More Ways to Blow Things Up

pitabutter writes "Since the /. crowd seems to appreciate the exciting combination of amateur chemistry and fearlessness (what is it about intelligence and the desire to blow things up?), Sam Barros' site would be worth a look. Rail guns, high voltage, electromagnetic experiements-all there and with videos to boot. Unable to confirm if Sam still has appendages intact........"

Comments

If you like this, try this, too....

[mickwd]

George Goble's home page.

Re:If you like this, try this, too....

[ruprechtjones]

http://ghg.ecn.purdue.edu/~ghg/morebbq/index.html

what the hell are those pressurized tanks in the bkgd? Are they really lighting LOX only 4 meters away from that much explosive material?

Balls, bravery, stupidity... a jedi craves not these things...

Re:If you like this, try this, too....

[pipingguy]

what the hell are those pressurized tanks in the bkgd? Are they really lighting LOX only 4 meters away from that much explosive material?

Ahhh, one of my favorite sites.

Don't worry, George knows what he's doing. That's why he's not allowed to do it anymore.

What about amasci and keely-net?

[orangesquid]

Bill Beaty's Amateur Science Pages are a great place for this kind of thing, too... Although his site is a little more aimed at electronics, but there's plenty of physics-related (read: explosive) stuff too :)

answer

[labratuk]

what is it about intelligence and the desire to blow things up?

Lack of it?

Re:answer

[Jeff DeMaagd]

>>what is it about intelligence and the desire to blow things up?

>Lack of it?

Well, intelligence and common sense aren't always connected. Making these devices requires people with a lot of intelligence and posessing very little common sense.

intelligence?

[Anonymous Coward]

Q: what is it about intelligence and the desire to blow things up?

A: they are inversely proportional. just look at the current US administration.

Good lesson for an engineering student

[kuhneng]

> January 26th:
> PowerLabs was featured on a ZZZ Article;
> traffic triples (now at 4000+ hits/day).

Let's see what he's learned about scalable designs. I guess Slashdot is going to be part of the "+".

Cool

[jeffbruce]

Cool work, but this guy has way too much time on his hands.

Wow

[Hercynium]

I, for one, am thoroughly impressed! This guy has put a lot of time, effort and experience into the gentle art of making SMITHEREENS! :-)

So what happens when he has kids, I wonder???

Build, don't blow...

[bobwyman]

The site claims to be: "The number one Amateur Science page!" This is a bit depressing if true. I sure hope that amateur scientists are working more useful problems than blowing things up...
I can't help thinking about Vannevar Bush's article in the July 1945 Atlantic Monthly in which he surveyed the possible uses for organized technological development and concluded that "Memex" - the source of the hypertext idea, was the most important thing to work on. What would a similar analysis uncover as the most important problem for technology and "Amateur Scientists" today? I don't think it would have anything to do with blowing things up...

bob wyman

Neat

[KDan]

Send that to the people who have been building potato bazookas and wounding people in germany.

Hmm, on second thoughts, no, don't send that to them. Last thing they need is someone to build a portable potato railgun...

Daniel

Go Edison...

[403Forbidden]

Thomas Edison used AC power to electrocute cats, dogs, a horse, and even a 3-ton elephant. He also created the first electric chair, which ran on DC power and almost set the person to be executed on fire (nowadays they are AC). As our knowledge of electricity expanded so did the uses to which this most versatile form of power has been put to.

And he was the greatest inventor of all time... why?

Re:Go Edison...

[Ryan Stortz]

That's a little wrong. Used AC power to electricute animals and on the first electric chair. The reason was that Edison the creator of DC, wanted to show how harmfull his competetor's (Westinghouse) AC power was.

Edison thought that once people saw how dangerous it was, they'd use his DC power. AC eventually won out because it was able to be sent down powerlines.

Re:Go Edison...

[attobyte]

Wasn't Nikola Tesla that came up with AC? Westinghouse just funded him or something? Tesla worked with Edison for a while until Tesla told him AC was better.

Atto

gone are the days of mr wizard

[Brigadier]

I grew up with the Mr Wizard generation. Making bombs from flour, hot air baloons and electricuting weiners. Which looking back could have killed me. In highschool we discovered the proportions to gun powder and made a beaker full .... then lit it. We also did electrolisis of salt water H + OH + Na + CL -> NaOH + CL2 + H2 at the time it was looked on as being smart. Now there are flashback of colmbine. I think twice about showing this stuff to my children because it's looked upon as so anarchist

Re:gone are the days of mr wizard

[collapser]

electrocuting your weiner can kill anyone.
Unless you're female, in which case it's someone else's.

Re:gone are the days of mr wizard

[Blind_Samurai]

I have a vivid memory of my mother yelling from the upstairs, "What are you doing!?!" "Nothing..." I was dancing around holding a box fan and herding a big green cloud of chlorine gas I had just liberated from pool chemicals out one of those narrow rectangular windows. I didn't think it would make so much.

Re:Repost, but not recent anyway

[mshultz]

Evidently he's finished high school, since this page is a link to his IB extended essay project, which is done during one's senior year of high school. Unless something went horribly wrong with the project and he never graduated... :)

Report from the general

[Joe the Lesser]

'The Rail Gun upgrade should be completed soon. I than plan on firing it with a plasma armature, incorporate an inductor into the circuit, and research the effect on efficiency of different pulse lengths and armature compositions.'

Excellent. With these new weapons our plans to invade earth will soon be complete. Glory to the planet Zorba!

Differences in people...

[cuyler]

what is it about intelligence and the desire to blow things up?

Oh no, you're wrong. Blowing things up is a univerisal love of all humans. It's just the un-intelligent ones only do it once.

Holy shiznit.

[Phanatic1a]

For my senior EE project, I built a railgun. Used aluminmum bar stock for the rails, milled out a channel for a ball bearing, injected the bearing with a paintball gun. The power supply was a bank of electrolytics in parallel totalling 48 mF at 600V, so around 9 kJ total.

Didn't look anywhere near so impressive as this guy's.

Re:Holy shiznit.

[WolfWithoutAClause]

Actually, secretly, he rather overdesigned it; and it works, but doesn't work so well.

I think out of the hundred meter per second or whatever that the projectile leaves the breech, about 90+% of the speed is due to the gas injector he uses to avoid spot welding.

The problem is that the pulse of current happens way too early in the gun, and he skids off a lot of his power in arcing.

He used to run a forum on his website (it seems to be still there, although it doesn't work right now). There was a lot of people, more or less as knowledgeable as him on his forum really interested in trying to help him design it; but he ran roughshod over the lot of them. And they told him about the pulse length issue. So basically they all got majorly pissed off and went off elsewhere in a huff, and they laughed when it didn't go supersonic; well it was Sam Barros's rail gun, but they were trying to help, and he ignored them, and he suffered. Sam had spent too much time going for 'oxygen free copper' to try to improve the current flow, but it didn't help, because but didn't get the fundamentals right.

But that wasn't the reason they left; it was just the proverbial straw; the problem is that Sam has a few ego problems, atleast online, he may well be more personable in the flesh; but he enjoyed telling people how stupid they were online. Mostly they were too, but few people came back to the site after that kind of treatment; and sometimes Sam was wrong, so he treated them unjustly for no reason.

So, basically, the powerlabs forum has basically died, all the contributors went elsewhere.

His basic technical skills are exceptional, although nothing he has done is actually original, so it remains to be seen whether he can achieve his potential, and as anyone can see from the site- he is good.

Babu smash!

[Wraithlyn]

"what is it about intelligence and the desire to blow things up?"

I think that's more of a male thing than an intelligence thing.

All you destructive women out there, feel free to violently disagree. And get it on camera, for fuck's sake.

Survival Research Labs

[Bowling Moses]

This blowing things up reminds me of the Survival Research Labs. Big pseudo-military machines running about and causing destruction and mayhem, like the Pitching Machine? I'd love to see any machine that can huck 2x4's at 120 mph. Anyone been lucky enough to see a show?

Re:Survival Research Labs

[ddimas]

I've got one in my garage, it's called a tablesaw. If you let it get out of alignment (or just use it wrong) it'll chuck wood faster than a woodchuck.

Re:Huh?

[Anonvmous Coward]

"I don't get it. What's the connection between intelligence and the /. crowd???"

It's an inverse relationship. Think of intelligence as a vaccine for blowing stuff up.

We DO like to blow things up

[TerryAtWork]

Including Sam Barros' web site when it gets Slashdotted, right?

Ahem, I have noticed a few errors . . .

[GMontag]

From this crackpot's website:

The discovery of electricity came hand-in-hand with the realization that it could be use to harm and kill living things. In 1945, with the
invention of the Leyden Jar (the first type of capacitor ever developed, invented in the University of Leiden, Netherlands),

Sorry, Ben Franklin used those jars in Philly way back before france was a county in Germany.

high power
electrical discharges became a possibility, and with them came numerous salon shows where these discharges would be used to
electrocute birds, rats and other small animals. Thomas Edison used AC power to electrocute cats, dogs, a horse, and even a 3-ton
elephant. He also created the first electric chair, which ran on DC power and almost set the person to be executed on fire
(nowadays they are AC).

Yes, Edison used DC, his competitors (I think they are called General Electric now but I may be mistaken) used AC and the story is backwards!

The AC guys made the DC electric chairs to show how "dangerous" DC was and they "showed" how "safe" AC was by it not killing people!

As our knowledge of electricity expanded so did the uses to which this most versatile form of power has
been put to.

yea, that might be right.

Why the young people always with the explosions?

[sam_handelman]

Okay, I wear a trench coat, I was just as alienated as the next teenager, but I find this picture a little troubling. Sam Barros lives in Michigan now, and if you saw Bowling for Columbine you know what that means - all the other children are armed too. Teenagers with guns bother me, because my Mom TOOK MY GUN AWAY - I mean, because it's dangerous.

It's not how long you lived, it's HOW you lived...

I felt the same way when I was his age :)

Seriously; there are physiological changes that occur, alterations in brain chemistry, which, let us face facts, impair the judgement and good sense of young people. That is not to say that there are no teenagers with far better sense than the average adult; but even so, it's a stage in neurological development that does not promote sensible behavior.

It also means that explosions are not nearly as cool as they seem when you're 18. Another fact - chicks do not dig explosions. I learned this the hard way so now I pass it on to the younger generation.

I don't think explosives chemistry is a good starting place for a junior chemist; Sam Barros has obviously done fine, but I'm not sure how this stands as a role model. For one thing, he clearly does have good sense (note the many safety warnings emblazoned all over his web page.)

Chemistry involving dyes, optics, visual effects, material science and metallurgy (electroplating, for example) is no more difficult and much safer. Making stuff like this can't indulge your inner pyromanic like a bomb can. I'm not trying to criticize teenage boys for wanting to cause some damage - I certainly did - but it worries me.

So, I wonder - why does the slashdot story focus on the explosives? His EM devices are cooler anyway.

Ah, the hell with it. I'm only 23 years old! What am I thinking? It's time I put together a web page on how to weaponise biological and chemical agents. Now THAT would earn you some attention at the science fair.

Finally - when blowing up your school, wear ear protection! Regrowing fingers and toes is just around the corner (well, hopefully, I have some friends working on this); regrowing your inner ear may never be possible.

The Electrocuting Water Cannon

[Alien54]

Well, there's always the Electrocuting Water Cannon.

As noted in the Village Voice:

The innovative savvy of American electrical engineers always astounds. If something terrible can be built in the name of security, they never shirk. Who else would be brilliant enough to come up with a water gun that carries molar-rattling electrical shocks?

The aqueous electrocutor sprays a "high-pressure saline solution with additives" mixed in to maximize range in putting down that troublesome rabble. "[Debilitating] but not lethal shocks" move through the water jet, according to Jaycor's online brochure. The company hints the voltage can be turned up "to deliver potent electrical shocks to equipment as well as individuals."

This stuff is starting to scare me. And the basic idea is simple enough that it could be a do it yourself in your own garage type of project for either the profoundly brilliant or profoundly stupid

Sam Barros? Bah! That's kids stuff compared to....

[Dolemite_the_Wiz]

...Survival Research Labratories (Their motto: "Producing The Most Dangerous Shows on Earth.")

Here's a tesla coil for you!! (Standing 20 Feet Tall)

With shows like:

A CALCULATED FORECAST OF ULTIMATE DOOM: Sickening Episodes of Widespread Devastation Accompanied by Sensations of Pleasurable Excitement

...and...

A Carnival of Misplaced Devotion: Calculated to Arouse Resentment for the Principles of Order

...and, of course...

The Best of SRL!!!

Pretty friggin cool 'eh?

Dolemite

ah did he get call from Ashcroft yet?

[linuxislandsucks]

did he get a call from Ashcroft yet? supposedly the gov doesn't free non govermental site like this up because it provides too much informattion to terrorists..

Of course try explaining that any religous fundamentalist who is edcuated in science can do the same things seems to fall on deaf ears..

Stop Terrorism Now! BLOW UP TH FREAKING SCHOOLS!

Security through noneducation?

[Tuxinatorium]

Seriously, security through ignorance is about as futile as security through obscurity. If High Schools want to water down their chemistry classes in a vain attempt to keep people from learning how to make bombs, I pity them. It's not going to stop a kid who wants to blow up the school from doing so, because the information is everywhere and the materials are common household products. They should just go ahead and teach the kids some cool chemistry with cool demonstrations like methane bubbles, nitrocellulose, thermite, Sugar+KNO3, Zinc+NH4NO3+NH4Cl+H20, etc., all of which I got to do in my AP chem class. :) Plus you can save a lot of money on fireworks around the 4th by making your own ;). Go grab a 20-lb bag of ammonium nitrate, some zinc powder, and then some colorings:
NaCl (table salt) - orange KCl (salt substitute, road salt) - purple CaCl2 (road salt) - orange Copper - blue
plus paints are a good source of exotic transition metals, if you can figure out what exactly they contain.

Nye Thermodynamics - DIY Jet Turbines!

[swordboy]

Nye Thermodynamics

Nothing like the sound of the afterburner kicking in. I want to make a jet ski hovercraft out of these one day...

Love the line...

[Uncle Flip]

I love the first line on one of the pages: "Anything is a weapon if you swing it right."

My man Frued would be proud.

-UF