Hydogen mixed with oxygen (from air) will explode quite violently if an ignition source is present, a small demo here.

Thor

Edited By Thor on 21/04/2018 06:42:31

There's an upper and lower explosive limits table here

Even stuff like propane is pretty limited at 2 to 10%

Acetylene is right up there at 2.5 to 100%, one reason it's still used a lot is the temperature it burns at with O2 is around 2500+ degrees and it can be used in steel work

The chap who discovered coal gas, and it's use for domestic lighting lived in my village a long time ago. He blew his house up too, but managed to live. So a fine line between dead tinkerer and clever hero.

The future of technology is still in the hands of the amateur.

A house blew up in Wellington NZ maybe thirty years ago, there was a leaking LPG cylinder in the basement garage, the car was in the garage with the door shut, when the gas reached the critical level, BOOM. It was thought at the inquiry that the electric (non digital) clock in the car caused a minute spark in the relay(?)that operated it. The car was found to be the ignition point.

Ian S C

.

What goes around comes around [or some-such truism] …

This is quite a recent development: **LINK**

http://bullfinch-gas.co.uk/blowtorches/safeflame

MichaelG.

Propane is a welling gas so should not be stored below ground level! 

Hydrogen is very easy to produce, just pass an electric current through water!

Edited By vintagengineer on 21/04/2018 13:14:48

A shame for the poor chap and his family, but fortunate his neighbours were OK.

I wonder how and why he was storing the gas? Perhaps he was trying to make some form of balloon/airship model?

Every UK schoolkid has used various ways to make hydrogen gas, and knows you can make it a test tube of it 'pop' with a lit splint.

Neil

Egad!

You have solved the oil crisis and climate change at a stroke

When I was at school we had, for a short time, a chemistry teacher who tried that demonstration but, instead of collecting the hydrogen in a gas jar used a narrow necked flask. You can guess the result, showering the front row of the class with glass fragments!

Russell

It might be worthwhile expanding on this, propane being heavier than air will sit on the floor and not disperse through open windows etc. Hydrogen is very light and diffuses readily, so buildings where hydrogen is generated and stored should have a vent right in the apex of the roof. I guess many of us have propane bottles in our workshops, not really a good idea. If my workshop wasn't at the front of the house I'd keep the bottle outside, but I fear it would dissappear overnight. If you've ever seen a propane bottle exploding in a fire (a Boiling Liquid Expanding Vapour Explosion **LINK** ) you'd keep it outside! Thought, must check my house insurance to see if it says anything about gas bottles.

Edited By duncan webster on 21/04/2018 14:42:31

All way's a shame when someone dies, I worked in the metal finishing trade and had several large automatic zinc plating lines which I was responsible for. Every effort is made to avoid causing a spark but many a hydrogen 'bang' as led to brown trousers ​ on one occasion I've seen plating barrels with a couple of their panels blown out !

H

Remember the Glasgow Airport attack?

A Jeep Cherokee crammed with propane bottles – they vented, but none of them exploded.