This Gun Could Reach Space

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Credits:
Writer/Narrator: Brian McManus
Editor: Dylan Hennessy
Animator: Mike Ridolfi
Animator: Eli Prenten
Sound: Graham Haerther
Thumbnail: Simon Buckmaster
References:
Select imagery/video supplied by Getty Images
Thank you to AP Archive for access to their archival footage.
Music by Epidemic Sound: epidemicsound.com/creator
Thank you to my patreon supporters: Adam Flohr, Henning Basma, Hank Green, William Leu, Tristan Edwards, Ian Dundore, John & Becki Johnston. Nevin Spoljaric, Jason Clark, Thomas Barth, Johnny MacDonald, Stephen Foland, Alfred Holzheu, Abdulrahman Abdulaziz Binghaith, Brent Higgins, Dexter Appleberry, Alex Pavek, Marko Hirsch, Mikkel Johansen, Hibiyi Mori. Viktor Józsa, Ron Hochsprung

[@donaldneill4419]

Fairly certain that the propellant bags the lads were loading were bog-standard US Navy 110-lb charge bags for the MkVII 16"/50 battleship guns from the Iowa-class BBs, which is what the HARP gun was built from. While the ignition patches at the base of each propellant bag are indeed black powder, the propellant is not. Otherwise, outstanding video; as both a former Canadian gunner and a former defence scientist, Gerald Bull's tale has always been a cautionary one.

[@sleat]

From Wiki, _"For propellants, the 16-inch gun used either the solvent type WM/M.225 or the solventless M8M.225, both manufactured by Canadian Arsenals Limited."_ Other propellants may have been used in other tests, of course, but I wouldn't be using BP for the main propellant. Also, I'd expect much more of a "white cloud" at the muzzle if only BP were in use. Any citation for the Navy 110 pound charges?

[@Shakes355]

There seem to be references to black powder and gun powder used interchangeably throughout the video. Since M8M appears to be a double base powder consisting of primarily nitrocellulose, it is functionally a gun powder. I suspect the author's focus was elsewhere and didn't note the difference. Thanks for the information!

[@LeviathanFoundation]

i still love how its explained 2 16in guns welded to gether its the most redneck thing ever besides perhaps duck taping theming to gethar. though it still does not beat that man hole cover which became the first man made object to leave the planet and perhaps solar system.

[@LoanwordEggcorn]

@@Shakes355 It's not the first time KZbin videos have contained inaccuracies. And yes, black powder and smokeless powder have radically different properties. They generally cannot be safely substituted for each other.

[@sleat]

@@Shakes355 You write: _"it is functionally a gun powder"_ Yes gun propellants are a product made of specifically-shaped smaller pieces which might resemble "powder" from a distance, which is used in guns. The chemistry and behavior are very different, though. Double-base propellant charges are certainly made of smaller parts, but they're not generally random ground-up propellants like various fine-ness grades of black powder (i.e. F, FF, FFF). They are individual pieces of propellant, which are very accurately shaped, like the cores of solid-fuel-rockets. If you look at gun propellants (that are not black powder), up-close, they may look like short strips of translucent spaghetti, tiny cylinders with a tinier hole through, about the outside-diameter of a mechanical-pencil-lead, or disks or donuts with a hole through the middle. The point of this is to have the propellant burn more consistently regardless of the combined temperature and pressure, such that it provides a "push" rather than something more like an HE detonation when ignited. The different shapes and compositions are all in order to give a very consistent and predictable burn-rate across different charge-sizes and pressures. You want the charge to deflagrate at the desired rate, not detonate. This burn-rate attribute is not as easy to control with ordinary "gunpowder" (i.e. black powder). If you put, say AR-2208 rifle propellant and FFF black-powder side-by-side under a magnifier, you'll notice they are very different. The black-powder resembles black rocks, randomly shaped, with a specific size-range, while propellants have definite individual shapes (AR-2208 is tiny pale green cylinders) which are consistent throughout the charge.

[@Pest789]

I don't know where you got the idea that the gun used black powder as a propellant, but all of the documentation I can find lists surplus naval propellant as the propellant used in the project. The US hasn't used black powder as an artillery propellant since before 1900. Edit: Your own animated graph lists M8M as the propellant, which is mostly nitrocellulose and nitroglycerin, not sulfur, carbon, and saltpeter

[@timothybeal799]

I had the same sputtering reaction: WTF!! WHY the hell would they be using black powder?!!! How could that POSSIBLY have advantage over smokeless???

[@billynomates920]

@@timothybeal799 imagine patching it 😄

[@subliminalvibes]

There's no way they used M&Ms as propellant... 🙄

[@JinKee]

​@@timothybeal799 black powder firearms are legal for felons to own

[@Pest789]

@@subliminalvibes Nobody said they did

[@paulbrooks4395]

That guy’s life took quite a turn, going from scientist to international arms dealer.

[@whatsuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu]

Sucks what happened to him since he was basciley scamming the Iraqi government. Israeli government being idiot assholes as usual

[@orionakd]

In fact, this is quite an interesting approach to villainy, in order to create a remarkable cannon, a scientist decided to become an arms dealer, only the reality is not cartoon colors, ending up in dark red.

[@ExtremeSquared]

​@@orionakd I certainly don't consider Bull to be the villain of the situation. At worst he was more of a chaotic neutral -- no worse than the board of the average tech company or corporate lobbyist. At the end of the day, a scientist was murdered. We can agree the outcome was predictable, but excusing it is still not the right conclusion.

[@ailediablo79]

It might been ineffective but if it was nuclear then GG. It also if it nuclear or carry an E-Bomb or both, you wouldn't be able to pin point from where did it come from. It is too very effective against aircraft carriers and ships. It can be used to stop oile from existing the gulf or redsea or any big ship or attack the harbor. It also especially at the time, undefinedable so it can do alot of damage on military bases. It is cheep at hendering Israel and Iran airforce bases. Especially at the time when Uran didn't have under mountains bases. It can be used to assassinate gov officials. It can be used to terrorise the region. It can be used to intercept bombers at an important location. You coukd use cluster technology in combination to intercept air formation or better at destroying bombers. It is actually not that expensive to make with this conversation. Because the German version was looking at useing alot of weight and explosives. They didn't care much about range. But now it does not need to be havey and range is a game. Imagine many of those get made and beput at hidden locations all over the country including traines. Also they could every year keep making more of them. Especially after the make first 1 or 3 it would get even cheaper to make. You can add an automatic blet fead reload system to it. That would increase the frequency. U can have it on a big truk anywhere and mobile. You can make many fake trucks to hide it even more. For Iraq USA can only come from the sea and that location is small. This would be very annoying. Something like this in some numbers would give Iraq a strong ability of making the point of Harmoz gap unbreakable by sea and makes attacks by air on Iraq hard due to the distance to travel and fuke useage andcrange of the fighters. Not to mention the aircraft carriers needs to be even feature or in range of the cannons. A single cluster round even with indirect hit would rander an aircraft carrier useless to lunch jets until repairs are done. Iraq as they moved south , even if that point is broke throw it makes sea machines extremely vulnerable from arab cost a the gulf is not that thick/wide. Especially when you don't want to enter Iranian waters. So thin is infact with this gun and cluster weaponry even if u maje small vessels to use is still very dangerous. U need an underwater carriers. A submarin carrier of land equipment. Those solders would have very little air support. That yime before drons. The machine itself would vulnerable to air attacks by jets and maby helicopters or even standard altery units. The only support and defens is few rockets and ICMPs from outside the battlefield. If equipped with E-Bombs or flash bombs it would very effective against sitlights and cheep. For Israel don't forget that land is small. For Israel bases this can very deadly if the shot had a new or one of those biological chemical posioning weapon on bord that kills fast. Those chemical are very easy to make. Many terrorists already have access to. But hard to deploy. However, with such canon no problem. As it would be deployed without even targeting water supply it would be very hard to detect in time. Dooming the entire or most of the base inhabitants in a less than a day. Some of those chemicals know for not making pain but die unknowingly. It can be used with radiation posioning too. You can shot a shot not even targeting a military base in a random forst area. Then let the radiation posioning or biological weapon do the job. This is too the ultimate altery support and sabotage/skirmish. Imagine if Ukraine or Russia get 100+ of those units to be used on traines or big tracks. Even with 50% less range for 50% heavier shot it would be great. Especially for Ukraine. Having hundreds of those would be useful and very annoying for the enemy.

[@boblikes]

​@@ailediablo79 it's ineffective because at a fraction of the cost the research and development you can use rockets to achieve the same goal on a mobile platform that is much harder to target and eliminate. The systems are ineffective because at best they sit on railroads and at worse they cannot be moved without great effort and disassembly. A standing target is a soon to be destroyed target for anyone seeking to eliminate the threat.

[@chubbypanda1263]

Real engineering: incredibly serious and educational channel which teaches the complex topic of mechanical and aerospace engineering to the masses in an easy to digest way. Also Real Engineering: “space gun go brrrrrrrt”

[@Kenionatus]

More like "kaboooooom"

[@deforged]

Also Real Engineering: “sPiNlAuNcH" seriously. i almost spilled my coffee. what a joke.

[@meta_username]

"Yeet a chicken" is still one of the best caught-off-guard laughs I've ever had

[@firstletterofthealphabet7308]

@@deforged I don’t have a great deal of respect for the concept, but at least I don’t believe one single perspective on the internet simply because the person spouting it sounds loud and angry.

[@CinemaDemocratica]

Also Real Engineering: "Here's a runway with an obvious heading of about 070 that we'll refer to as Runway 9."

[@rubenschutte5781]

Finally... An invention that can shoot my problems to the heavens, literally.

[@tommyboi0]

Me next please

[@techpriest4787]

Yeah my father always used to say: Son, if you can not flush your problems down the toilet then shoot them into space.

[@birdness]

Jajajajaja you are sooooooooo funny

[@elstevobevo]

Also prayer.

[@babayaga5620]

Doubt u would survive on the way

[@NothingXemnas]

The fact it shares some resemblance to (and likely inspired) the Stonehenge from Ace Combat is REALLY interesting. Of course the fictional machine is much more powerful, but the fact we got THAT close to something so ridiculous is absurd and amazing!

[@christianheichel]

Not sure I'd say absurd. It'd probably be cheaper to get raw materials to space. (Probably wouldn't work for satellites too easily. The g forces would probably damage most machines.) Once the raw materials are in space you could have construction/production of items up there rather than building large items here and trying to get them to space. It'd make way for eventual mega projects like O'Neill cylinders, Moon bases, larger space stations, and so on.

[@VeggieRice]

and not just that, it was designed and manufactured in the '60s!

[@Alexander_Kale]

Cannons to orbit are a very old idea. Older even than rockets. Jules Verne wrote about shooting a spaceship to the moon with a giant cannon in the 19th century, and then there was the Paris gun in the second world war. So I wouldn't necessarily say that THIS inspired the stonehenge.

[@smgdfcmfah]

@@Alexander_Kale True. Also H.G. Wells imagined the Martians making the trips to earth via space capsules launched by some sort of cannon, although Konstantin Tsiolkovsky suggested rocket powered space flight as early as 1898, so the timing between that and War of the Worlds is only a year (I think?)

[@janedoeYT]

Thank god I wasn't the only one who first thought of Ace Combat lol

[@SirJulianTaylor]

As a McGill graduate, I find the names for the rockets, the Martlets, rather funny. Martlets are birds used in heraldry and are in fact the three red birds you see on the McGill crest.

[@danieldonaldson8634]

that's where the name came from...

[@draco1803]

Operation plumbob’s manhole cover actually holds that record, as it was flung out of the atmosphere at 130,000 miles per hour, far too quick to have been caught by earths gravity, so it either burned up on its journey through the atmosphere, or left earths sphere of influence

[@dtibor5903]

Fun fact: piezo cristals can output extreme voltages like 30KV. Lighters use piezos to create electric arc

[@ciCCapROSTi]

What is a Kelvin Volt?

[@rolfbjorn9937]

@@ciCCapROSTi kiloVolt A unit of 1000 volts

[@smorrow]

@@ciCCapROSTi It would be "kelvin volt"(lowercase), if anything.

[@skelligfiftyeight2519]

Piezoelectric crystals will produce an electric charge under pressure, they will also change there shape when an electric charge is applied to them. They are used in direct injection fuel injectors do to the high pressures present in the cylinder preventing the use of conventional injectors.

[@rfvtgbzhn]

@@skelligfiftyeight2519 They produce a voltage, not an electric current. The current then depends on the resistance. Though there is also an influence of the output impedance, that will make the voltage drop if the resistance is low enough.

[@Boatti_]

The visuals of this video are phenomenal! Great work!

[@Miftahul_786]

Bro hasn’t even watched the video yet

[@lkenken8717]

Only if the video wasn't filled with misinformation Like project Babylon being made to bomb Israel While it was actually a space program

[@LuisSierra42]

i wasn't even sure if i was looking at CGI or real footage until they showed the cross section of the gun

[@porfirioErodriguez]

dude off the charts. who they let create it ? AI? lol this was so advanced. very well done. im a nerd now. :P

[@hisfatness522]

Thanks!

[@lotuselanplus2s]

Finally, someone did it good, i live in Barbados and have stood upon this very gun, now a rusting hulk, sadly but glad to see it being recognized. much Thanks.

[@U.s-epa]

You can actually go see it?

[@sumbuddy4088]

⁠​⁠@@U.s-epa The main super gun is along the beach just east of Barbados’ international airport. While it is pretty close to a military base, people are still able to get to it. It’s visible on Google Maps and there are a few 360 images of the area.

[@niniv2706]

Richard Bull ... was a friend of mine as his dad was making blueprints of super guns ... We were at the same Mont-Jésus Marie boarding school, same class and never were worried about war, terrorists, military superpowers and ideological fanaticism . It was 1969 and Armstrong was our hero . Les Cantons de l'Est étaient tout aussi paisible qu'aujourd'hui . My friend lost his dad .

[@twotrackjack2260]

Although this isn't the first I've heard of project HARP, you included a number of details I was unaware of. Great work on this!

[@johndododoe1411]

​@repliesgptPiezo-electric pressure sensors have become extremely common. They even make wireless light switches powered entirely by the finger pressure levered onto a piezo crystal inside.

[@the_undead]

The only problem in this video is that he claims that the gun uses black powder when in reality quite likely just uses a lot of the 110 lb standard-issue charge bags that the iowa-class battleships used

[@ray095883]

Harp and H A A R P

[@here_for_the]

Only leaving out the single most important thing. The guy who did it all, Gerald Bull. By branding him as an Arms dealer. It was the CIA who politely FORCED HIM to sell artillery to Angola. They continued to berate Gerald Bull thru-out this video, & for that, they should be ashamed. Jerry Bull far exceeds the men & women who critique him in this video.

[@here_for_the]

@@the_undead Gerald (Dr Bull) had his charges blended to his specifications, when he worked inside programs that didn't have the ability in house. Or to Chris's I may add, as he was a valuable contributing engineer to the programs they did together. This video portrayed Gerry in an un-factual manor. He was literally made a USA citizen, by act of Congress (only ever done once before Jerry was made a citizen) so the CIA could use him to design & build artillery weapons for the Governments they were trying to protect or overthrow. Thats why he left the USA. Because the CIA let him go to jail, (only for 6 months) when they promised him that even thou he was breaking USA laws, it was in the name of Democracy, & the CIA could & would protect him at all costs, & he would never be punished fir doing work that was directly approved by the Whitehouse & Pentagon. He was wrong to believe them, as they promised to fund his SUPERGUN , if he would do them a 'solid', & help them change wars in 3rd world nations, because they (CIA) were the good guys. The reason he didn't care that the Iraq Supergun was fixed, was because he wantto shoot satellites from it. Not weapons of war, like this video, & Governments claim. Now, the Iraqi leadership may have felt differently than Dr Bull. History is painting Jerry in a bad light. He does not deserve to be portrayed the way clandestine USA military operations, or this excellent channel, would like you to believe. They are sadly misinformed about Gerald 'Gerry' Bull is remember, by those who do not even know him.

[@taylorh.3484]

The inspiration for the Stonehenge rail gun weapon from Ace Combat.

[@bernard2735]

The V3 cannon used multiple timed charges along the length of the barrel to minimise the shock.

[@CandC68]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-3_cannon

[@marekchildress5428]

I heard a little bit about this on the podcast Behind the Bastards. They have a whole episode devoted to Gerald Bull, if you want to hear more about him. They don't get into the technical project stuff as much, but more of the behind the scenes madness of having two nations and multiple institutions fighting for their priorities to be pursued, all while one self-centered obsessive guided the project. The episode name is "The Man Who Built a Gun to Shoot Space"

[@raylopez99]

For Mossad to off Gerald Bull means they must have believed the hype, and did not consider the weapon a white elephant failure. Too bad for Bull.

[@danieldonaldson8634]

@@raylopez99 They probably didn't assassinate him for that reason. The Martlet 4 tech was adopted by another Canadian aerospace company. Supposedly this company supplied the Israelis with these (who then sold many on to the South Africans against the apartheid embargo). His mistake was to then seek buyers for the same technology on the other side of the fence, which Israel was not keen on.

[@maxjoechl5663]

@@raylopez99 Bull designed the GC-45, which served as the basis for a number of 1980's era artillery pieces from all over the world (including the GHN-45, which the Austrians sold to both sides during the Iran-Iraq war). That's not the kind of expertise you'd want to fall into the hands of one of your worst enemies. It's similar to how the Osirak reactor was a 'dead end' for the Iraqi nuclear programme in the sense that it couldn't be used to produce plutonium, but it would nonetheless have allowed the Iraqis to acquire more nuclear know-how than the Israelis could afford to let them have.

[@davidbuckley2435]

@@maxjoechl5663 there's also the fact that he was helping the Iraqis with their Scud programme. Since the redesigned Scuds had the range to hit Israel, it's unsurprising that Mossad (probably, though it's never been confirmed) considered it necessary to take Gerald Bull out.

[@Boatti_]

The visuals and story telling is unreal! Banger video😎😎

[@GreenHatAnimation]

@DontReadMyProfilePhoto_1 ok

[@glueguzzler9548]

Most likely, they would have used some high tech sort of smokeless powder. Black powder is one of the oldest forms of gunpowder, it was phased out in small arms in mid 1880s. It is extremely limited in it's ability to propel a projectile, as well as being very corrosive and requiring much more work to prevent against said corrosion. Smokeless powder gets rid of the intense corrosion, as well as being able to throw a projectile much, much further and faster than any sort of black powder could.

[@ambergris5705]

You could say that SpinLaunch is... a spinoff of HARP I'll see myself out, barrelling through the window

[@JinKee]

9:04 imagine being the diver who had to grid search the atlantic ocean to find each sabot piece for analysis

[@can_hauler]

The sabot fall area wasn't actually all that large (according to the graphic). It would be a long job, but much better than being told to recover live torpedoes from the base of a cliff after they had been fired out of a sub to figure out why they tended to poke enemy ships instead of detonate. I don't think anyone ever tried to use "to expensive to test" as a reason to not test stuff after that.

[@bbbb98765]

"I just wanna do my science. Even if Mossad doesn't like it. What could go wrong?"

[@MattyEngland]

Both Saddam Hussein and Gaddafi were killed because they refused to let Israel run their central bank.

[@papagrounds]

Immediately had to look from Google Maps that is the gun still there and it is! Amazing video! 😃👌

[@hexateron]

^AI generated comment

[@stephenweaver7631]

I met a fellow (he had served in the 630th TD Battalion in WWII, my father's outfit) who was a contractor on the HARP project. I remember him talking about it at one of the reunions I attended for the 630th. I was just a kid, but it was fascinating to hear about.

[@Ragondarknes]

"From the Earth to the Moon: A Direct Route in 97 Hours, 20 Minutes (French: De la Terre à la Lune, trajet direct en 97 heures 20 minutes) is an 1865 novel by Jules Verne. It tells the story of the Baltimore Gun Club, a post-American Civil War society of weapons enthusiasts, and their attempts to build an enormous Columbiad space gun and launch three people-the Gun Club's president, his Philadelphian armor-making rival, and a French poet-in a projectile with the goal of a Moon landing." Once again, Jules Verne with some CRAZY foresight.

[@Seth-Halo]

I dunno if I'd call it foresight. Like, the main way to launch anything far away in his time was guns and cannons. If it had talk of the bullet having rockets to help get it to space then sure. Like if there was a story from medevial times about launching people to space on a giant catapult we wouldn't look at those spin launchers and say that the medevial author had amazing foresight.

[@b.griffin317]

A section of the 1-meter-bore Babylon Gun can be seen today at Imperial War Museum Duxford.

[@ABrit-bt6ce]

The rest of that "pipeline" is kicking about somewhere, I'm sure.

[@nickc6882]

The Novel “Fist of God” by Frederick Forsyth is about Project Babylon. It’s fictional in its detail but factual in relation to the gun, Gerald Bull and building a gun this big. Great episode, thank you.

[@TheMrMEEEEE]

Incredible video. Thank you for all the effort and the depth of research

[@Ben-Ken]

Bul was a real life mad scientist straight from the movies with a life and death to match.

[@Freesorin837]

Read a book about artillery through history. This was the last subject the book covered and I’ve always been fascinated by it. Surface to orbit capability without the need for a heavy and inefficient first stage, cheap and reusable. The potential for both launching satellites and intercontinental ballistic weaponry without needing to worry about high maintenance costs on the launch vehicle makes my mind wander.

[@joelspaulding5964]

The muzzle forces on sensitive satellite equipment...there is a reason or two why this isn't being done, even though it would be far less expensive than rockets.

[@b.griffin317]

Guns are cheaper on a per-shot basis but have higher initial development costs which is why you don't see them (plus the engineering and metallurgy to develop the gun barrel to launch a payload of X size is much more challenging than the equivalent rocket fuel-tank-rocket-body to the point of simple infeasibility beyond a relatively low point). Any system which relies on achieving their maximum velocity at the point of highest drag is not a very efficient launch system.

[@khankrum1]

The probkem us inertia will flatten anything none solid even before it left the barrel.

[@b.griffin317]

@@khankrum1 Depends on how long the barrel is.

[@khankrum1]

@@b.griffin317 have you ever fired a gun. Barrel length is irrelevent. The inial acceleration from zero from tge explosive charge would create enormous G force and woul crush you like a bug.

[@amanlikechris]

I live in Barbados and visit the ruins often. Those gun animations are really good!

[@MDKKnD]

The amount of CG and work you put into this is amazing. Yet few people would even notice it. Great work!

[@bumcamp9108]

Yet he didn't research how to say piezo

[@AndrewFremantle]

I've never heard of Project Harp before, but as soon as you mentioned the timeframe and an expert in the field who would run into trouble later, I guessed that was Bull.

[@polka23dot70]

HARP is ancient pre-history of high velocity guns. The Earth-To-Orbit Transportation Bibliography describes much more advanced gun called vortex gun. The vortex gun was also mentioned in Andrew J. Higgins paper published in 1997: "A Comparison of Distributed Injection Hypervelocity Accelerators"

[@luigeribeiro]

Project Orion is another interesting subject, you should consider making a video about it.

[@sferrin2]

And Project Pluto, NERVA, etc.

[@umjackd]

The channel Kurzgesagt has illustrated railgun style satellite delivery systems. I wonder if you'd like to explore this sometime. That, and these gun-launched rocket systems definitely remind me of the HIMARS systems being used in Ukraine, which might be interesting for you to go into someday too.

[@robertboudreauxxx]

I worked for the department of energy at a remote test sites, I worked on the free electron laser FEL it was one of the star wars lasers during the Reagan era. I used to drive past the two-stage gas gun everyday for 3 years

[@mikebauer6917]

Visited the caves for that gun in the early 1990s. Huge compared to US 16” naval guns for example.

[@the_undead]

All it is is two of the guns for the iowa-class battleships just welded together

[@mikebauer6917]

@@the_undead well, yes and no, the base and other parts in Barbados were huge. I had been in the US navy a few years before my visit and was quite familiar with big equipment (i was even fortunate enough to have been in Norfolk when the USS Wisconsin was still active), but this was still impressive.

[@the_undead]

@@mikebauer6917 to be fair I was oversimplifying a little more than maybe I should have, but at the same time I've had discussions with people who try to make it sound like this gun is the most complicated thing ever made by a human even today when fundamentally the only thing wrong with my original statement is it's a little too simplified. But if you just wanted this thing the fire straight over the water you could get away with just doing what I said in my statement although you probably only got a couple shots out of the gun

[@calvincheney7405]

Exceptional research, well done!

[@kevincronk7981]

1:00 we aren't certain, but it's possible that the very first man made object to ever enter space was a manhole cover that was on top of a hole in the ground for a nuclear test by the US, in which was utterly underestimated the power of the nuke and sent the manhole cover flying, potentially into space, so this gun may have been the second highest projectile ever launched depending how high that manhole cover went

[@ArcticArmy]

I think that record was for the fastest projectile, I don't think its known how high or far it went.

[@archvilethe87th60]

V2 was the first manmade object in space.

[@OtherWorldExplorers]

I absolutely love the animation that you put together. That's some serious unreal engine going on there.

[@TheFriendlyGamer289]

Awesome video! keep up the good work guys!

[@dasstigma]

13:02 Where I live, we have the "Tischbombe" (literal translation would be "table bomb") which has a fuse to light, then there is some sort of explosion and the cap pops off and a bunch of stuff (little plastic craptoys, confetti, such stuff) comes out (kinda like a clown orgasm). This was likely the most expensive Tischbombe ever set off.

[@brianargo4595]

Clown orgasm is not a combination of words I ever expected to hear or read. Thank you.

[@dasstigma]

@@brianargo4595 You're very welcome 🤡 Thank you for appreciating.

[@johndododoe1411]

We have or had those too.

[@johnlovett8341]

I think you said "Black powder". If so ... that's really, really surprising. The naval smokeless types used at the time can be tuned to get to get the right burn rate and don't foul like black powder. Might check the powder. Love the rest!!

[@Amenti_H]

@repliesgpt Bullshit. HARP gun used standard modern artillery propellants, around half a ton of it. Huge bags of propellant had small pouches with black powder at rear end to facilitate ignition. Search for the paper “Multiple point ignition in HARP guns”.

[@the_undead]

From what I can tell this thing just used a lot of the standard-issue charge bags for the Iowa class. Which technically do have a little bit of black powder in them acting as a primer

[@NotYourArmy666]

This thing is better than spinlaunch in every way!

[@edgarwalk5637]

Green Launch is the closest design today of the space cannon concept. Their proposal is a semi submerged compressed hydrogen cannon, similar to project SHARP. No wonder, the company was founded by the the man who lead the SHARP project in te 90's. While you cannot launch anything fragile, like people with a space cannon, you can sure launch alot; like fuel, supplies, and hardened electronics.

[@foxhound24]

Real engineering quote of the century “ space gun go BRRRRRRRRRRRR”

[@duncanmcallister7932]

Great video as always!! The visuals are top notch!!

[@JH_Tech49]

This project was the source of a (mildly) famous UFO case in Fort-de-France. Unfortunately, the witness died shortly before it was found out that what he had seen was some Martlet shot.

[@phillipswann6432]

I'm not sure, but I don't think they used black powder as the main charge. it might have been used as the detonator for the main charge.

[@davidvik1451]

Yes very unlikey

[@michaelr7899]

🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯 🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯

[@bringer-of-change]

That's pretty cool, especially for the time it was made, but the navys railgun can do pretty much the same thing. I think it would make more sense to use a railgun for such a task. Its not good that space is being weaponized, but since its happening, I would use railguns and direct energy weapons to deal with it.

[@AKG58Z]

I loved the way it looks in your animations nice white and somewhat complicated gun, project started as what and now it's something else entirely but the goal is still the same.

[@saukhaven]

I enjoyed this. You do a great job of describing what is essentially rocket science. Thank you!

[@gianmarcoguarnier2525]

Just a random thought, was magnetic accelerators ever tested? Like particle accelerators but for satellites? Love the video btw, awesome story of the technology and the person behind it

[@themysticalcolby]

The US military has a rail gun project that last I heard, launched a projectile a distance of 100 miles.

[@roxasparks]

​@@themysticalcolbythey disconiued the project years ago. It may be a black book project still but officially its no longer under development

[@williamsnow2763]

EM accelerators came in two types. Railguns used the magnetic pressure similar to a propellant gun. Coilguns were coaxial and could come in three types Pushing, Pulling, and Traveling Wave. The traveling wave type was initially the type proposed by Gerard O'Neill for mining the moon for space colonies based on Henry Kolm's work for magnetically levitated trains. I worked with Henry building demonstration devices called Mass Driver 1 at MIT and headed the effort for Mass Driver 2 at Princeton with O'Neill. I worked later on with Kolm to propose building a Superconducting Quenchgun which would work by charging the barrel with the launch energy and would pull and accelerate the projectile forward. This eliminated the switching issue which plagued all coilguns. This was proposed for launching payloads off the moon for propellant delivery back in the early 90's. Research has been dormant since then. One of the last papers was NASA SP-509 and by the Large Scale Programs Institute.

[@upperhandcustoms11]

Big guns!!!

[@philb1595]

I saw that HARP space Cannon in Barbados in 2019 , no security watching it, just rusting there in place just below the airport. we loved the experience

[@George-jg9sy]

Correction, you wanted to say smokeless powder not black powder in all your video. The propellants used were the WM/M and M8M on the project.

[@vimvigour3327]

We need a full video about the piston compressed hydrogen launch system.

[@Choscura]

FANTASTIC episode! Keep this up!

[@seanprice7645]

I'm family friends with Sannu Molder (good friends with his son). He is the man who designed the scram jet powered martlet-II projectile that HARP shot, one of the early pioneers of the technology. Very brilliant man, he was actually neighbors with Gerald Bull. His son told me some WILD stories about Gerald lol. He is currently working with greenlaunch.

[@slowerpicker]

Those engineers had the best jobs, making big stuff go bang and watching what happens. The story of the McGill scientists chasing down their spent rounds on the frozen lake made me chuckle.

[@T7_H3rbz]

Gerald Bull is not the man we asked for, but the man we deserved

[@heidirabenau511]

I love that you put Space Gun go Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr on the thumbnail!

[@pharmdiddy5120]

Can we just stop and appreciate how cool the concept of "space cannon" is? Like really, what could be cooler than a space cannon?

[@rodchallis8031]

I remember an investigative report (either CBC or CTV) on Bull, sometime in the early 90's, after he was murdered. The whole story about HARP, gun running and working for Iraq seemed like and Ian Fleming plot line.

[@Dr.Kay_R]

*"Everyone knew that Space artillery was completely useless in the era of Guided Missiles."* Israel & US:- _"I know but still no"_

[@Dr.Kay_R]

I know that guided missiles cost money whereas artillery can be used en masse to cause havoc.

[@gryph01]

I read about Project HARP. It was a neat experiment.

[@162manoj]

you mean a sound experiment?

[@gryph01]

@@162manoj The punnery is strong with you. 😁

[@magister61]

I remember have watched in TV years ago a movie despicting the fantastic life of Mr. Gerard Bull and his crazy cannon ideas

[@cgarzs]

That Gerald Bull guy really REALLY went above and beyond for the sake of unlocking space. I really admire his desire to leave this planet. I feel the same way.

[@Chris-ok4zo]

I can only imagine the noise this beast makes. I'd think we were going to war with the moon.

[@shawn8093]

The noise was the least of our problems (I am a Barbadian). Each shot of the gun would shake houses, and sometimes crack foundations.

[@Chris-ok4zo]

@@shawn8093 That just makes the fact it exists and was tested even better.

[@ericlotze7724]

It was mentioned as a bit of a reference at 17:30, but a Part 2 with coverage of “Quick Launch”, and maybe even details Electromagnetic Launch designs (although that may deserve ANOTHER video) would be neat! Granted probably plenty on your plate as is.

[@MisterNohbdy]

he already did a video on SpinLaunch, which is what he was referencing: kzbin.info/www/bejne/r6PGZ2ZopM6fjdE

[@ericlotze7724]

@@MisterNohbdy True yeah, dumb of me to miss it oof, the quicklaunch / electromagnetic stuff still stands. I’ll edit out the Spinlaunch bit.

[@thepeff]

I find it interesting how polyethylene was the material used for the expansion rings. For munitions the choice is usually pure copper so it will deform and engage with the rifling in the barrel.

[@viktorstojanovic9007]

I think this barrel didn't have rifling

[@quintusfabiusmaximus8700]

my only wish is Magnetic accelerator cannon or MAC for short.

[@Exentity]

Could you look into the Lucy spacecraft by chance? I feel like it doesn’t get enough attention on KZbin.

[@viltsuville1]

I'm sure they're working on that already, they love Lockheed Martin technology😉

[@bretdaley6869]

I'm so rooting for spin launch, the engineering behind the project is amazing

[@AlteraLin]

Its dead on arrival. The whole idea is idiotic.

[@Electric999999]

I thought that altitude record was held by that one manhole cover that was launcher by underground nuclear weapon test.

[@thecrazyfarmboy]

That was calculated to have achieved escape velocity, however being such an un-aerodynamic shape, it most likely burned up in the atmosphere while still travelling upwards. They never did measure its actual height reached, only it's initial velocity after detonation

[@thecrazyfarmboy]

I don't know if their escape velocity calculation factored in the amount of drag it had, but I wouldn't even be surprised if the manhole cover slowed down before fully disintegrating and just fell back to earth somewhere. It would have been experiencing huge amounts of Gs slowing it down the entire time it flew

[@metatechhd]

Thanks for clarifying that! It's always important to ensure that the information we share is accurate. It's interesting to learn that surplus naval propellant was used instead of black powder. I appreciate you sharing your knowledge and helping to clarify the information presented in the video. 🤔👍📖

[@Pyotyrpyotyrpyotyr]

@Real engineering are you sure it's black powder and not cordite? The footage doesn't have that much smoke. And I doubt black powder could achieve those pressures. Also because they used16 inch barrels I'm pretty sure they just recycled Battleship barrels which use cordite as their propellant. They even use the same type of propellant bags as you showed in the footage.

[@theotherohlourdespadua1131]

The US Navy doesn't use cordite as that is a Royal Navy specialty. Most WW2 surplus charges are instead of black powder nitrocellulose based explosives...

[@Pyotyrpyotyrpyotyr]

Yes I watched Battleship New Jersey video and a 4mins he mentions nitrocellulos. But nitrocellulose is definitely NOT black powder. So I still think this is a mistake. Here's a link to the battleship New Jersey video kzbin.info/www/bejne/o3ekm4OaoK6hmtU

[@brothergrimaldus3836]

Cordite is a British smokeless powder in squiggly strips. Smokeless powder in US battleship guns are cylinders about 3in. They are not made of cordite but nitro-cellulose.

[@Pyotyrpyotyrpyotyr]

​@@PADOYLE sweet! Good to know. He could have just called it "powder" instead of calling it "black powder".

[@homiedaclown4381]

It would have been cool, if a bit gratuitous, to have the HARP cannon fire a projectile horizontally at a ship just to see what happens

[@billkramme5443]

Glad to hear Antidote X by Van Sandano in the music bed (starting at 4:04). A great track that I first heard in CGP Grey videos.

[@i3looi2]

The proper way to do it would involve a huge railgun ramp on top of a hill/mountain , probably 1-2km long.. to allow proggresive acceleration.

[@theairstig9164]

Launching a 25Kg projectile in to space 450km from the surface and having it appear there briefly before falling f back down would take 110 MJ in a vacuum. It’s more like 250 MJ when losses are taken into account. That is 30 to 70 KWH in the space of a few seconds. How does this energy get stored and expended without using gunpowder? You railgun would need to be at least 8km long. Possibly a lot more than this depending on efficiencies and location on the earth

[@joephus420]

Centrifugal launches are definitely carrying the space projectile torch these days! Go SpinLaunch!

[@TheWebstaff]

Let's revisit this comment in 10 years.. Spinlaunch Vs gun. Gun everytime.

[@likilike501]

Just imagine how much stronger/efficient they could make this gun just by creating low pressure in the barrel. In the best case some level of vacuum but that could become really costly at that age pretty quickly. SmarterEveryDay has amazing videos on his supersonic baseball air cannon. That cannon can achieve around Mach 1.6 with just compressed air and vacuum. So in short they could make it in to Vacuum cannon.

[@bocahdongo7769]

Nah, it's dumb idea to use vacuum as a booster since vacuum is only had 100 kpa pressure gradient. With insanely complex mechanism Instead, we can use light hydrogen gas in between propellant and projectile, and then pressurize up to 350 kpa pressure gradient before firing. Which had 3.5 times more initial pressure gradient and energy than vacuum with less complex mechanism due to both end already sealed. That way it's much more elegant and genius- -OH WAIT THEY ALREADY DID IT WITH LIGHT GAS GUN! So here we go, seemingly ancient technology still wins

[@michaelwallace9291]

I never heard of this project. Thank you

[@petdemrabbits5103]

Commander Gilmour : Sir. Are you suggesting that we blow up the moon? The President : Would you miss it? [looks around the table] The President : Would you miss it?

[@Dr.Kay_R]

*"Why was Barbaros chosen?"* My brain:- _"Perhaps because of the large ocean ahead of it and Equatorial spin assistance?"_ Me after he gave the same reason:-👁️👄👁️

[@ThCp__]

We really need to talk about that thumbnail.

[@sabersz]

Space gun go brrrrrrrr, it's self explanatory

[@theknifedude1881]

Probably a nice place to spend some time while you are researching your project. I’m really surprised black powder was the chosen propellant. I would think some more modern propellant would have been used,but I guess I would have been wrong.

[@suspectsn0thing]

As far as I can tell, it was probably a smokeless propellant and the narrator misspoke, since the two are sometimes used interchangeably in colloquial speech. You can tell this is the case, because if there's ever an opportunity to be pedantic about firearms terminology, the comments will be FLOODED with people eager to show how much they know about how guns _really_ work, which appears to have happened here.

[@jehffvredition2026]

i listened to a podcast on the guy who headed this project and he is genuinely insane

[@ollietizzard5180]

As something of an Urbexer, I had a chance to visit the remains of this gun in Barbados on my honeymoon, but figured wifey wouldn't appreciate me dragging her around it. To this day it is one of the biggest regrets of my marriage....

[@higgsbonbon]

Okay but do you have delivery chests at the destination? And are they properly wired?

[@sampfrost]

galacticraft?

[@cf453]

A modded Factorio joke, and I’m here for it.

[@ELF_Productions]

i live in barbados and some of my family worked on the project. it was a super cool gun

[@devial9879]

this is the best thumbnail you've ever made Brian

[@deltaecho1776]

The gun, in fact, did not reach space. It never left the ground. The projectile technically reached space. Also, no brrrrr. Just a singular boom. All the disappointments!

[@jrohit1110]

Guns, how... ...American

[@PBMS123]

Just FYI, the Sabot is the part the fits around the sub calibre projectile, allowing it to sit centred in the barrel, and not the projectile it self. It's also NOT PIE-zo-electric. It's Pee-et-zo. The Pie in pietzo is not pronounced literally like Pie, it's separate syllables. Pi-et-zo

[@poodlescone9700]

This concept could work on low G bodies like the moon.

[@MrBrassporkchop]

like a low rider 1980 El Camino?

[@mycroft1905]

"Loaded with over half a metric ton of black powder?" No no no. Modern propellant is not black powder.

[@AWACSROCKET]

The thumbnail just says "space gun go brrrrr" lol

[@onetrickhorse]

Great video, as usual, thank you! But.... (there's always a but)... the space gun may not actually hold the record for the highest altitude projectile ever launched (certainly by humanity anyway). Let me elaborate... In 1956/1957, the USA did a series of nuclear weapons tests, 'Operation Plumbbob' at the Nevada Test Site, where one such test, Pascal-B, may have been responsible for the fastest projectile in recorded history. Two tests were both conducted underground in boreholes 500 ft deep, where the weapons were lowered into the boreholes, then covered with concrete. During Pascal-A, the test immediately vaporised the concrete and blasted a jet of plasma skywards, resulting in a poor test objective result. Pascal-B was conducted in a similar fashion, with the same concrete plug and depth, but this time with a steel 'manhole' cover weighing 2000 lbs welded over the borehole. When the test was conducted, the steel cover was immediately blasted upward at a speed of roughly 150,000 mph (66 km/s), which was only estimated by looking at high speed camera footage of the event which managed to catch the cover mid-launch in only one single frame post-detonation. Subsequently, speculation among scientists at the time concluded that the sheer velocity of the cover would have vaporised it promptly as it rose, while others believe at least some of it would have made it past the earth's atmosphere. Because the cover was travelling vastly greater than earth gravitational escape velocity, if any of it did survive the launch, it is likely hurtling through the solar system somewhere very far away. No one knows for sure of course, as only one frame managed to capture it during ascent. But if it did survive at all, then it is by far, not only the fastest man made object, but also the fastest projectile.

[@lukefuller284]

17:15 "No projectile can exceed the velocity of the propellant pushing it" Derek of Veritasium: "We shall see..."