GB mortars, and illuminated golf balls

[neros]

Anyone tried to use an illuminated golf ball for night shooting..?
Would be fun to see the trajectoy at night, and should be easy to find the balls downrange..

Any thoughts...?

[Artilleryman]

I would be somewhat hesitant about shooting into the dark without knowing what is down range.

This reminds me of a story told about the Confederates in the Petersburg campaign.  At night to annoy the Federals the men on picket would sometimes fill the hollow base of their bullets with cotton, grease, and maybe a little bit of gunpowder, load them backwards in their muskets with a light powder charge, and fire them at a high angle into the Federal lines.  The bullet would tumble and the burning composition made it look like the fuse on a mortar shell.  This would of course cause the Federals to take cover.

By the way who plays golf at night?

[JeffG]

If playing golf at night is somewhat obscure, night time atillery might be less that a good idea. (fore!_ow?)  One year, many many years ago, I fired my soda can mortar over a water. as soon as the round went off, a jet skier came from the right. It was a long 11 seconds (hang time) till we knew everything would be ok. (I never caused THAT situation to happen again!)  Firing at night, you might not know until the next morning if everything was alright.

[neros]

Argh Partypoopers     Thought I had a great idea, but you are so right.  Impossible to be 100% sure whats i lurking in the dark downrange.. The idea popped to mind, as I now has read back in the archives 126 pages, and I see some postings about making the flight of the ball more visable. Smoke and fire streamers are possible but to dangerous, so the idea of a non-pyro effect did seam as a good idea (for a while :-)


Back to the drawingboard 

PS: regarding golf after dark.. When you live north of the artic circle you do anything in the dark 6 month pr year, we even play golf in snow.. Yeah-yeah, crazy vikings we are...

[Doc Brown.]

Are golf balls heavy enough to hurt someone if they was shot straight up in the air and came back down on someones head? I seen a video of some guy shooting an anvil on youtube straight up in the air. He was running away like his hair was on fire then he fell over when the cannon went off. Im sure he was praying that the anvil didnt come down on his head. Im wondering if the same is true with golf balls.

[Artilleryman]

Probably not, but who wants to find out the hard way?

[jeeper1]

Golf balls whether fired from a cannon/mortar or hit by a golf club has the potential to cause serious injuries.
Way back in the fifties when I played golf I got hit my a golf ball on my hand and that put an end to me playing golf for a couple of weeks. No broken bones but I was lucky.

[GGaskill]

You can find reports on the internet about people being killed by normally struck golf balls when hit in the head.  However, I would expect a golf ball coming more or less straight down is going a lot slower than one hit sideways with a club.  Still, there would be some risk, although one cannot eliminate all risk from life.

[Victor3]

Argh Partypoopers     Thought I had a great idea, but you are so right.  Impossible to be 100% sure whats i lurking in the dark downrange..

 Don't let these guys poop on your party. 


 If your range is safe to shoot golf balls during the day and you have a good spotlight to scout it out at night, fire away. Probably safer than throwing a rock.


 Wonder how well glow in the dark paint would work? I imagine the blast would damage it some. 

[GGaskill]

Wonder how well glow in the dark paint would work? I imagine the blast would damage it some.

Judging from recovered golf balls, half of the ball would be soot covered, so you might get a flashing track due to ball rotation.

[neros]

Well, must addmit that I proberly will try this out in a VERY remote spot, and  do a good search dowrange first.
The balls in question are not glowstick or illuminated paint. They have an internal battery and LEDˋ s.  Knock them hard and they stay lid for aprox 10 min. I have yet to see them in real life, but from div youtube  vids they look promising..


But need to build me a GB mortar first, got one in the works but it will not be finished before I am done with my currrent 24 pounder naval model...

[Artilleryman]

If the light lasts for 10 minutes, you will want to only fire them far enough into an area that you can see them and retrieve them in that amount of time.