Designing an orange gun with optimized combustion chamber and barrel length

[morry]

Hi guys,

I have holidays coming up and if I have any spare time (Which I doubt), Id like to build an orange gun. For those of you who don't know, I am talking about some pvc pipe with an orange/potato shoved up it. Spray some hair spray down there and spark away.

Anyway, instead of just hacking one together, I was thinking about actually designing one properly. ie Combustion chamber size, barrel length etc.

I reckon it would be interesting to measure how far one could shoot.

Anyway, has anyone made these before and any tips?

 

[anorlunda]

Sure you can be nerdy about it. Here's a masters thesis on the topic.

https://www.stevespanglerscience.com/lab/experiments/potato-cannon-design-robert-croft/