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Flaming Skip-It Of DeathBecause anything + fire = awesome

I have a special place in my heart for weird takes on old/traditional games and toys. I’m also blessed to have amazing friends who (for some crazy reason) listen to me when I say things like “Man, you guys remember Skip Its? Wouldn’t it be so cool if the end part lit on FIRE and you had to skip over it while also not turning in to a blaze of death and glory?”. Sometimes this even results in them saying “Fuck yeah, let’s do it”. And when those friends have access to drill presses, a good time is bound to be had.

Add in a few beers, and that’s more or less how the Flaming Skip It Of Death happened. Myself and Seth Hardy of Site3 (who masterminded Super Street Fire) built it in an afternoon out of pretty low-key parts. All it took was a wooden dowel, tinfoil, kevlar, a metal pipe, airline cable, and a part of a spool we broke off to make sure it spun properly.

I was happy to finally test it a few weeks after we finished building it. As it turns out, in the process of making this I had completely forgotten that I have no idea how to actually, you know, skip it. Thankfully, we figured it out while keeping casualties to a minimum.

This was actually really fun and not as terrifying as one would think! Not a single person got set on fire, even after we brought it to the local spin jam. We managed to break it later in the night after lighting it up several times, though I do plan on making a beta version that ideally doesn’t make HORRIBLE NOISES when you spin it. Either way, this was a fun thing to build that you can do in an afternoon for relatively low cost, that will net you a toy you can set on fire at the end.

Moral of the story: if you want to make something totally off the wall and ridiculous JUST GO OUT THERE AND DO IT. If nothing else it’s an adventure!