SpudFiles

Hi, I recently built my first pneumatic potato cannon. It has a 2’ x 2” ABS air tank, a 2 inch ball valve trigger, and a barrel the same size as the air tank. I usually only pump it up to about 60 psi and at 40 psi it almost split one of the boards of a pallet in half with an empty caulking tube with the blunt end of a nail in the end. Should I try firing it at 80 psi or would it explode from the pressure? This is solid core schedule 40 ABS pipe.

I'd Stick with the pressure you're using right now, I've had my fair share of plastic cannons exploding on me.

If you want more performance, try actuating the ball valve by means of a spring and trigger, that way it will open faster, and increase your muzzle velocity. I will dig up some examples when I'm on a computer.

What he said

Labtecpower wrote:I've had my fair share of plastic cannons exploding on me.

Represent!

Ok thanks I will keep it at 60 or so psi.

I know I shouldn’t have done this but I fired it with about a litre and a quarter of water in the barrel at 80 psi (to clean out the potato bits), the recoil was nuts.

Like this

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Wow that’s crazy/cool!

Yeah. Id be very careful about chargin the tank up to 80psi. 80 psi might not seem much, but when it has that sort of volume it can be pretty dangerous. not to mention, if it did explode, you would most likey loose some hearing. i have had an accident recently where i pressurised a 20cm diameter tube by 70cm in length to 90psi. it then fell off the chair it was resting on and cracked making a huge bang. then it flew off hurling towards my cousin and put a nasty gash in his arm. my ears where ringing after that, and i was even standing 4 meters back from the loud bang. please be careful!

I find that wooden projectiles about the size of a red potato wrapped in duct tape work very well.