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The lowly skateboard was in dire need for a technological upgrade. And it got it in the form of The Magic Wheel. This is not a sort of skateboard you’d want to jump off ramps or slide down banisters with. The Magic Wheel is more utilitarian than that, an excellent vehicle for making your way around urban areas (once you get the hang of how to use one). The Magic Wheel has the maneuverability of a skateboard. Like a skateboard, it is also near-instantaneous to get on and off. It also has some properties of a bicycle, allowing riders to move rather fast — up to 13 mph (20 kph). Check out the video, below.
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The canopy top cockpit allows the C-Quester driver to look all around the submersible except for straight down.
How much to we want one of these! Our inner Jacque Cousteau gawks at the C-Quester, the only (relatively) affordable submersible boat designed for recreational, as well as commercial, use. There are two models: the one-person CQ1 and a two-person version called, logically enough, the CQ2. Both are capable of surface and underwater speeds of about 3 knots, both can descend to a depth of 50 meters and have the operational capacity for a 2 1/2 hour dive, though as a safety feature both can provide up to 36 hours of life support. The CQ1 weighs around the same as a small subcompact car (2400 pounds, 1100 kilograms) meaning it can transported and launched without any special equipment. The design simplicity and boat-like qualities of the C-Questers mean that you don’t have to be a graduate of the Naval Acadamy to learn how to operate one. The manufacturer of the C-Questers, the Dutch company U-Boat Worx, runs a comprehensive four-to-six day training course. The course is also open to enthusiasts like us who have the $120,000 (80,000 euros) to buy a C-Quester . . . yet.
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