Technical question for you brain boxes

[lincolnsteve]

Ok we have been having an in-depth discussion at work and its divided the team up so much that its time to ask for outside help.

We use professional leaf blowers at work (we are tree surgeons) and know that they kick out a lot of power on the wind front. We were wondering if you were stranded on a sailing boat (a small one) with no wind and just happened to have a blower handy, would you be able to move the boat forwards with said blower? Our theory is that if you are creating your own wind surly the boat must move forwards, but would the blower create an opposite force that would neutralise the force of the forward motion? (every action has a reaction right?!?)

Any help would be much appreciated!

[rocky]

ignore the fact you have a sail, point the blower backwards and you've just made a small scale one of these:

[Adventure Racer]

Though you could actually also point it sideways at the sail and get forward motion with the sail working as normal with the airflow - the reaction from the blower would simply mean you didn't need a centre board.

This is of course always assuming your leaf blowers are petrol powered - otherwise I think finding somewhere to plug it in might cause you problems

[Shea]

If your looking for the reaction, its the wind youve made move behind you.

[The Loofa]

You'd be better off using it as a paddle

[FromTheGrassyKnoll]

Our theory is that if you are creating your own wind surly the boat must move forwards, but would the blower create an opposite force that would neutralise the force of the forward motion? (every action has a reaction right?!?)

I would agree with that assertion. You will get a force exerted on you... who are attached to the boat that drives the boat backwards... assuming you are sitting in the stern pointing the blower direction at the sail which is across the boat. The wind impacts the sail and forces the boat forwards but the two cancel each other out.

If you ignore the sail and point it out the back of the boat you will do much better.

Now let's say a swamp boat has a 300 HP engine and a nice efficient prop.... A leaf blower is say 10 HP.

So would it work?

Of course it would...

http://www.epoxyproducts.com/restore.html