Now, THIS is overpenetration...

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Evan Thomas

New member
A Pennsylvania man has been charged with reckless endangerment, and various other things, after "accidentally" firing a two-pound cannonball through his neighbor's house.

There are a few details in this story from AP. Unfortunately, it doesn't say how he achieved this feat, so it's not clear which of the Four Rules of Safe Cannon Handling he violated...

But he did say he's sorry.

:cool:
 
G

Gbro

New member
Where is this over penetration?
He must have been shooting tennis balls to only go through a window and one wall;).
I met a bear hunter this week that told me about the cannon he built that shoots a 2" cannon-ball. It has a range of 3 miles. That has got to be getting close to indirect fire:rolleyes:
 
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MLeake

New member
Heard a story once...

... about some drunken revolutionary war re-enactors, who were sitting around a campfire and a cannon one night, when a US Navy frigate came steaming upriver for the next day's festivities.

The drunken re-enactors, as the story goes, decided it would be a great idea to fire a salute with their cannon.

Somehow, one of the gun crew managed to toss a cannonball in with the salute charge.

Touchhole was fired, BOOOM!!!... ping...

Searchlights come on, and GQ is sounded aboard the frigate.

Police reacted quickly and caught several re-enactors. Apparently, sedition charges were considered at first (attacking a US warship), but the ultimate charges were reckless endangerment and a few others.

Go figure...
 
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Chuckusaret

Moderator
Two buddies of mine were arrested for firing a simple old home made potato gun. Seems the range of the potato was alot further than they expected. The potato cleared the field they were in and impacted on a car traveling on the state road abutting the field. The car was a state police car.
 
A

Avenger

New member
Ah, it was a ricochet.....I can see how it could happen, Uniontown area has plenty of rocks around. Little more attention to berm construction would've been a good idea it seems.....
 
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Dragon55

New member
A few years ago my son and his best bud at the time wanted to make a tater gun.

Well, the best bud's dad and I were/still are good friends. He worked construction so he had access to lots of heavy schedule (or large caliber in this case) PVC pipe.

So OK I was thinking some hairspray and fling some taters across the field right?

Well, no when we heard the kabooms my friend and I went down to the shed to check out their toy. You should have seen it. They were using some pieces of old sheets for wadding, axle grease for bore lube, and propane for the charge!!
Both our boys are pretty smart and meticulous so they were.................... shooting coke cans full of sand over 200 yards!! I swear if they had had more time I bet they would have had sights on this thing for range and windage etc.
Needless to say we had to confiscate and dismantle.
It was awesome ....... but very dangerous.
 
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Mike Irwin

Staff
A friend and I use engine starting fluid to fuel our spud gun.

You get the mixture just right and a spud will go a LONG way.
 
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Falcon5NZ

New member
Just thought I would let everyone know that this made the OddSpot on the front of the Southland Times here in NZ today and was also discussed on The Rock radio station.
 
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Dannyl

New member
Dragon55, thanks for the warning

Hi,
I have a 10 YO, who loves to tinker in the garage.:eek:
Soon as I get home my propane torch and spare cylinders get locked away.:D

Cheers,
Danny
 
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Evan Thomas

New member
I've always wanted to build a Gatling potato gun, the better to hit the jet skis on the lake... The closest thing I've seen is this multi-barrel spud gun... although (alas!) it doesn't appear to be a true, revolving-barrel, self-loading Gatling gun:

attachment.php


Looks like they used spark plugs for ignition -- but I wish the photo showed
the traversing mechanism, if any.

(Just kidding about the jet skis, although I'd like to do it... With the current spud gun, we could hit pontoon boats with no trouble, but you'd have to lead a jet ski quite a bit, I think. :D)
 
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