Michigan Etiquette

Wingnut · Apr 8, 2002

My goodness ... and I thought I was really pushing the envelope with the goose gun and tennis balls.
I think I'll stick to safe stuff like the machined barrels and actions of real live guns, thank you .... my idea of experimentation doesn't include losing postions of my body ...

patrickg · Apr 8, 2002

Uh Pitbull... Same thing. Calcium carbide when wetted gives off acetylene gas. Some old cars and miners lamps are examples of the technology. A car would have a gas generator on the running board and a hose to the headlights which burned the acetylene gas. The oxy-acetylene cannon I described is pretty much the same but but more violent with the oxygen instead of air. With a perfect fuel/air ratio a carbide cannon (as advertised in the old days on the back pages of comic books) only had about 20% the power of a oxy-acetylene due to the atmospheric O2 content not being 100%.

Too bad we didn't really understand the nature of progressive hearing loss from loud sounds. As a kid, oh heck I still do, just love certain kinds of noise, firework, cannons, etc. Being a drummer was a maint dose but no cure. Now yo can buy propane cannons with electric ignition and timers or random sequencers for scaring pests like birds or ...

Never quite saved up enough to get a carbide cannon as a kid but could scrounge up the ingredients for black powder.

Patrick

BWa · Apr 9, 2002

This reminds me of a story my dad told me back when I first got an intrest in stuff that goes BOOM.......... As a kid he and his brother got his mothers brand new Milk can , one of them big ones , took it down to the shop , cut a hole in it and screwed in a spark plug ,,,,, 1/4 full of water , 1/2 cup of cal. carb. put cover on and wait a couple of minutes , they got it down to the point they could launch that lid out of sight ....... just don't be around when it was on the back down ,,,,,, lol And two , don't use the new can mom (my grandma) was not a happy lady and those two were very soon unhappy lads with sore rear ends I guess them old tack belts get right to the bottom of a problem .........

Bird · Apr 9, 2002

Patrick, do they still make and sell "carbide"? From the time I was about 4 years old until I was 11, my dad drove a truck route in your area selling welding supplies, and in addition to the oxygen and acetylene tanks, he had "cans" of carbide on the truck. I once gathered up a batch that had been spilled on the ground and it was fascinating to put a tablespoonful in a coffee can of water and watch it "boil". Then you could light it with a match and see water "burn". Of course, you had to be quick to light it when you put the carbide in the water because the reaction was all over very quickly. Dad told me to never put more than one tablespoon of carbide in a can of water, but at that age . . . I wanted the fire to last longer, so one day I very quickly spooned several spoonfuls of carbide in the can and lit a match./w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gif My hand burned the rest of the day and I thought I might lose it but couldn't tell anyone 'cause I was afraid I'd also lose my rear end if dad found out what I'd done./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

patrickg · Apr 9, 2002

BWa, Love to hear these stories. Thank you. I was aware of but not "into" carbide as a kid (younger kid). My dad bought me a chemistry set at an auction (slightly used but still viable). In the "Gilbert" instruction manual was a formula for what they called an "explosive mixture". The proportions were by volume using an itsy bitsy scoop supplied with the set. I scrounged up the same ingredients from various source, including a drug seller where I used a "cover story" about needing it for the pigs. Seems that there were instructions on the box of Potasium Nitrate AKA salt peter for the dosage size for various farm animals and I wasn't going to blow my cover telling the guy I was making BLACK POWDER.

Anyway over time I built up to larger batches. I was having trouble with the wind outside blowing out my matches so I asked to borrow my dad's lighter. He asked what I needed it for and I said to light a chemistry experiment. He asked what experiment and I said 75% Potasium Nitrate, 15% Sulphur, and 10% charcoal, thinking I'd float one past him. Well, it may have been a few years but he recalled his chemistry well enough and asked me how much of this gun powder I had. That is when I showed him my coffee can full! Needless to say he was not amused, took it from me, spread it out on a newspaper and lit it on the slab in the carport. It just fizzled harmlessly of course but had I successfuly lit it in the can I could have done some damage to me and the surrounds.

This was when I was about in the 5th grade. He told me that if I later accumulated a stack of degrees that would cover the coffee table I would never be any smarter than I was right then. Young kids think they know it all, there parents are old and dumb, and they have personal invincibility. I scored zero out of three.

Patrick

patrickg · Apr 9, 2002

Bird, I wasn't really sure if carbide was still easily available. I thought so even if not like it was in the days of old. So I hit a search engine and found a plethora of hits, several of which are sources.

One of the chem companies listed their product as supplying 285-295 Liters per kilogram. I assume liters of acetylene per kilo of carbide.

Maybe I ought to get some for ugh...errr...ahhh historical reasons. Never being directly exposed to it I had to resort to other means to get a bang out of things. Hydrogen gas generators and black powder. I did the same thing with black powder you did with carbide/acetylene. I lit a quantity of FFF or FFFF (Store bought), really fine stuff and it flashed off before I had a chance to get my hand back. Got a flash burn, painful but not serious. No blisters just red looking for a while. You'd think a married man in his late 20's should have known better.

Patrick

patrickg · Apr 9, 2002

Bird, you ole rapscallion. You got me started! Did a search on carbide cannon and got a zillion hits among which is a scanned in copy of an article in Mechanix Illustrated June 1976 (Think US bi-centenial) on making a carbide cannon out of PVC pipe. Uses Calcium Carbide (Bangsite trade name) and water to make the gas and kitchen flour to provide "smoke". Nice color photo of dad, daughter, and American flag with "smoke" belching out of the cannon in a near Norman Rockwell 4th of July pose. Cannon in on carriage with wheels. Didn't keep site but found it with "ASK JEEVES".

Also there is the one that used to be advertised on the back pages of comic books (when they were 10 cents).

http://www.bigbangcannons.com Still selling a variety of working carbide cannons afterall these years. They sell "Bangsite" in tubes (there version of Calcium Carbide) and some king of spark plug that ignites the charge through mechanical action.

Patrick

BWa · Apr 9, 2002

Yup , I have a small one of that type .. .....Had the good fortune as a kid to go to vermont on a family holidayto visit with a family friend .. ... as a little boy of 11 I was introduced to a cal. carb. Cannon , with that tube of Bangsite and a home made wood lathe ... by the older boys of this family friend ..Great times .....
Bill G.

bgott · Apr 9, 2002

Years ago I worked in places that still used acetylene generators for cutting torches.

bgott · Apr 9, 2002

My dad didn't know chemistry from poop, but rumors got back to him about my next door neighbor and my "science projects". Unbeknownst to me and the neighbor kid one of my dad's drinking buddies was an FBI agent. The old man had tossed my bedroom and found our lab. He left everything there and later that night I had a "visit" from the FBI. Between the "projects" and the mortar and pestle stolen from the high school lab I was lead to believe I was looking at 30 or 40 years at least. I found a new hobby.