At the end of last month we got a small taste of the inspired craziness of Brit backyard tinkerer Colin Furze when we took a look at his insane DIY hoverbike. Earlier in April, Furze asked viewers of his YouTube channel for ideas on how he could modify a rather nice-looking Epiphone Les Paul guitar. Clearly Mad Max fans were watching as most viewers voted for a flamethrower.
For those who didn't catch last year's Mad Max: Fury Road, blind guitarist Coma-Doof Warrior pretty much stole the show on a rolling PA bandwagon playing an incredible double-necked axe that breathed fire to punctuate the heavy rock soundtrack.
The idea behind the Epiphone sacrifice was to drum up some interest in Intel's America's Greatest Makers TV show, with Furze asking viewers for "ideas on what mods to make to a guitar to mask my terrible guitar skills and make me feel like a rock god." His fans clearly wanted to feel the burn.
Furze began his flamethrower guitar mod by cutting and shaping two blow torch heads for pilots at the guitar's headstock. These are held in place behind the neck with a custom mount, which also feeds fuel to the burners and to a central Y tube for the main flame. More tubing was installed behind the neck and up over the back of the body and a fuel reservoir fitted to the body of the guitar.
First though, Furze had to shave the top of the instrument's body and install a made-to-measure stainless tube, adding to the steampunk vibe of the build. A solenoid valve was attached to the fuel reserve, controlled by a manual fire switch installed on the guitar.
Furze also modified a small Marshall combo amp to house a gas bottle, so as well as outputting the instrument's audio signal it also feeds the flamethrower with fuel. A footswitch connected to the amp can also be used to fire the flames.
You can see the resulting flame-throwing guitar in the video below. Or you can jump over to his YouTube channel to see how it was built.
Source: Colin Furze
