FINALLY Completed Howitzer
Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2014 9:50 pm
Good evenin folks!
I've been waiting months for this. This gun has gone from a vintage-looking wooden carriage with shells the size of large spud gun chambers into a pretty distinguishable howitzer.
My original idea was to use gigantic shells, and a rifled barrel. The barrel rifling... didn't work out. The jig worked, the cutters worked, but it was an extremely slow and lengthy process. I think I'll try making a soldering-gun tip so I can burn the grooves in, something a machinist buddy of mine mentioned.
My original carriage fell apart, and I threw out the frame because I had to keep the chamber, barrel, and two shells in my dorm room for a few months. Brought it home thinking I could get it to work the way I intended. Welded a heavy duty frame up, tore apart an old bicycle for parts, and made it look cool. The shell thing... no dice. I couldn't get them to ignite using spark plugs.
I got some new parts and made my shell-holding chamber into just a chamber. I cut the ends off my shells and made them into mini-shells that just hold a potato. They've got a cable going down the middle so I can push them up the chamber and extract them with the sacred shell retrieval staff (pipe with a hook). The back door has an interrupted thread and four handmade rubber gaskets. I certainly had some issues getting a good seal to start with, but I eventually got it to stop leaking.
This is one of my favorite projects I've ever done. I learned a lot about the difference between half-a**ing and doing professional quality work. Even when I couldn't get the gun to fire, it still looked good. This is my first combustion cannon build, and I don't think I'll be making any more for a while, haha.
By the way, it's called The Projectile Impregnator.
This is a video of a firing comparison:
And the link to the photo dump for all the build pictures:
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set ... 700&type=3
I've been waiting months for this. This gun has gone from a vintage-looking wooden carriage with shells the size of large spud gun chambers into a pretty distinguishable howitzer.
My original idea was to use gigantic shells, and a rifled barrel. The barrel rifling... didn't work out. The jig worked, the cutters worked, but it was an extremely slow and lengthy process. I think I'll try making a soldering-gun tip so I can burn the grooves in, something a machinist buddy of mine mentioned.
My original carriage fell apart, and I threw out the frame because I had to keep the chamber, barrel, and two shells in my dorm room for a few months. Brought it home thinking I could get it to work the way I intended. Welded a heavy duty frame up, tore apart an old bicycle for parts, and made it look cool. The shell thing... no dice. I couldn't get them to ignite using spark plugs.
I got some new parts and made my shell-holding chamber into just a chamber. I cut the ends off my shells and made them into mini-shells that just hold a potato. They've got a cable going down the middle so I can push them up the chamber and extract them with the sacred shell retrieval staff (pipe with a hook). The back door has an interrupted thread and four handmade rubber gaskets. I certainly had some issues getting a good seal to start with, but I eventually got it to stop leaking.
This is one of my favorite projects I've ever done. I learned a lot about the difference between half-a**ing and doing professional quality work. Even when I couldn't get the gun to fire, it still looked good. This is my first combustion cannon build, and I don't think I'll be making any more for a while, haha.
By the way, it's called The Projectile Impregnator.
This is a video of a firing comparison:
And the link to the photo dump for all the build pictures:
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set ... 700&type=3