Water Cannons [formerly Launchers] - A New Class of Weaponry!

Guides and discussions about building water blasters and other water warfare devices such as water balloon launchers.
SSCBen
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Post by SSCBen » Tue Jul 04, 2006 4:44 pm

No. The piston design is unlike the Douchenator. The idea is that the piston separates the air and the water, allowing for the water gun to be shot at any angle. That, again, is another reason to use a piston water gun. Lots of advantages, but they obviously are harder to make.

Here's some images of very early piston water guns (circa 2000): http://www.geocities.com/mrpukeonyourhead/cannons.jpg

I'd also like to say that I sure with MrPukeOnYourHead was still around or left a trail to find him... sadly there's not much aside from his posts at Aquatica and his website. He was ahead of his time. Most everything he has done has not been done again until recently, and some of it is very limited in popularity (like use of latex rubber tubing to make CPS homemade water guns, which is not only easy, but cheap and very powerful).




Edited By Doom on 1152103025

DX
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Post by DX » Tue Jul 04, 2006 7:04 pm

Ben brings up a good point. You don't have to build an air pressure water cannons. There are also pistons and prechargers. Then again, it's not very easy to construct a piston if you don't have big O-rings available.

What rant? Nothing happened...




Edited By Duxburian on 1152142667
marauder wrote:You have to explain things in terms that kids will understand, like videogames^ That's how I got Sam to stop using piston pumpers

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Lt.Winters
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Post by Lt.Winters » Wed Jul 05, 2006 1:27 pm

Umm...I'm not sure if you decided on making your point across about an issue that happened somewhere else or you misunderstood what I said. ???
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isoaker
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Post by isoaker » Wed Jul 05, 2006 1:55 pm

Lt.Winters wrote:Umm...I'm not sure if you decided on making your point across about an issue that happened somewhere else or you misunderstood what I said. ???

@Lt.Winters: Uh, my guess is that Duxburian's rant was aimed at Doom/Ben for something that may now have been edited out.

Back on topic: sadly, I don't have any real experience at building homemade soakers to add apart from theoretical thoughts. Perhaps one day I'll try building some things I've been toying with in my mind, but first I need to find the time.

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Post by SSCBen » Wed Jul 05, 2006 3:01 pm

Yes, I did edit something out because it was inappropriate.

sbell25
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Post by sbell25 » Wed Jul 05, 2006 4:42 pm

Just one question about these piston water cannons: once the piston has moved to the front of the gun (towards the ball valve) after a shot, how do you get it back to the other end of the gun again for another shot?

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isoaker
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Post by isoaker » Wed Jul 05, 2006 4:48 pm

how do you get it back to the other end of the gun again for another shot?

One easy way is to reduce pressure in the back and fill water in the front. For the Water Warriors Aquamaster series, the pressure in the back side isn't too high, thus water can be pumped into the front side to move the piston without needing to reduce the back-side pressure.

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SSCBen
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Post by SSCBen » Wed Jul 05, 2006 6:19 pm

A ram rod was what MrPukeOnYourHead used. You should also have a valve on the back that opened to vent the air.

83-1154123461

Post by 83-1154123461 » Mon Jul 31, 2006 7:19 am

well, i have something like what you are talking about, but it sucks unless you are really strong and can literally push water to a 60x+ stream. it's a little double barreled thing with two handles, one at the end and one in the middle. the one at the end you use to pull it and then suck up the water into the launcher. the one on the middle you use for balance. if it's loaded, the one on the end should be streched out and it should have another 2 barrels. then you just push the one at the end and the water comes out to be as powerful as you push it.

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Post by SSCBen » Mon Jul 31, 2006 8:03 am

The Stream Machine does not get 60X output, especially the double barrel one. You seriously are overestimating output there - that's 15 - 20X at most. The piston water gun I recently made is powered by air pressure, just like pneumatic rams. That's much more power than anything a human could push out.

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Post by dandoodatrite » Mon Jul 31, 2006 1:19 pm

can i just ask something, how do you put pressure in??? the dude who drew the diagram did not show how to put pressure into the thing! how does it work???????
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Post by SSCBen » Mon Jul 31, 2006 2:04 pm

As with any pressurized reservoir water gun, air must be pumped in. It's implied that you'll use a pump or an air compressor with any of the designs mentioned in this thread. I use an air compressor and it works great. We can get 100 PSI really fast.

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Post by dandoodatrite » Mon Jul 31, 2006 2:15 pm

do ya fink you could hook up a pressure meter taken from a supersoaker, or will it break easily?
Think Different. Think Midget

MIDGETS OWN WATERFIGHTS
they are stealthy :D

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Post by DX » Mon Jul 31, 2006 5:13 pm

Stock soaker pressure gauges can't go high enough. They were not designed for homemade pressures. It would be easier to buy a good gauge [not very costly] and attach that.
marauder wrote:You have to explain things in terms that kids will understand, like videogames^ That's how I got Sam to stop using piston pumpers

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Lt.Winters
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Post by Lt.Winters » Wed Aug 02, 2006 2:33 pm

If I were to make a mini water cannon, at 100 PSI, firing oh I dont know..maybe 750 ml of water. would that be good? Or would the preasure cause the water to turn into mist????
"In better days that lie ahead, men will speak with pride of our doings." --Gen. Monty

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Post by DX » Wed Aug 02, 2006 4:40 pm

If you make a mini water cannon, use a piston/air pressure combo. That way the air does not actually get shot out, nor does it ever mix with the water. Also, with a piston, you can use a straight piece of pipe. Simple air pressure is the easiest to make, but adding a piston improves a lot of problems that plain air pressure cannons have naturally.
marauder wrote:You have to explain things in terms that kids will understand, like videogames^ That's how I got Sam to stop using piston pumpers

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Post by SSCBen » Wed Aug 02, 2006 6:24 pm

The last thing I would worry about in any water gun would be the water turning into mist because the pressure is too high. It's going to take a lot more pressure and also temperture to cause a phase change in the water. And it wouldn't turn into mist, rather steam.

You should worry about the stream turning into mist if a smaller nozzle is used. I've seen that happen even on less powerful homemade water guns. In fact, if I use a 1/16 inch nozzle on any homemade water gun, the stream breaks up very quickly and a small mist is around it. I wouldn't even try it on my more powerful water guns because I'm sure it would simply create a fine mist. To get very fine streams, you need the right sorts of nozzles, like those used in water jet cutters.

Making any extremely powerful water gun without a fairly larger pressure chamber would be worthless. The 1/2 inch fire hose nozzle I was using was getting about 125X of output. Unless you want a serious fraction of a second of shot time, you should construct a normal sized one.

If a piston is used as well, you would ideally want a larger internal diameter. The force of pressure is a function of the pressure and the surface area. You can get a lot more force with the same pressure at a larger internal diameter.

For example, if you wanted to match the force of my 100 PSI shot on Supercannon II with 2 inch PVC to reduce the capacity, you would need 400 PSI. 400 PSI simply is unattainable for our purposes. Supercannon III might use 6 inch PVC for the increased force, but pressure rated 6 inch PVC is extremely expensive and hard to find. That's for next year anyway.

Simply put, unless you want to use a really short design with a larger internal diameter, you can't make a smaller and good water cannon. And anything you will make will cost about as much as the larger one. It simply would be better to make a normal water cannon.

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Post by DX » Wed Aug 02, 2006 9:55 pm

Supercannon III might use 6 inch PVC for the increased force, but pressure rated 6 inch PVC is extremely expensive and hard to find. That's for next year anyway.


There's tons of 6 inch at my local Home Depot. However, a quick glance at the prices explains why I probably won't bother trying to beat you to a cannon of 6". :laugh:
marauder wrote:You have to explain things in terms that kids will understand, like videogames^ That's how I got Sam to stop using piston pumpers

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Post by SSCBen » Thu Aug 03, 2006 8:03 am

Finding 6 inch PVC isn't a problem here either because there is plenty of it. The problem would be finding a pressure rated one with the right internal diameter for the piston seals. Even McMaster-Carr doesn't offer that. If you can find a pressure rated, correct diameter pipe, you're in very good luck. You're also in good luck if you can afford it. You're in even better luck if you can afford the piston seals and reducers.

This will literally be a $300 water gun, but it might actually be worth the money in it's extreme performance. 2.25 times the force of Supercannon II at the same pressure does sound very good. Instead of 1250 pounds of force, you've got 2800!

I actually considered 6 inch pipe for Supercannon II, but you can easily see why I avoided it.

After this I'm not too sure what else people will do. If you use steel pipe to get higher pressures, you're adding a lot of weight. Would be neat for artillery (try 8500 pounds of force). I think pretty much we're hitting the limit here. Once the 6 inch diameter pressure chamber water guns are made, there's not much else you can do.

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Post by sbell25 » Thu Aug 03, 2006 3:49 pm

Another problem you might have using 6-inch pipe is that the pressure rating is lower than smaller sizes, at only 180psi. In 80-90 degree heat, that rating drops to only 135psi. As you're using compressed air, it could be dangerous when charging it to 100psi+. Unless of course you managed to find some schedule 80 6-inch PVC, but I imagine the cost would be ridiculous.



Edited By sbell25 on 1154638267

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