The $40 Estate sale cannon

[Jason Fry]

Couple weekends ago I was driving around in the rain and saw a folded over/wet Estate Sale sign. This was 10 miles off the real highway, out on a two lane road. Turned out to be a single-wide trailer house estate sale. But, they had a cannon in the front yard. I had been planning a cannon build for a long time, and so was able to assess that this one was a very well made home-made job. I ended up paying $40 for it.

First I took it home. Here's the "OMG I got a cannon!" video.

Then I cleaned it up. It was gross!

 

[Jason Fry]

Finally last night I went out and shot it. I set up charges of 2, 4, and 6 oz, plus an additional 2 oz to shoot with a projectile. It worked great, with no problems or indications of trouble. Here's the video of all four firings.

 

[Sharp & Fiery]

That looks SO fun!!!

 

[oldmanwilly]

Oh my, I suspect your son now has a new summer project that will be a PERFECT science fair topic: which projectiles fly the farthest and hit hardest? I eagerly await the results!

 

[SharpBits]

Next on your list should be a siege mortar!

 

[Jason Fry]

Cannon blasting a water tub is the most Texas thing ever.

 

[Jason Fry]

I had some trouble in the water tub blasting. I shot two blank loads for the peanut gallery, then loaded up a mini coke can. The mini cokes stuck in the barrel about even with the trunions. So I blasted the first one out. The second one stuck and the charge also misfired, so I had to fill the whole thing with water. I crowbar-ed the can apart and wormed out the charge. Third one is the shot that hit the barrel, but that can was also stuck with 5-6" of headspace between the charge and the projectile. I have yet to see what a properly seated projectile will do.

So after I got home, I did a bit of measuring and trial and error. A mini coke is 2.260 inches, while an Izze fizzy water can is taller and 2.095. Izze can fits just fine. I'll try a few of those next.