Shooting an empty propane container

[shermacman]

Ya know, I should have thought of that!
It wasn't me shooting at a steel propane tank with a hollow point round that was dangerous:
It was the gun!
It is Glock's fault!
Gotta sue someone and then write my congress-critter to pass some more gun control legislation....

 

[0luke1]

I've shot empty ones with a .357 mag (w/ jacketed hollow points). If you hit them on the top, you can really get them bouncing along.

 

[Cosmoline]

LOL! I need to get a photo of the propane heap at the compound. There are about 100 coleman canisters in a pile, all shot. I make a point of shooting every empty propane canister prior to disposal. Even when empty they hop around a bit. When full--well even the little ones should be a good 25 feet away.

The BIG containers you can refill--just forget it. Detonate one of those and you'll get frequent flier miles the hard way.

 

[DVDTracker]

A full 20lb propane tank vs .50 BMG APIT. Guess who won.

 

[Ironbarr]

Distance and shrapnel?????

Heck of a photo, for sure.

 

[DVDTracker]

100yds+, no shrapnel, just a clean hole through the tank.

 

[bluecowdawg]

if you want it to explode upon impact you can use one that is about 2/3's or 3/4's full and build a small fire , like a camp fire and set the CLOSED container on the fire and then shoot it and it should explode

 

[Roger Williams]

Back when freon was about $.25 a can, we used to shoot tons of 'em with .22s. Most of the time they'd shoot off like a rocket, spinning around wildly and when they came down, they'd freeze the ground where they hit. Pretty cool!

I think it'd be fun to shoot a shaving cream can. The last time I saw a can of shaving cream blow up it was at VERY close range. At the first house my wife and I lived in, I saw a nail sticking out the side of one of the kitchen cabinets. I didn't have a hammer handy so I picked up a can of shaving cream... it went something like "tap, tap, tap, boom!" My wife came running into the room and started laughing so hard she was crying. I looked like a damned cream pie!

I never have shot a propane tank. A good friend of mine told me his brother threw a full one in a camp fire, jumped in his truck and hauled ass down the holler. About a mile down the road BOOM!

 

[BWC]

In a house fire situation, those tanks will explode. I have found the twisted remains of propance cyclinders 200-300 yards from the building. They blow up with a bit of a fireball and the nasty chunks of metal go into orbit. I once heard one explode, and the remains of the tank (a big commercial sized one) landed on the windshield of a rescue team SUV parked 100 yards from the building and ended up in the front seat....luckily no one was inside. The remains weighed about 30 lbs and was pretty jagged where the cylinder had been ripped open as it exploded........

 

[Dain Bramage]

A safety warning. The local news just had a story on not messing with any propane tanks found in the woods. Seems meth cooks use them to store anhydrous ammonia.

So, shoot 'em only if you brought 'em.

 

[KevinB]

Beer keg.....

Not a reactive target but it does make a very satisfying noise when hit.

 

[444]

"In a house fire situation, those tanks will explode."

I have personally never seen one explode in a house fire, or in a motorhome fire: the safety valve has always opened and relieved the pressure (which never fails to scare the crap out of everybody there). This is not to say that is can't happen. This phenomenon is called a BLEVE (Boiling Liquid Expanding Vapor Explosion).
When I was on the Haz-Mat team we wached a video tape that was shot in Canada where they laid out a huge grid on the ground so they could easily measure distances. They then exploded propane tanks of the size seen at gas stations or whatever used to fill home propane cylinders. Sizeable chucks of the steel tank traveled over a MILE.
Having a propane tank explode is a VERY BAD senario.

http://www.interfire.org/termoftheweek.asp?term=1072
http://www.safteng.net/Links Page/BLEVE Page.htm
http://ncsp.tamu.edu/reports/NFPA/vapor_explosion.htm
http://www.epa.gov/superfund/programs/er/resource/d1_22.htm
http://www.efcog.org/publication/WG Minutes/sawg/2000 Conference/papers_pdf/roberts.pdf

As you see in the links, a BLEVE usually occurs when the integrity
of the tank has been compromised such as turning a train derailment or from rust. The tank fails before the relief valve can vent the pressure.

 

[KB180]

Agreed, combustible liquid propane under pressure can be rather dangerous under the "wrong" circumstances. I had a neighbor who was bar-b-queuing on his deck and apparently some drippings from his meal burned threw the rubber hose to the tank and ignited. The sound and subsequent fire sounded like a low constant roar (like a jet engine warming up just before for take off). Flames were shooting 10 feet up in the air. Seemed like an eternity for the fire department to arrive and by that time the roof on the side of his house was fully engulfed in flames. Although his house was saved, it did suffer heavy damage to the roof and substantial water damage to the interior. I guess I'll stick with my Weber Kettle.

 

[Med 10]

BLEVE. aka Blast levels everything very effectivley.

Seriously, those are nothing to play around with.

 

[lbmii]

Some other common junk you come upon out in the woods that will send a pistol bullet right back at you are old steel wheels and old hot water tanks.

 

[ShaiVong]

My buddy put a .40S&W bullet into an old tire rim, and I heard it wiffle back about 10' left of me. Needless to say, there was no more tire shooting allowed .

Although I found out that the Turkish Mauser, and Enfield will rip right through it at 100yrds no sweat. Payback!

 

[Sunray]

"...Hollywood been just making up this exploding thing..." Yep, and car gas tanks don't explode by just rolling the vehicle down a hill either.
"...drippings from his meal burned threw the rubber hose..." Those hoses must have been damaged to start with. Hot grease isn't hot enough to burn through them. And shutting off the tank would have put it out. Mind you, it would take some stones to reach under the BBQ to do it though.
"...Beer keg..." Don't be daft. Kegs can be re-filled.

 

[Ironbarr]

Sunray...

No, the grease won't burn it through, but I found out - just before I needed to - that the grease will catch a flame and enough will burn the hose through. I suppose then the grill and things around it would have "BBQ'd".

Yep - reached under - lucky, since that puts you face-to-face with you-know-what.

-IB