It would seem like an impossible endeavor to top NASA engineer Lonnie Johnson’s Super Soaker water gun, but a team of German engineers may have taken the water weapon crown with their Spyra One– a water rifle that fires ‘water bullets,’ meant to improve accuracy and distance.
Whereas the Super Soaker requires you to fill a water reservoir manually and pump air to create firing pressure, the Spyra One uses a motorized pump that does all the work for you.
Filling the Spyra One is done by simply submerging the business end into a bucket of water, lake, or another water source, and an internal pump automatically fills its tank. The intake sports a filter that keeps small particles from entering and damaging any internal mechanisms. While the tank is being loaded (takes about 14 seconds), another pump simultaneously pressurizes it, making it ready to fire once it’s fully filled.
A full tank packs roughly 25 1-ounce “water bullet” shots of ammo that can hit targets 25-feet away before the water blob breaks apart. A top-mounted digital display helps to keep track of how many shots you have left before needing a refill, it also tells you how much power the rechargeable battery has left, and according to the engineers, each charge holds enough power for 45 refill cycles or around 1125 shots.
So how does the Spyra One compare to the Super Soaker in head-to-head competition? Unfortunately, we will have to wait until next August, as the engineers recently finished a successful crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter earlier this month, and won’t be available till next year.
