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Hmm according to myth busters, it does work if you have a giant fan and sail, just much less effectively than just the fan. Since the sail is acting as an inefficient air redirecter, kinda like an airplane thrust reverser.
Also, using the leaf blower on a skateboard should work even better, since the air is coming in though the side instead of straight back.
i think the mythbusters result goes against the spirit of the myth. yes you “can” blow your own sail, but it’s never going to be as effective as shown in cartoons and such, or just turning the fan around like a normal air boat.
I wonder how much more effective it would be if you had a duct behind the fan pulling in air from the sides, or maybe angled more towards the front?
Apologies if they covered this in the video, but I can't watch it at the moment.
That's what I was thinking.
The fan in the thumbnail (and the one he tries in the video) fails because the fan's intake is pulling the fan away from the sail (like an airplane propeller). However, I wonder if you redirected that intake to the front of the boat while directing the output to the sail, could you get more thrust? The fan's intake and output would then be working together.
Also the leaf blower could work in theory but I think there's too much friction for the leaf blower to overcome. If it did have enough to push you, then you'd also be pushed sideways by the blower's output as well