly, you'll notice radiators and fans.

So, how do they keep the aero engine from hydraulic locking, considering the cylinders on this powerplant are below the crankcase? Gravity's expected to force the oil down into the cylinders, which could ultimately kill the cylinder if it seeps for an extended period.

The setup on the prototype is designed with a compression pump and an electric scavenger pump. When you are cranking the engine, it drains all the oil. As a result, when turning off the engine, you must pull the valve.

All the oil will be drained when you start the engine (valve pulled during shutdown). Unlike traditional radial engines, it doesn't go out through the exhaust – Radial Motion was keen to build a smokeless radial engine.

An aircraft engine isn't the simplest to maintain, so the team designed it with off-the-shelf LS1 internals. The setup has zero belts or chains – it's all gear driven.

"Nice! Very good. A lot of fun. The steering is heavier than I thought; I think that's the big tires, but maybe a new steering box might lighten it up a bit," Leno said about what he thinks of the Meyers Manx prototype.