Amateur Scientist Builds Thermite Grenade Cannon

YouTube personality Colin Furze has built a homemade cannon which he's filmed launching grenades filled with thermite, "an especially nasty chemical composition made of metal power and oxide that burns as hot as 2,500 degrees Celsius." Furze once co-hosted Sky1's program Gadget Geeks, and he's since made a new career demonstrating strange science projects on YouTube. Furze's other homemade devices have included a rocket-powered go-kart and a knife that can also toast bread while it's cutting.

Re:

[chuckugly]

He's British, dummy.

Well then maybe he won't mind.

Re:hi

[Sechr Nibw]

Thanks for playing, but he's British, not American. Try changing your TLA.

Re:

[rholtzjr]

That was pretty much obvious when he pronounced Aluminum as "Aluminium".

Re:

[U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M]

You mean, the way he pronounced it correctly?

Signed,
the rest of the World.

Re:

[rholtzjr]

Just curious, where does that second 'i' come from in enunciating Aluminum. Instead of a silent character as in knight, we now have the opposite as a ghost character? Pronouncing what does not exist?

Re:hi

[Deadstick]

Just curious, where does that second 'i' come from in enunciating Aluminum

From its discoverer. He called it alumium, aluminum and aluminium in that historical order, and the different versions basically spread by diffusion.

OTOH, "solder" has only one spelling, but two pronunciations: in Britain they pronounce the L.

Re:

[U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M]

Also consider the atomic elements. They're not called Helum, Lithum, Beryllum...

Re:

[jeffb (2.718)]

Red herring. Helium should properly be called "helion".

As for aluminum/aluminium, I'll grant that aluminium is "correct" when we all also adopt "platinium", "lanthanium" and "molybdenium". For bonus points, we can go back and retcon iron to "ferrium", gold to "aurium", lead to "plumbium"...

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[twosat]

OK, but what about words like plutonium and uranium then?

Re: hi

[loufoque]

that's pretty much what those elements are called in French...
or, fer, plomb

Re:

[rholtzjr]

This is why we (the US) wised up and changed it back to the agreed upon name without the second 'i' in 1925.

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[Aighearach]

Everybody pronounces the L in solder, but in American English it is not aspirated. Very similar to the glottal T in Estuary English. Colloquially, we "swallow" the L, but it is still pronounced.

Re:

[Deadstick]

Internet connections between us were down for two hundred years. Shit happens.

Re:hi

[thegarbz]

Pronouncing what does not exist?

We had a Texan come over as a maintenance manager at our plant when the previous one left suddenly (or was told to leave suddenly depending on who's story you believe). Lovely guy, very Texan complaining loudly about not being allowed a gun rack on his massive pick-up in Australia.

One day he bursts in to the reliability office and proclaims with incredible pride: "I finally figured out why you pronounce it aluminium!!!! You actually spell it with the second 'i' !!!!".

We're of English decent. Not only do we not pronounce what does not exist, quite often we actively avoid pronouncing things that do.

Greetings to you from your colourful neighbours across the pond. :-)

Re:

[retchdog]

So, do you pronounce the "s" in "descent"? :P

But seriously, this post made me smile. Cheerio and well-met!

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[thegarbz]

I'm putting that s in the things we avoid pronouncing that do exist, it can sit in the nife draw next to my balle shoos :-D

Re: hi

[Kickasso]

Pretty much obvious from the moment he opens his mouth...

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[Barny]

Also in the first video of the series, he does note that making device that launch the stuff are regulated and he had to have supervision on this one.

Also also, article linked talks about 'rocket powered', that word... I do not think it means, what they think it means. He did make (and continues to make) a kart with a JET engine (specifically a pulse-jet), but that is very different from a rocket.

Re:

[metaforest]

Seen his vids. Clever and crazy dude. At one point he used thermite to boil water for his tea... in about 5 seconds. The special kettle he built to do this was an amusing hack, and quite effective. The pulse jet kart started life as a pulse jet bicycle. AIUI he used to be a professional plumber, and now does these zany vids for income. Lots of fun to watch, but his Brit-version of fratboy attitude grates on me after a while.

Re:

[RockDoctor]

but his Brit-version of fratboy attitude grates on me after a while.

[self] SOBS in distress at American distress.

< /sarcasm >

Re:hi

[ShanghaiBill]

1. Thermite is perfectly legal to own. It is not regulated by the ATF whatsoever.

We made it in high school chemistry class. Here is the recipe:

1. Powdered aluminum
2. Powdered rust
3. Mix
4. Ignite
The stuff does not explode. It just burns, and produces molten iron. We did it on a 1/2" steel plate out behind the school, and it burned through the steel.

Notes:
1. Our chemistry teacher was really cool
2. Always wear eye protection when doing stuff like this.

Re:

[no1nose]

I had a very cool Chemistry teacher in High School too. He tossed sodium in the pool as a demo once or twice :)

Re:

[GeekyThomas]

We did it inside the classroom, in a bucket full of sand though.

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[Aighearach]

Thermite is legal, but there are other aspects of the device that require licensing. Exploding projectiles are regulated by the ATF. Their full name actually includes the word "explosives," but it isn't in the acronym. (ATF or BATF)

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[metaforest]

Just like black powder (which can also be said not to explode), Thermite will explode if contained in something like a pipe-bomb configuration.
Throwing a mass of lit thermite in water, or onto ice causes a gas explosion. Partly due to generation of high temperature steam, and also due to Thermite being hot enough to split water into atomic hydrogen and oxygen. At that point, the aluminum gets a boost of more oxygen that the rust alone can provide, and goes explodey.

Re:

[PPH]

3. He isn't American.

This.

Thanks to regulations, American scientific inquiry by young people is limited to how to mod a vaper to volatilize hash oil.

Re:hi

[PopeRatzo]

American scientific inquiry by young people is limited to how to mod a vaper to volatilize hash oil.

At least that's something that makes the world a little bit better. A "thermite grenade cannon"? Not so much.

Not scientific inquiry

[Roger W Moore]

Thanks to regulations, American scientific inquiry by young people is limited to how to mod a vaper to volatilize hash oil.

Actually a far better sign of how bad things have become is that you think that both the video and your example are scientific inquiry.

Re:

[RockDoctor]

Hello sir, we're with the ATF and would like to have a little chat.

Irr-as the saying goes-fucking elephant. He's not a Septic. Even if he's building this in the US, he's got a GTF card in his pocket. (Which it might be a good idea to use, PDQ. If in the UK, chill.)

I haven't looked at any mechanical specs. But ... it looks like a gas-powered launcher (SCUBA shop - not significantly regulated) ; mechanisms (not regulated) ; blowtorch to light a time-delay fuse (not regulated) ; mechanism launched, lands, fus

He's not an amateur scientist

[bigsexyjoe]

If he did amateur scientific experiments or research, he'd be an amateur scientist. He is more of an amateur engineer, if you'd call him that. Not to knock him, but I'd probably just call him a guy who builds cool stuff.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, if you read TFA, you would know he is "A Wannabe Supervillain". So yeah, you are wrong. And that makes you, an amateur poster on slashdot.

Colin Furze! My favorite crazy scientist

[Eloking]

Actually, he's more an engineer but anyway, not my favorite video of him.

I'm was more impressed when he hydroformed a pulse jet [youtube.com]

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[Brett Buck]

Wo. After watching the pulse jet video, I have to say that's one of the most annoying people I have ever seen.

Re:

[Eloking]

Wo. After watching the pulse jet video, I have to say that's one of the most annoying people I have ever seen.

You misspelled "awesome"......and funny.

Re:

[delt0r]

Let me guess, you like the videos with some classical score in the background and a 3 hour side excursion into the chemical reaction rates of Al and Fe2O3. All in a perfectly monotone voice. https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

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[ShaunC]

I watched several of his pulse jet videos yesterday when I caught this story. It doesn't look like they really do much of anything propulsion wise, they just generate a lot of heat and are noisy as fuck... And that's precisely the kind of project that gets people interested in building stuff. Playing around with metal and fire, being loud, this is awesome! It doesn't need to do anything else! It got me to look up pulse jets on Wikipedia and I learned some things.

While I was watching the videos I kept thinki

Re:

[Blaskowicz]

Pulse jets were a dead end technology anyway.
I had seen the one with the bicycle. I thought it was powerful ENOUGH for such a vehicle, or even downright evil!
I agree that most of the energy is hilariously wasted.
The technology was only ever used to terrorize civilians, but it was not long till detecting and shooting down flying pulse jets was a routine task. Perhaps there would be value in using one to scare birds away!

Re:

[jafiwam]

After watching his videos, I figured it would be a good drive device behind a siren.

He does pick up quite a bit of speed given a good run to accelerate.

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[findoutmoretoday]

Pulse jets were a dead end technology anyway.

With the V1 in mind that's funny.

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

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[thegarbz]

Actually, he's more an engineer but anyway, not my favorite video of him.

Actually he's a plumber and frequently goes out of this way to point out he's not an engineer. :-)

Either way he's an awesome backyard tinkerer powered by caffeine and hearing loss.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[Tx]

Props to him for being a little unsafe, to be honest. I get really fed up of all these shows where they try to give the impression of risk for dramatic effect, while in actual fact they have eliminated pretty much all risk; on mainstream TV, this is pretty much always the case, because lawyers. When Mr Furze does something risky however, it's probably risky for real, and he has the burn scars to prove it. He could tone down the presentation style just a notch IMHO, it gets a bit much for me, but he does coo

Re:

[dissy]

He might want to be a little safer

What, he was clearly wearing his safety tie!

Eye protection?

[legRoom]

He's lucky he didn't go blind while making this. That fireworks clip, in particular, was just asking to get hit in the face with something burning and white-hot.

Re:

[thenetbear]

You'd think the horrible second degree burns he got lighting a jet engine while not wearing protective gear would have taught him something. Searching "Colin Furze hand" will yield the post detailing the injury. Do not view the page if squeamish about images of burned skin.

Re:

[kyrsjo]

Yeah, that was my thought too. Eye protection should be the bare minimum when doing something like that - personally after seeing the effect and the not-so-long range, I would not have fired it without a face shield+helmet+heavy protective garments/boots/gloves with little chance of any pieces getting caught long enough to burn through...

Just imagine what would have happened if the shell didn't go as far as it was intended, but landed at his feet...

Orkin Man

[PopeRatzo]

I don't see why you'd need a grenade cannon just to get rid of termites. Seems like overkill.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

I see you've never encountered Aussie termites.

Re:

[Type44Q]

...or Oklahoma fleas... or Oklahoma roaches... or Oklahoma mites... or even Oklahoma brown recluses (they take over crawl spaces, attics, etc); I've seen them so thoroughly saturate a building that you could firebomb that shit like Tokyo and still be in doubt...

Darwin Awards

[mlwmohawk]

This guy should be cloned and duplicated so more of his type get into the gene pool. Normally when you hear about people doing this stuff, it is through the darwin awards.

Re:

[retchdog]

Maybe the Crown could grant him a license to rape?

Trivia on his last name

[Qbertino]

"Furze" is actually the German plural for "fart", i.e. his name is "Farts" in German.
"Furz" being singular.

Just sayin'. :-)

Re:

[Harold Halloway]

And the name 'Colin' comes from the same root as the word 'colon.' So his name means 'Arse Farts!'

Re:

[Falos]

I chose my handle 20 years ago when picking out a name for a video game (Secret of Evermore). I had no idea it had linguistic ties in most of Europe's languages. To this day I have mixed feelings about the glory-or-not of running around on the internet as "penis".