Dry Ice as alternative fuel?

[Tony.Knaak]

I have made my fair share of "dry ice bombs" but I was wondering if anyone has tested it as an alternative air pressure source in a pneumatic gun?

If you have an all metal pressure chamber, some sort of sealing hatch to add the dry ice and the water, and a pressure limiting pop-off valve to ensure a safe, steady pressure rate it could be done.

I did a search on the forums here and came up empty. So has anyone tried it?

[john bunsenburner]

It does work theoretically but is fairly expensive, doesn't last long and is dangerous. Usign the same principle, and the sheer turn on you get of several tens of thousands of psi, the same can be done with liquid nitrogen.
It deos work but migth not be your best best.

[Ragnarok]

I don't pretend the search function is easy to use unless you know how, but perhaps next time you should be a little more persistent in trying, because the idea does come up reasonably regularly.

Even just skimming the topic search results for "Dry Ice" and picking out the topic titles that obviously talk about it (and thus ignoring those where it wasn't the primary intention of the topic), here's a selection of eight topics that ask about it.

http://www.spudfiles.com/forums/dry-ice-t16353.html
http://www.spudfiles.com/forums/dry-ice-t9694.html
http://www.spudfiles.com/forums/dry-ice ... t8168.html
http://www.spudfiles.com/forums/dry-ice-t5628.html
http://www.spudfiles.com/forums/dry-ice-t4278.html
http://www.spudfiles.com/forums/dry-ice ... t4414.html
http://www.spudfiles.com/forums/dry-ice ... -t933.html
http://www.spudfiles.com/forums/dry-ice ... -t554.html

However, I'm not on this forum to criticise people for not searching... (you should bear it in mind though)

To summarize up the general consensus on dry ice powered cannons - it's normally thought of as fairly dangerous, and it's much better to just get a CO2 bottle.

Bottled CO2 doesn't vaporise off after a few days, is much less likely to give you freeze burns and is much easier to control and regulate. Also, you don't have to wait for it to warm up for each and every shot.

It's not a hard choice to make when you actually look at the pros and cons of the various ways of getting CO2 power.

[jrrdw]

1 more mention of "dry ice bomb" and I will delete this entire thread without notice! Read the rules!!! !!!