Product: Snow: Shape
Snowblunderbuss   (+3)  [vote for, against]
<chck chck> pew

Pressing forward on the lever alongside the barrel of your Snowblunderbuss stretches a spring.

As you press the tip of your Snowblunderbuss rifle into the freshly deposited powder of snow the spring oscillates an aluminum/ium bowl, with an hydrophobic coating and spins a perfect snowball.

Drawing back on the lever alongside of the barrel creates negative pressure holding the snowball to the bowl until fully retracted up the barrel, while also stretching the slingshot elastics to launch said perfect snowballs at velocities which would make snowball fights more like paintball.
-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Mar 28 2024

Bowling snow https://www.youtube.../shorts/13ieuEf3rK8
[2 fries shy of a happy meal, Mar 28 2024]

Trying to picture how an oscillating bowl makes a snowball ...

Also, you're trying to use negative pressure to draw the snowball into the muzzle of the weapon, but that would only work if the snow fitted snugly into the bowl, right? And you've made the bowl hydrophobic, so wouldn't that tend to break the seal, and cause the new snowball to just stay on the ground when you lift the blunderbuss?
-- pertinax, Mar 28 2024


Give me a sec.
-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Mar 28 2024


The negative pressure intake is at the centre of the bowl so hydrophobic be damned the ball will stick. This [link] will show you how to make a perfect snowball with a bowl.
-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Mar 28 2024


Unless you have some way to actually compress/pack the snow densely into the mold, I suspect you're gonna have a poof of powder in your face as soon as it leaves the barrel upon firing.
-- 21 Quest, Mar 28 2024


You just need two hemispherical scoops mounted on lever arms like tongs. Pulling the lever operates a cycle of extend - close - retract - open so that the scooped up and compressed snow is left on the hydrophobic non-stick slingshot platform ready for rapid ejection.
-- pocmloc, Mar 28 2024



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