Reply To: How close have you got to a Darwin Award?

[noel shelleyParticipant @noelshelley55608]

It all started with repurposing of the contents of bangers ! Then the startling reverlation that mixing weedkiller and iceing sugar would make a loud bang ! Remember the miniture gas bottles for sparklet syphons ? Along the way calcium carbide and an old 350 velo magneto had also upset the neighbours. 2 years chemistry improved my understanding No end, and now I'm 17. By grinding the chlorate in a pestle and mortar and minor adjustments to the recipe resulted in the mixture now being so sensative that it would fire by precussion ! A steel cap(type) bomb was made, the concrete door step seemed a good anvil, BUT I had forgotten the balcony above, the projectile nearly got me ! We're on a roll now and I have a welder and machineshop scrap is readily available. 1" round bar made good projectiles, some tube and a bit of welding soon formed a mortar launcher, range – about 300yards. and it only needed a tiny amount of propellant. Bombs now had welded casings and sometimes 1.5Lb of filling ! Getting safely away was easy – I had developed a slow burning fuse- about 1"/minute. Thank the Lord shortly after I discovered girls – – – Having driven from age 12 it was about this time that I bought an Austin Champ and carried on causing mayhem..

Always willing to help I tried to save a fishing vessel in a F8 gale, The chances were not good and I knew it but still carried on – I got a lift in a helicopter !

I go cold thinking of some of what I got up to, I feel guilty about the vast amount fo good luck I had, that rightly belonged to others. Noel