Make your very own super basic pulse jet for under $10

[Turbinator]

Here is a video - because who doesn't like a video - explaining exactly what this is all about.

All you need is a jar, some denatured alcohol, and a "long nose" BBQ style lighter (for safety), or you could use matches, if you don't mind accidentally burning your fingers.

Here is a step by step article:
http://www.instructables.com/id/Be-an-Aeronautical-Scientist:-Make-your-Own-Jet-En/

This works on the same principle as a pulse jet engine, however you would call this a Reynst Combustor

Longer burning one:

 

[IgnoreThisBarrel]

Quick! Somebody make this for Orbiter!

You know, I might just make a Spacecraft3 version of this...

 

[Pyromaniac605]

I saw videos of these on Youtube a while ago, I would try it but I'm sure my parents can't trust me.

Darren

 

[Tommy]

Small pulse jets that run on propane aren't that difficult to make if you have access to a drill press. The hardest part is the "flapper", but Lennox (they make home heating furnaces) actually make them. They used to make a "Lennox Pulse" line of furnaces that were essentially pulse jets - it was a way to increase efficiency. They tend to be problematic and difficult to work on - not to mention noisy. A guy four houses away from me has one - and it wakes me up every time it fires.

 

[Urwumpe]

Doesn't look really like a pulse jet, but rather like the combustion products are just modulated by the flexible metal with the hole. It only sounds like one. All the fuel/air mixture is already inside the jar by shaking it.

Pretty much the principle behind a two-stroke motorcycle engine exhaust pipe.

A real pulse jet is also not that hard to be produced, if you have some model building experience. A valve-less pulse jet is hard or making a pulse jet that can run for more than 15 minutes before the valve reed breaks.

 

[Turbinator]

Doesn't look really like a pulse jet, but rather like the combustion products are just modulated by the flexible metal with the hole. It only sounds like one. All the fuel/air mixture is already inside the jar by shaking it.

Reynst Combustor