Would argon work on the rat?

I had a personal close call with nitrogen. I had no motivation to leave the space, just an overwhelming desire to go to sleep.

I've heard of it "working" on weldors in enclosed bulkheads for instance; as long as you can get the holes nice and closed up I'd say it should work great.

Could also use something cheaper, like baking soda and vinegar CO2.

Just remember that if you can't get him out of there once he's dead, you've got a problem concerning rather different gases...that tend to have upleasant odors. ;)

Tim

-- "I have misplaced my pants." - Homer Simpson | Electronics,

I used a exhaust hose into a ground hog hole just ran the car for 1 hour. You need to close up the holes. I have heard it works with moles to. Just make sure you don't fill any of your living space

Or a slightly more controlled version of Caddyshack... :)

--Winston

You'd hate to use that thing and find out they tunneled under your house foundation.

GTO(John)

Reminds me, I was watching American Hotrod a few days ago, one of the old guys in the shop snuffed out an O/A torch, pointed it under a styrofoam cup, then lit the torch and pointed it at guess what.. :>)

Tim

-- "I have misplaced my pants." - Homer Simpson | Electronics,

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - --+ Metalcasting and Games:

If the idea is to get he rat to feel suffocating, it wont work. Lack of oxygen is not the trigger for suffocation sensations, it comes from the increase of co2 in the blood, (actually the acidity resulting from the co2). So the rat wil just die and start to smell unless he is accesible. Pumping in co2 might do the trick. Have you considered using a trained weasel or similar? Henning

is not the trigger for suffocation sensations, it comes from the increase of co2 in

die and start to smell unless he is accesible. Pumping in co2 might do the trick.

If you can corner the rat in an enclosed area, as previously, use a fire extinguisher. Certainly no danger of fire that way. Are you filming this stuff yet? Could get on one of the blooper kinda shows, or maybe America's Most Wanted.

michael

I think I would beg borrow or buy a non-poisonous snake. Once the rats and mice are gone he/she will pack his/her bags and slither on down the road.

VT

Back in the early '70s I was involved in some tests at a major aerospace company on the space coast of Florida. One of the engineers told of a guy who went into an extreme cold lab one night to check on a test. In that area LOX and LN2 were readily available from rocket fuel manufacturing. The test area was so cold that people had to have a suit with an external air supply to avoid freezing their lungs. Since liquid oxygen was so plentiful the suit air was pure oxygen rather than setting up a special supply of clean air. The guard found the guy out cold on the floor a short time later. It turns out that at night the breathing air lines were flushed with dry nitrogen to prevent fires. The guy was lucky; he wasn't without oxygen for long enough to have brain damage. He said if he ever got the death sentence he wanted it by nitrogen. He was checking the test, next thing he knew he woke up with the paramedics. No discomfort whatsoever. No C02, no choking sensation.

I've read that OD'ing on nitrogen is a really nice way to commit suicide....... plus, you don't mess up your shop, like a bullet through the head will.

"Tim Williams" wrote: (clip) one of the old guys in the shop snuffed out an O/A torch, pointed it under a styrofoam cup, then lit the torch and pointed it at guess what.. :>) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^ I did that several years ago with a balloon. My ears are still ringing. Literally.

On the order of $1/cu-ft, argon is very expensive to merely displace air. CO2 is much cheaper and would inhumanely kill (OK, it's a rat) in relatively low concentration. R-134a (auto A/C refrigerant) is cheap, readily available, and strongly narcotic even if quite diluted. We used it to euthanize a pet.

Seems that's how I got suspended from school one time....the other time had to do with a couple pounds of limburger cheese and the school's gas furnace system...made six 300,000 BTU fart machines...and the local news :-)

Anyway, that doesn't have anything to do with the rat. Seriously, if I were you, I'd scare him out from under the cabinet again, but this time allow the rat 1 single dark place to hide once he breaks loose...like an open microwave door... or a Chevy driveshaft with 1 end cut open. You can use your imagination beyond there...

Todd

Really! What is this bottle made of?

While I usually like sarcasm, I'm not sure you have applied it correctly. Re-read the post. Gary

"Leo Lichtman" wrote > I did that several years ago with a balloon. My ears are still ringing.

I did it with a plastic kitchen garbage bag fifiteen years ago. Mine are still ringing too. The dumb stuff we do for kicks, whodda thunk? "Huh? What was that? I can't hear you honey, you know I'm half deaf." Sometimes not such a bad thing. Tom