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Former NASA engineer builds world’s largest Super Soaker, firing water at 272 mph

Former NASA engineer builds world’s largest Super Soaker, firing water at 272 mph

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Summer is here, and that means it’s time to break out the water guns. Or, if you’re YouTuber Mark Rober (formerly a NASA engineer), it’s time to build the largest water gun ever made (via Gizmodo).

Rober’s giant water pistol is a little more overpowered than the original backyard toy, firing jets of water at 272 miles per hour, with enough force to slice through a watermelon and shatter glass. But despite the giant scale, the supersized Super Soaker works pretty much the same way as the toy version: pressurized air is pumped into a chamber of water, and released with the trigger to shoot a jet of water. Rober’s version instead uses pressurized tanks of nitrogen gas and water for far more impressive results,. But hey, it’s all working on the same principles.

Video: Mark Rober

Rober is no stranger to building comically oversized children’s guns. Last summer, he put together the world’s largest Nerf gun. While that was impressive, the 40-mile-per-hour darts it shot barely hold a candle to the destructive power of the seven-foot-long water pistol.

The gigantic Super Soaker is definitely a custom, one-off build, though Rober does provide a build list of parts and CAD files should you want to try to cobble together your own. As a note: pressurized gas as used here is dangerous, and Rober is a trained engineer, so proceed carefully if you’re trying this at home. This is not meant for human targets!