Jake really broke out the explanations for this video as people requested more information on the devices that we test. Ask and ye shall receive! As always, the 1000th comment will receive a prize so comment away!
have you made home made napalm yet ? How about some powergel in a container of phosphorus and fuel oil of course in an air tight self contained container until detonation with an outer core of mercury ?
@@zaynevanday142 Okay, but what is the pure elemental mercury for? That does not sound very environmentally friendly. Hg does not make for an effective thermobaric casing layer anyway, it is far from an optimum metallic fuel for usage in energetic devices. Hg is only useful in energetics in the forms of some of its salts and complexes, not as the pure element mercury.
Look at the off the press channel. They also made some amateur thermobaric devices, and did get a successful one done after many failures. They used liquid fuel.
I got one we did in the military. If you wanna destroy a simple structure with minimal use of explosives set up a charge in a 5lb bag of flour and set up a secondary charge to detonate a second later. The flour will cause increased air pressure in a confined space and a small secondary charge will cause massive structural damage. Its really awesome when timed perfect.
We filmed this a while ago but couldn't get to releasing it in sequence. You might notice the lack of the MOAP crater. Brian and I are working on the second iteration of t-bombs.
Would you guys be able to do a video explaining white phosphorus? alot of people immediately associate WP as a war crime but thats just innacurate becuase WP does not fall into the category of either chemical weapon or incendiary weapon despite having the properties of both. This leads alot of people to believe its use is in war is automatically considered a war crime despite not being banned by the geneva convention. Would love to hear an explosives experts take on it and its potential uses on the battlefield. I would also be interested to see a small WP charge but that might be a little too dangerous for your guys taste. As far as i know there is not a single video on youtube explaining the legality of WP in war despite there being several videos of its chemical reaction.
@@jlambuth I would love to see the look on the suppliers face when you call up inquiring about purchasing large quantities of white phosphorus, im sure it will be interesting trying to explain that.
If you will be killed by mistake in a street shooting police with guys, or by police car accident, they will say: he was a terrorist! Because we found a lot of instructions how to make bombs in his YT history.
I did quite lot of research about these for our video some time ago. It seems that the most of solid fuel devices without second charge for ignition need quite sturdy outer shell. That helps the temperature of the fuel to get high enough for good detonation when mixed with air instead of burning. With liquids you probably need second charge for ignition and high speed camera for getting the mixture right. Also all the best liquids are quite toxic and non-toxic ones have really narrow window that you need to hit to make them explode instead of burning. But if you are interested on testing liquids I might have some specific information about delays and other stuff that you need to figure out to make it work :D
I remember a video on RUclips where someone made a fuel air bomb with nitromethane in a 2L bottle. It seemed to work really well. I remember in that video it was winter and there was snow on the ground, but I just cant find the video anymore.
@@TheBackyardScientist Nitromethane should be quite suitable and even methanol is pretty good but those are also quite toxic so not ideal for testing things out :D We used etanol which isn't toxic but is really hard fuel to be used on this type of use.
These videos remind me of the hay day of RUclips’s experimental stage. Homegrown and entertaining. A lot of “science” pages have gotten too big for their own good and care more about cinematography and metrics. Keep up the good work Ordnance Lab!
"Low Budget Imhotep"... I can't unsee it. I was profoundly disappointed to learn that this is not in fact a way to shower your enemy with flaming hot bears. Could you... make something... that does shower your enemy with flaming hot bears?
This reminds me of something I read not too long ago. Apparently during WW2 the germans developed a FAE where they would disperse coal dust and aluminum to simulate the interior of a coal mine during an explosion. It worked spectacularly and they ended up making it delivered by rockets, but by chance the vehicle carrying the explosives was detonated just before they were going to use it by an artillery barrage
@@mk6315 It's in a book called "D-Day through German eyes" by Holger Eckhertz, in the second part. It was called "Typhoon B", ruclips.net/video/pUqhlgbgEu0/видео.html is a link for the audio book, timestamped at the correct part
These Blast Bombs were used with great effect during the Crimea and Sevastopol siege They are some of the first instances where Weapons of Mass Destruction are mentioned other than Gas!
Technically, that's an incendiary charge, not a thermobaric charge. A thermobaric explosive disperses the fuel before lighting it up, causing a detonation. In this video, the fuel is lit before it is dispersed, which just causes a large fire instead of the desired detonation.
Interesting but it looks like the dispersion charge did more of the destruction than any thermobaric effect. The bits of the fuel are flying off in chunks, almost as if the fuel was wet and clumping. This is a really cool experiment, maybe try significantly more fuel, in as fine a powder as possible and a smaller dispersion charge. Maybe also have a separate ignition source for the ignition of the fuel air mixture.
or maybe try actual FAE fuel like.... isopropylnitrite? this was so week, im embarrassed. 100g flash should have ripped that little tin can into pieces lol what size is that metal powder, 50 mesh? flour would be 100x better
Yes... that was the dispersion charge and some sparklers. But I imagine properly igniting such a small thermobaric device with solid fuel ist pretty hard. It's already difficult with liquid fuel. I haven't tried it with solid fuel, but liquid fuel already needs milliseconds precise delay of an ignitor charge. With solid fuel conditions need to be even much more precise. Metal powder doesn't burn as readily as liquid fuel does.
Hm, we tried something like throwing in a pound of normal baking flour into an enclosed structure (a relatively small building slated for demolition), immediately followed by a thunderflash into the resulting flour cloud. The effect was devastating and it completely took the structure down all the way to its basement level. Fuel-Air explosions are extremely powerful, certainly when happening in enclosed environments.
@@samhaines8228 Our local grain elevator had a grain dust explosion years ago. We felt it 3 miles away. It really wrecked one silo and severely damaged one next to it. Really impressed me how oats dust could damage such large concrete structures. If anyone was climbing the outside ladder they'd been ejected into space as the walls flexed outward.
@@samhaines8228 Yeah, In Minneapolis, MN US they made a complete museum about a grain elevator/mill-complex that was nearly completely eradicated due to graindust that went past ambient air/particulate-matter ignition-point. That said, outdoors the effect can be pretty dramatic too. We sometimes made (strictly unauthorized) what we called stationary atom-bomb simulators using that kind of stuff. Trick is that it had to be windstill with pretty accurate dispersal and ignition detonations to have the best effect with heat, observable wavefront and meassureable flash/bang times present.
I knew that there was an initial shock wave that goes off right when the explosive detonates, but I didn’t know it was that noticeable on a camera. That’s really cool.
For future tests, built a scaffold from which you can suspend the devices. Also, the more spherical you can make the container, the better, more symmetrical the dispersion of fuel will be.
Armchair mad scientist here. The dispersion charge should be of the rapidly-decomposing type rather than something that deflagrates or detonates. There should be an inert buffer between this charge and the fuel, to prevent premature ignition, and it should NOT be initiated by a burning fuse. The ignition charge should deflagrate an instant later than the dispersion charge. Premature ignition is the main pitfall here, causing a sad pile of burning slag rather than a big bada boom.
My dad demonstrated a dust explosion to me when I was 8. 1 M80 1 5 Lb bag of dried flour. 1 Natividad candle. 1 Outhouse. Light candle, place on floor. PLace M80 under bag of flour on seat. Light, RUN!
Hints: For your liquid fuel, try Triethylborane, and store your disbursant explosive charge in a tube of fused quartz (so as to ionize the TEB), then (using a detcord delay of 5 to 15 ms.) detonate a high brisance ignition charge. You'll probably be amazed. You're welcome.
@@fallinginthed33p Unless you're *TRYING* to make something rather spectacular... It's what they used in the predecessor to the MOAB. It *may* be what was used in the actual MOAB, but I don't actually have any knowledge of that.
TEB is mixed with a hydrocarbon in the liquid fuel versions, it causes abrupt multipoint ignition. Same deal burst than the fuel mist ignites and boom.
@@christopherleubner6633 Basically, if done right, the ionized fuel air mixture actually *detonates* rather than ignites, resulting in a *MUCH* more energetic event.
Use (by volume) 2 parts bearing grease to 1 part aluminium *dust* (not flakes!). Mix it very very well. You can thin it a bit down with gasoline to make it more workable, but it is vital that it can suspend the aluminium evenly. For a cylindrical bomb you need a core of about 15% TNT-equivalent high explosive (by mass - adust for equivalency). The higher the detonation velocity the better. So if you have RDX or PETN use that (So 1kg of metallized grease to 150g TNT-equivalent). When using grease/wax/paraffin the principle is a little different to using gasoline or diesel. The reason for the relatively large amount of high explosive is not that it is more viscous and thus need more energy to turn into an aerosol, but rather that you need the energy to break the long hydrocarbon chains into smaller and more volatile components (this is why RDX/PETN is preferable over TNT. You want brisance over gas generation). The aluminium is there to keep the combustion temperature high as the pressure eventually drops. These types of bombs have an ungodly energy density and when done right they produce incredibly large flame fronts. Source: I used to be an Artilleryman in the Danish army. One from each cannon got "the big explosives certificate". I was that one. We were taught everything from taking down bridges to making impromptu shaped-charge weapons.... Later I got an advanced chemistry course (outside the army) and everything made a whole lot more sense then! :P
As kids, we took course corn meal and would grind it down into a fine powder. Three of us would get small hand’s full of the the flour and toss it above a simple torch held high by a fourth person. We would get some great flashes, but sometimes it would make a ‘Whomp’ sound along with a good pressure wave. Not enough to hurt us but we did feel hair and clothing moving. This ‘fuel’ was better than wheat flour. This was back in the mid 60’s. The things we did were explained by our science teacher. Couldn’t help doing it as an experiment! We also waited till dark to get the best effect! Oh yeah!!
The amount of smoke means you arent getting detonation of the fuel, just deflagration. When you get the timing of dispersion and detonation right, there shouldnt be much in the way of waste products.
That sounds right in theory, but I highly doubt its true in practice. After all many of the classic high explosives themselves are oxygen deficient as well, even though they're proper secondary explosives, and will give greyish to black smoke when detonated. There probably isn't enough oxygen available in the air to completely oxidise the detonated fuel in this video.
@@pieterveenders9793 There is more than enough O2 in the air to completely oxidize and Im only talking about free O2 not oxygen bound to anything else in the atmosphere. Fuel Air bombs require a pretty well timed explosion/detonation setup to get the fuel atomized properly before the shockwave of detonation is fired. Get it right and there should be little byproducts created and almost no smoke which are indicative of all the oxygen chemicalliy bonding to the free nitrogen released during detonation.
Were these used on caves for their unique effects on enclosed spaces? I seem to recall them being deployed to try to clear some caves a while back, something about the pressure wave, overpressure, and oxygen usage in the confined space.
They are, yes. Some were developed for the specific purpose of flushing enemy troops out of caves, and the MOAB was used in battle in such capacity against ISIS
Thermobarics are the best useage in caves and tunnels and the overpressure is enough to rupture your lungs and blow out your ear drums. Were talking overpressures that can reach into the 1000 psi range which dwarfs even a nuclear weapon.
@@hjorturerlend wouldnt say thats the most extreme, just the most portable version. MOAB is probably the most extreme short of a high yield nuke or a comet making direct impact with Earth.
I'm really impressed with Jake's progression of comfort with public speaking. I'm the same way he is, but I would have never thought I could get over it with practice. You're inspiring people in lots of ways here. Keep up the good work
You guys are the reason I do what I do, science and chemistry is my thing, and I discovered your channel a while back, I now make this stuff just to see if I can do it, and it truly makes me happy. I just wanted to say thank you, truly.
Perhaps a much finer metal powder is needed as a fuel source, my understanding of solid fuel thermobarics was that you want them to be an ultra fine dust cloud, similar to a silo fire or dust explosion but created intentionally
You need a stronger outer casing. The metallic fuel has to be compressed and heated well beyond the point of autoignition by the primary HE charge before the outer casing breaks, that way it will ignite progressively as it expands and encounters atmospheric oxygen. I spent a lot of time studying the Hellfire MAC (Metal Augmented Charge) warhead, and this is the method they used. It also helps to mix the metallic fuel (aluminum) with a small percentage polytetrafluoroethylene (Teflon). It helps to have the Al/PTFE pressed into a cylindrical billet "jacket" before assembly, as loose, unconsolidated powder takes longer to compress, which reduces its efficiency and contributes to the "slag-throwing" seen here.
Pretty sure I remember Beyond The Press (Hydraulic Press Channel's non-press related channel) doing a liquid fuel air bomb a few months ago. They built a scale model town out of plywood, then used their thermobaric device to flatten it. Might give you guys some insight/ideas on how to make this project work.
They got it basically perfect, after a lot of work and a lot of looking through slow-motion video to analyze what was happening. It is *extremely* obvious when there is a real detonation instead of deflagration. It startled everyone and shook the hell out of the camera. It's a very fiddly thing to get right, but when it is right, wow.
The problem with improvised thermobarics in Ukraine is the dispersal charge almost always detonates the fuel. You need to separate the dispersal explosive by putting it in a pipe B. separate to the rest of the B. That way the heat has a chance to drop below flash point and the pressure escaping will disperse the mixture.
The British Flame Fougasse would make an excellent base for thermobarics. They simply lowered a grenade into a drum of petrol to use as an anti tank trap, using the incendiary effect. This is not a thermobaric of course, but a similar idea could possibly be employed with jerry can and explosive bursting charge. For smaller thermobarics, a wine bottle filled with a gasoline mixture (phosphorus and aluminum additives come to mind) that is burst by either an internal charge with the fuse fitted through the cork or an external charge for simplicity, in which case the blast may be somewhat directional. I'd also look into using a more readily vaporized fuel source, such as propane, as that may mix with the air better. I reckon a purchased small propane tank could be ruptured by a sufficient bursting charge and achieve a desirable effect.
More data!!! I'm a glutton for data and facts, and you guys do all the things I don't want to jump through the hoops to do legally. I live vicariously through you guys.
I owned a defense company some years ago and developed armor and worked with explosives. One of the projects we developed led (unexpectedly) to a phenomenal new napalm. Now, I have no interest in developing napalm as a weapon, (Geneva Convention issues) and all. But, the fact that mixing powders and liquids,with explosives, is intriguing. Fun stuff.
A million years ago in my, "how did I survive?" days I tried making one, it didn't detonate properly, but definitely kaboomed enough to scare me away from trying again. I made basically a short cannon with screen in it to break up the fuel, filled it with a cup of gasoline, and used a hose clamp to keep a pipe cap (with Teflon tape so it wouldn't leak) on. Then I made a campfire about fifteen feet in front of it and pressurized it with the oxygen from my dad's torch until the cap burst off. Still had my face attached afterwards, which was frankly surprising.
I just spent 11 minutes watching, "we made something that went boom". You may need a permit in order to build and use them but the chemistry itself is not illegal.
In the second of the books "D-Day through German eyes" one of the subjects interviewed was an officer who spent much of the war on the development and testing of thermobaric explosives. The earliest experiment was in Russia and was used to crack a fortress in Crimea. The weapon was primarily developed for area defense of Channel ports but was deployed on a tank concentration as a sort of Hail Mary action. It "very nearly' worked -- premature shelling by the Allies hit the fuel delivery rockets causing a huge pillar of fire but no real damage. Worth a read. (After capture a few weeks later he passed himself off as an ordinary artillery officer so he escaped the notice of the Allies.)
Someone may have mentioned this already, I'm not gonna read 1040 comments to check. Anyway, some time ago, a very shady individual I met at the ballet, regaled me with a story about a device he may or may not have assembled many years ago, a improvised thermobaric, constructed, as best I remember, from a pressure cooker, 1/3 full of gasoline, initiated by a 1X3 inch pipe bomb, the fuse being routed through the pressure vent in the lid. Probably just another armchair commando. He didn't strike me as a very reliable sort, these days, he probably spends his time on the internet, watching Tom Leher videos or worse. However, in the event that this information might in some small way assist in your research of such things, I thought I'd pass it along. Love the Lab Lab BTW!
An old Vietnam era tech manual used a bag of white flour and a small tuna can filled with a mixture if high explosive and thermite to detonate the flour and blow up a warehouse. Cool reading
a little idea I had for testing: build another one that has the same dispersing charge as the real one but has sand instead of magnesium. That way you can compare how the fireball expansion knocks over the targets vs what happens when it's just flying particles and the dispersing charge.
Powdered iron would give yellow gold sparks that burn slower than magnesium so easier to see. Used in commercial fireworks for gold sparks in chrysanthemum aerial charge.
Once, I saw a British Science program, they demonstrated how the different curved shapes of metal cover lids of the explosive container can have marked effects.
Another point about thermobaric devices is that while solid explosives are basically a point in space that expands, thermobaric explosives are volumes that expand. So their pressure wave is not losing umph by distance^2, but by Δdistance^2. If you can skip the first three meters of losing pressure, the wave will lose less power with distance. They have a greater kill radius.
I saw designs for a thermobaric using super heated fuel which when dispersed covered a very large chunk of atmosphere. The explosion had a massive shock wave and even created a vacuum which was just as destructive to structures and people.
One cool setup I saw demonstrated many years ago was a bag of flour taped to the top of an M16 type antipersonnel mine. The boost charge propelled it up into the air a few feet and tore the bag open then the subsequent detonation did it’s thing. Perhaps disburse it first with a car airbag charge before the ignition charge goes off.
In my younger days reading the JR cookbook, they had it in there with a thermite charge to superheat the liquid, and then a secondary high explosive charge to ingite and rupture the steel vessel. - That said, alot of what was in there has been prooven incorrect, but a good portion is/was real. I'd also point out that the military video had the detonation happening in mid air. I wonder if this helps to atomise the fuel better, as it's not instantly hitting the ground for nearly 50% of the available directions it can expand. As such, I'd suggest an experiment, whereby you build 2 devices the same, set one off on the ground, and the other suspended in mid air. Compare results.
I should've followed my dreams as a child to be like y'all...sadly the family frowned on an 11 year old me building bb grenades from old film canisters and blackpowder...never tried fuel air
Oh Great! Let's all play with thermobaric grenades in the tall dry grass. I'm too busy watching for the chain reaction of wildfire to watch the dynamics of the detonation video.
Jake really broke out the explanations for this video as people requested more information on the devices that we test. Ask and ye shall receive! As always, the 1000th comment will receive a prize so comment away!
have you made home made napalm yet ? How about some powergel in a container of phosphorus and fuel oil of course in an air tight self contained container until detonation with an outer core of mercury ?
Wish Cody a happy marriage for me!
@@zaynevanday142
Okay, but what is the pure elemental mercury for? That does not sound very environmentally friendly. Hg does not make for an effective thermobaric casing layer anyway, it is far from an optimum metallic fuel for usage in energetic devices. Hg is only useful in energetics in the forms of some of its salts and complexes, not as the pure element mercury.
That was pretty impressive
Look at the off the press channel. They also made some amateur thermobaric devices, and did get a successful one done after many failures. They used liquid fuel.
I got one we did in the military. If you wanna destroy a simple structure with minimal use of explosives set up a charge in a 5lb bag of flour and set up a secondary charge to detonate a second later. The flour will cause increased air pressure in a confined space and a small secondary charge will cause massive structural damage. Its really awesome when timed perfect.
Yup flour mills are dangerous places, that's why they use intrinsically safe lighting and power devices.
@@marvindebot3264 yeah so are corn cribs. I live in Iowa and it happens at least one or twice a year.
Oh damn, that was the coolest demonstration a science teacher ever did and you just weaponized it.
Ah.. the "notorious" powder explosion -😂🤣
That's in TM31-210.
Also saw it referenced in a book in the Golden Compass series, which was written for late teens/early adults type age group.
We filmed this a while ago but couldn't get to releasing it in sequence. You might notice the lack of the MOAP crater. Brian and I are working on the second iteration of t-bombs.
Would you guys be able to do a video explaining white phosphorus? alot of people immediately associate WP as a war crime but thats just innacurate becuase WP does not fall into the category of either chemical weapon or incendiary weapon despite having the properties of both. This leads alot of people to believe its use is in war is automatically considered a war crime despite not being banned by the geneva convention. Would love to hear an explosives experts take on it and its potential uses on the battlefield. I would also be interested to see a small WP charge but that might be a little too dangerous for your guys taste. As far as i know there is not a single video on youtube explaining the legality of WP in war despite there being several videos of its chemical reaction.
Yes. Do white phosphorus stuff.
@@abrahamm1325 we are working on sourcing it in large quantities that aren't going to cost us a kidney. Lol
@@jlambuth I would love to see the look on the suppliers face when you call up inquiring about purchasing large quantities of white phosphorus, im sure it will be interesting trying to explain that.
is there a way to suspend the particles in fluid to possibly make it easier to disperse or do a 50/50 solid/liquid in two charges? or nanoparticles?
Hello, FBI, CIA and the ATF. I am not a domestic terrorist, this was simply recommended to me by RUclips. I love my dogs and my family
If you will be killed by mistake in a street shooting police with guys, or by police car accident, they will say: he was a terrorist! Because we found a lot of instructions how to make bombs in his YT history.
But that's where we differ
Me too man
I did quite lot of research about these for our video some time ago. It seems that the most of solid fuel devices without second charge for ignition need quite sturdy outer shell. That helps the temperature of the fuel to get high enough for good detonation when mixed with air instead of burning.
With liquids you probably need second charge for ignition and high speed camera for getting the mixture right. Also all the best liquids are quite toxic and non-toxic ones have really narrow window that you need to hit to make them explode instead of burning. But if you are interested on testing liquids I might have some specific information about delays and other stuff that you need to figure out to make it work :D
Jake would love to chat with you. If only we could easily road trip to Finland.
I remember a video on RUclips where someone made a fuel air bomb with nitromethane in a 2L bottle. It seemed to work really well. I remember in that video it was winter and there was snow on the ground, but I just cant find the video anymore.
That video might have been yeeted by the YT gods.
@@OrdnanceLab Gotta admit, that trip sounds like it would be a blast though
@@TheBackyardScientist Nitromethane should be quite suitable and even methanol is pretty good but those are also quite toxic so not ideal for testing things out :D We used etanol which isn't toxic but is really hard fuel to be used on this type of use.
Jake is slowly turning into a high school science teacher with a low key drug business in the back.
Lol. I have to pay the bills somehow.
@@jlambuth well you have the haircut down 😂
Sounds like that would be a great, long running, TV show based in Southwestern USA. Hmmm
combusting bad lol
Low key my arse, hs got the hard core crap and hes selling in bulk!
These videos remind me of the hay day of RUclips’s experimental stage. Homegrown and entertaining. A lot of “science” pages have gotten too big for their own good and care more about cinematography and metrics. Keep up the good work Ordnance Lab!
"Low Budget Imhotep"... I can't unsee it. I was profoundly disappointed to learn that this is not in fact a way to shower your enemy with flaming hot bears.
Could you... make something... that does shower your enemy with flaming hot bears?
This reminds me of something I read not too long ago. Apparently during WW2 the germans developed a FAE where they would disperse coal dust and aluminum to simulate the interior of a coal mine during an explosion. It worked spectacularly and they ended up making it delivered by rockets, but by chance the vehicle carrying the explosives was detonated just before they were going to use it by an artillery barrage
Interesting, do you have a link for it?
@@mk6315 It's in a book called "D-Day through German eyes" by Holger Eckhertz, in the second part. It was called "Typhoon B", ruclips.net/video/pUqhlgbgEu0/видео.html is a link for the audio book, timestamped at the correct part
These Blast Bombs were used with great effect during the Crimea and Sevastopol siege They are some of the first instances where Weapons of Mass Destruction are mentioned other than Gas!
Believe these were used in the Warsaw uprising too against the Polish insurgents in the sewers.
also flour works
Technically, that's an incendiary charge, not a thermobaric charge. A thermobaric explosive disperses the fuel before lighting it up, causing a detonation. In this video, the fuel is lit before it is dispersed, which just causes a large fire instead of the desired detonation.
Interesting but it looks like the dispersion charge did more of the destruction than any thermobaric effect.
The bits of the fuel are flying off in chunks, almost as if the fuel was wet and clumping.
This is a really cool experiment, maybe try significantly more fuel, in as fine a powder as possible and a smaller dispersion charge. Maybe also have a separate ignition source for the ignition of the fuel air mixture.
Yah. They really missed the mark. It’s hard to mess up this bad. It’s worse than regular flash, which is in a sense thermobaric
or maybe try actual FAE fuel like.... isopropylnitrite? this was so week, im embarrassed. 100g flash should have ripped that little tin can into pieces lol
what size is that metal powder, 50 mesh? flour would be 100x better
I can't help but agree, there was no real secondary explosion from the fuel air mixture combustion, just some smoke and sparks
Yes... that was the dispersion charge and some sparklers.
But I imagine properly igniting such a small thermobaric device with solid fuel ist pretty hard. It's already difficult with liquid fuel. I haven't tried it with solid fuel, but liquid fuel already needs milliseconds precise delay of an ignitor charge. With solid fuel conditions need to be even much more precise. Metal powder doesn't burn as readily as liquid fuel does.
@@jackmclane1826 he put together a failed FAE charge, youre 10 levels above him.
Hm, we tried something like throwing in a pound of normal baking flour into an enclosed structure (a relatively small building slated for demolition), immediately followed by a thunderflash into the resulting flour cloud. The effect was devastating and it completely took the structure down all the way to its basement level. Fuel-Air explosions are extremely powerful, certainly when happening in enclosed environments.
I have heard about the devastating impact of accidental ignition of wheat flour suspended in a cloud indoors
@@samhaines8228 multiple flour mills have blown up over the years from it.
@@samhaines8228 Our local grain elevator had a grain dust explosion years ago. We felt it 3 miles away. It really wrecked one silo and severely damaged one next to it. Really impressed me how oats dust could damage such large concrete structures. If anyone was climbing the outside ladder they'd been ejected into space as the walls flexed outward.
@@samhaines8228 Yeah, In Minneapolis, MN US they made a complete museum about a grain elevator/mill-complex that was nearly completely eradicated due to graindust that went past ambient air/particulate-matter ignition-point.
That said, outdoors the effect can be pretty dramatic too. We sometimes made (strictly unauthorized) what we called stationary atom-bomb simulators using that kind of stuff. Trick is that it had to be windstill with pretty accurate dispersal and ignition detonations to have the best effect with heat, observable wavefront and meassureable flash/bang times present.
@@Centurion101B3C good times!
Super impressed with how jake presented this episode! It was flawless!!! He's getting so much better in my opinion
Love the scientific method your team is using. Absolutely fantastic.
I knew that there was an initial shock wave that goes off right when the explosive detonates, but I didn’t know it was that noticeable on a camera. That’s really cool.
For future tests, built a scaffold from which you can suspend the devices. Also, the more spherical you can make the container, the better, more symmetrical the dispersion of fuel will be.
Armchair mad scientist here. The dispersion charge should be of the rapidly-decomposing type rather than something that deflagrates or detonates. There should be an inert buffer between this charge and the fuel, to prevent premature ignition, and it should NOT be initiated by a burning fuse. The ignition charge should deflagrate an instant later than the dispersion charge. Premature ignition is the main pitfall here, causing a sad pile of burning slag rather than a big bada boom.
I'd like to see someone try out the improvised FAE munitions presented in US Army FM 31-210.
Is that the one with the HE/Aluminum initiator under a standard 5lb bag of flour? That's ridiculously effective.
My dad demonstrated a dust explosion to me when I was 8.
1 M80
1 5 Lb bag of dried flour.
1 Natividad candle.
1 Outhouse.
Light candle, place on floor.
PLace M80 under bag of flour on seat.
Light, RUN!
Hints: For your liquid fuel, try Triethylborane, and store your disbursant explosive charge in a tube of fused quartz (so as to ionize the TEB), then (using a detcord delay of 5 to 15 ms.) detonate a high brisance ignition charge. You'll probably be amazed.
You're welcome.
I feel like TEB is a little on the unstable side to be using with explosives...
TEA-TEB is one thing you don't want exposed to air.
@@fallinginthed33p
Unless you're *TRYING* to make something rather spectacular...
It's what they used in the predecessor to the MOAB. It *may* be what was used in the actual MOAB, but I don't actually have any knowledge of that.
TEB is mixed with a hydrocarbon in the liquid fuel versions, it causes abrupt multipoint ignition. Same deal burst than the fuel mist ignites and boom.
@@christopherleubner6633
Basically, if done right, the ionized fuel air mixture actually *detonates* rather than ignites, resulting in a *MUCH* more energetic event.
Use (by volume) 2 parts bearing grease to 1 part aluminium *dust* (not flakes!). Mix it very very well. You can thin it a bit down with gasoline to make it more workable, but it is vital that it can suspend the aluminium evenly. For a cylindrical bomb you need a core of about 15% TNT-equivalent high explosive (by mass - adust for equivalency). The higher the detonation velocity the better. So if you have RDX or PETN use that (So 1kg of metallized grease to 150g TNT-equivalent).
When using grease/wax/paraffin the principle is a little different to using gasoline or diesel. The reason for the relatively large amount of high explosive is not that it is more viscous and thus need more energy to turn into an aerosol, but rather that you need the energy to break the long hydrocarbon chains into smaller and more volatile components (this is why RDX/PETN is preferable over TNT. You want brisance over gas generation). The aluminium is there to keep the combustion temperature high as the pressure eventually drops. These types of bombs have an ungodly energy density and when done right they produce incredibly large flame fronts.
Source: I used to be an Artilleryman in the Danish army. One from each cannon got "the big explosives certificate". I was that one. We were taught everything from taking down bridges to making impromptu shaped-charge weapons.... Later I got an advanced chemistry course (outside the army) and everything made a whole lot more sense then! :P
You are still here so you must know what you are doing. Good Luck to You and Yours.
@@liljohnp132 Uh, thank you! And in kind return! :)
Natural gas explosions in homes and businesses are excellent examples of thermobaric explosions.
As kids, we took course corn meal and would grind it down into a fine powder. Three of us would get small hand’s full of the the flour and toss it above a simple torch held high by a fourth person. We would get some great flashes, but sometimes it would make a ‘Whomp’ sound along with a good pressure wave. Not enough to hurt us but we did feel hair and clothing moving. This ‘fuel’ was better than wheat flour. This was back in the mid 60’s. The things we did were explained by our science teacher. Couldn’t help doing it as an experiment! We also waited till dark to get the best effect! Oh yeah!!
You forgot to mention the most important part of thermobarics. They get their oxidizer from atmospheric oxygen.
Yes!
They literally set the fucking air on fire.
The amount of smoke means you arent getting detonation of the fuel, just deflagration. When you get the timing of dispersion and detonation right, there shouldnt be much in the way of waste products.
Normally you would be 100% but in this case, I believe it’s because it a metal fuel and MgO and Al2O3 are white aerosolized powders.
That sounds right in theory, but I highly doubt its true in practice. After all many of the classic high explosives themselves are oxygen deficient as well, even though they're proper secondary explosives, and will give greyish to black smoke when detonated. There probably isn't enough oxygen available in the air to completely oxidise the detonated fuel in this video.
@@pieterveenders9793 There is more than enough O2 in the air to completely oxidize and Im only talking about free O2 not oxygen bound to anything else in the atmosphere. Fuel Air bombs require a pretty well timed explosion/detonation setup to get the fuel atomized properly before the shockwave of detonation is fired. Get it right and there should be little byproducts created and almost no smoke which are indicative of all the oxygen chemicalliy bonding to the free nitrogen released during detonation.
6:40 The starburst shape of the container left over from that first test was super satisfying
Were these used on caves for their unique effects on enclosed spaces? I seem to recall them being deployed to try to clear some caves a while back, something about the pressure wave, overpressure, and oxygen usage in the confined space.
They are, yes. Some were developed for the specific purpose of flushing enemy troops out of caves, and the MOAB was used in battle in such capacity against ISIS
Thermobarics are the best useage in caves and tunnels and the overpressure is enough to rupture your lungs and blow out your ear drums. Were talking overpressures that can reach into the 1000 psi range which dwarfs even a nuclear weapon.
The most extreme example of this IMO is the GM-94 grenade launcher. It uses 43mm thermobaric grenades for *squints* room clearing.
@@hjorturerlend wouldnt say thats the most extreme, just the most portable version. MOAB is probably the most extreme short of a high yield nuke or a comet making direct impact with Earth.
I'm really impressed with Jake's progression of comfort with public speaking. I'm the same way he is, but I would have never thought I could get over it with practice. You're inspiring people in lots of ways here. Keep up the good work
Something about fuel air bombs is so awesome, the precision of calculating the fuel dispersion creating the perfect fuel/air ratio is just... poetic😭
You guys are the reason I do what I do, science and chemistry is my thing, and I discovered your channel a while back, I now make this stuff just to see if I can do it, and it truly makes me happy. I just wanted to say thank you, truly.
Perhaps a much finer metal powder is needed as a fuel source, my understanding of solid fuel thermobarics was that you want them to be an ultra fine dust cloud, similar to a silo fire or dust explosion but created intentionally
You need a stronger outer casing. The metallic fuel has to be compressed and heated well beyond the point of autoignition by the primary HE charge before the outer casing breaks, that way it will ignite progressively as it expands and encounters atmospheric oxygen. I spent a lot of time studying the Hellfire MAC (Metal Augmented Charge) warhead, and this is the method they used. It also helps to mix the metallic fuel (aluminum) with a small percentage polytetrafluoroethylene (Teflon). It helps to have the Al/PTFE pressed into a cylindrical billet "jacket" before assembly, as loose, unconsolidated powder takes longer to compress, which reduces its efficiency and contributes to the "slag-throwing" seen here.
I've learned so much from this channel and I enjoy it immensely, I wish it got more recognition. Jake, you nailed the narration on this one!
This reminds me of the time I tried to make a sparkler fountain and blew up a stack of 2x4s along with losing hearing for a few days!
Pretty sure I remember Beyond The Press (Hydraulic Press Channel's non-press related channel) doing a liquid fuel air bomb a few months ago. They built a scale model town out of plywood, then used their thermobaric device to flatten it. Might give you guys some insight/ideas on how to make this project work.
Thats right!
They got it basically perfect, after a lot of work and a lot of looking through slow-motion video to analyze what was happening. It is *extremely* obvious when there is a real detonation instead of deflagration. It startled everyone and shook the hell out of the camera.
It's a very fiddly thing to get right, but when it is right, wow.
Ordnance lab is the only channel I actually click on the notification when I see it.
_…Agreed,_ *100%.*
Russia wants to know your location
I feel like I'm on a list for having watched this video
HE dont move objects well, but rather shatter. Low Velocity explosions might propel the fuel more effectively
The problem with improvised thermobarics in Ukraine is the dispersal charge almost always detonates the fuel. You need to separate the dispersal explosive by putting it in a pipe B. separate to the rest of the B. That way the heat has a chance to drop below flash point and the pressure escaping will disperse the mixture.
imagine being the wife of this guy and seeing what he does in his free time, man is never going to have someone who cheats
Thank you, I've been leaving requests for this for months!!!!
It’s great they are finally tinkering with Thermobaric Energetics, truly the “big stuff” when it comes to the field of high energy materials.
Well this came in my feed at good time
Slava Ukraini
The 90s intro music takes me back to 90s CPU game music. Rise of the Triad comes to mind.
yep.... watching this in March 2022.... You know .. with Russia doing its thing and all...............
How does this guy not have more subscribers. Lol. Blowing stuff up, comedy. Omg this channel rocks
Methinks you forget which side your bread is buttered on.
The British Flame Fougasse would make an excellent base for thermobarics. They simply lowered a grenade into a drum of petrol to use as an anti tank trap, using the incendiary effect. This is not a thermobaric of course, but a similar idea could possibly be employed with jerry can and explosive bursting charge. For smaller thermobarics, a wine bottle filled with a gasoline mixture (phosphorus and aluminum additives come to mind) that is burst by either an internal charge with the fuse fitted through the cork or an external charge for simplicity, in which case the blast may be somewhat directional. I'd also look into using a more readily vaporized fuel source, such as propane, as that may mix with the air better. I reckon a purchased small propane tank could be ruptured by a sufficient bursting charge and achieve a desirable effect.
We used 55 gallon drums in the Army filled with thickened gasoline with bursting and pusher charges and WP grenade in path to ignite. Lots of fun.
More data!!! I'm a glutton for data and facts, and you guys do all the things I don't want to jump through the hoops to do legally. I live vicariously through you guys.
Beyond the press guys has very cool video about these
I thought West Virginia Chemistry was mostly comprised of lithium batteries, Coleman fuel and value packs of sudafed.
The algorithm keeps giving me these videos. Is it really my fault im on the watchlist for it now?
You should check the thermobaric bomb video on the Beyond The Press channel, they were pretty succesfull with them as well.
Maybe RUclips just blanked banned some keywords?
At least it's back and relevant
The real prize is watching your guys awesome videos. HELL YEAHHHHHH
I owned a defense company some years ago and developed armor and worked with explosives.
One of the projects we developed led (unexpectedly) to a phenomenal new napalm.
Now, I have no interest in developing napalm as a weapon, (Geneva Convention issues) and all.
But, the fact that mixing powders and liquids,with explosives, is intriguing.
Fun stuff.
Man this was what i asked. Great video and can't wait for future episodes
We are working machining new grenade hulls and testing different metals. Should be a ......blast!
Sounds good
A million years ago in my, "how did I survive?" days I tried making one, it didn't detonate properly, but definitely kaboomed enough to scare me away from trying again. I made basically a short cannon with screen in it to break up the fuel, filled it with a cup of gasoline, and used a hose clamp to keep a pipe cap (with Teflon tape so it wouldn't leak) on. Then I made a campfire about fifteen feet in front of it and pressurized it with the oxygen from my dad's torch until the cap burst off. Still had my face attached afterwards, which was frankly surprising.
I just spent 11 minutes watching, "we made something that went boom".
You may need a permit in order to build and use them but the chemistry itself is not illegal.
Jake should do a presentation on the principals of EMP explosives
In the second of the books "D-Day through German eyes" one of the subjects interviewed was an officer who spent much of the war on the development and testing of thermobaric explosives. The earliest experiment was in Russia and was used to crack a fortress in Crimea. The weapon was primarily developed for area defense of Channel ports but was deployed on a tank concentration as a sort of Hail Mary action. It "very nearly' worked -- premature shelling by the Allies hit the fuel delivery rockets causing a huge pillar of fire but no real damage. Worth a read. (After capture a few weeks later he passed himself off as an ordinary artillery officer so he escaped the notice of the Allies.)
Went a whole minute and a half thinking that was his water to drink from in case he gets thirsty before realizing that was the ordiance.
Someone may have mentioned this already, I'm not gonna read 1040 comments to check. Anyway, some time ago, a very shady individual I met at the ballet, regaled me with a story about a device he may or may not have assembled many years ago, a improvised thermobaric, constructed, as best I remember, from a pressure cooker, 1/3 full of gasoline, initiated by a 1X3 inch pipe bomb, the fuse being routed through the pressure vent in the lid. Probably just another armchair commando. He didn't strike me as a very reliable sort, these days, he probably spends his time on the internet, watching Tom Leher videos or worse. However, in the event that this information might in some small way assist in your research of such things, I thought I'd pass it along. Love the Lab Lab BTW!
Jake I'd say deserves a raise for being such a badass and mad lad
Silo and dust explosions are essentially thermobaric in effect....
Simple one ; flour !
when flour is vaporized.. OH BOI ! One spark and it's a KABOOM !
The irony of the spartans is their obsession with their military tactics was one of their downfalls.
As someone that has zero knowledge of explosives, this is a very cool channel.
Interesting that some terms were never mentioned. Overpressure, dust-initiator, bladder bomb, or grain silo explosions.
An old Vietnam era tech manual used a bag of white flour and a small tuna can filled with a mixture if high explosive and thermite to detonate the flour and blow up a warehouse. Cool reading
Looks like Putin was watching this video closely
a little idea I had for testing: build another one that has the same dispersing charge as the real one but has sand instead of magnesium. That way you can compare how the fireball expansion knocks over the targets vs what happens when it's just flying particles and the dispersing charge.
Powdered iron would give yellow gold sparks that burn slower than magnesium so easier to see. Used in commercial fireworks for gold sparks in chrysanthemum aerial charge.
Once, I saw a British Science program, they demonstrated how the different curved shapes of metal cover lids of the explosive container can have marked effects.
For the record,it was the EU that ruined the economy of Greece.
thermobaric bombs looks really cool
so glad you made one.
Another point about thermobaric devices is that while solid explosives are basically a point in space that expands, thermobaric explosives are volumes that expand. So their pressure wave is not losing umph by distance^2, but by Δdistance^2. If you can skip the first three meters of losing pressure, the wave will lose less power with distance. They have a greater kill radius.
beyond the press did a good video on this
I saw designs for a thermobaric using super heated fuel which when dispersed covered a very large chunk of atmosphere. The explosion had a massive shock wave and even created a vacuum which was just as destructive to structures and people.
I love this youtube channel, it reminds me of vietnam times
"Putin wants to know your location."
Great video! Thank you, educational
Great descriptions
We put two and two together and BOOM 💥🔥
One cool setup I saw demonstrated many years ago was a bag of flour taped to the top of an M16 type antipersonnel mine. The boost charge propelled it up into the air a few feet and tore the bag open then the subsequent detonation did it’s thing. Perhaps disburse it first with a car airbag charge before the ignition charge goes off.
To save you time Ukraine: this is really good resource!
A buried petrol drum with a claymore charge on one side can work in a similar way.
This channel is fun. Thanks.
In my younger days reading the JR cookbook, they had it in there with a thermite charge to superheat the liquid, and then a secondary high explosive charge to ingite and rupture the steel vessel. - That said, alot of what was in there has been prooven incorrect, but a good portion is/was real.
I'd also point out that the military video had the detonation happening in mid air. I wonder if this helps to atomise the fuel better, as it's not instantly hitting the ground for nearly 50% of the available directions it can expand. As such, I'd suggest an experiment, whereby you build 2 devices the same, set one off on the ground, and the other suspended in mid air. Compare results.
a thermobaric bomb is essentially a Fuel-Air Explosive or a Vacuum Bomb
The hottest soldiers sleep in the thermo-barracks.
OMG, "low budget Amenhotep" you guys crack me up. LOL
Your leg was on fire im shore it was a joke and I found it hilarious 😆
I should've followed my dreams as a child to be like y'all...sadly the family frowned on an 11 year old me building bb grenades from old film canisters and blackpowder...never tried fuel air
It's never too late to become the next Unabomber ;)
@@trashcanman6649 sadly those days have passed and I have now conformed to society like a good little consumer
@@XZLR8N There is still hope as long as you are able to recognize what you have become.
Jake is so bald the top and sides of his head reflect the color of the environment he is standing in. It’s like adaptive camouflage
Great work
Oh Great! Let's all play with thermobaric grenades in the tall dry grass. I'm too busy watching for the chain reaction of wildfire to watch the dynamics of the detonation video.
That poor shed... can't help feeling sorry for that thing.
Nice work y’all
No way in hell is this channel monetized.