The Royal Institution
What would Halloween be without exploding pumpkins? In order to not find out, we enlisted Dan Plane, our resident pumpkin exploder, to investigate the explosive power of acetylene.
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Calcium carbide reacts with water producing acetylene gas which is highly flammable and an excellent fuel for blowing up pumpkins. It is made of calcium ions and carbide ions. When it comes into contact with water it the carbon atoms react with the hydrogen in the water to produce acetylene gas. The calcium in turn binds with the hydroxide group to produce calcium hydroxide.
Acetylene is a hydrocarbon that has applications, in welding, in portable lighting and as fuel for pumpkin explosions, among many others.
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Happy Halloween
Its my birthday..
I suggest supplying the pumpkin with a stream of oxygen on one end of the pumpkin via the decomposition of hydrogen peroxide and acetylene on the other to prevent incomplete combustion
Some ideas for next year. KNo3. Liquid oxygen that flows visible gas vapor out of the pumpkin and then ignited. Petrol. Vibration sensitive Nitrocellulose. Would love to see any of these next year.
Hold on to your dookie, it's about to get spooky!
Perhaps put in sodium peroxide and calcium carbide in at the same time to make a good mix of acetylene and oxygen
Try nuke next year
Oxyacetylene, as mentioned by some, would be interesting as an experiment but probably far too violent for carving. Do your first tests outside.
Oxygen+dust could be cool, if it could be done reliably. Sawdust, metal powder, flour, pollen etc.
Electrolysis of pumpkin juice and the explosion of the resulting H2+O2 would be cool.
Thermonuclear bomb.
paint inside with damp NI3. Dry out. toss tennis balls at it from across the room.
I also think thermobarics could be interesting – something relatively inert in a mass, but volatile when aerosolised.
Loved you all looking in the windows. Great vid !
Aluminium foil and sodium hydroxide to make hydrogen gas. Super easy and always a good bang
As a child in the 50s, I can remember that a few neighbours still used carbide cycle lamps, & a lump of carbide & a splash of water in an old paint-can makes a loud banger! 😀
Before widespread rural electrification, some houses had 'carbide generators' to fuel gas lights. Growing up, I lived in a house that still had the generator below ground in the back of the house and much of the gas plumbing for the lights still intact within the walls.
For next year: given the fuel mixing difficulties, maybe try electrolysis of water to get a perfectly balanced hydrogen/oxygen mix?
nitromethane vapour : or better diazomethane vapour
Let's try with butane propane from aerosols spray.
During the early 1900-dreds they used is also as head lights on bikes all around Europe.
There is also this tradition in rural parts of the Netherlands to fire the lids of big milk containers with carbide. They can reach over 100 meters.
Next year – butane?
We watched Dan give one of the best demos at the Science Museum Wonderlab last weekend. Dry ice and then liquid nitrogen with gummy snakes. Absolutely brilliant. “Be prepared to run if I spill any.” Loved this explanation of making acetylene.
Our 2017 edition of pumpkin spookery can now be enjoyed with Portuguese subtitles. Obrigada!
Try using HHO gas.
You know, back in the days, in the Netherlands they had bike lights that ran on carbide 😉
I had great fun teaching my friends sons about balanced equations and gas laws on bonfire nights. Fireworks were much less fun than a collection of 2 litre plastic bottles, a bucket of water and cylinders of oxygen and acetylene. Work out the ratio of oxygen to acetylene giving a perfect balance, explain that 1 mole of oxygen occupies the same volume as 1 mole of acetylene at constant temperature and pressure, fill the pop bottle with the appropriate ratios of gases, pop the lid on and then throw the bottle on the bonfire.
Yeah… let's just play with acetylene… it's only the second most explosive gas on Earth (behind hydrogen)