Posted by Ross-O on April 22, 2005 at 10:26:12:
In Reply to: SCUBA tanks for target practice!!!! posted by Chuck Tribolet on April 22, 2005 at 08:32:10:
Very Nice!
Here's a pic that a friend who used to be an engineer at Scubapro or US Divers (I forget, which ever one was in in OC) sent me.
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I don't remember if I sent you this previously, but here is a photo of a burst 80 cu ft aluminum tank.
Two clever young individuals ran a part-time hull cleaning business somewhere in Florida. Their tanks got beat up, and they were going to have them repainted. Someone had the bright of idea of having them powder-coated instead of painted.
The powder coating process heated the tanks up to 400 F or so, and of course fully annealed the aluminum alloy.
Days later, the first guy had his tank filled, it failed, and blew out the rear of a dive shop. Luckily the tank was in a water-filled bunker and no one was seriously injured.
A few days later, the second guy took his tank to s different shop, except here the compressor operator was allegedly holding the tank between his knees when it failed. Supposedly he lost both legs and other "parts".
I participated as a witness in the metalurgical analysis at Atlas labs in LA, where reps from Luxfer, US Divers, various insurance companies, etc. The material turned out to be dead soft & stretched like taffy in the tensile test machine.
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BTW - If you liked that video, you would really get a kick out of "Machine Gun Magic" by Dillon Press. They rig radio control aircraft with explosives and then shoot them down with various machine guns including quad 50's, miniguns, etc.