How to Build a Pirate Cannon

Materials

cannon

• 5' 8" - sewer pipe
• sill seal
• flat black spray paint
• frisbee
• 2" pipe
• 3" ball
• styrofoam
• wood screws
• staple gun
• fun-noodle

truck

• 2x4s
• wood screws
• 2" pipe bracket (2)
• towel and brown fabric dye (optional)

Instructions:

Build the rear of the cannon:

Cut a 1" section of 2" PVC and place it between a frisbee and a 3" ball. To secure the pieces together, drill a hole in the center of the frisbee and ball and run a threaded metal bar through everything and cap the ends with large nuts. Once everything is tightly together, spray paint the whole thing black.

Attach the rear to the cannon:

The lip of the frisbee fits perfectly over the edge of the sewer pipe. To secure it, insert four wood screws through the lip into the pipe.

Add texture to the cannon barrel:

Using the sill sealer, cut strips the circumference of the pipe and use a staple gun to hold the strips in place. The easiest way to do this is to start at the rear and work toward the open end. The contours on the open end of the pipe require customized thinner strips that you'll have to measure individually. Once the entire pipe is covered, paint the foam with black spray paint.

Build the barrel muzzle:

The default diameter of an 8" sewer pipe is, of course, 8". If you look at a real cannon, you'll notice that they have much smaller openings. To achieved this look, buy a pre-cut round piece of styrofoam that is the same circumference or larger and manually shave off the exterior until it fits snugly into the end of the sewer pipe. Cut a center hole of 3 1/2". To paint the styrofoam, use black acrylic paint and brush (don't use spray paint).

Build the truck:

The cannon truck is made from old 2x4s that I had lying around and some wood screws. Here are the basic dimensions of my truck.

Once the truck is assembled, add a 2" pipe bracket to each side and cut notches into the wood beneath them to create circular opening for the cannon 'arms'. Optionally, take some brown towels (I dyed an old white towel brown) and make cushions for your cannon to rest on. These help prevent the paint on your cannon from getting scratched.

Build the cannon 'arms':

These are built last so that they are detachable and so much about their design depended on the finished truck and cannon. Cut sections of a fun-noodle and spray paint black.

Finished cannon:

Additional pictures can be found here.