Heat can be a hacker’s best friend. A little heat can help release a stubborn nut cleanly, and a lot of heat can melt a rusty bolt clean off. An oxy-acetylene torch is handy for these applications, but if you need a more portable setup, and you want enough heat to melt rocks, you might want to look into this field-expedient thermic lance.

Thermic lances have been around a long time in the demolition industry, where cutting steel quickly is a common chore. Commercial thermic lances are just a bundle of steel fuel rods which are set on fire while oxygen is blown down a consumable outer tube. The resulting flame can reach up to 4500°C with impressive results. In need of a similarly destructive device, [NightHawkInLight] came up with a super-simple lance – a small disposable tank of oxygen and regulator, a length of Tygon tubing, and a piece of 5/8″ steel brake line. No need for fuel rods in this design; the brake line provides both fuel and oxygen containment. As you can see in the video below, lighting the little lance without the usual oxy-acetylene torch is no problem – a “wick” of twisted steel wool is all that’s needed to get the torch going. The results are pretty impressive on both steel and rock.

You say you’re fresh out of brake line and still need some “don’t try this at home” action? No problem at all – just hit up the pantry for the materials needed for this tinfoil and spaghetti thermic lance.

Don’t forget the oxygen fired bacon-lance, as well.

DIY Thermic lance. FTW! This is why I love HaD. Excuse me, I’m going to go melt rocks and open bank safes now

this why i like the weekly instructables email. a not insignificant had posts stem from that email blast

This is why I like being subscribed to NightHawkInLight’s (and others like him) YouTube channel.

i was wondering how i was going to cut up that roughstock for later use, this gave me an excitingly fun way to do it, i wonder if the oxygen flow from expired medical bottles will do, only one way to find out.

Oxygen is oxygen. Medical grade simply means it has no contaminants or a far lower amount that welding grade. If you can get hold of an oxygen concentrator that still works, it can be used for light duty welding. Jewelers love them, hook up to an O2 concentrator and a gas pipe for cheap and endless torch power.

i was wondering about the flow rate, not so much the chemistry of it but thank you for the clarifications and the oxygen concentrator trick.

No, please no. Expired medical cylinders are dangerous, please consider something that you are able to reduce to a harmless state while keeping your watch on;

All it take is oxygen and a spanner…

As a aside how does one embed YouTube videos? The helpful link seems to have gone, and neither embed or YouTube tags worked.

What makes the tank expired? It seems the tank was full with a stuck valve and the employee tried to use a wrench to open the valve enough to let the oxygen bleed out.

The same danger presents itself when said cylinder is on a cart following a 90 year old smoker or when a much larger oxygen tank is sitting behind a welder.

The valve itself was stuck, and the workshop man was trying to take off the valve assembly from the head of the tank.

Cylinders are “off” when they no longer pass safety checks, and the degradation of components means that a valve-closed or valve-open failure may only occur once the cylinder is pressurised.

The smoker is likely to set his home on fire (and most sane companies refuse to rent cylinders or concentrators if there is a smoker in the home) and will certainly have a set of safety-checked valves. The welder would also insist on inspected tanks.

“Expired” tanks would not be in either of those examples, and oodain specifically mentioned expired bottles. My point was that would be in advisable, and who would have thought that merely trying to loosen a valve assembly from the top of a tank, without external heat or spark, would result in an explosion, a fire which melted steel, brass, and the severing of a firearm.

There’s an episode of MacGuyver breaking into a safe here somewhere.

I never liked macguyver, it’s all such unscientific and impossible BS, but since you and some others might I can tell you I recently saw a headline that they are probably going to make a new macguyver series, and wikipedia seems to suggest the new one will be a woman.

don’t break my childhood dreams.

@Whatnot Oh no, TV shows aren’t like real life!

Well there was no need to go as far as they did in macgyver IMHO, things like taking two pieces of a mirror and the hold them just right in the sun to crate a laser to cut through things at long range, I mean you can use more realistic science and still have a show.like macgyver.

It’s the same as with the CSI shows, once you start showing two people typing on the same keyboard at the same time to make a VBscipt to hack into a computer or some such silliness you just went too far with your comedy.for a show not meant to be a comedy.

But macgyver was meant for kids some might argue, but that’s my beef, you should respect kids a bit and not put too much nonsense into their heads in my personal view. But that’s just this guy”s view. Take it or leave it.

Are you thinking you are clever enough to coax us into a ruse? Please Whatnot. We haven’t seen a single positive contribution, suggestion or point out of an systemic error to warrant your opinion of MacGuyver.

Tl;dr – This CYKA, never even watched SG-1

He might consider installing a flashback-valve…..

I agree but i think the bottle will have one already? I might be wrong. Also I would use stainless steel shower tubing instead of the plastic, It’s quite cheap and isn’t going to melt on contact with a spark.

No I checked they wouldn’t come with one, So Yeah I would attach one with the shower tubing.

Isn’t ‘steel’ shower tubing always just steel covering a plastic tube? Or are there metal ones that are of a different design?

Those “stainless steel” water hoses are a fine braided stainless cover on a rubber hose. Not exactly what I’d call heat resistant, but just fine for containing mains water pressure.

I thinkso but the metal protectsthe inner tubing.

Why would you need a flashback valve if your fuel is a solid?

Oxygen doesn’t burn… No flashback valve needed.

im confused, you say standard steel(impurities) burn if only you give it enough oxygen???

Anything will burn if given enough oxygen, even diamonds.

Oxygen is already burned.. O doesn’t exist commonly, mostly O2

It is just rusting really really fast.

Difference between rustage, fire, or explosion?? Duration of event.

Technically I think an explosion (or at least a detonation) has to propagate at the faster than the speed of sound, but as long as there is a local increase in air pressure, you’re good.

Can you get any of this effect with 21% oxygen? Something must vary with the percentage of O2.

This is such a neat tool.

no, you need the high oxygen content to oxidize the steel fast enough to get a decent amount of heat. at atmospheric composition you would have all that inert nitrogen preventing your reacting and carrying that heat away.

making permanent magnets with something like this could be possible, you have to hit 700 degrees celcius – then shoot the electricity through at as it slowly cools down.

” No need for fuel rods in this design; the brake line provides both fuel and oxygen containment.” so the brake line is the fuel rod…cool

Does anyone know how copper or aluminum tubing would behave? I saw an article that stated that iron burns via exothermic oxidation of the molten part. Copper is listed as having low-flammability but burns in the same mechanism as Iron. Aluminum has high flammability and burns from the aluminum vapor at the flame end..

I saw a reference to some commercial thermic lances that use aluminum fuel rods for higher temperatures. Think about it – aluminum and iron burning together is basically thermite…

I hear some bent aluminum arrow shafts and an oxygen concentrator calling my name…

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