Mythbusters stuff

speaking of gunpowder - I am told that one old farmer explained that he had learned that the secret to a long life was to sprinkle a bit of gunpowder on top of his eggs each morning - that it kept him energetic throughout the day. It must have worked, when he died of old age, he was 104. He is rememberd to this day for blasting a 10 foot hole in the side of the crematorium.

** Posted from **

Here=92s a patent for a gunpowder-fuelled IC engine:

A 1965 movie with Jimmy Stewart called =93Flight of the Phoenix=94 had an airplane with a Coffman starter: in 2004 with Dennis Quade)

Coffman engine starter:

I remember reading somewhere that an engine was once made which actually ran (for a short time, at least) on coal dust. I don't remember anything more, except that I don't think Rudolf Diesel was mentioned.

Best wishes,

Chris

Diesel's first engine ran on coal dust, but it blew up, injuring him.

There were later IC engines that ran on coal dust, but they had the obvious problem: the abrasive quality of the ash caused severe engine wear.

-- Ed Huntress

Steamer inquired about running I.C. engines on acetylene gas and to this I say: Google up "running I.C. engines on acetylene gas" 170,000 hits including A link to A 1980 article on running A car engine on acetylene gas from Mother Earth News. Many years ago I had some correspondence with A fellow who owned a company named Ace-Car-Go. He was experimenting with this subject and I had A Site-Feed Acetylene Generator at the time and I was thinking about converting A Dodge truck I had but than I figured it was impractical in Minnesota since it's below freezing 8 months A year. (At least it seems like it.) Speaking of acetylene generators: I can give someone A real deal on about A 100 pounds of carbide!

Good Luck! H.R.

BobH sez: "Mr. Diesel (Rudolf I think) was killed trying to make an engine run on coal dust if I remember right."

Dr. Diesel was mysteriously lost overboard from a ship.

Bob Swinney

BobH

wrote (clip) Speaking of acetylene generators: I can give someone A real deal on

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ I picked up an old carbide miner's lamp at a flea market, which I would like to fire up, but I can't find carbide for it. Would you sell me some--I really can't use 100 lb?

Rudy was *such* a ham.

Nowadays they won't even let you bring your own generator aboard.

--Winston

Leo Lichtman inquired about purchasing some carbide and to this I say: Sure. It should work in A carbide lamp as it's in granulated form (some acetylene generators used A cake type product). The only problem is logistics as it would have to go by the post office or one of the delivery concerns and I don't know if they would have A problem with it. Not dangerous in any way as long as it's kept dry! Contact me at my email addy. It works.

H.R.

--Yeah; I found a 2-lb can of the stuff when cleaning out the shed. That's what got me to thinking about the whole thing! :-)

Looks like small amounts (less than 10 pounds) are shippable USPS marked ORM-D (see ) and "Consumer Commodity" according to "Mailing Hazardous Materials" in

UPS might have the same ORM-D rules as USPS but I didn't read their pages closely. UPS at least lists a contact to inquire about details, instead of just saying to contact local post office for details. There seem to be an awful lot of details that apply. Eg -- follow links to "Title 49 CFR 172.101 Table (List of Hazardous Materials)" in and see several refs to calcium carbide.

Then see where the following sections say that ORM-D flammable solids can be mailed by Surface Transportation: section 344 "Flammable Solids"; section 344.1.C: "Division 4.3, Dangerous When Wet. A material that, by contact with water, is likely to become spontaneously flammable or to give off flammable or toxic gas at a rate greater than 1 liter per kilogram of the material per hour"; section 344.2, Mailability; section 344.2.c, "Domestic Mail via Surface Transportation. A flammable solid that can qualify as an ORM?D material is permitted."

Id like to have 10 lbs myself, depending on price and cost of shipping.

Ive a couple old carbide lamps and a carbide cannon.

Gunner

"They couldn't hit an elephant at this dist..." Maj. Gen. John Sedgewick, killed by a sniper in 1864 at the battle of Spotsylvania

steamer wrote in news:4926e5c5$0$2723$ snipped-for-privacy@news.sonic.net:

I know some early engines ran on coal dust, in a sort of diesel cycle.

compressed air to

The Kauffman starter was an emergency use only sort of thing, for when an aircraft was stranded at a field which didn't have the appropriate huffer to start it. There was a time when almost every aircraft had specific starting gear, different from any onther aircraft, driving the logistics people near to distraction. Some were huffers of various pressure and mass flow. Some moved huge amounts of air at low pressure, others moved small volumes at high pressure. Other aircraft used electric starters of various currents (pretty much all of those were ~30 V.) All the F4 models use air start turbines, and needed 28 V DC to operate the fuel valves and ignition system.

Jon

Yes, I think that is still a version of the Kauffman. The reciprocating engines needed a much shorter inpulse, mostly to get over the first compression stroke, so the time/energy of the cartridge was tuned to that engine's needs.

Jon

I've pushed a large radial prop or two and didn't notice much change in resistance from individual cylinders.

I dunno about Kauffmans, other than seeing something like it portrayed in Flight Of The Phoenix, but some rotary wing birds (Sea Knight, etc) had a manually operated pump to charge an accumulator for a hydraulic starter motor.