Great Fun! And we didn't break any windows (but we came close).
Our pneumatic potato cannon was a 10 foot PVC pipe cut in half. We put a bicycle valve in one end to add the air from a bike pump, and a valve half way to launch the potatos.
As you can see in the picture set, we broke the fence on our first test in the backyard, so we moved our next testing to the field around the corner from our house. Our longest shot with the wind, and 80 psi was 120 yards.
Conclusions:
- next iteration will have a shorter air collection tank (way too much work to fill a 5 foot, 2 inch PVC pipe, with a hand bicycle pump)
- about 80 psi shoots the potato about 100 yards, without blowing out the cannon.
- Its difficult to hand pump 80 psi.
- The electric pump works better, but there's too many things to break in our cul-de-sac.
- the potato flys better when packed in pretty tight, and pushed down with a plunger
- Finally, kids (and dogs) love to see potatos flying through the air at high velocities.
Many thanks to our lovely camera person, who doesn't appear in the pictures.
2 comments:
Oh my goodness, that's hilarious!
Christian and Faith shot off a corn cob cannon into a corn field in Lubbock and loved it! They were trying to hit scarecrows in the field.
I'm very impressed with you guys making this--you definitely would do a better job on our science experiments than I do! :)
Love, Nancy
Faith said, "It's good..it's cool!" Christian said, "It's great and he'd like to hear how high it flew."
Gammy said, "Did you read the part of the instructions that said do not fill it past 50 psi and have fun and BE SAFE?"
Great Grandma said, "Where did you get so smart...and follow instructions?"
Love from the four of us
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