15 ms·
Anvil Firing
- Waterluvian 8y agoI hope if aliens size us up, it's by a random sample of Wikipedia pages. That would be a lot of fun.
- golemotron 8y agoIt's nice that the 'Dangers' section of the article tells you exactly what hazards to avoid if you're going to do it.
- fredland 8y agoyeah that persuaded me to not try it.
- Millennium 8y agoI wonder: they mention that the powder can ignite prematurely when you place the top anvil. Could you prevent that by putting a piece of paper between the anvils? It seems to me that the paper should prevent sparks by preventing direct contact between the anvils, but be weak enough that it shouldn't affect the deflagration too much. Then again, I'm not an expert in this kind of thing. Would this somehow make things way more dangerous in a different way?
- snazz 8y agoI’m not an expert either but I would have guessed that the force from the top anvil acts like a hammer and detonates the gunpowder that way instead of with sparks.
- larkeith 8y agoThey mention using a playing card between the anvils in the article, and in at least one [1] video they seem to use paper between the anvils as well, so it seems probable it would work - or at least not hurt. [1] https://youtube.com/watch?v=S8HbhiRlgM0 https://youtube.com/watch?v=S8HbhiRlgM0
- mojomark 8y agoAnvil firing clip from Sweet Home Alabama movie: https://youtu.be/WqAo_AJHnf4 https://youtu.be/WqAo_AJHnf4
- mcguire 8y agoI have been living in Alabama for 12 years and I still haven't seen any any anvil launches. I am beginning to wonder if the rumors about this state are false.
- oflannabhra 8y agoOne of my favorite videos of anvil firing: https://youtu.be/lKjpgCraVGk https://youtu.be/lKjpgCraVGk
- dmckeon 8y agoThe series of videos from Scott & Nate Wadsworth, aka "Essential Craftsman" with several featuring Cy Swan, are good example of some of the best YouTube has to offer: great content for makers and DIY folks, well produced, well shot and edited, and they have very little extraneous framing - don't start them with the sound muted, because whatever they are talking about starts right at the top. That they (probably Nate) time-lapse/fast-forward through most anything repetitive shows just how to save the viewers' time while still showing the work.
- jcims 8y agoEverybody needs a Cy in their life.
- yoodenvranx 8y agoIf you are even remotely into tools, construction work or DIY you need to binge-watch "Essential Craftsman"! It's one of the best channels for that kind of stuff.
- Griever 8y agoThe "Spec House" series is incredibly valuable if you're even remotely interested in building your own home. I'm incredibly excited to see how that series continues! I consider Essential Craftsman to be one of the best YouTube channels out there. If you're interested in tools, construction or history in heavy industry, definitely give it a look.
- jcims 8y agoAlso known as anvil shooting. Some great vids on youtube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHuQy0mqW5I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHuQy0mqW5I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKjpgCraVGk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKjpgCraVGk
- gaze 8y ago“On September 5, 2011, The Science Channel premiered Flying Anvils, a reality television series about anvil firing.[6]” They really seem to be scraping the bottom of the barrel.
- chrisseaton 8y agoSeems like a legitimate and interesting scientific and cultural topic. Probably fun to watch - bigger than life, noisy and exciting. Sometimes the most interesting programs go into depth about some esoteric topic and can end up revealing a lot. What’s your problem with it?
- agency 8y agoIs there really enough there to support an entire reality television _series_?
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- whatshisface 8y agoIt is once you start including all of the personal details and daily lives of everyone involved. That's what separates reality TV from documentaries.
- gaze 8y agoThis is essentially my problem. Every reality TV show is the same. Every esoteric subcommunity has the exact same pattern of drama, competition, cliques. Take it from someone that did everything from competitive yo-yo to ham radio. I just don't want to see the same reality tv show again, but about anvils. I want to see something that focuses on the science.
- jtms 8y agoWould rather watch this than 99% of the garbage that qualifies for programming - might actually learn something about physics, chemistry, engineering, etc
- Millennium 8y agoSince we're apparently all posting vids, here's what happened when the Finnish hydraulic press guy learned about anvil firing: https://youtube.com/watch?v=S8HbhiRlgM0 https://youtube.com/watch?v=S8HbhiRlgM0
- arxpoetica 8y agoI love that YouTube channel..."and here we go!"
- bitdestroyer 8y ago“Lets.... deal with it.”
- mikeash 8y ago“Individuals may be crushed by a falling anvil.“ Life imitating art once again, I see.
- raverbashing 8y agoScience(-like) projects with little regards (but not too little as to become dangerous) for safety regulations are a great way of bonding between father and son. (Though I never did such things with my father or alone, as I did not have access to the needed equipment)
- philipkglass 8y agoMy father demonstrated the combustion of a mixture of potassium nitrate and sugar to me when I was 7 or 8 years old, and I was instantly hooked. The effect is spectacular: thick white smoke, hissing pink flames, a huge charred mass of fluffy carbon, and the smell of burnt sugar in the air. My interest in chemistry up to that point had centered around growing crystals. After that first smoky demonstration I wanted to make fireworks. It's still possible to have that bonding experience today if you have some open space where there is nothing flammable. I see that Amazon has multiple sellers of saltpeter (potassium nitrate), the key ingredient. As recently as last year I have also seen it sold as stump remover in the gardening section of Fred Meyer (Kroger). Potassium nitrate plus various fuels like charcoal and/or dusting sulfur, sugar, and iron filings is great fun and relatively benign. Do any grinding by hand in a porcelain mortar and pestle and there's really no risk of mechanical ignition. The mixtures don't burn fast enough to risk explosive effects unless ground very finely or strongly confined [1]. I had to photocopy the black powder and pyrotechnics sections of The Chemistry of Powder and Explosives from the library, but today you can find a full scan of that book (and much more) online. [1] You can also make more vigorous mixtures with potassium nitrate by using powdered metal fuels, but you're not going to find those fuels just sitting on the shelves of ordinary retailers.
- raverbashing 8y agoYes, yes, though the potassium salt is restricted in some places, the sodium salt not so much (and it works almost as well, though it's hygroscopic as F) Those were cool experiments :) though I never got much bang for the buck (more like a schwoooooo)
- jancsika 8y agoUK: This is a great way to test anvil quality. US: This is a great way to shoot heavy shit really high.
- jtms 8y agoUK: let’s shoot heavy shit really high but pretend we aren’t at all amused by it
- village-idiot 8y agoThis is serious business chaps, I don’t know why you’re grinning so much.
- cs702 8y ago"Dangers: Individuals may be crushed by a falling anvil. The black powder can also prematurely ignite when the top anvil is placed. As in any case where an explosive is confined on all sides by metal, shrapnel presents a hazard. If a damaged or structurally weak anvil is used, the anvil base may shatter upon ignition."
- YjSe2GMQ 8y agoIf there's one thing anyone that plays with explosives should know is the lethality of flying shrapnel. A simple mix of KNO3 with sugar, when ignited inside a metal pipe, is a very effective killing device. Please take hard cover (hill, thick wall; with distance) when exploding anything that's not paper.
- noahl 8y agoHi! I enjoyed reading your comment, but please be careful before posting working explosive recipes on the internet nowadays. It's sad that we have to think about it, but we do. (Unless you deliberately posted one that doesn't work, in which case, you got me :) )
- jcoffland 8y agoRight, because if we hide the information then bad people won't have access to it. One of the first uses of the public Internet was to distribute text files with bomb recipes. That and porn. Cat pictures came later.
- jpitz 8y agoPotassium nitrate and sugar has been a very well known mixture for - what? Hundreds of years at least. We need a culture of rational and critical thought, not one that sequesters away knowledge.
- BenjiWiebe 8y ago"Rocket candy" is very widely known already, and HN is probably the last place terrorists will look. And terrorists won't use rocket candy. Hey, did you know you can react nitric acid with glycerin to get nitroglycerin?
- emptybits 8y ago> "Anvils were also traditionally fired on St. Clement's Day, honoring Pope Clement I, the patron saint of blacksmiths and metalworkers." Hm. Obscure. Intriguing. Okay. Then briefly down a rabbit hole I learn that Saint Isidore of Seville is the patron saint of "the Internet, computer users, computer technicians, programmers, students"[0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isidore_of_Seville https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isidore_of_Seville
- rixrax 8y agoDoes this mean that some hundred years from now, we’ll be blowing MacBooks up to the sky?
- legohead 8y agofrom reddit [1]: * Saint Bartholomew was skinned alive - he is the patron saint of butcher, tanners, book binders etc. * John the Apostle was boiled alive - he is the patron saint of burn victims * Simon the Zealot was sawed in half - he is the patron saint of sawyers, lumberjacks and curriers (leather tanners who specialize in shaping and stretching leather) * St Sebastian was shot full of arrows, recovered, an beaten to death by a bunch of clubs by the emperor's soldiers - he's the saint of archers and soldiers * St Barbara was tortured and then beheaded, when they were carting her body off, the cart was struck by lighting, catching fire - she's the patron saint of firefighters, artillerymen, and those who work with explosives * St Lawrence got cooked to death over hot coals. After being roasted for a while, he told his executioner "I'm done on this side, turn me over" - patron saint of cooks and barbeque and comedians [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/b9u3d8/statue_of_saint_bartholomew_an_early_christian/ek7bzg6/ https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/b9u3d8/statue_of_sain...
- HankB99 8y agoThis is done (or was done) every year at the Falling Leaf BMW Motorcycle rally in Potosi Missouri. It's pretty impressive to see how high the anvvil goes.
- rhn_mk1 8y agoThat explains the cartoon gag.
- Endy 8y agoI am suddenly reminded of the one Animaniacs skit - "Let the anvils ring!"
- jtms 8y agoI love that “Dangers” gets its own subheading, though it probably could fill its own dedicated page
- haihaibye 8y ago[Roadrunner citation missing]
- JustSomeNobody 8y agoI honestly thought this was going to be a new business slang for reducing workforce numbers.
- OneWordSoln 8y agoYou're not the only one.
- userbinator 8y agoTry to lift an anvil by hand, then watch it get rapidly thrust dozens of feet into the air by a really small quantity of explosive. Demonstrations like this really put the power density involved into perspective.
- mikece 8y agoMy high school chemistry teacher told our class that in the very-old times at the county rodeo the trick was to coat the top of one anvil with nitroglycerine then VERY carefully place another anvil on top... then a sharp-shooter would shoot the anvil stack, igniting the nitro and shooting the upper anvil "at least 150 feet into the air." The dude seemed old enough to have seen this done in antebellum days so we believed him.
- rkagerer 8y agoWile E. Coyote approves.
- honksillet 8y agoWhy doesn't th eycombinator link actually take you to wikipedia?
- urA_faget 8y agoHow about you fucking kill yourself with some homemade explosive, you fucking gay little faggot.
- PopeDotNinja 8y ago"The private citizen who carried out the order to fire the anvil was seriously injured."
- warp_factor 8y agoI thought this was a joke. Seems to be real though.
- angry_octet 8y agoA similar experiment, called a plate test, is used to evaluate explosives. A small charge is detonated under a very heavy steel plate, often 100mm thick. The height the plate is blasted gives a comparitive measure of power, and the size of the dent tells you about brisance, related to the speed of detonation. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/07370652.2016.1143059?journalCode=uegm20 https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/07370652.2016.11...