Blank, 30 years ago a teenage friend of mine put a ball through his parents' garage door, too!:eek:
We had all made calicium carbide cannons from large rug tubes with coffee cans on the end to hold some water. Pour the powdered calcium carbide in a hole where the fuze would be on a cannon and let the stuff fizz, forming acetylene gas. Wait 30 seconds and apply match to hole. KABOOM. The same friend had an eight-foot long cannon mounted on a push mower chassis, and covered with camoflage netting. It could fire a heavy shrunken rubber ball (about 5 inches / 12.7 cm in diameter) 250 yards / 225 meters.
One time someone called the cops on us...for shooting off firecrackers. When a police officer arrived he asked us if we had any firecrackers. "No, sir", my friend said, "just this calcium carbide cannon!"
"Oh, okay. I had one of those when I was kid. But no firecrackers, you understand!"
"Yes, sir!"
This was about 1973. In today's climate, who knows what would have happened to us? We certainly would have been arrested and asked many, many questions. Probably would have been on the news, too.
MRPLUTO VMF-323 ~Death Rattlers~ MAG-33