How Smart is This Thread?
- Thread starter Big Daddy
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Here is a picture of a canon my friends and I made in high school. It was a nitrogen powered canon that could fire a golf ball at a theoretical range of 4.2 miles [at it's full power of 250 psi (we estimate it only made it a mile and a half or so)]. It wasn't done in the most professional manor, and about a week after this picture was taken the canon actually exploded (no one hurt, thankfully).
My dad owns a glass company and so we were able to get a hold of some bullet-resistant glass to use to shoot it at. We angled the glass so the ball would deflect into the ground. It would sometimes bury the ball over a foot and a half underground. It was powerful enough to shoot through 3 pieces of plywood, leaving a perfect, golfball sized hole, and not to mention a wicked exit wound on the last piece. We also had a barrel that we could place on it that would shoot tennis balls, but we just used that to shoot at our friends since a tennis ball has about as much wind resistance as a paper ball (little exageration).
Anyways, we weren't always smart when constructing or testing it, but it was fun nonetheless. It even has a remote trigger that opened two sprinkler valves to release the nitrogen in the holdong tank on the canon, and we were using a giant tank rented from a local gas store to fill the holding tank. Only 3 shots were evere fired at 45 degrees, and it was way out in the country, and to this day we haven't heard of any mysterious golfball injuries from people who lived around that area, so I think we're in the clear. I wish I had a better picture. I'll try and get my friend to send me the videos we took. After that we started construction on a trebuchet, but that fell through when we all went to college.
The last image is what was left of the canon after our little over-pressurization event.
Once again, I'm going to try and get that video for yall of some test shots.
Also, we figured out it's range by first firing it through a crono and then firing it at 90 degrees and timing it airtime (we only knew it hit because it hit the street and bounced. We had lost sight of it and given up until we heard it hit, which was over a minute after firing it).
My dad owns a glass company and so we were able to get a hold of some bullet-resistant glass to use to shoot it at. We angled the glass so the ball would deflect into the ground. It would sometimes bury the ball over a foot and a half underground. It was powerful enough to shoot through 3 pieces of plywood, leaving a perfect, golfball sized hole, and not to mention a wicked exit wound on the last piece. We also had a barrel that we could place on it that would shoot tennis balls, but we just used that to shoot at our friends since a tennis ball has about as much wind resistance as a paper ball (little exageration).
Anyways, we weren't always smart when constructing or testing it, but it was fun nonetheless. It even has a remote trigger that opened two sprinkler valves to release the nitrogen in the holdong tank on the canon, and we were using a giant tank rented from a local gas store to fill the holding tank. Only 3 shots were evere fired at 45 degrees, and it was way out in the country, and to this day we haven't heard of any mysterious golfball injuries from people who lived around that area, so I think we're in the clear. I wish I had a better picture. I'll try and get my friend to send me the videos we took. After that we started construction on a trebuchet, but that fell through when we all went to college.
The last image is what was left of the canon after our little over-pressurization event.
Once again, I'm going to try and get that video for yall of some test shots.
Also, we figured out it's range by first firing it through a crono and then firing it at 90 degrees and timing it airtime (we only knew it hit because it hit the street and bounced. We had lost sight of it and given up until we heard it hit, which was over a minute after firing it).
wow...that valve is ripped apart...not too bad.
you guys were lucky that there was no one in the street when the projectile came down. and you did shoot at your friends? you gotta explain that!!!
you should pick up the trebuchet project once again. you know? there are those that shoots people through the air into a huge net?
you guys were lucky that there was no one in the street when the projectile came down. and you did shoot at your friends? you gotta explain that!!!
you should pick up the trebuchet project once again. you know? there are those that shoots people through the air into a huge net?
With the tennis ball barrel, you could fit 8 or 9 tennis balls in it at once. Someone would go stand out in the field and we'd fire all 8 or 9 at once into the air and watch the other person try and not get hit by falling tennis balls. It was nothing harmful, just pure fun for some kids bored on the weekends. I guess a good comparison is the tennis ball canon on American Gladiators, only we'd fire all our shots at once. We never fired the golfballs at each other. That would have been extremely lethal. I'm sure we broke some sort of laws when firing this thing, but we were in high school and didn't care too much. It was all in fun.
[headbang] i think that was fun...i really believe that. i didn´t wanna sound like your dad or teacher...but i imagined good ol´mommy walking down the street with her puppy and the puppy gets hit by a tennis ball [target]
in younger years we all did things that broke some stupid law, no problem with that. actually most of us still do everyday in traffic![[hihi]](/images/smilies/icon_smile_hihi.gif "Hi Hi [hihi]")
in younger years we all did things that broke some stupid law, no problem with that. actually most of us still do everyday in traffic
