Diet Coke-Propelled Cars?! Yep, they're real!

       If you’ve got Diet Coke coupons and Mentos, you’ve got everything you need to power a car … a lego car, anyway.

         Engineers in the Department of Chemical Engineering at Finland’s Abo Akademi have harnessed the chemical reaction that occurs when mentos mints meet diet cola to propel a miniature automobile constructed of lego building blocks. They call it the “CoMet” ( get it – COke + MEnTos, plus it’s super fast… oh those witty Finnish engineers!). It’s a relatively simple device, which is part of what makes it so brilliant.

         The foaming action initiated when mentos are dropped into the soda causes foam to burst out of a nozzle and start a spool spinning. A Fishing line is wound on the spool, and that line is connected to the car, so that the car is pulled by the line at speeds up to 40 kilometers per hour. That’s 24 miles an hour, which is pretty darn fast for a car that size.

         I really wish they’d figure out how to power full-sized cars this way – I think I could save a ton on gas with Diet Coke coupons, and it would be kind of neat to be able to drink the stuff that fuels your car.