SpudFiles

I've often mentioned making launchers out of the pipe fittings at work, well I bought myself a half decent cellphone recently, looks a bit like an F117 stealth but anyway, I thought I'd snap a picture. That's basically lots of fittings camlocked together to make the chamber, the black pipe on the left is 2.5 inch hydraulic tubing which is the current barrel. Air is fed from the quick fit next to the red ball valve and the burst disk is placed at the camlock which is connected to the barrel.

Here's some accident damage pics, ammunition was a small orange:

entry hole

exit hole

I have some videos but I seem to be having trouble getting sound when converting from .3gp format, any help?

edit: videos and detail shots now added on page 2

Today we made a fitting for a 3" barrel, so we might be firing that 2.75" ball bearing in the near future To give an idea of scale, the large ball valves with blue handles are 2", it's all 316L stainless

that looks fun.

where exactly do you work?

I work in a laboratory for a pharmaceutical company, we do quality control and assurance for what is manufactured in the plant, which is where such devices are made and tested

That sure is a nice shiny err... thing you got there, Jack
Looks like some kind of weird alien plasma-shooting staff you'd see on stargate or something.

You call that a half decent cell phone. I got what they call the nokia brick.

At first I was half expecting an epoxy cannon, but this is even better!

From the pictures it looks like a 1/2" or even a BB gun, but 2.5" dia. barrel? Wow!

What pressures are you using in this? 120PSI from a standard compressor or like Nitrogen/Helium?

at first i lookaed at it and thought it was some tiny new bb gun see ing all the valves but it is huge. Yea that cellphones a little more than half decenct i think.

@JSR. If you have more of that hydraulic tubing around, make a chamber out of it. Then make a burst disk gun in 3" bore that runs on an unregulated SCUBA tank. Then you could actually do some damage with the 2.75" ball bearing.

And after all that stuff you tell DYI about shooting his shed, you go and shoot a reinforced window

Nice looking... weapon? Gotta love all those fittings.

I was wondering if you could seal a burst disk in a cam lock, any leaks or such?

What pressures are you using in this? 120PSI from a standard compressor or like Nitrogen/Helium?

I do have a regulated nitrogen cylinder on hand but for safety's sake we're using the plant air suplly, aroind 70-80 psi

If you have more of that hydraulic tubing around, make a chamber out of it.

Don't tempt me! - but I think we've reached the practical limit of power that can be safely used within what it after all a chemical plant.

And after all that stuff you tell DYI about shooting his shed, you go and shoot a reinforced window

I was holding the barrel, my colleague opened the air supply and - nothing. I turned round thinking "dude, WTF?", raising the barrel slightly in the process, and *whoomph* at least I wasn't deliberately aiming at it hehe

re: the phone, it's around $300 US, surely you can spend a lot more these days? I'll try and get some better pictures this morning, but I'm trembling in my safety boots worrying abvout that 2.75" ball flying at any velocity

that ball bearing would be super sweet to shoot.

ooooooh they're both shiney HALF-DECENT!?!?!?!? that's a pretty sick phone, and i didn't know an orange could make it through a reinforced window. They always say you learn a new thing every day, since i joined i think i've learned 2 new things every day...that sounded alot better when i said it in my head

edit: cwazy, they should give you a sig within a sig, that'd be awesome

Now this would have to be the first cannon that you have made out of off the shelf parts, would it not? I still have to get around to making one like that one day! That "bb" should be quite fun to shoot
You just have to find a suitable target, like an aircraft carrier or something

Today's tests were relatively disappointing, I'll have some pics when I get home and have access to my USB cable. The bearing came out slow enough to be seen, managed a nice dent in a concrete pillar though hehe.

Now this would have to be the first cannon that you have made out of off the shelf parts, would it not?

Certainly the only one without a drop of epoxy, though I'm sure the parts were never intended for such abuse

I would get a 3" ball bearing from McMaster, but they're $110 for one

Where did you get the 2.75" one Jack? Just build a replica of the SCTBDC to fire it, GGDT says over 340 fps at full power, which should be enough completely annihilate most targets.