"Made It Myself" Land, Snow And Water Machine

"Made It Myself" Land, Snow And Water Machine MISCELLANEOUS EQUIPMENT Miscellaneous 27-6-29 Raymond Maguire combined an Arctic Cat snowmobile, a Bombardier jet-ski, and a Suzuki ATV to make a first-of-its-kind machine that runs equally well on land, snow or water. "It goes 60 mph on snow and 30 mph on water," he says, noting that he spent about $5,000 total to build the versatile machine. The 40-hp, two-cycle engine from the Arctic Cat powers the vehicle. "The same design would work with more powerful engines," says Maguire. Both the front two wheels and the rear treads can be driven at the same time, giving the vehicle tremendous traction year-round. Modifying the vehicle to work in the water wasn't that much of a chore. "I'd seen snowmobiles do just fine in the water. It's only when they slow down that they sink. So I just had to figure out a way to make it float," says Maguire. The Ski-Doo hull was sealed up and the front wheels made retractable. "It'll hydrofoil real easy and when you ease off the throttle you won't sink much at all," says Maguire. The front wheels retract hydraulically 8 in. and the rear tracks move up 14 in. The key to his design is the adapter that transfers power from the snowmobile engine to the front wheels of the ATV. This is a part for which Maguire received a patent for earlier this year. "I'm looking for a buyer of this idea or someone who would like to manufacture it," says Maguire. But for right now he is having fun on his four prototypes. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Raymond Maguire, 446 Maguire Road, Lennoxville, QC, J1M 2A2, Canada (ph 819 875-3578; fax 819 875-5271; email: terrilee@sympatico.ca).

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