Fun with potatoes

I have wasted about 20lbs of potatoes with one of those. Mine was similar to the second model they showed but I never had a problem with if blowing me over.

The biggest annoyance is the cap on the end getting glued on from the potato goo.

We used to make those all the time. Only ever used hair spray though. Propane looks cool...

- Jon

A while back my friend Dave and I made one of the big ones with the 2 inch diameter.. We launched rachet balls straight up so high we lost site of em and on their way back down were whistling really loud.. We were using RC car fuel..

How did you use R/C car fuel ?

At a guess, put it in a spray bottle, give it a squirt.

We didnt push the ball all the way in so what we did (Which mind you probobly wasnt the smartest thing in the world) we would pour a little of the fuel down the tube and turn it so it coated the tube, jam the ball in the top so it sealed except for a small hole at the bottom for ignition. let it sit for a bit and light..

Well, now you know a good reason to visit the empeg Owner's meet - we've been doing this for years....

did I ever mention one of my siblings used to get paid to do this, by the Fleet Air Arm. The biggest things he used to launch were pianos (for Taranto night celebrations) but in general tennis balls, oranges and potatoes were the most common.

Ok, I have to ask (knowing only now via Google that Taranto is a town in Italy), what do their celebrations have to do with launching a piano into the air?

-Zeke

I'm dense then - I've read your linked article (and two others) and see no reference to flying pianos!

-Zeke

I can't view the link from work but are we talking about one of these ( my gf and I built this one a couple weeks ago )?

A while back my friend Dave and I made one of the big ones with the 2 inch diameter.

Wuss!

My friend Joachim told me of the time he and his cousin went out into the German countryside with a 55 gallon drum with the top cut out of it, a coffee can, a grate, and some gasoline.

They built a fire and mounted the grate securely over the fire. They took the coffee can and put a half liter or so of gasoline in it, then sealed it with the very tight-fitting lid. Placing the gasoline-filled coffee can on the grate, they then placed the 55 gallon drum upside down over the coffee can, and stood back.

When the gasoline boiled, it blew the lid off of the coffee can, instantly filling the inside of the drum with well-atomized gasoline vapor. This might have been quite exciting had there been an ignition source nearby. Oh, wait...

Joachim said the drum would launch so high in the air, turning end over end, that it would be just a little speck up in the sky. I imagine it made a pretty satisfactory noise as well.

This is the same fellow who, as a machinest apprentice welded together a box out of 6mm steel plate, the box being about 15 CM on a side. He filled the box with water, welded up the filler hole, and then just before lunch hour tossed it into the annealing oven. The resulting damage when the box exploded was quite extraordinary. Took the door off of the oven, blew out the windows in the shop. Nobody ever found out who did it.

A two inch plastic potato gun? Pah! Kid's stuff!

tanstaafl.

I used to make these as a teenager. Of course, I used gunpowder. It would have easily taken that fence behind his glass window apart.

If you're a-gonna be a-makin' one of these, don't use regular pvc pipe. Look up the word shrapnel. Use a pipe rated for compressed air.

When I built mine in college, I used a 22kv power transformer instead of a piezzo ignitor. I could jump an arc an inch and hold it there. Never failed to fire.

Because of this, I used 2 4" x 2' pieces going to a y adapter, then to a 1.5 reducer to get to the 3' barrel. Wiring both combustion chambers together in series, I could shoot a potato about 300 yards. Great fun.

Even speaking to my bro and other navy folks, I am not sure there is a direct connection between Taranto and pianos, but they sure look good being steam catapult launched off an aircraft carrier, before the mid-air detonation of fuel / air / liquid oxygen mix inside

being a little military myself I can confirm that in the British armed forces there is a long, and often spectacular, history of destroying pianos. The most common way being outside the bar on a friday evening with the addition of a little alcohol

Thank you for that image, I'm sure it would horrify my old piano teacher to see pianos being blown up, but it makes me smile.

1 milion gallons diesel fuel, check.
500,000 40mm rounds - check.
70 jet fighters - check.
300 days' food - check.
pianos for demolition - check.



-Zeke