Haven’t you always wanted to know how to build one of these? I have. Well, maybe not exactly; however, jet packs or rocket packs are geeky and cool, and always will be.A young pilot stumbles onto a prototype jetpack that allows him to become a high flying masked hero.When Eddie Valentine and his gang learn that Neville Sinclair is a Nazi, they quit working for him and join up with the FBI agents against the Nazi thugs hidden in the shadows. This reflects the attitude of real-life American gangsters during this era, in that they did not like fascism, particularly because Benito Mussolini persecuted the Sicilian Families back in the Old Country. Nor did any Jewish mobsters like Adolf Hitler. In fact, organized crime was one of the biggest allies the American government and law enforcement had when it came to rooting out Nazi spies and collaborators.The plane flown by Cliff in the opening is the Gee Bee racer, specifically Model "Z" from 1931. It was built by the Granville Brothers Aircraft Company (brothers Zantford, Thomas, Robert, Mark, and Edward), hence the plane's initials "G.B." The R-1 was for a time the fastest land-plane in the world, essentially a cockpit, wings, and tail built around an 800 hp Pratt & Whitney Wasp engine. James Doolittle (who would lead the bombing raid over Tokyo in 1942) won the 1932 Thompson Trophy race flying a Gee Bee R-1 at a speed of 252.686 miles per hour.
It’s fun to think about what it would be like to put on a jet pack, hit the buttons on the handles and fly up in the sky, Buzz Lightyear style. After all, we’ve been watching them in the movies for years. People everywhere have tried to make homemade jet packs. You can find the videos all over YouTube.
Allison (love that geeky girl), over at Instructables (love that geeky site), made a rocket pack from items you can pretty much find in your recycle bin. She was inspired by the 1991 movie “The Rocketeer.” You can make this for a costume or just for some random weekend fun. Better yet, wear it to impress that geeky guy you’ve had a crush on for a while. All you’ll need is some empty soda bottles, some empty shampoo bottles, an empty jam container, some empty cardboard cereal boxes and a paper towel tube. You can read step-by-step how to put it all together here. According to her personal blog, Allison says this cost her a total of $0 to make. Nice job!
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