Home made spud gun

KaHn said:
With the materials it would probably take me a few hours to build it, also if they are any IC engineers on here (not really my strong point) who want to work out the best compression ratio other than "lests see if this works" please post away :)

KaHn
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I buggsie test pilot ;)

Stelly
 
Just read the law for these in this country apparently pnuematic ones have to be under a certian limit, but they say nothing about combustion ones.

Hmmm I will talk to Hedge either 2nite or on wednesday and see what we can sort out with freebies from the council.

KaHn
 
I made something similar to this but with a lot more power since I dont use hairspray :) still got it, I can get about a 200m range with it depending on the power of explosives I use, its not that dangerous either :p

This is an early low powered photo, (when I was using carrots instead of slugs)

potatocannon.JPG
 
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I made one of these a few months ago, actually asked on here first before i made it. Mine was smiliar in dimensions to that guys "bazooka" stlye one, and stood about 6 foot tall. I worked out it had a muzzle velocity of about 70mph shooting potatoes and i daren't shoot it at anyone, almost got a rabbit though!!! Ask if you want help building one, i may be able to advise.

Oli
 
Ok to get a bang you need a near perfect fuel/air mix and compression so the potato either has to fit tight in the tube or you need baffles in the tube. The baffles are the easiest way to get reliable compression and the way you do this is leave half an end on a couple of the baked bean tins.

I normally use about 6 baked bean cans and tape a length of plastic drain pipe in the end for a smooth barrel with the baffles on the third, forth and fifth cans. It'll practically put a tennis ball into orbit, just keeps going up and up until it goes out of sight.

The bottom can you leave the end on and bang a small hole in the side, large enough to hold a zippo lighter across to light what's inside. You need a small squirt of zippo petrol, that's all and shake it for a while to get a good column of mixed air and fuel. More than a small squirt and it gets too rich and won't get a good bang. Basically shake until you can smell the fuel at the end of the barrel, load it up and light the hole.

I'll look for a piccie...
 
OSB said:
Rich1988, you say you used explosives, care to elaborate?
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I have, I used to work in special effects. You might have seen my stuff on TV in fact ;)
 
G-MAN2004 said:
What kind of explosives?
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Maroons, flame pots, black powder, flash powder, fireballs, that sort of stuff.

da_mic_1530 said:
examples? :)
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A lot of mine was in a kids series called X-perimental that used to be on Wednesday afternoons. Kinda like brainiac for kids, blowing stuff up. Had my rocket hovercraft on there too.
 
Here we go, one cannon as demonstrated to the exam board at Brunel university!

Cannon.jpg


Shot a skateboard down the hall with that :D

Edit:

This one before I put the jet on it :D

Skateboard_2.jpg
 
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KaHn said:
Maybe i can just remember clarkson in it, was also with the cheese pizza's and the oxycet tourch.

KaHn
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Yeah it was the "clarkson" chat show type program, other great things were blowing up turkeys and putting light bulbs into a microwave! :p
 
OSB said:
Rich1988, you say you used explosives, care to elaborate?
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I use meal powder, (really fine gunpowder) mostly, goes off really easily and with a tonne of power ^_^ you need very little and you have consistent explosions each time. have experimented with makeing my own gunpowder but it comes out to coarse.

And yes I know its dangerous bla bla, have been at it since I was 15 and havent damaged myself yet except tinitus a couple of times.
 
Lol! Someone gets killed. Police writes: Causes of death:

Murdered by a tube firing potatoes.

LMAO :p
 
I made a potato gun out of some bits in the irrigation warehouse at work :D


1 1/2" PVC Threaded end cap With Sparker in the end :p

1 1/2" PVC Plain - Thread

1 1/2" PVC Plain Socket

1 1/2" PVC Pipe x 2 meters

1 1/2" PVC Socket

1 1/2 x 1" PVC Reducing ring..




1" PVC Pipe..

The pipe was all Class 7 PVC, it cost me about £30 to build..

and to propell the spuds i used some easy start :D


EDIT : I will upload some pics for you tomorow :)
 
Could someone write out a list for me ? of things I'd need to build one of these ?

Could pop down to B&Q and pick up the bits. If thats possible.. But this looks to good not to do :D.
 
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