Firecracker to unstick a piston

Hear me out!! I want to have an actual discussion, not stupid comments, about your thoughts on using a firecracker to shock loose a stuck piston. I know it sounds absurd but the more I thought about it, the less silly it sounded. It's a tiny explosion in an area made for explosions and I'm not looking to turn the engine over, just "shock" the piston. I would leave the spark plug out. The motor is a common chev inline 6 and is no good if the piston won't move anyway.
Hmmmm....

 

Lol, the ultimate irony, starting this discussion and asking for serious comments....

 

Sparkplug out, no effect whatsoever. Sparkplug in, no effect whatsover. But try it and see.

 

The sparkplug hole would need to be closed. Both valves would need to be closed. If there's an opening, no "shock wave". If no opening, no way to pop a cap inside. That's the catch.
The position of the frozen piston is connected to the camshaft bone which is connected to the valve bone........ chances are one or both valves are open.
Anyway, the cylinder wall is toast. The piston has to come out to fix that.

 

how big a firecracker? do you plan to do this wearing hearing protection?

 

If you had a hydraulic pump maybe you could use it with a fitting on the plug opening to pump oil or water into the cylinder. Some hand pumps can make a couple thousand PSI.

 

pull the rockers to close the valves,
machine an adapter to screw into a spark plug hole
that a shotgun shell (with shot removed) fits in
screw a cap with firing pin over it and smack it with a hammer.

no, on second thought dont do that

 

Added to the above reply, maybe make an adapter for a zerk fitting and pump it full of grease if the piston is near the top. Should be good for 2000 psi

 

yes a grease gun can put out 2000 psi, you could try that but like said before both valves would have to be closed. And that is the problem, most of the time pistons get stuck because water got in. So how did the water get in? head gasket? if the gasket is blown you will never get the pressure up with a pump. Most of the time water gets in through an open carb, down the intake and, you guessed it, through the open intake valve. and if the valve is open you will never get pressure built up.
An explosion may work better than a pump as the pressure rise would be faster and may overcome a head gasket problem but I don't think it will work if a valve is open.
But let's say you want to try. I would get one of the model rocket engine igniters, these are small wires with some flammable coating on them. you can pull the fuse out of the fire cracker and bend the igniter in half and shove it in the hole where the fuse was. Then take the spark plug and remove the insulator run some small wires through the hole and seal them up with epoxy or something. connect the wires to the igniter leads and screw the whole mess in. I think a 9v battery will set it off.
I say this all kind of tongue in cheek as it would be best to just remove the head and soak it down with something and work it loose.
Anyway let us know how it goes!

 

This sounds like something my 15-year-old mind would cook up, therefore, dangerous and on the knife's edge between stupid and genius. So here goes: empty the contents of four or five firecrackers or an M-80 into the cylinder, being careful not to let any of the powder contact the sparkplug threads (you don't want to set this off prematurely and end up with a sparkplug embedded in your forehead). Then CAREFULLY thread in the sparkplug, attach it to an ignition source and fire it. Seem dangerous enough to you, too? I'm not recommending this, just saying it is how I would have done it at 15. It's amazing that I've managed to live to 73 so far.

 

^^ I like that one, maybe use ether? or hair spray works in the potato gun. set it off with the spark plug.

 

Classic HAMB

 

https://www.ckom.com/2020/07/16/saskatoon-sees-absolute-explosion-in-methamphetamine-use-sps/
Drugs are bad...

 

Hold my beer and watch this.....

 

Stay away from that bunch down at the spit and whittle club, They will put strange Ideas in your head and then have a good laugh when you try them.

 

OMG! LMFAO!

 

Do like Paul said about the valves, connect a grease gun to the spark plug hole. It works, this is how a lot of the old hit and miss engines are freed up! The biggest problem is what to do with all that grease afterward!

 

As long as no one loses a eye, breaks a bone, bleeds on the carpet...make yourself famous.

 

I’ve dreamed up I few unorthodox repairs, but this one just makes me laugh. Thanks for the laugh.

 

A little OT, but as a kid I had a little balsa wood race car that had a hole in the rear to insert a c02 cartridge to propel it. Didn't have one so stuck a firecracker in the hole assuming it would provide the same effect. Blew that poor little car into a hundred pieces. Little firecrackers do have some power.

 

Oh Lord. No matter what the problem, somebody's gonna want to solve it with an explosion. I present Oregon's legendary Exploding Whale:

 

That one is legendary in the Pacific Northwest!!! "Holy flying blubber, Batman!"

 

Just one question, how do you know which hole it needs to go into?

 

Not really, it's an area made for controlled combustion. Faster, uncontrolled combustion is called detonation and can easily happen in engines too when running lean, ignition too far advanced, too low octane rating and so on, this kills engines by hitting them too hard, too fast. You could compare the difference to pushing the piston down all the way with your hand, and hitting it with a hammer. The same muscles deliver the force used, but one actually makes the piston move while the other most likely just breaks the piston.

 

Some great (some crazy) answers here. Most entertaining. I'm just amazed that after 11 years, this is the first post the OP has done and this is the question.

 

Perfect!

 

Engines are designed for combustion. Explosions (detonation) aren't good to them.

 

What wrong with doing it the traditional way, I have used Coke several times over the years and it has always worked. HRP