Ars Technica – by Timothy B Lee
Over the last 15 years, Elon Musk’s companies have had a big impact on the rocket, electric car, and battery markets. This weekend, Musk entered yet another new market: flamethrowers. Musk’s Boring Company began selling branded novelty flamethrowers for $500 apiece.
“Obviously, a flamethrower is a super terrible idea,” Musk tweeted on Saturday evening. “Definitely don’t buy one.”
By Monday afternoon, customers had reserved 10,000 of the 20,000 units the company planned to produce.
Founded in late 2016, the Boring Company’s mission is to bring down the cost of underground tunneling. But while it’s working on that, it has become a platform for Musk to launch goofy side projects. Last year, Musk sold 50,000 Boring Company hats for $20 apiece.
“After 50k hats, we will start selling The Boring Company flamethrower,” Musk tweeted as that sale was wrapping up.
Now Musk has made good on his pledge. He posted a video of himself playing around with a flamethrower on Saturday. While the term “flamethrower” might conjure up images of a soldier throwing enormous flames over long distances, the Boring Company flamethrower is more modest. As Quartz points out, the flame it throws looks a lot like you’d get from a roofing torch.
Musk tweeted that the Boring Company avoided regulatory headaches by keeping the flame’s length under 10 feet.
Musk’s other company, Tesla, is struggling to produce enough Model 3 cars to satisfy hundreds of thousands of pre-orders—many of them placed in 2016. Hopefully, the Boring Company will be able to satisfy orders for flamethrowers more quickly. The company says flamethrowers will ship in the springtime.
Long distance bacon blaster?
Another twist on pig roasting ?
The article doesn’t say what he’s charging for them, but a flame thrower is a simple device that you can make yourself.
Just don’t let the pressure drop while you’re using it.
$500
wow…..right in the first paragraph and I missed it.
“Buy an overpriced Boring Company fire extinguisher! You can definitely buy one for less elsewhere, but this one comes with a cool sticker and the button is conveniently riiiight above.”
They actually say this on the first link to pre-order this junk. Stupid musk hipsters will lap this garbage up. It barely even “throws” a 5′ flame, so you can rest assured those purchasing it are as useless as the product they purchased.