Ever shot a steel CO2 tank?

[Red State]

I have some old CO2 tanks that I used to use when I played paintball. Since the seals/valves are past a certain age, I can no longer get them refilled adn they are pretty much useless to me..........

............. BUT I know that some of them still have CO2 in them (no idea how much pressure). Some of the tanks are aluminum and some are steel.

What will happen when .45 or .223 hits them? Minimum safe distance? Anything else I should think about?

 

[Erebus]

Those tanks are pretty heavy/thick, I don't know if shooting them is a good idea. May ricochet. Shoot them outside if you do. CO2 can overcome you really fast.

 

[AJ Dual]

.45 might just make a dent. To get reliable penetration you'd have to stand too close to be safe, so stick with .223.

The .223 will make a hole and the bottle will squirt around a bit. Since the hole won't be in the perfect spot for it's center of mass to act like a rocket, it'll most likely spin around on the ground, or scoot about randomly for about 1 second. It could go flying, but the odds are against it. However, to be sure so you want a good clear area to shoot it and a decent backstop.

I'd stay back at least 50 yards. At that distance, on the million-to-one chance it does come flying at you, the bottle won't be moving much better than if someone chucked it at you in anger.

 

[Lupinus]

if there is just a little left it should be ok and fun to see what happens

If these things are full DO NOT SHOOT THEM

If you want to know why ask a welder or someone else who uses presurized gas what happens if someone moves them without the caps dropps them and breaks the stem off.

A paintball CO2 tank probably wont but a full sized oxygyn tank like use in welding WILL fly through a cinder block wall and fly like a ballon if it gets the right take off angle. I dunno what one of the smaller paintball co2 tanks will do or what presure they have when full but I still wouldn't wanna get smacked in the head with one.

 

[Erebus]

I had the pressure relief valve let go on a brand new one once and it didn't move. It was full when it went. Was in my hand and I dropped it and it just emptied. It was a 20 ounce.

 

[armedpolak]

this is a liberal anitgun headline waiting to happen !!!

don't do it! and if you do, make sure you don't get hurt please! :banghead:

last thing we need is... another tragic accident due to stupidity of a gun owner

 

[Jackal]

Why don't you just get the tank re-hydro tested. There is no need to destroy them.

 

[Lupinus]

Erebus-
Thats because it is a safty valve and is designed to let the gas out slowly.

Take a ballon blow it up and then let the stem go, it flys around. Then take it blow it up agian tie the stem and either right by the stem or opposit it where it wont pop and stick it with a pin. It might still move a little but it isn't gonna go flying around the room. Thats the same thing when talking about releasing the safty valve and either breaking off the tank stem or a rupture the size of a bullet hole.

Like I said half full or less and it might be cool to try, any mroe then that and he is taking a gamble with any caliber that wont just obliterate the tank and just put a hole or crack into it.

 

[shermacman]

I know that a .40 S&W from a KelTec Sub2000 at 50 yards into a propane tank will dent the metal. Then the bullet will the ricochet back at you. It will be moving much faster than you can react. It will smack into a tree behind you. Your hands will shake, you will gasp at your stupidity.

Don't do it.

 

[Roadwild17]

CO2 tanks are like $20 at wally world, its gona cost more than that to re-hydro them. Those thanks have ~850 psi (if i recall right) in them. I have seen the blow plugs break on them, they danced around for about 20 seconds and broke a glass display case. My main concern is the tank its-slef the CO2 would be the least of my concern.

 

[ndh87]

The first thing i shot with my marlin 44 mag lever action was a full 20z CO2 tank. i was about 50 feet away and it still punched through with no problem, the tank spun off into the air about 20 feet, not thing too spectacular. the round could very well have bounced off if i hadn hit it dead center. the bottom line is, unless you have a bout a mile in every direction to soak up those stray rounds you might want to find something else to do with those tanks.

 

[Red State]

Thanks for the replies, guys.

armedpolak, don't get too riled up. The reason I posted here before attempting anything is because I am not a stupid gun owner - just a curious one.

Roadwild is right, it is cheaper to get a brand new tank than to have the valves/seals reworked. Looking at a box of unfillable tanks is what started me thinking about what to do with them...........

 

[Dr.Rob]

it won't blow the head off a 3 ton shark. (Mythbusters vs. Jaws)

 

[Lupinus]

nah rob, but if ya hit an oxygyn tank right or knock the stem off it will go through a cinderblock wall And yes that was an awsome video in welding class lol

That was one of the first safty things we learned when it came to moving gas cylanders. Always with the cap because if you drop it and knock the stem off it will go through wall, it will remove heads and limbs, and it will kill someone easily. That was when I was a HS freshman (only did a year, welding is cool but not something I wanted to do for a living so I stopped doing the class after a year) and I still remember the better part of the safty stuff and when I see a truck on the road who has gas cylinders without the protective caps I stay very far away or get around it fast cause if someone clips him or something I don't want to be near that accident.

 

[Dr.Rob]

I have shot a partially filled propane tank with a full-auto BAR at a machine gun shoot.. they kind of burn and spin like a catherine wheel but they don't really leap into the air or explode.

pretty sure though the scuba tank didn't explode.. it did shoot all over the inside of the container and bust up the shark's face.

You wouldn't want to be holding one when it was punctured.

 

[grizz]

I've shot a 1lb propane cylinder in a lake w/ a .44 mag. It didn't do what I thought it would (blow up). All it did was take off like a torpedo for about 50 yards.

 

[Nathan Williams]

Not sure about tanks but I can across some old empty ( I checked myself ) beerkegs. Pumped them up to pressure and used them for target practice. At 40-45 yards a .45 had just as much chance of denting them as it did making holes, just depends on what angle they hit at. At 150 yards a .223 went through them everytime.

 

[Lupinus]

I dont know what presure the CO2 has but I know propane tanks are a much lower presure then oxygen tanks for welding. Bad number memory so I forget the exact numbers but them suckers have a lot of presure in them. And at the same time the actual fuel (varies but acetaline...spelling may be off....is prefered and goes the hottest) tank is a much lower presure. Mainly because you use less. For instance in cutting you use 7lbs of acetaline and 40 of oxygen if I remember correctly (been a few years). Those oxygen tanks just have a very high presure and a lot of energy and I for one have no interest in playing with them.

 

[BoomBoom25]

Cant say I have to much expereince shooting CO2 tanks I do have a funny story about what I did once. This was about 9 or 10 years ago when I was 16. I had just gone to Wally World and bought myself a knew pellet gun and was pretty excited since it was the only type of gun I could buy legaly. Anyway it took those little CO2 cartridges to fire with a 12 shot rotary cylinder. I remember because it was the neatest bb/pellet gun I ever owned. I had used all the CO2 cartridges except one and was down to my last full rotary clip. At the time I was tired of shooting at cans, bottles, and what ever else I could find so I got the bright idea to shoot the CO2 cartridge. So i got back about 50 or 60 feet and started firing and missed every time and by then I was down to my last shot. Thats when I got the bright idea to take everything inside to my room. I then placed the CO2 cartridge on my dresser and knelt down about 3 feet away with the muzzle of my gun right up to the catridge. Well i chickened out didnt know what to expect when I shot this thing so I got a blanket to put over my head and I made sure everthing was perfect, the muzzle was lined up perfectly to the cartridge, and proceeded to push to blanket out a little bit so there was some room between the blanket and my head. Then I fired not as much noise as I had expected but the one thing I hadnt counted one was the CO2 cartridge having as much energy as it did. It flew into the back of my dresser and right into my forhead with enough force to cause some bruising, a headache that hurt like amug for a few hours, and a knot that lasted a week and a half aout 11 days. So I learned my lesson and never did that again.:banghead:

 

[airmonkey]

Oxygen cylinders have around 1800 psi. in them.

 

[Hkmp5sd]

Check out the Mythbusters website. They did the scuba tank in the shark's mouth with a 30.06 from Jaws. No kaboom.

 

[Lupinus]

no it wont kaboom that is indeed a myth. Oxygen itself is not flamable hence it itself can't expload. Oxygen can seem like it sometimes because of the the acceleration pure oxygen can add to a fire or explosion. Keep in mind to the air in a scuba tank is not the same as what is in an oxygen tank. Breathing pure oxygen is actually bad for you over a long period if I remember right so the air in a scuba tank is cut with other gases.

 

[Kor]

On a similar note...

...a friend and shooting buddy has an 'in' with a local safety equipment company, and he's been able from time to time to get his hands on expired fire extinguishers for free. We've shot at them from 100+ yards, and they have to be one of the coolest reactive targets we've found. The first time, we weren't sure what would happen, so we sniped 'em from 100yds with a Finnish Mosin and a .308 Garand - a good hit would send a white column of fire-retardant chemical agents 20-30ft up in the air. Afterwards, the holed extinguisher canister reacted just like any other steel target, plus you could often elicit a few more puffs of residual agent with the first few subsequent hits. I only ever saw one extinguisher 'jet around' after getting its valve shot off, and not very far or very long at that.

 

[Cosmoline]

I used to shoot spent propane canisters to prepare them for the garbage. Once in a while one would have a bit more juice than usual in it. Neat little boom, but no fireball.

 

[Medusa]

I attached a PDF file which describes one event where a big oxygen tank let go and created a small havoc. It was sent to me, so no responsibility and copyrights taken by me.