I found this on the AuctionArms forum.

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DANG!!! That was SUPPOSED TO work - I'll try another way . .

www.break.com/index/fa...-hay-bales

I like it...nothin' better than blowin' things up...its a hoot.

Cheers, Vince

Thats got to be better than blown the candles out on the cake!

Dang it! Puter here wont play it. Gotta wait ta git home.

Wanna see big badaboom!

Ever mess with acytelin (sp) and oxy ballons? 60% ox, 40% acet, big Jack in the Box balloon. LONG tp fuse....and run like hell.

Concussion of one knocked out all the street lamps for abour 5 mins in my buds neighborhood two years ago, all the car alarms went off, best part was hearing his wife scream from INSIDE the house....
Next scream from her was outside, at me, saying LEAVE.

I'm not allowed over there on the 4th anymore.

(note - DO NOT try this at home...EVER, under any circumstances...cuz it is LOUD! )

Back in my youth I knew more about ANFO than was good for my health.

Yeah, Stovey - Those are VERY loud. Whacko welder at a shop I worked in made up a dozen of these in plastic ziploc bags. He carried them out to the back lot in an open box with a cigarette hanging from his lips. No, no accident.

BIG Baddaboom when he touched them off.

I'm not sayin' anything about any explosives I may or may not have made or played with in my youth.
I did put a paper and wood rocket completely through an 8" apple tree once from only about 15 feet. The rocket didn't even have a chance to get close to its top speed (which took 100 yards or so).
When I started making model rockets I had the usual "fizzlers" and some that blew up on the pad. When I finally got the fuel recipe to the point that it was consistent and produced a good bit of energy I finally got rockets that whould consistantly perform as designed. It is hard to get really fast model rockets with less than 4 oz. of fuel but I finally found how to do it. I even made nozzles for hypersonic flow - something not available in model rocket engines of the time.
Top speed that I ever calculated was mach 2.5 (approx) timed over a 200 yard range.
I never had a warhead on any of my rockets and they used no metal parts. Other than for specific tests I always fired them vertically with a means of recovery - usually a long ribbon so I could find them.
I had a design that I would liked to have tried for an IR guidance system but life got in the way and I never got around to making or testing it.

PaulS wrote:

I'm not sayin' anything about any explosives I may or may not have made or played with in my youth. I did put a paper and wood rocket completely through an 8" apple tree once from only about 15 feet. The rocket didn't even have a chance to get close to its top speed (which took 100 yards or so). When I started making model rockets I had the usual "fizzlers" and some that blew up on the pad. When I finally got the fuel recipe to the point that it was consistent and produced a good bit of energy I finally got rockets that whould consistantly perform as designed. It is hard to get really fast model rockets with less than 4 oz. of fuel but I finally found how to do it. I even made nozzles for hypersonic flow - something not available in model rocket engines of the time. Top speed that I ever calculated was mach 2.5 (approx) timed over a 200 yard range. I never had a warhead on any of my rockets and they used no metal parts. Other than for specific tests I always fired them vertically with a means of recovery - usually a long ribbon so I could find them. I had a design that I would liked to have tried for an IR guidance system but life got in the way and I never got around to making or testing it.

Nice work Paul - Always thought your avatar reminded me a bit of the unabomber Haha Just kidding.
Back in high school we used to make some interesting rockets, but not so technically advanced as yours. We weren't going for speed like you were, but worked mostly on basic delivery systems for the different "warheads" we were trying out.
That stuff sure was fun, back in the day . . . These days we would probably be arrested or at least investigated. The world has sure gotten paranoid.

Marty,
I have been looking into model rocketry for my grandkids and the laws have changed a lot. You can still use the model kits from Estes and fly the class "A", "B", and "C" engines without licensing or permissions. Even though my engines would require a license today I could go through the process and use them but I would have to get a permit to use the airspace and be far enough from any controlled air space. I can however still use my launch controller and platforms with the smaller rockets.

Sounds terribly like a guy that used to live up the street from me when I was a teenager.

Him and one of his mates were pretty clever when it came to chemistry... sooooo...they made their own "fuel". This was a mixture of two very common elements that are readily available from hardware stores and chemists (drugstores). Mix the metal dust and the yellow powder in the correct proportions and you could do some very interesting things with the resulting mix.

It burns extremely hot (will melt glass with ease), gives off copious amounts of smoke (may be toxic, not sure), is incredibly bright (a teaspoon of the stuff in a glass enclosed telephone box makes a huge "light bulb"), wrapped and sealed in wax paper and ignited with the correct fuse gives a HUGE BADABOOM.

Pack the mixture into an aluminum tube about 2.5 feet long, with good straight fins and with a steel exhaust nozzle will put this rocket about 3000 feet into the air, straight up...we had the civil aviation mob looking for us because they picked one up on their radar in Sydney. Definitely fun stuff.

They stopped "playing" with the stuff though when one of the guys over compressed a quantity of the mix sealed into a 3" diameter metal container. It spontaneously ignited, blew a brick garden shed to pieces, vapourised half his arm, put a large chunk of shrapnel through his leg, another piece of shrapnel went across the yard, through the fence, through the wall of the house next door and "took out" the roast in the oven. Also broke windows everywhere. The guy that was playing with it has permanent injuries, apart from his arm...loss of hearing, scars everywhere and dodgy eyesight.

They laugh about it now, but they were very lucky one or both were not killed.

Cheers, Vince

I knew it!
Paul really is a rocket scientist!

*

Vince wrote:

through the wall of the house next door and "took out" the roast in the oven. Cheers, Vince

OK- ya know it's a bad badaboom when it takes out the roast... in someone elses house !!! Holy snikees!

I found out that potato guns can do a lot of damage as well. About 2 years ago we confiscated one off a bunch of morons who were firing frozen oranges at silage bales near some houses, the oranges were penetrating about 6 - 8 inches at about 20 meters.

My staff then took it up onto a lookout which over looks the town on a nightshift and came scurrying back to the station. I asked what had occoured and got told they had used a plug of paper rather than anything solid, prepped it with wd40 and hit the igniter, the jet of flame was about 3 foot long from the muzzle and they thought they'd woken the town with the boom. Boys and their toys. I am thinking of building one to launch my bait off the beach with my surfcaster, I reckon 200 - 300 meters is a decent cast by anyones books.

Vince wrote:

Sounds terribly like a guy that used to live up the street from me when I was a teenager. Him and one of his mates were pretty clever when it came to chemistry... sooooo...they made their own "fuel". This was a mixture of two very common elements that are readily available from hardware stores and chemists (drugstores). Mix the metal dust and the yellow powder in the correct proportions and you could do some very interesting things with the resulting mix. It burns extremely hot (will melt glass with ease), gives off copious amounts of smoke (may be toxic, not sure), is incredibly bright (a teaspoon of the stuff in a glass enclosed telephone box makes a huge "light bulb"), wrapped and sealed in wax paper and ignited with the correct fuse gives a HUGE BADABOOM. Pack the mixture into an aluminum tube about 2.5 feet long, with good straight fins and with a steel exhaust nozzle will put this rocket about 3000 feet into the air, straight up...we had the civil aviation mob looking for us because they picked one up on their radar in Sydney. Definitely fun stuff. They stopped "playing" with the stuff though when one of the guys over compressed a quantity of the mix sealed into a 3" diameter metal container. It spontaneously ignited, blew a brick garden shed to pieces, vapourised half his arm, put a large chunk of shrapnel through his leg, another piece of shrapnel went across the yard, through the fence, through the wall of the house next door and "took out" the roast in the oven. Also broke windows everywhere. The guy that was playing with it has permanent injuries, apart from his arm...loss of hearing, scars everywhere and dodgy eyesight. They laugh about it now, but they were very lucky one or both were not killed. Cheers, Vince

Vince,
I know what those two chemicals are. I looked into using them but that compound is too sensitive. A friend had some stored in a canning jar - knocked it off the shelf to the concrete floor and it blew up. Luckily he wasn't hurt by the explosion.

radar wrote:

I found out that potato guns can do a lot of damage as well. About 2 years ago we confiscated one off a bunch of morons who were firing frozen oranges at silage bales near some houses, the oranges were penetrating about 6 - 8 inches at about 20 meters. My staff then took it up onto a lookout which over looks the town on a nightshift and came scurrying back to the station. I asked what had occoured and got told they had used a plug of paper rather than anything solid, prepped it with wd40 and hit the igniter, the jet of flame was about 3 foot long from the muzzle and they thought they'd woken the town with the boom. Boys and their toys. I am thinking of building one to launch my bait off the beach with my surfcaster, I reckon 200 - 300 meters is a decent cast by anyones books.

We used soup cans and tennis balls...same diff.

I'd love to see a pic of that surf caster. That's a great idea!

Note to those who want to fire tennis balls from pipe.......
Make sure you use steel pipe and not lead pipe.
As always start your powder loads low - and work up.
Lead pipe mushrooms better than any bullet I have ever seen!