Gas-powered vortex cannon as big bad wolf

Science

A bit of fairy tale busting from the BBC’s Bang Goes the Theory – A gas-powered vortex cannon does some impressive huffing & puffing, taking on the role of big bad wolf against little huts of straw, sticks, and brick. That be one very loud & gassy wolf!

More:

Weekend Project: Vortex Cannons

Vortex Cannons 
Volume 15, Page 116

18 thoughts on “Gas-powered vortex cannon as big bad wolf

  1. ellisgl.myopenid.com says:

    Are usually put together with mortar…

    1. Collin Cunningham says:

      Yah – I’m guessing the Bang crew either didn’t have time for mortar curing, or didn’t want their new wolf defeated on its first outing.

  2. Jake von Slatt says:

    “Bang goes the Theory?” I do think they could have come up with a better re-work of “MythBusters” for the title. But then again perhaps it doesn’t seem so contrived in the UK.

    Also, I MUST get my hands on the plans for that cannon! With a rich mixture I think it might produce a vortex ring, OF FIRE!

    1. Collin Cunningham says:

      I fell into a vortex ring of fire!
      I went down, down, down – and the flames went higher!
      and it burns burns burns …

      1. Anonymous says:

        “vortex ring of fire” is the outcome from serving my green chili.

        (4-quart crock pot will use 200 small jalapenos)

      2. Jake von Slatt says:

        . . . this article is the only Google result for “vortex ring of fire.”

        1. Collin Cunningham says:

          You’ve done what many claim is no longer possible – brought forth an idea no one else yet has! (or at least ever blogged/forumed/tweeted/commented/etc before)

          I’d consider registering the domain =]

          1. amasci.com says:

            There was a ring-launching fire vortex device at Burning Man a couple of years ago. It had no launcher, it just sprayed a cloud of ?gasoline? and sparked it off. The flame ball then ascended rapidly as a black ring of smoke.

            My own “Evil Genius Hoaxes” page
            Stink beam ray gun from 1999
            http://amasci.com/hoax.html#stink

            I tried a quick crude test of this “active no-smoking sign” phenomenon using propane instead of acetylene (less chance of torn eardrums.) The rings wouldn’t ignite at a meter distance. However, they *did* cause the tiny blue target flame to suddenly turn orange as the ring passed by. The color change still worked at many meters distance. It might have actually ignited if I’d used a carefully-tailored gas/O2 mixture, rather than just squirting propane into the vortex-launcher for a minute. I didn’t write this up, since my page is aimed at 9yr old children!

  3. Datamancer says:

    I believe the Nazis were working on those during WWII. They thought they could take planes out of the sky with them but it didn’t work so they scrapped the project. Silly Nazis. They should have been working on much more feasible weapons…like our bat bomb or the pigeon missile!

    -~D~-

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