March 11, 2024

Carbide cannons and lamps, oh my

Simple enough, eh?

I remember my dad saying that he used to play around with toy carbide cannons when he was growing up. By the time I was a kid, however, carbide cannons as children's toys had gone well by the wayside because of the danger involved.

The Rose Hulman Fighting Engineers (seriously), however, still fired one off in their quonset hut of a gym (since replaced) back when I was a student at Wabash College and occasionally travelling to watch the basketball team. I can't remember exactly why they were firing off the cannon. Maybe it was for their football team and I'm misremembering things. I can't find proof on the internet either way.

Check out some more carbide toys after the jump - including a far safer way to demonstrate this reaction thanks to Steve Spangler and Bob Becker.


 

 

 


I used to have one of these miner's lamps. I wonder where mine got off to. 

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