RB2000 Rocket Belt
In 1995, the construction of the rocket pack was improved. Three men from Texas, Bradley Wayne Barker (Brad Barker), Joe Wright, and Larry Stanley, after inviting professional inventor Doug Malewicki, built the new version of the rocket pack, which they named "RB 2000 Rocket Belt". The "RB 2000" pack in essence repeats the construction of Wendell Moore, but is made from light alloys (titanium, aluminium) and composite materials, has increased fuel stock and increased power. As a result its maximum duration of flight is increased to 30 seconds. On 12 June 1995 Bill Suitor flew the RB2000; afterwards he gave the RB2000 back to Bradley Wayne Barker, who drove away with it, and it has not been seen since. A lawsuit resulted. The story is recounted in the book The Rocketbelt Caper: A True Tale of Invention, Obsession and Murder by Paul Brown, and fictionized in the 2008 movie Pretty Bird.
The following is from New Scientist October 2005 :
In 1992, one-time insurance salesman and entrepreneur Brad Barker formed a company to build a rocketbelt with two partners: Joe Wright, a businessman based in Houston, and Larry Stanley, an engineer who owned an oil well in Texas. By 1994, they had a working prototype they called the Rocketbelt-2000, or RB-2000. They even asked Suitor to fly it for them. But the partnership soon broke down. First Stanley accused Barker of defrauding the company. Then Barker attacked Stanley and went into hiding, taking the RB-2000 with him. Police investigators questioned Barker but released him after three days. The following year Stanley took Barker to court to recover lost earnings. The judge awarded Stanley sole ownership of the RB-2000 and over $10m in costs and damages. When Barker refused to pay up, Stanley kidnapped him, tied him up and held him captive in a box disguised as a SCUBA-tank container. After eight days Barker managed to escape. Police arrested Stanley and in 2002 he was sentenced to life in prison, since reduced to eight years. The rocketbelt has never been found.
| Technical characteristics of rocket pack | ||
|---|---|---|
| Bell Rocket Belt | RB 2000 Rocket Belt | |
| Duration | 21 s | 30 s |
| Thrust | 136 kgf (1.33 kN) (calculated 127 kgf or 1.25 kN) |
145 kgf (1.42 kN) |
| Maximum distance | approximately 250 meters or 820 feet | |
| Maximum altitude | 18 m (~59 feet) | 30 m (~98 feet) |
| Maximum speed | 55 km/h or 34 mph | 96 km/h or 60 mph |
| Equipped mass | 57 kg or 125 lbs | 60 kg or 132 lbs |
| Fuel stock | 19 liters or 5 gallons | 23 liters or 6 gallons |
Read more about this topic: Bell Rocket Belt
Famous quotes containing the words rocket and/or belt:
“Along a parabola life like a rocket flies,
Mainly in darkness, now and then on a rainbow.”
—Andrei Voznesensky (b. 1933)
“Your work is to keep cranking the flywheel that turns the gears that spin the belt in the engine of belief that keeps you and your desk in midair.”
—Annie Dillard (b. 1945)