Lonnie Johnson (2017)

I went to the library and got a book on how to write patents. But before I submitted the patent I went to an Air Force patent attorney. He reviewed it as a favor, and told me it needed a lot of work. Through working with him, and redrafting my patent, I learned how to file patents on my own. As a result I was able to file my first series of patents on my own.

Now I use a law firm to file my patents for me, but having an understanding of patents certainly helps to understand when you have a quality application.

Jammin' Jet. It was commercialized. It was a water propelled airplane that was pumped just like a Super Soaker with water shooting out the back, propelling it into flight. The manufacturer changed the design of the plane to fly in a circle, but didn't adjust the wings so as it turned it would roll and dive into the ground. Usually causing the plane to break after the first launch. Exciting toy, exciting commercial, disappointing in the end.

CPS 2500

Very sobering. "Oh wow my life has changed". I had to sit down and think about what my life would be like going forward.

I am responsible, to a large extent, for the success of the NERF dart gun line.

Yes

I went and gave a talk at a school, years ago, after the Super Soaker first came out. I told them that I had invented it, and they didn't believe me. I left the school with them never really accepting the idea that I had invented the water gun.

The Digital Distance Measuring Instrument. Patent No. 4143267 - It used photolithography to produce a binary encoded scale that could be read using an optical sensor and a magnifying glass. That is the base technology for DVDs and CDs. I received that patent in 1979. I was enjoying my day job working on space craft and was patenting for fun. Knowing what I know now, it is the big fish that got away.

In designing the gun I applied certain engineering principles with the idea of maximizing the distance that the gun could shoot, but at the same time designing it so that a small child would be able to pump it up to very high pressure. The design of the gun evolved over a period of years, litterally. The initial designs did not have a bottle on top. It wasn't until right before I presented the gun to Larami that I put the bottle on top.

When I made the Super Soaker I was trying to make a high performance water gun. The desire to make a high performance water gun occurred when I was shooting a stream of water from a nozzle I hooked to a bathroom sink while working on an air conditioner that would use water as a coolant instead of Freon.

Having high pressure and a relatively large nozzle. However, as you go to higher pressure and the water comes out faster, the stream breaks up in the air and limits how much further the water travels. There's an optimum combination of pressure and nozzle size.

High performance dart guns were originally based on my patents. I hold them in high regard.
I'm a nuclear engineer, and engineers aren't known for their humor.

Royal Blue

Edit: Royal

horse-sized duck. Bigger target.

I have some ideas...

Well let's see. Going very well. Busy day. A number of meetings. I got to spend some time in the shop making some parts for my engine. I got an update from my team working on the solid state battery. Got a hair cut. Had a very good lunch. And now I'm enjoying my first time here on Reddit.

I really appreciate the compliments people give about the water gun. It makes me want to do more to improve quality of life. I'm hopeful that my new technologies will help improve more lives. In fact, the heat pump that I was working on when I got the idea for the Super Soaker was being made to address an environmental problem.

I knew it would be successful because I knew it was a fun toy, but I didn't anticipate it to be a number 1 toy in the world. That's not something one can predict.

I have an invention on the Galileo spacecraft which went to Jupiter, and my fellow engineers at JPL were skeptical that it would successfully solve the problem we ran into. It went to Jupiter in support of a very successful mission.
I also invented an engine that converts heat into electricity more efficiently than perhaps any other engine and it has no moving mechanical parts.
Super Soaker remains what I am most known for.
I am confident that history will be kind to me.

My bad.

The N-Strike line was started based on my patents. And the whole thrust of my approach to NERF was to take NERF guns to much higher performance. Shooting darts further. Using rapid fire technology. Making NERF more exciting than what it was prior.

I got the idea in '82, had a number of false starts, and it wasn't until '89 that I made the presentation to Larami. It was on the market a year later in 1990 as the "Power Drencher". We changed the name in '91 to Super Soaker and because of the consistent sales success in both years by word of mouth, Larami decided to run TV commercials. In 1992 it became the number 1 selling toy in the world.

I once used a Super Soaker to unclog a plugged up water drain at my home.

I have in the past. We used to routinely get them when we were focused on improving them and redesigning them. But at this point in time I'm not really active in that sector.

I have worked with and been funded by the Department of Defense in the past for my inventions. It's probably better that I not comment on the specifics of those contracts however.

I sold a patent to Mattel after the relationship with Hasbro terminated. They created BOOMco Rapid Madness using my technology. I'm curious to see how well they'll do.

Send me a direct message.

Depends on who you ask.

I wanted to be an engineer long before I knew that "engineer" was the term that described what I wanted to do. I was tinkering as a little kid. Always curious about the way things worked. Since that time, what I've done has been to be persistent. So perseverance and continuing to hone your skills is the key to being successful in anything you do.

First off, you can't make money unless someone knows about it. Secondly, I was willing to put my idea out there and to lose as long as I learned from the experience. I felt that subsequent ideas I had I would be able to use that experience to become successful.

Thanks, chuckdooley

Erector set

Now that's a complicated question.

But the easy answer is "higher efficiency"

I was designing space craft before I was designing Super Soakers. That being said, when you present a really innovative idea the general reaction is usually skepticism if it is something they are not familiar with or have seen before. People don't usually accept radically new ideas readily.

Yes and no. I do have a display of Super Soakers and I have a display of prototypes we built over the years. My collection is not complete, there are some that got away. Periodically I'll go on ebay to find ones out of production, and some are stored away to protect them. The room in the background of my proof picture is the prototype "museum" we have at my laboratory.

Depends on the size of the reactor.

I went to the toy store one day and saw a number of guns being sold under the N-Strike name, and my royalty check did not reflect the number of guns I saw in the store. I took out my contract and did a close review.

Inventing energy converting technology and batteries that will be 2x better than lithium ion.

No

Video games are satisfying to a point. There will always be a role for activity toys. In the future toys will become more technical and more sophisticated and even more entertaining. The digital and the physical world will tend to merge, and you'll see more and more sophisticated toys.

The monster was the largest gun that Larami produced. It was very badass in its look. But the seals around the nozzle had manufacturing defects that were not corrected, and it did not deliver on the promise that the appearance presented. It was a dual nozzle version of the CPS 2500, and would've been great if it worked as well as the 2500.

Yes. Eventually JTEC technology will mature and become widely used. The nuclear community is very conservative with respect to implementing new technology and want to rely on the tried and true. But eventually the performance of the JTEC will warrant its use in nuclear applications.

That never occurred to me that people would do that with a water gun, but my philosophy is that everyone is an inventor. Everyone has creative ideas, and hopefully most of them are productive.

I could be wrong. It'll stick around, but I suspect it'll go the way of the hula hoop.

I had one that would be a great Super Soaker in a water war. It was a rapid refill model that when you ran out of water you put the nozzle up directly to a water source and it refilled your gun automatically.

Try to get into Officer Candidate School.

No

I wouldn't phrase it that way. I would phrase it as hard-ball, hardcore business. One would like to see businesses operate more on principle as opposed to what they can get away with legally.

Nope.

NASA is presently reviewing our proposal for use of the JTEC to replace TECs (Thermoelectric Converters) for powering outer planetary space craft. The TECs that NASA presently use are in the 6-8% conversion efficiency range. The JTEC will provide conversion efficiency in the range of 30-40% and thereby SIGNIFICANTLY reduce the nuclear heat source sized requirements to provide the same amount of power.

One of the keys to success is realizing that there are many things that can go wrong with a given idea, but my strategy has been to develop multiple inventions to put the odds in my favor. Also to persevere. It's important to know when to quit, I'm just not very good at it.

The solid state battery uses a solid electrolyte instead of liquid. So it's an all ceramic and metal battery with twice the storage capacity. We are in the process of transitioning the battery out of the laboratory. We have working cells at this point. There are improvements I'd still like to make. We have not yet set up an investment vehicle structure. Stay tuned.

Swamp coolers are used in arid environments where the humidity is low. The evaporation of the water within the swamp cooler takes its heat of evaporation from air resulting in the air becoming cooler as the water evaporates into the air. In a swamp cooler you need a constant supply of water. In the heat pump I was working on, the water would circulate in a closed system similar to the way Freon circulates in a typical AC or refrigerator. In that system the water evaporates because I create a low pressure point within the system and the heat of evaporation is extracted from the surroundings through a heat exchanger.

The Super Soaker and NERF allowed me to pursue the other projects that I'm working on.

Invent.