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Offline Spuddy

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Interested Younger Generation
« on: October 20, 2009, 10:17:17 AM »
Having some fun this past Saturday with my son.
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Offline RocklockI

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Re: Interested Younger Generation
« Reply #1 on: October 20, 2009, 10:58:11 AM »
Those are some nice shots Spuddy . How far away is the barrel ? Did you guts hit it ?
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"I've seen too much not to stay in touch , With a world full of love and luck, I got a big suspicion 'bout ammunition I never forget to duck" J.B.

Offline FTB1-SS

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Re: Interested Younger Generation
« Reply #2 on: October 20, 2009, 11:34:39 AM »
Are you shooting golf balls? looks like fun!
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Offline Spuddy

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Re: Interested Younger Generation
« Reply #3 on: October 20, 2009, 01:52:55 PM »
Yes we were shooting golf balls.  We were 100 yards away using 400 grains of FF.  I have several pictures of the balls near the barrel and one just after it glanced off.  The golf balls hooked and sliced like crazy at that distance.  They also lifted up as well.  The mandrel that I roll my tinfoil on for making the cups to hold the powder in, is a bit undersized.  I tape the golf ball to the charge but am inconsistant in getting the ball exactly centered on the charge.  I think this is one of the reasons that the balls do not fly consistantly.  We did have alot of fun but only hit the target once.    The guy taking the pictures lives in Pau Pau New Guinea.  He was very impressed with the construction of the cannon and Dom's welding skills.
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Offline RocklockI

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Re: Interested Younger Generation
« Reply #4 on: October 20, 2009, 05:50:16 PM »
Well , Spud .... when are you going to try a steel ball ? at 100 yds you are certain to hole the darn ironclad 'thru and thru' and send her to the bottom . ;D
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"I've seen too much not to stay in touch , With a world full of love and luck, I got a big suspicion 'bout ammunition I never forget to duck" J.B.

Offline Spuddy

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Re: Interested Younger Generation
« Reply #5 on: October 21, 2009, 01:24:02 AM »
Gary,
Those five balls and sabots that someone so graciously gave me, are kind of like my halloween candy when I was a kid.  As long as I didn't start to eat the candy it would last, as soon as I started it wouldn't last the night.  I have taken one of the balls and sabots and put them away.  Our next outing will include the firing of four of those balls.  I did make a simple canister load out of a soda can superglued together and loaded with 18 lead balls.  I only used 200 grains of FF.  I crimped the ends of the can over and glued them down.  The "canister" did not come apart until it impacted a tree.  I need to figure out how to make it so the canister open up as it exits the tube.  I finally found someone who will help me make wood sabots for use with the steel balls.  The steel balls will be next.
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Offline Cannoneer

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Re: Interested Younger Generation
« Reply #6 on: October 21, 2009, 08:20:43 AM »
That's the way to go Spuddy, nice pics of you and your boy enjoying yourselves.

I hope you don't take offense at what I'm going to type here, but my last post has lodged cannon safety issues on my mind. That's a fine miniature that Dom has made for you, and it would be a relatively easy thing for you to make a safety rammer to be used on it. If you did this, neither your sons nor your hand would ever have to be placed in front of the muzzle when ramming the powder charge down the bore.
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RIP John. While on vacation July 4th 2013 in northern Wisconsin, he was ATVing with family and pulled ahead of everyone and took off at break-neck speed without a helmet. He lost control.....hit a tree....and the tree won.  He died instantly.

The one thing that you can almost always rely on research leading to, is more research.

Offline seacoastartillery

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Re: Interested Younger Generation
« Reply #7 on: October 21, 2009, 09:32:27 AM »
     Boom J. has an excellent idea here, Spuddy.  We use a Safety Rammer every time we load our cannons.  The photo below shows a type anybody can make very easily and costs only about $8.00 for the parts at your local Home Depot or Lowes.  There are only two fine points in making one of these "Finger Savers". One, make sure that the dowel you hang on to is 1.5 or 2 times as long as the dowel that rams the charge and then the shot.  Two, taper the end of the long dowel for one foot, (zero to 1/8" deep all around) where your "gloved" hand grasps it, (align with two hands; ram with one).  Also, the copper plumbing elbows and straight piece DO NOT have to be soldered; 5 minute epoxy can be used in this construction, metal to metal and wood to metal.  A fancier one can be made at some future time.  This one can be made and in use in two hours.  This design keeps your hands behind the muzzle at all times during loading.

FYI,

Mike and Tracy

Tracy uses the Safety Rammer during loading of "Ugly", our first accurate rifled cannon tube, (5 shot, 3.25" group at 100 yards).

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Smokin' my pipe on the mountings, sniffin' the mornin'-cool,
I walks in my old brown gaiters along o' my old brown mule,
With seventy gunners be'ind me, an' never a beggar forgets
It's only the pick of the Army that handles the dear little pets - 'Tss! 'Tss!

From the poem  Screw-Guns  by Rudyard Kipling

Offline Spuddy

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Re: Interested Younger Generation
« Reply #8 on: October 21, 2009, 11:44:30 AM »
Safety rammer is a great idea.  Thanks for the comments.  One can get a bit of complacent until something bad happens.  I currently use the handle end of the worm to move the charge and ball down the tube.  M&T I will be making one like the one you have.  In the middle photo Caleb is removing the tompion that Phantom made for me and I am tightening the trunion cap nuts. 
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Offline phantom

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Re: Interested Younger Generation
« Reply #9 on: October 21, 2009, 01:53:46 PM »
Hey Spuddy didn't Dom make a safety rammer for you when you got your cannon?? It is good to see your son is intrested in the Hobby.
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Offline dominick

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Re: Interested Younger Generation
« Reply #10 on: October 21, 2009, 03:18:32 PM »
Spuddy,  If you did not receive a safety rammer, please let me know and I will send one to you no charge.  I usually supply a safety rammer with all 1/3 scale and larger cannons but I may have missed one somehow.  Dom
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Offline Spuddy

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Re: Interested Younger Generation
« Reply #11 on: October 22, 2009, 05:09:56 AM »
This is the post where you all will realize what an amature I am.  I now know what the thing is that was included with my cannon that I bought from Dom.  Apparently it is a safety rammer.  Dom does include one with each of his 1/3 scale cannons and one was included with mine.  Boy do I feel dumb.
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Offline RocklockI

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Re: Interested Younger Generation
« Reply #12 on: October 22, 2009, 05:51:10 AM »
ya ,but you wont feel hurt now ! ;D

I modified the one Dom sent with mine . I made a new 'hand piece' , its longer now than the ramming side .

Also with that long of a handle piece the angle that Dom had set mine for began to be too much .

so I bent the top metal closed abit bit . The rammer looks more like a U instead of a V .

Gary

ETA I took a sabot and drilled it thru in the center and glued it on the rammer side as to cup the ball rather than have the ramrod end just pushin the ball down from one side of it or the other ...

Also check those sabots for fit B4 you take them out to shoot . I discovered two days B4 the Mont shoot that the darn sabots had swollen and did fit anymore . same same for the rammer cup part it didnt fit either ....!


 
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"I've seen too much not to stay in touch , With a world full of love and luck, I got a big suspicion 'bout ammunition I never forget to duck" J.B.

Offline phantom

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Re: Interested Younger Generation
« Reply #13 on: October 22, 2009, 07:35:10 AM »
Well Spuddy will all learn somewhere. I added a piece of oak to the end of my safety rammer rod to push the ball down the tube. 
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