I had the pleasure recently of examining a small land mine, fortunately safely disarmed. This particular mine has a rubber diaphram on the top which when pressed down detonates the mine.

My assumption is that a sudden incease in air pressure would press the diaphram and set it off.

The proposed mine clearance machine is a heavy tracked vehicle like a small bulldozer fitted with a short length of large diameter concrete pipe. Approximately 8 feet in diameter and about 6 feet long. A sort of concrete ring rather than a pipe.

This pipe is mounted on hydraulic lift arms so that it can be lowered towards the ground. When in this position an explosive, heavier than air, gas is released into the ring while a simple coil or mageto device is fed to a spark gap inside the ring. The spark discharge is repeated while the gas flows in and when an explosive mixture is created it explodes and so detonates any mines that may be under the area covered by the explosion.

Most small mines will be contained within the ring and safely vented upwards. In the case of a bigger mine the only loss may be the cheap concrete pipe provided of course that the front of the bulldozer is adequately protected.

After each explosion the vehicle moves foward and repeats the process.

For safety sake the whole system could be remote controlled.
-- KiwiJohn, Jun 03 2004

Mine Clearance http://www.defensel...171999_9906176.html
See bottom of page [BillyBB, Oct 04 2004, last modified Oct 06 2004]

FAE's for mine clearance http://www.defense-...news/6702carpet.htm
[Klaatu, Oct 04 2004, last modified Oct 06 2004]

Giant Viper and the M58 Mine Clearing Line Charge (MICLIC) are effective minfield clearance systems for creating breaching lanes in wartime.

Your system is effective on a smaller scale, potentially less damaging to the environment and less costly.

=> Croissant +

I suggest that instead of creating a field-effect fuel:air detonation, the system should fire a pressure wave from a pipe or pipes. This is less devastating to the environment and less likely to start a brush fire.
-- FloridaManatee, Jun 03 2004


how do you know where the mine is ?
-- SystemAdmin, Jun 03 2004


// how do you know where the mine is ? //

[SystemAdmin] - there is this kind of "whooosh" noise and dirt and fragments fly up everywhere.
-- dobtabulous, Jun 03 2004


sounds feasible.

i thought this was going to be about professional women golfers driving balls into a mine field.
-- xclamp, Jun 03 2004


If you used a compressed air pneumatic cannon to do this, you would not need a machine carrying a huge tank of LPG to be rolling around a minefield.
-- bungston, Jun 03 2004


I like this.
It seems to me you don’t need the containment to make this work (unless it’s windy out).
-- ldischler, Jun 03 2004


I think the containment acts as a method for somewhat-accurately directing the gas blast and for extra shielding for the minesweeper. Perhaps not essential, but better to have it and not need it...
-- shapu, Jun 03 2004


I'm not sure. If we are using explosives, why have a physical minsesweeper enter the field at all?

Couldn't we just fire balloons of explosive gas mixture over the mines? Make 'em a bit heavier than air and it should be fairly simple to get them where we want.
-- RobertKidney, Jun 04 2004


Explosive devices don't always go off - and eliminating duds is hard and dangerous work. This way, if it doesn't go off, you're right there to spark it again.
-- shapu, Jun 04 2004


My understanding was that this is Baked, using those highly destructive gas bombs they were lobbing at the Afghans at one point, rather than vehicular distribution.
-- DrCurry, Jun 04 2004


Why not just resort to using a thick, heavy, metal pipe, enclosed on the ends with a weight rotating around the center, pulling the thing along internally? To steer, I guess you could use the same weight as it is spinning, and have it move the length of the pipe, distributing more weight to one side or the other. This'd need to be remotely operated of course.
-- -lines-, Jul 11 2004


Baked <link>

Google for "FAE mine clearing"
-- Klaatu, Jul 11 2004



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