Flutterby™! : non-lethal landmines

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non-lethal landmines

2003-05-25 05:07:26.471853+00 by Dan Lyke 11 comments

I may have mentioned that a while ago Zack was talking about playing Airsoft[Wiki] and said "I want to build a Bouncing Betty". Well, we didn't quite end up with one of them, but we did build a trip-wire triggered flour thrower. Here's a close-up of the mechanism, cut from extruded steel pieces with a little bit of braizing, and another image of it firing. We need to work a bit on how the payload is dispersed, but the launching mechanism has plenty of force and triggers fairly easily.

[ related topics: Children and growing up Dan's Life ]

comments in ascending chronological order (reverse):

#Comment made: 2003-05-25 12:11:05.523213+00 by: Jeffery

Pretty kewl ... what's the muzzle velocity of the device? :^)

#Comment made: 2003-05-25 15:25:47.974505+00 by: Pete

So, uh, you've built a stealthy, boobytrapped, powder dispersal device. I can feel the calm emanating from it already... :)

#Comment made: 2003-05-25 23:03:50.961649+00 by: Dan Lyke

Muzzle velocity seems pretty low, enough to put the payload over the top of my head easily, and it seems like it'll do that with a fairly heavy payload. Right now we have the range we were hoping for, we're looking to ways to get the necessary psychological impact and make sure that the intended victim knows they've been hit.

#Comment made: 2003-05-29 19:00:08.450407+00 by: moonsownsister

Add scent to the flour.

#Comment made: 2003-05-29 19:08:41.06137+00 by: Dan Lyke

Oooh. Teenage boy suddenly smelling like lavender? I think you've nailed it.

#Comment made: 2003-05-30 01:47:02.466565+00 by: Pete

Tangent alert!

I had a slice of homemade rose and cinnamon cake at a cookout this week. It was like eating perfume, but I still can't decide if that's good or bad!

#Comment made: 2003-05-30 02:40:36.381833+00 by: Spook

Make it smell like crap. I mean REALLY rank, so there will be NO doubt that you got hit by the mine. You want guys to ask the victim: "Dude, did you SHIT yourself or step on a mine?" LOL.

Spook

#Comment made: 2003-05-30 02:43:42.340405+00 by: Larry Burton

I'm just wondering if there is some way to add a spark to this contraption.

#Comment made: 2003-05-30 13:51:38.952495+00 by: meuon

Sure looks like a terrorist device. Airborne agents.. Anthrax.. But I think perfumed powder is an excellent idea. What powers it? Springs or CO2?

#Comment made: 2003-05-31 03:21:10.272153+00 by: Dan Lyke

Springs. We actually thought about using a pressurized soda bottle, but it's just two concentric square steel tubes, with a slot cut in the outer one for the catch bar, and a hinged catch. If you were making more of these you could just buy three nesting tubes, we used two and cut and brazed one to make the catch.

I've had an email request for drawings, so I'll try to put something together.

#Comment made: 2003-06-03 15:11:39.005015+00 by: Spook

IF you put enough BBS in that sucker, they will know they've been hit. And so will the guy behind em, and the guy behind the guy behind them, etc etc etc. Use all those spent BBs we leave everywhere when we play.

Spook