Saturday, May 8, 2010

Kinetics Is Coming Back!



A long time tradition around here, the Kinetics, is coming back after a couple of years of absence. Here's a photomontage with music.

For those of you who have never seen this, it involves teams of crazies and engineering undergrads (but I repeat myself) building a human-powered vehicle to move on land and across water. Points are awarded for style and performance.

Since some of these vehicles get their first shakedown run at the start line, one of my favorite awards is the Titanic trophy for the best sinking at the start line.

Tentative date this year is August 28th, so there's still time to get building your human-powered hovercraft. The venue will be Union Reservoir, in Longmont, just up the road from the old venue.
One of these two babies will provide the motivation at the start. Participants have until I can reload to get out of range, so speed will be at a premium.

Oh snap! I'm told I can't do that.

Never fear, there will be at least an earth-shattering Ka-Boom.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

You can't reload, or you can't let them get out of range?

Of course, given some of the craft in question, getting out of range isn't a major concern. Neither is your ability to sink them.

Billll said...

In the past we had the mortar and the pumpkin gun. My policy was to give everyone 20-30 minutes to get going, then begin lobbing basketballs at the stragglers with the pumpkin gun. My range with a deflated basketball was about 100 yards, so anyone who hadn't covered that distance in 20 minutes was likely in no danger of winning anything, excepting the Titanic award.