A monster truck hurtles its way down a runway. It has 1 flat dry-racing tyre at the front on the left. The runway has been flooded on that side and the truck edges over to it.

A man in the back of the truck with a board strapped to his feet climbs over the edge on to a short ladder.

The crowd, as if one organic being, gasps in unison.

The truck begins to aquaplane over the flooded area. An eruption of water sprays out with intense force. An enormous wedge of water is formed gushing out from under the front dry-tyre.

The crowd cheers and whoops.

The man, holding on to a rope and handle, lowers his board onto the wedge. He slowly adjusts to the feel of the wave beneath him, and readies himself.

The crowd becomes silent.

The boarder lets go of the truck, suspended upon the wedge of water, pulled by the rope...

He surfs the aquaplane.
He braves the wedge.
He Monster-Boards.

_________________

See artistic impression, below...

[EDIT] - [marked-for-engineering] - would the resultant wave have enough up force to keep the rider from hitting the ground? And with one tyre as a racing tyre, would the rest of the treaded wheels keep the monster truck from careering into everyone to a horrible messy death?
-- theleopard, Jun 23 2007

From the annos of the Gnarly Surf-Plough Gnarly_20Surf-Plough
[theleopard, Jun 23 2007]

(?) Artistic Impression http://i37.tinypic.com/syqjaq.jpg
Enthusiasm and perserverance only slightly obscure my feeble photoshop skills. Still, monst-on! [theleopard, Jun 25 2007, last modified Oct 02 2009]

Slap a plow on the front of one of them babies! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocket_sled
[bleh, Sep 25 2007]

Monster Truck Steering http://www.monsterhighway.com/mt1.shtml
Apparently, the steering wheel controls the front wheels and the back wheels are controlled by a toggle switch. When the switch is not being used, the rear wheels center themselves. [bleh, Sep 26 2007]

Disappointed - I thought this was a boarding house for monsters.
-- nuclear hobo, Jun 25 2007


Ah, danger shmanger. I was hoping that by having only the front-left wheel as a dry-racing one and the other three as the full monster-truck-style hugely-treaded wheels, traction would be kept up, possibly by adjusting suspension to put more weight on those three wheels.

Alternatively, I had a second thought that, should my physics be somewhat flawed (no doubt), the truck would have a 5th wheel that jutted out from it and lowered on to the water to do the aquaplaning independantly of the truck itself. Although that would be cheating really.
-- theleopard, Jun 26 2007


Does it have to be a wheel in the water? It would be better to have all 4 wheels on dry land, perhaps next to a canal, with an adjustable scaffold overhanging the water which the surfer can launch from. This scaffold would then have some highly engineered piece of something protruding from the bottom into the water to create the desired wave, adjustable for different waveforms of course.
-- marklar, Jun 26 2007


I like the idea of a driver-boarder team dynamic, assisting each other to pull off some brain-melting tricks. For instance the track could be flooded intermittantly on both sides of the runway so in order to surf all the way to the end the surfer would have to cross over to the otherside of the truck. This could be done by whipping the board outwards and swinging up and around the back. Meanwhile the truck itself, in order to catch the surfer on a fresh aquaplane, has to veer to the otherside of the road to create the wave that the surfer can land on - mid-jump.

Of course, there's the possibility that we give the board some wheels, that way there may be less danger of death, and more tricks possible (like going under the truck).
-- theleopard, Jun 26 2007


May I suggest a combination between your 2 ideas. how about a rocket sled in an indoor venue similar to what you describe above. It seems the amount of water that would have to be displaced to support a surfer would be large. Large enough that the truck wouldn't be able to get enough traction to push such a mass of water (I think). If you fashion a rocket sled like those used to test ejection seats and such in a 5 or 6 foot pool pushing a snow plow, you should have your indoor manmade surfing wave. Plus it has *rockets*!
-- bleh, Sep 25 2007


oh, and [+] by the way.
-- bleh, Sep 25 2007


Thanks. But [Bleh], not much surfing to be done in a 5 or 6 foot pool, especially when rockets are involved.

Not wanting to stray too far from the idea: From what I read of aquaplaning (US: hydroplaning), it renders the aquaplaning wheel completely uncontrolled; acceleration, braking, steering etc. So, either the aquaplaning wheel has to be one of the unsteered wheels at the back and the driver atempts to maintain a steady speed throughout, or, a 5th wheel rig needs to be installed on the side of the truck - a wheel that can be forced down into the water to displace as much of it as possible.

I still think this is too cool *not* to work.
-- theleopard, Sep 26 2007


I dont doubt that the water would support the surfer from below as he is being pulled by the truck, but if you want him to be able to tricks as in your artist rendition, I think a more forceful wave generator would be needed.

As a side note, If I remember correctly, monster trucks have 4 wheel steering.
-- bleh, Sep 26 2007


//4 wheel steering//

Damn!
-- theleopard, Sep 26 2007


Ok, now I'm somewhere where I can think about this undistracted for a minute and consider the feasibility of the idea. (read:in class)

the surfer hydroplaning on level water being dragged by a truck is no problem, those fools do it at running speeds with no pull everyday at the beach. The problem I see here is when they leave the horizontal and attempt to 'Ride the Tube' of the wave as a large amount of energy would be required from the wave to support their weight. Again, I don't know if one tire on a monster truck would displace enough water at a fast enough rate to provide the necessary energy.

Lets think about this for a minute. For a surfer to be suspended above the horizontal the water would halve to counteract the force of gravity meaning it would have to exert an upward force equal to the surfer (and board's) weight times 9.8 m/s^2. As the surfer rides up the wave, the surface of the water becomes less smooth and hydroplaning becomes less possible so he's relying on the upward force of water to support him. Lets assume a 55 kg surfer (with board). He'll be exerting a downward force of 539N on the water. That means the water shooting up at the bottom of the board must either be in large enough quantity to counteract the force or be accelerated fast enough to counteract it (F= m*a).

How deep is your water trough?

What about a slingshot track instead of the rocket sled? Like the ones they use to launch fighter jets off aircraft carriers. Basically I'm thinking you're going to need a deeper trough than a monster truck will be able to drive through, so alternative plow propulsion may need to bo considered. I really like the idea.
-- bleh, Sep 26 2007



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