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Post by c64 on Nov 17, 2012 20:23:33 GMT
Ice is overrated. They now make snow cannons and wildly use them.
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Post by silverdragon on Nov 18, 2012 8:22:08 GMT
Trust me, a Refer van thats on the way to Scrap will be cheeper than retro-fitting a "normal" van, or even buying loads of ice....
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bioLarzen
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Post by bioLarzen on Nov 18, 2012 11:42:18 GMT
Trust me, a Refer van thats on the way to Scrap will be cheeper than retro-fitting a "normal" van, or even buying loads of ice.... ... and anyways, finding the best (cheapest?) solution is their job, not ours - and they are quite good at that, aren't they?  bio |
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Post by Cybermortis on Nov 18, 2012 13:54:06 GMT
Trust me, a Refer van thats on the way to Scrap will be cheeper than retro-fitting a "normal" van, or even buying loads of ice.... ... and anyways, finding the best (cheapest?) solution is their job, not ours - and they are quite good at that, aren't they? bio The 'best' solutions would be those that are; Cheap, or at least within their budget. Safe, would provide the best opportunities for visually impressive footage. Don't require locations they can't film in and last of all can be implemented by the cast rather than having to turn things over to experts - although they have turned things over to experts on occasion the cast are still part of the testing. Although they are the ones who have to decide how best to test something, that doesn't mean that fan ideas as to how to test things are useless. Providing such ideas gives them more to think about, and may even turn up something they would otherwise have never considered doing. |
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Post by the light works on Nov 18, 2012 15:40:07 GMT
Not really, as I said I think cannon used a hollow metal tube filled with powder as a primer - a way to ensure that the power wasn't blown away and that the trail of power into that cartridge wasn't broken. Standing water in the base of the breach shouldn't be a problem as long as the powder is contained in a waterproof bag/cartridge and the touch-hole is on the upper part of the breach. The problem would be the hole that needs to be punched into the cartridge to allow the powder to be ignited. This could allow moisture to seep into the powder, which in turn might render the powder inert - worse is that this would be happening with the powder around the fuse - meaning that the gun isn't going to fire. let me spell that out for you: I don't think a metal tube as the priming tube would be disallowed, as it is the cannon that is to be made of ice, not the firing system. and with the cannon properly loaded and the charge driven home, meltwater would go somewhere, and if the only hole was the touchhole, it might be forced into the touchhole. otherwise, with collected water inside it, you would also have hydraulics and steam expansion to consider. |
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bioLarzen
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Post by bioLarzen on Nov 19, 2012 2:38:29 GMT
... and anyways, finding the best (cheapest?) solution is their job, not ours - and they are quite good at that, aren't they? bio The 'best' solutions would be those that are; Cheap, or at least within their budget. Safe, would provide the best opportunities for visually impressive footage. Don't require locations they can't film in and last of all can be implemented by the cast rather than having to turn things over to experts - although they have turned things over to experts on occasion the cast are still part of the testing. Although they are the ones who have to decide how best to test something, that doesn't mean that fan ideas as to how to test things are useless. Providing such ideas gives them more to think about, and may even turn up something they would otherwise have never considered doing. I guess you're taking some of my comments a bit more seriously than they're meant to be taken  bio |
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Post by Cybermortis on Nov 19, 2012 14:00:29 GMT
Hey, you'd be surprised how 'silly' ideas can on occasion lead you down unexpected and viable routes.
Heck, the final test for Poo hits the Fan was written as tongue in cheek....
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bioLarzen
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Post by bioLarzen on Nov 19, 2012 15:06:08 GMT
Hey, you'd be surprised how 'silly' ideas can on occasion lead you down unexpected and viable routes. Heck, the final test for Poo hits the Fan was written as tongue in cheek.... I meant my comment about finding the cheapest buy being their job - not the whole idea of the ice cannon. bio |
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Post by The Urban Mythbuster on Nov 19, 2012 16:16:41 GMT
Did we ever come to a concensus about the best option for the projectile? I know we were discussing using a premanufactured item (ping pong ball, tennis ball) vs creating an ice cannonball. Though, if possible, I suppose the MBs could trying different projectiles depending on failure/success at each stage of the test.
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Post by Cybermortis on Nov 19, 2012 16:37:58 GMT
I think the final decision as to what projectile to use would depend on how strong small-scale testing shows ice to be in resisting the pressure of the propellent. This will denote the amount of powder/propellant that could be used before the gun just shatters, which in turn will denote how thick the barrel walls would need to be. The thicker the walls the larger and heavier the cannon would have to be, and the harder it would be to make one - Small scale testing may show that while it could be possible to make such a cannon that fires iron-shot, the barrel would have to be so thick as to make it effectively impossible to make or transport.
Personally I think ping-pong balls would be ideal as their small size and the ability to alter their mass by changing their filling should allow them to get away with less propellant and hence a thinner barrel. This would in turn allow the gun to be smaller, making construction* and transportation easier.
(*The larger the gun the larger the freezer would need to be, and the longer it would take to make their guns).
Another factor, which is related to the comments about size, is if MB consider it practical to build more than one cannon. If they can build several and transport them then using ammunition they can buy in bulk for next to nothing would be a considerable advantage - assuming of course that they don't have ping-pong balls in their inventory already.
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bioLarzen
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Post by bioLarzen on Nov 20, 2012 8:48:33 GMT
Did we ever come to a concensus about the best option for the projectile? I know we were discussing using a premanufactured item (ping pong ball, tennis ball) vs creating an ice cannonball. Though, if possible, I suppose the MBs could trying different projectiles depending on failure/success at each stage of the test. I guess it would depend on what the cannon would have to do for a successful test. One single shot? Multiple shots? Shots that go a certain distance? Shot that could be lethal? We didn't even come to a concensus on that bio |
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Post by silverdragon on Nov 20, 2012 9:15:52 GMT
It HAS to be a Frozen chicken.....
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bioLarzen
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Post by bioLarzen on Nov 20, 2012 13:43:40 GMT
It HAS to be a Frozen chicken..... The chicken gun myth evolution extreme? bio |
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Post by The Urban Mythbuster on Nov 20, 2012 14:06:48 GMT
I guess it would depend on what the cannon would have to do for a successful test. One single shot? Multiple shots? Shots that go a certain distance? Shot that could be lethal? We didn't even come to a concensus on that bio I would say that a good metric for measuring the level of success would be how many shots. I suppose a single successful shot could earn a Plausible, while multiple shots should make it Confirmed. Gleaning from earlier posts, I think the minimal objective for success is the projectile leaving the barrel and going some distance (no mimimum requirement), condition of the cannon after this shot would determine the future direction of the test. |
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bioLarzen
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Post by bioLarzen on Nov 20, 2012 22:55:17 GMT
I guess it would depend on what the cannon would have to do for a successful test. One single shot? Multiple shots? Shots that go a certain distance? Shot that could be lethal? We didn't even come to a concensus on that bio I would say that a good metric for measuring the level of success would be how many shots. I suppose a single successful shot could earn a Plausible, while multiple shots should make it Confirmed. Gleaning from earlier posts, I think the minimal objective for success is the projectile leaving the barrel and going some distance (no mimimum requirement), condition of the cannon after this shot would determine the future direction of the test. I can sign up to all of these. bio |
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Post by OziRiS on Nov 21, 2012 0:07:23 GMT
Well, the whole point of a cannon is to destroy/kill things, isn't it?
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bioLarzen
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Post by bioLarzen on Nov 26, 2012 19:30:47 GMT
Just heard somewhere that both sugared and salted water gives tougher ice than pure water.
Anyone has any knowledge on this? I know nothing about the trustwotrhiness of the info.
bio
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Post by The Urban Mythbuster on Nov 26, 2012 19:41:33 GMT
Salted water will change the freezing/melting point. The freezing point is noticeably lower, the actual NaCl:H20 concentration determines the effect. (23% conc = -21 C FP). So, adding salt may actually be detrimental to the experiment.
Not sure about the effects of sugar in water.
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Post by The Urban Mythbuster on May 20, 2013 17:34:56 GMT
We've seen the MBs shoot projectiles made out of ice, but how about when the object shooting the projectiles is made out of ice?
This is actually a rehash from the old board. I remember it created some really intriguing dialogue about the technicalities and potential pitfalls to testing whether or not this is at all possible.
Things we had gone over:
-How to create the cannon? (use a mold vs chisel a large block)
-Keeping the cannon frozen throughout the test.
-What type of projectile? (should the cannonball also be ice?)
-What are the benchmarks for determining plausibility?
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Post by WhutScreenName on May 20, 2013 20:25:45 GMT
What difference would it make what the projectile is? I do NOT think it needs to be made of ice. In fact, I think it should be a normal cannon ball in order to confirm or bust the plausibility.
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