doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com In the Interest of Science - Slightly OT, But....

Only the manufacturer will be able to answer your question succintly but the propellent is still gunpowder and the material that causes the effect is the payload which really ignites outside of the barrel because it probably requires oxygen to burn. Gunpowder is a pyrotechnic and does not require oxygen to burn.-Dick

Rocketman; No didn't do any work directly related to these experiments. Many other tests were also run there in what was known as "G-Range" which fired projectiles of about 1" dia as I recall from a "Gun" built using surplus breeches from 16" naval guns. A powder charge was placed behind a polyethelene piston molded around a 98lb lead slug in a short bore stopped by a pre-creased diaphram leading into a smaller bore & followed by another diaphram leading into the final 1" bore. Tremendous velocities were built up as the pressure built up to the point it would burst the diaphrams & enter the smaller area of the next bore. I did work on several occasions on repairing this High Pressure chamber section, which would swell from continued use & we would bore it out & re-line it. Also threaded some breech blocks for it which used a coarse interrupted Buttress thread so it would slide in, then lock with a ¼ turn.
One building there had many photographs on the wall with pictures of these projectiles showing the shock waves & also impact photos. Along side them someone had hung an old cast iron skillet with the caption 12ga Slug b@ x Yards, don't recall exact range now, but think it was 40yds.

OK, I know all you inquiring minds have been dying to know why someone would shoot hot titanium at mud. Well, here's why (according to my boss).

http://abob.libs.uga.edu/bobk/firewate.html

This one rates five smileys.

Got It figured out why they want a flamethrower. Read the National Georgraphic link. The Boss must want to simulate a atmospheric blast like what happened in Tunguska, Siberia. The Comet exploded in the atmosphere and caused a massive blowdown and fires in the boreal forest.

Yes indeed my dear Watson, that is truely interesting.

FIRE AWAY!!! (I'd use the single barrel)

IM, I see a future in science for you. As noted, the theory this research team is working on is that a comet exploded in the atmosphere somewhere over eastern Canada about 12,900 years ago. It set off a series of events of which the evidence can be seen across much of North America. I don't profess to understand the whole thing, but the bottom line is that the earth's climate changed soon after the event and resulted in the extinction of many large mammals and the Clovis people. There are some who contest it, but that's the way science works; propose a theory with evidence to support it and then let people take pot shots at it to find the flaws.

Thanks Dave, that was a nice thing to say.

To close this tread, I've learned that the boss and his research associates have arranged for a gun to fire one or more of the Flamethrower loads. This is at the maximum muzzle velocity and I do mean ULTIMATE. Somehow they have arranged to have the shells fired by NASA's Ames Lab Vertical Gun, which can fire projectiles up to 11 km/sec (23,000 fps by my calculations). The device is used to simulate meteors and asteroids striking objects at high velocity. Here's a link to the description of the gun (device). This will be a bit safer and more scientific than firing it through his Remington auto.

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2007/14mar_marbles.htm

and

http://thermo-physics.arc.nasa.gov/fact_sheets/Range%20Fact%20Sheet.pdf

Miller, your mention of the 16-inch naval guns triggered memories of my friend Gerry Bull's work first at McGill University, Montreal, then in Vermont with NASA support, then South Africa, followed by Saddam's Iraq with sabot-assisted space shots. Gerry was assassinated in Belgium, apparently by Mossad. Was your work connected in any way?