I was a commercial fisherman in Alaska in the 90's. All the ships had potato guns and we would use them to warn off other boats when they got too close (sometimes we would just get drunk and shoot at each other. Shhh... don't tell anyone).
Back in HighSchool we made one that fit golf balls perfectly with a rag wrapped around it. She would put a hole in a 55 gallon steel drum from 20 yards. So much fun
We used socks, used a barbecue starter for the ignition device, and a combination of hairspray and other aerosol flammables for fuel. We drove a 500 yard par five at the golf course behind my buddies house with roll included
Built one when I was 12 years old. Decades ago tennis balls were sold in metal cans. Three balls per can, so they were long cans. Punctured the bottom of three cans, taped them together and placed a hole on the bottom side of the fourth can. Poured about 3 oz of alcohol into the cans and spun them around to get alcohol all the way down to the bottom can. Dropped a tennis ball into the top can. Ball could not go further down because the bottom of the top three cans was only punctured. Took a match to the only hole on the side of the bottom can, and booooooom. The tennis ball went so far up in the air we could barely see it. My next adventure was more complicated. Home made gun powder. Followed by a homemade pipe bomb. Buried the bomb and blew it up leaving a three foot wide crater. But I was 13 by then and more responsible. Set up a perimeter and wore safety glasses 😅
@@Handle-q6x cool, I also made rockets, but I used the pre-made fuel cells. Then I got into building airplanes. Fortunately, there was a park behind our house, so all experimental craft was done there. Now kids are to attached to their phones.
I built one years ago that used a spark igniter. We shot hairspray into it as fuel. Didn’t have any potatoes, but I had a bunch of apples that were bigger than the bore. So I sharpened the outer edge of the bore where if you took the Apple and rotated it, it would cut and make a perfect fit. Then all of the peelings would fold in behind it, went outside in the backyard to test it. We had had an ice storm the night before so all the tree limbs had a quarter inch of ice on them. When I shot that thing off, it went up into the tree and it was like shrapnel cutting through the tree limbs. as the limbs are raining down around me all I could think of was “coooool!”
Man that sounds fun! Kids nowadays sit at computer desks, on their phones, playing video games...they haven't a clue what real fun is! Kinda sad really.
@@chikkenbonz If a kid in suburbia today made a potato cannon and fired it at trees in the backyard, the neighbor Kens and Karens would SWAT them, the local PD and ATF would swarm the house, and the kids would be charged with construction of an NFA destructive device, minor in possession of a firearm, discharging a firearm in city limits, terroristic activity, shooting within 1/4 mile of an occupied structure, etc. and the parents would be charged with constructive possession of a n NFA destructive device, unlawful transfer of an NFA item, contributing to the delinquency of a minor, and child neglect. It's a different world man, it's just a different world. :(
@@mannys9130 Indeed. I also made a potato cannon with friends as a youngling, and had a BLAST doing it. (😉) Also, I have nieces/nephews, several of whom don't know s**t beyond the 1nt3rw3bz...... 😮💨 We. Are. DOOMED. 😔
We use them for launching frozen baited hooks for fishing in texas but with pressurized air with a valve to shoot. At 110 psi they launch 8-10oz baits over 200 yards.
@@bartbullock7817 first off, you don’t have the answer you think you do. Ammo is a part of the firearm therefore is already covered by 2A…. But let’s say you can get rid of ammo…. You can’t ban straw charcoal and urine…. We can make our own powder and cast our own rounds homie.
I was about 20 yrs old, hammered drunk and we went through a big bag of tators and then we decided to use onions. My girlfriend took my dog for a walk the next day and apparently there were onions rings everywhere for blocks. 😂 good Ole aqua net!!😂
@kinderdm Can confirm. My local ace even made sure that we used primer and cement with our joints. 😂 Metered propane is really the best way to get consistent results.
I used two wood screws wired to a cheap taser that was mounted to the side. Super reliable ignition and not worried about blowing a lighter clean out the back.
There is a story in my Family about my Great Grandfather. Apparently he always carried around a flask with calcium carbide in it. One summer, at a family gathering at a lake, they dug a hole in the beach and put one of those metal Milk jugs into it and filled the hole around it, leaving just the top exposed. They broke the glass off a light bulb, draped it into the jug, put some of the Calcium Carbide into the vessel along with a little water, and hammered the bung into the top. They then backed off and waited a few moments for the hydrogen gas to develop then touched the wires to a battery. The story claims there was a gout of flame 10 feet tall, and a horrendous boom. The bung what blown straight up, out of sight, whistling as it went. They heard the whistling die out, the start up again. They looked at each other and remembered the adage, what goes up, must come down, and they all scurried for cover. Under trees, under cars, in a house. When the bung landed, 30 feet from where it started, it did so in a small wooden row boat, which gracefully settled into the lake in a few feet of water. No indication if anyone got in trouble for the event.
Yeah, that's acetylene. In the early days, they used to have acetylene lamps where you put in a small piece of calcium carbide and some water, lit the flame, and used it like a candel.
Fresh-off-the-tree walnuts work pretty well. My brothers and I made one back in the 90's, and it would put a walnut through sheet metal for siding/roofing. Those were good times.
Back in the mid 90's my buddy brought a tater cannon like this one. He was using hair spray for propellant. He shot it for me and my dear Pop. My pop said bring that to the shop. He got the cutting torch and shot some ascetaline in the tater gun. It was SPICY! Buddy got excited. Next shot Pop gave it a whiff of oxygen.😆 Touched it off and it shot the barrel about 20 feet in the air.😂 Oh the good times you can have when you have no neighbors.
My son built one for science class in high school! He is Ed hair spray for propellant also. I had the bright idea to use oxy acetylene also! Blew a hole in garage door and blew back end off gun! My son yelled at me and said “you son of a bitch! You tried to kill me”! It’s funny now!
Some people trust the PSI rating, marked on the of the pipe, but that number isn't for sudden pressurization, like in a poor man's cannon. I won't even use PVC for compressor use, because when it fails it shatters.
We in Australia we have what we call Beach bazooka Coper pipe tire valve and 110 pound air and it can reach 310klms verbosity My bazooka runs golf ball size Made my own Reverse style hollow point round You guys are way behind the times .... We been doing it since I was 12 years old ,. I'm now 49 years old Ya want more info just let me know and I might help out .. My lead weight sinker that I've design Will go through 2 car doors in one blast Cheers jase 🎉 Australia cheers 🎉
I always used air with a pressure gauge so i could keep them more consistent and hopefully "safe". Valve stem and an air gauge on the back and a ball valve to release it.
@@brianburnside5949 Yeah, I'm not sure you guys are all with it. Because my 6 decades here, Spuds was the name of a Beer Dog, not the guns. Just read an Idaho License Plate 😂 ... it's potato out here
I remember in the early 90s when these became popular in Australia the government had them banned and classed as a dangerous weapon in about 2 months🤦🏼♂️ So in Australia you could go to jail for doing what you did in this video.. Australia used to be a free country but when they took away our guns they started taking away all our rights
@@machwind3266 That makes a lot of sense too. Though obviously it needed something to actually happen. And you don't spell it "Maxes". ... must be Airbus salesmen 😂
I remember making one of these as a kid. The middle-aged guys at the hardware store knew exactly what we were up to, as they probably got kids with the same list of components every time. Luckily, they weren't boy scouts about it and even gave us a few pointers. They could probably tell we were good kids- and we didn't end up causing more than our share of property destruction. It's harder to crack the screen on those old tube TVs than your neighbor's windshield.
My pops n me used to use walnuts in the fall right when they drop with the green husk on, with whatever diameter pvc it was. Ram em down n watch em fly 400 yards or more. They'd go right through the old pine boards on the old barn real slick too haha. Cheers
I call them "spud guns." I used to make them in various sizes and lengths. I had things that would go so high, I'd never see them again. I shot a rubber ball into a swimming pool, and it vanished. I had a lemon come down onto the street, and the splatter was instant, and it went at least 10 feet in every (flat) direction. Then came the grapefruit gun . . . I still have it put away after 20 years. P.S. Do NOT use hydrogen as a propellant in spud guns. I never did. It's highly explosive. I used to make hydrogen using chemicals and then electrolysis, but for lift in large balloons.
Built one of these in the late 90s that used acetylene, oil rig pipe and a piezo switch from a BBQ. I launched a half-frozen peach at an old Buick station wagon in what I thought was a junk yard. The pit went through both doors and lodged in the tree behind. Turns out, it wasn't a junk yard. Just a super white-trashy dude who liked to drag junk into the woods. We had to go find him and apologize. He traded us a case of beer for my launcher. We were 13-15 years old at the time. Good trade.
I used to work at a produce cooler on the central coast of California. It was corn season, and I made a launcher tube with a barrel that matched perfectly to an ear of corn. The corn has its own lube from the kernels. I have lost sight of an ear of corm more than once.
Built one from 10 foot long PVC pipe, the inner dimension allowed a perfect fit for a 2 liter soda bottle. I filled the bottle halfway with water and drilled a small hole in the cap to accommodate a compressed air hose nozzle. I propped the pipe up on some material at a 15 degree angle and secured it. Shoved the air hose nozzle into the hole and gripped the neck of the bottle, and filled it with compressed air through the hole till I could no longer hang on. That soda bottle shot out so fast and hard that it flew the distance in the shop, making a loud "Whooshing" sound, about 75 yards or so and hit the far wall! Who says you can't have fun at work?!
I did this once with my friends back in high school. When we were walking around the hardware store getting supplies, the old timer there knew exactly what we were doing & started telling us "oh no, you gotta get this kinda PVC & make sure you get the correct primer with the glue youre gonna use. You also wanna use a manual striker for a BBQ. Works great & you'll be able to seal it up really well on the chamber"😂 We then went & decided to put a golf ball in it with a paper sabot. Well in my back yard, there was about 300yds of wetlands between my house & an auction yard. I lost sight of the golf ball over the the auction yard & it looked like it kept climbing!
When I was maybe 8 years old. I sought after and found my sister’s exact product canister, the exact diameter of a golf ball. No shit, I gathered the funds to go downtown and buy the same canisters to make a six foot cylinder. I cut and ground down the lip to be smooth. I don’t know how I didn’t blow myself up, but I made a golf ball cannon. Small hole at the bottom, lighter fluid inside the tube, add the golf ball. Lot the hole and “boom” the ball went straight up in between my house and the neighbors house (15 -20 ft.) it was silent for about 5-10 seconds and then “thwap” the ball hit the concrete walkway “launchpad” about 6 feet in front of me and bounced into my neighbors backyard. “Shit!”. Learned not to launch straight up!
@@nitronitor1415probably is for how close the projectile lands to the person firing it. He eating I talking about 6ft high he was saying it landed 6ft in front of him
It might be a spellchecker that's dialed a bit to high that changed it like that ? Used to have mine on 24/7 but turned it off after it wouldn't quit changing my words to something totally different . Maybe ..maybe not
@@chuckfry1227Cubustion chamber, fuel & barrel. Same premise, different materials. What exactly about this do you not understand? Did I say they were equal in power, scope or scale? You must identify as simple.
Used to call mine a spud gun. Lol i still remember the sound the potato made going through the tube at mach snott! 😂❤ some unsuspecting person is going to be a hurting unit haha
It dose but makes everything sticky. Starter fluid doesn't, seems dangerous but if you use too much it won't ignite, i use like 1/8th of what this guy used and it would have been too much if he didnt vent it out a bit by blowing.
@@MrJustincrowdenaqua net and right guard are core memories for me. I might of been 8 and going to the ice rink and thought I'd Try deodorant for the first time cuz I use to sweat like a champ and not knowing put aqua net under my arms 😂😂.. Thankfully I hadn't hit puberty so hairless but still damn sticky
For some reason I'm visualizing that scene in Happy Gilmore where he's taking bets with the moving guys. He probably just broke somebody's window from a mile away 😂
@benfromalbuquerque6083 they have em but I thought it would be cheaper and funner if it was a potato gun mounted to a turret on the front but yea they have signal cannons! Also I have a barrel to a c130 I believe it's 40mm and I think that would work with modifications! If a breach was put on the back
I was a pyro in HS. In the course of my research, I came across people who made mindblowing potato canons out of thick stainless steel pipe. The fuel source? Stoichiometric oxypropane through a proportioning valve. 🤯 Ignition source was an Oudin coil from a stun gun. I believe they used saboted golf balls at Mach 1.5 or so. Unfortunately my budget was only schedule 80, BBQ ignitor, and Axe.
We got nabbed by the DEC up in the Adirondacks for using one of those things. Our fuel of choice was Aqua Net. My friend attached a grill starter for spark.
Once the propellant charge is consumed, any additional barrel length is just drag on the projectile. Make it 24" and you will get more distance. Also reduce the size of the expansion chamber. Overall length 30-36"
@@darrensmall4313 That is for shotguns. Rifles is 16", AND none of that applies to muzzle loaders. The golf ball/spud gun is a muzzle loader. Please cite any case where the ATF prosecuted anyone for a short barrel length on a muzzle loading spud gun. I'll wait.
@garyK.45ACP They have a bunch of overzealous, patriotic Americans in jail for essentially trespassing, but charged with trying to overthrow the government. If they want it, they'll make it up.
When I built my first one I took it to Kentucky to a family reunion to show my cousins we ran out of potatoes so one of my cousins grabbed a peach before I shot it into the air I told him I wanted to test it on his metal shed he was okay with that and on that day we found out that a peach pit Will penetrate a metal shed when launched from a potato launcher at 25 ft so try you some peaches buddy and you don't have to use paper towel paper towel
You know if you put fins that spiraled the round that could actually be quite effective… and leave it hollow inside to pour something in to add mass.. crayon wax even.. paint cavity..
@liquidrockaquatics3900 I have actually made a design with fins and it holds 10 of the large/adult "pop It's", I haven't tried them. but I do like the idea of printing an empty cavity for quick filling later and/or a monster paintball lol, Good ideas!
In the 90's in Australia, the news promoted how dangerous and illegal these were and they were showing up all around to the polices lament, I of course did not make one instantly. I know our rules are lame.
