Is that a car backfiring?

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Transformers blow up nicely, especially when struck by lightning. Had one blow up that held the controls or some such for all the alarms in the apartment building. One nice BLAAAAM and then the alarms start to wail all over the place. Electricity stayed on, alarm wouldn't go off when the code was entered.
Could definitely be mistaken for a gunshot on a less-rainy day.
 
I had a transformer blow outside my home with a good bang when a crow somehow manged to short it out. When I took a look there was one dead crow with a hole in him that looked liked a gun shot - and fifty crows sitting on the wire above giving a loud funeral service.
 
Last monday, (2/25), I'm on my way to work. The first time ever I saw the car in front of me...backfire. If I had not been looking right at the exhaust pipe I would have thought it was a gun shot. Windows up and heater fan blowing did a good job of masking the sound and it sounded like a shot. Was kind of funny.

Mark.
 
The 1st time I smelled...

Quite some time ago...
My uncle picked me up in his 69 rs camaro to go to the mall on a saturday
morning. En route, he pulled into the bank parking lot intending to use the
cash machine. Prior to 8am, no-one else around in the lot except a local LEO
in a marked car.
Front of bank is on the right side of a strip mall on Route 32 in Quaker Hill.
Uncle occupied the parking spot, officers car is stationary-approximately 20 feet away at our 8 o'clock position, officer car is pointing toward us at his 7 o'clock position.
Uncle clutch/brakes car to a stop in the spot. Moves his meatball right arm from the shifter to the column to kill the ingition then lean back to the seat taking his left hand off the wheel because he was about to open the door with his left hand...
Engine is off for about .5 second and I thought the engine backfired. It was
a single loud pop. I looked at my uncles face:( and he groaned. Taking my next breath I smelled... :confused:"What's that smell?" "That's gunpowder, stay put, stay in the car, keep the window up." :uhoh:
Uncle just had a ND due to a faulty "ghetto holster" (inside the belt&pant, muzzle pointing down, sun don't shine).
He opens his door, exits car, shuts door. Briefly the air smelled fresher, then
not. Quickly gets his cash and returns. Again tells me "Don't touch the window." Starts car, reverses out of spot, 1st, 2nd, exit lot, enter road, down the straightaway, finally says "Let's get some fresh air!"
Apparently the LEO assumed the noise was a backfire, his windows were up
too. Uncle got a nice ole slipped disc from the slide on his lower back.
Later on, Auntie wasn't very happy about the hole in the seat and floor.
Hey, at least I got a new video game at the mall!
 
You could actually make a carbureted vehicle backfire intentionally if you turned the ignition off whilst cruising down the road. Stomping the gas during the procedure could help to add some extra "oomph" if desired. My brother discovered this phenomenon when he was 16, and quickly became a practiced hand at coaxing some fairly impressive bangs out of his 1980 Chevette. This was all fun and games until the muffler succumbed to the stress, and my dad had to get it fixed. To say that he was displeased would be cutting it lightly.

I can also make a separate testament to just how loud backfires can be. When I was but a young lad, my dad had about a 1978 Ford truck that he used for cargo duties. One of the most famous features of this vehicle was that it generally required repair every time it was used. Nevertheless, the trash wasn't prone to hauling itself off, so one day he and I strapped in and headed to the landfill. We had gone about a mile when a detonation of epic proportions issued from beneath me. Upon stopping to investigate, we found the muffler split from stem to stern. Even more impressive, when we got home, we learned that my mother had heard it back at the house.

:eek:
 
A backfire will never affect the muffler, what you are referring to is after fire. A backfire is when the fuel is ignited and the explosion goes thru the intake (hence the name backfire). A backfire will generally melt all the o-rings and plastic pieces in any carb or elec ignition car.

Also what you describe by revving up the ingine is after fire and is what is done by vintage car owners. They rev up the car and turn the ignition off and pump the gas, then they have a sparkplug mounted in the muffler which they fire and it throws flames several feet out the back of the muffler. No damage to the car that way.

I will add, this is illegal in most states unless done at a car show on private property, don't try it a red light:what:.
 
As Joe Sarno says to Mr. Longbaugh when they first meet: "One's backfire, three is gunplay."

Kharn
 
As Joe Sarno says to Mr. Longbaugh when they first meet: "One's backfire, three is gunplay."
Click to expand...

I like it...Who's Joe Sarno and Mr. Longbaugh?

I began this thread with:
Whenever I hear a loud bang (a fairly frequent occurrence in a city), I usually assume it is a car backfiring. What is really the most likely explanation...a backfiring car...or a firearm?
Click to expand...

It would have been better stated if I had asked: "Whenever I hear multiple loud bangs...I usually assume it is a car backfiring. What is the most likely explanation?"
 
Tone of sound.

I can -usually- tell by the tone of the sound. We had some real beater cars and I heard backfires on a somewhat regular basis.

I got fooled once by a transformer.
 
Intentional Backfire

When I was in high school I had a 1973 Volkswagen Super Beetle with a bad muffler. I discovered that by feathering the gas pedal just right I could produce a fairly repeatable facsimile of a gunshot. It helped if the car was going down hill.

The road right by the ninth tee of a local golf course was perfect. That was great fun for a slightly anti-social 16 year old until one of the golfers jumping out of their plaid pants turned out to be my girlfriend’s dad. He knew exactly who belonged to that distinctive purple bug.

That weekend MY dad and I fixed the muffler and did a valve job. After that the only way I could make that sound was with dad’s old Remington pump .22 he gifted me that year. We didn’t shoot at the golf course.

I wish I still had that rifle, though.
 
it happens more so with older cars.

a carberated engine running through a straight exaust with no cat-converter or muffler will be more prone to backfire.

i can make my old truck backfire at will, say im going down the road, and i quickly turn the ingition off and on, because the carberated engine is still getting fuel, but no spark, it puts a lot of unburned fuel into the exaust, when the engine is switched back on, the heat causes the unburnt gas to explode.

sometimes the backfire can damage the muffler, cat-converter or cause the exaust pipes to rupture. but in an old truck liek mine it would hurt anything.

actually there is a funny story about this, a buddy of mine was riding around in his truck, and he got the law called on hime because his psyco neighbor though he was shootin at her! turns out it was just the truck backfiring.
 
Back in oh, about '82, I was working the missile field at Warren AFB, WY. I had been assigned standby for Vehicle Section duty on Commander's Option day and our job was to drive out any replacement vehicles to whatever LCF needed their security vehicles swapped out for maintenance. No one liked it, since the minimum round trip was 100 miles and usually it wound up being more like 250 miles. You generally didn't get called until about 1500 hrs (3 o'clock) or later, so everyone hated it, but, I digress.

My buddy for the day and I were bringing in an old Ford pickup that had definitely seen better days. It was having problems with the solenoid overheating, so we could drive it about 25-30 miles before it would backfire and die. Then we had to wait about 20 minutes for it to cool down so we could start it and go another few miles down the road. About 45 miles east of Cheyenne on I-80 is Antelope Junction, a tiny town on the Wyoming-Nebraska border. Sure enough, the truck started backfiring just as we got into Antelope and died just west of the last on ramp from town.

After we had been sitting there for about 10 minutes waiting for it to cool down, we noticed in the rear view mirrors a cop from Antelope pulling on to the interstate, lights and siren, pedal to the metal. We were watching him, wondering where he was going in such a hurry, when he screeched to a halt behind us, sliding to a stop at a 45 degree angle 10 feet off the back bumper of our truck. He jumped out with a 1911 unholstered, started yelling at us to show our hands and proceeded to get us out of the vehicle in felony stop fashion. Fortunately for us and him, we weren't typically armed for Vehicle Section duty since we weren't technically on post.

We got out of the vehicle as directed, tried to calm him down and he looked in the truck and demanded to search the vehicle. We refused until we contacted base and got authorization from our commander (he was out of his jurisdiction anyway) and let him look behind the seat. It seems that someone in town had heard the backfiring and called us in for shooting up the town. :rolleyes:

Had we had our M-16's it would have been a much stickier situation since there was no way we would have allowed him to disarm us to check to see if they had been fired. It was just as well that we weren't armed. We explained to him about the truck backfiring and advised him that if we had had classified material and weapons we would have had a very sticky standoff situation. He seemed rather unimpressed with this, but I found out later that the U.S. Marshal for the district was contacted and the chief of the Antelope PD was told in no uncertain terms that his officers had no authorization to stop Air Force vehicles on the interstate. It could have been ugly but it turned out to be almost comical, with an almost (and I really mean this) hysterical local cop trying to bully two Air Force cops, especially nuke security forces. I think what set him off so much was that we weren't really impressed by his 1911. :rolleyes:

The darn truck died two more times before we finally got it back to base at 2030 hrs. We should have been off standby at 1630 and I could have been drinking beer. :cuss:
 
I've seen a few superchargers totalled by backfires,and they ain't cheap:cuss:!I had a ford escort in college that would backfire and afterfire if you revved it high enough and then held the clutch long enough before shifting into the next gear.Dang wonder it lasted long as it did:D.My '92 Harley FXR will backfire if it's not warmed up properly before taking off and tailgaters back of REAL quick when I modulate the kill button at highway speed and she spits fire out both pipes:D!
 
I had an atv backfire on me. Scared me because I hadn't heard anything backfire before.
 
Unfortunately since you wear hearing protection you dont know what real gunfire sounds like. But it is easy to tell backfiring and gunfire apart. I would put $100 that 99.9% of the sounds your hearing are backfires. So unless you here a crack,pop or hiss, relax and dont stress on it.
 
Well Hopefully not

No you wont hear that from to far away, if you hear that you almost got whacked. You might hear it from oh about 50-60 feet away depending on conditions. In my opinion gun shots typically have a sharper sound and echo more as well if that helps, a car has a little more bass.
 
In my opinion gun shots typically have a sharper sound and echo more as well if that helps, a car has a little more bass.
Click to expand...

That helps...thanks. Perhaps I should remove my hearing protection and stand off 100 feet or so while my buddy shoots.
 
Ya that would probably help you distinguish the sound, besides you wont go deaf(at least right away) If you stand closer you will be fine your ears mine ring for a little bit. I have been around literally thousands of round fired through my gun or buddies and no hearing loss yet. But thenagain I am still young. Wait hold on I think my wife is calling I cant hear what she is saying!! haha jk
 
Good story, SACP. Was it against regs for you be armed off post?
Click to expand...

Using the definition of "on post" as being on duty in a posted security position and "off post" as being on duty but not in a posted security position, yes. We were in fatigues and Vehicle Section duty was similar to being on KP, in that no weapons were required so none were issued. NCO's would be tasked with vehicle delivery while airmen would wind up washing and fueling vehicles in the Security Police motor pool. Usually it wound up being a day off waiting by the phone and you only had to be on standby from 0730 to 1630, but you still couldn't drink and had to be able to report in uniform within 30 minutes of being called. That's why we hated getting the call at 1500, because it usually meant at least 4 hours of driving. :fire:

You know how kids are, especially when you could be drinking beer and had to wait. :(
 
I have a 85 5L chevy that backfires a lot less since I found the vac leak and fixed it. Now it just backfires because the timing is way off. Might fix that this weekend.
 
My buddy drives a 96 GMC Suburban. About two months ago, we discovered his distributor cap was shot and the car would randomly die at normal speeds. If he stayed on the accelerator, it'd restart-with a real loud bang. I was driving about a car length behind him and one lane over when it did it one day-shot about 4 feet of flame out the tailpipe. we finally got it changed the next day. It sounded sorta like gunfire, but I could tell the difference, having been at the range earlier in the day.
 
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