Who persuaded their parents to buy them a chemistry set when they were a kid.

[BulwellBrian 107]

BulwellBrian, # 4 ....... Wouldn't 2 parts Hydrogen and 1 part Oxygen be water? I failed Chemistry O Level getting on for 50 years ago but that looks like H2O to me? Don't laugh you lot, I just want to be educated here!

Quite right Lizzie, but only water when chemically combined. The reaction when Hydrogen is burnt in pure Oxygen is violent, when in a confined space like the glass bottle its a big bang. The outcome apart from the broken glass is water. We had cylinders of pure Hydrogen and pure Oxygen at the lab. (also Nitrogen, Carbon Dioxide and Argon).

[banjo48 928]

Thank goodness there are more of us out there. I always thought it was just me that was crazy.

I never had a chemistry set but did have a very inquiring mind as a 13-15 year old. I trolled through library books and chemistry books at school and used to make quite an acceptable gunpowder! placed in an old asprin bottle with a short piece of "Jetex" fuse from my brothers little jet car kit, and I had quite a decent incendiary device.

Me and a few mates used to dig a hole in the top of the bank at Mapperley brickyard near the top of Woodthorpe drive, and pack the bottles in there with clay, light the fuse and run like hell !

God knows how we got away with it.

I'm sure old Mr Peak of the chemists at mapperley tops knew what I was up to, buying small quantities of salt petre and sulpher etc. but never queried my requirements.

I quickly moved on to cannons and home made guns firing ball bearings ! all terribly exciting but dangerous stuff.

I progressed to more powerful exotic mixtures, using weed killer and sugar, very unstable but a bigger bang.

I even got into small fertilizer type bombs but came to a drastic halt with another home made cannon episode, with the fore mentioned mixture, went wrong and I ended up in hospital with my head split open and lots of awkward questions to answer to the doctors, who thought I had been hit with an axe! and I might add a very annoyed and worried mum and dad.

Thirty two stitches and a lucky escape moved me on to more exciting things like the opposite sex, yes girls suddenly became more interesting to me and my mates.

The 9mm ball bearing is probably still inside the large apple tree trunk in my mums old garden.

[Ayupmeducks 1,730]

Nightshift, just to pass a little time, big black garbage bag, drop some flame safety lamp oil in it, make a wick and soak it in the same oil, inflate the bag with oxygen, put wick in the end and seal it with insulating tape, light the wick and let the lighter than air bag go...DUCK!!! Bag explodes in a spectacular ball of flame.....

[Ayupmeducks 1,730]

Most farmers are aware of ANFO and how to make it, used often to remove tree stumps, no idea what they use for a detonator though...The authorities now frown on home made tree stump ANFO bombs.

I won't elaborate on ANFO in case we have kids reading this thread...

[katyjay 5,091]

If there are any kids reading this thread John, they've already got plenty of ideas!!!

[Ayupmeducks 1,730]

But ANFO is a particularly powerful explosive Kath, but getting it to explode is another story...I know most of the common explosives and a few that are not so common are out on the internet somewhere.

[firbeck 859]

I had to smile at your experiences with colliery shot-firing Ayupmeducks. During our crazy phase we were aware that they were blasting at the Hemlock Stone Quarry, originally positioned opposite where the gates to Bramcote Crem are now. We used to go through the rubble when everyone had gone home in the hope of finding an unexploded stick of Gelignite, fortunately for us we never did. All we used to find were empty boxes and brown paper packets marked up 'High Explosive'. Our plan, having watched too many films, was to cut off a small allegedly inert piece, connect it via a long cable to my Hornby control box 15v ac output, which gave a hell of a kick, and turn the power on, hiding safely, we hoped, in my mates blockhouse of a shed. Most of our experiments were carried out in the bushes in the front corner plot of his garden at the junction of Park Crescent and Firbeck Road, God knows what would have happened to any passers by had we managed to set off some Gelignite!

The ultimate idea was to somehow drop a device down the abandoned mine shaft at Trowell Moor Colliery, this place held a fascination for us. The shaft had been capped off with a brick and concrete structure that had been vandalised revealing a gaping hole in the wall allowing you to look down the shaft, except we couldn't see what was down there. We made magnesium flares, fired down rockets, air bombs, parachute flares, everything, but it remained a mystery, chuck a brick down and you got an enormous bang, presumably the old cage was at the bottom, a long way down at that. We figured out that the bottom of the shaft was probably awash with explosive fire damp and we could set off a bang to end all bangs, luckily we were never able to do it.

Talking of detonators, one day Bilbraborn and I cycled over to the recently closed Annesley engine sheds and wagon works, it was a bit of a treasure trove for us! While a certain amount of vandalism had taken place, it wasn't too bad and we found piles of interesting stuff to take home. What we did find however were loads of track detonators scattered about, these were circular devices with a lead strap that fitted around the rail. The idea was that in times of trouble either the guard or signalman put them on the track and they exploded under the engine to warn the driver of serious problems ahead. Naughty boys us, we strapped a whole line of them to the tracks leading into the sheds, mind you, not so bad, the place was a mess and it warned incoming trains, we could have been real gits and put them on the main line, but we weren't so irresponsible, even then.

[Ayupmeducks 1,730]

BG's Marblaegis Mine isn't very deep, I think it's around 400 feet at it's deepest and gets shallower towards the edge of the gypsum deposits. At the time, they were using a very high explosive called triminite(sp) made by ICI, came in standard sized sticks.

BG owns most of the land that Gypsum is mined under and has tennant farmers farming the lands.

One area being mined was to the south of the main advancing face, sort of recovering gypsum. Not too far away from this face was a farmhouse, as this was shallower than the main working areas we were getting reports of damage to the farm house household effects, like crockery falling from the lady of the houses Welsh Dresser... Then by all accounts the whole dresser fell over smashing the ladies best china... Of course, a claim was submitted to the company for damages.

Our shotfirers were a bit naughty...LOL The Beethoven battery was listed as a 100 shot maximum, but they found they could fire 700 rounds in one go without any missfires... Each heading used 70lbs of powder from around 32 rounds.

Anyway our geologists had set up seismographs in and around the farmhouse and arranged for shotfiring to be carried out at exactly ex O'clock. So the shotfirer obliged with just one heading at a time, 32 rounds.... When he got out, he handed the exact time of each round he fired on a piece of paper to the geologist who compared it with the graph....Not enough energy had been recorded to cause even a cat to blink...

This went on for a couple of weeks to compare readings...They told the farmer and his wife the damage couldn't have been caused by shotfiring...The company did cover the damage though out of goodwill.

Once it was over, said shotfirer went back to being naughty, firing several headings at once....Wasn't long before the company got a bill for a dead horse that had bolted and died of heart failure, several cows that had bolted and gone "dry"....Used to be funny working for BG.

I'll get Eric heard of some of these cases, he must have been there same time as me or just a little later.

[FLY2 10,108]

As I've mentioned on another topic, my mate and I made a Meccano trailer and mounted on it an aluminium bike pump tube filled with potassium chlorate, sulphur, sugar and the contents of several bangers plus some iron filings. A fuse from a banger was shoved up the small hole and pebbles packed into the top. I towed it behind my bike onto Robert Shaw Playing Field and lit it. An almighty bang then a mushroom cloud. A ping occurred near my mates foot, it was part of the pump taking a chunk out of the kerbstone.

As that was too feeble, we did the same procedure with the steel tube that holds a bikes saddle. That was done down near the footpath from Nuttall Rd to St Peters St. I blew the tubing like a banana skin. We thought it best to stop then.

[Bilbraborn 1,594]

Pete. My railway experience taught me they were fog signals. In the old semaphore signal days, the fogsignalman would place them on the line near the signal he was guarding. 3 if the signal was at danger and 1 if it was just caution. Also used mostly before track circuiting to protect derailed or crashed trains. The poor guard had to walk the line behind the train placing them on the track after so many yards. That is if he was still alive that is. The dets all have a use by date and at one time it was our job to replace them in the guards brake compartments. The old ones were used on the sidings line next to the mess room to wake any shunters up who might be having a sly bossack. They were quite dangerous as bits would fly out from under the wheels when they exploded. I believe some trains still carry dets if they work anywhere there is no track circuiting.