Anyone else into homemade Ballistics\Pyrotechnics?

[JaiNobeZ]

If people are truly interested in working with things that go boom and you are over 16 then you can do this: every state that has firworks displays use people to set them up and set them off, that means you can get training from the company in that state, firework companys train people every year all you have to do is look them up in the phone book where they are located and call and tell them you are intrested in becoming a PYROECHNICAN ! they will ask you a few questions and if all is well they will invite you to there next training sesion.

Omg! Thank you so much! I've been wanting to get involved in pyrotechnics professionally for years but not known how, and now everyone is being strongly encouraged to do as many "extra-curricular activities" related with what we want to do professionally but there's no easy-to-join pyrotechnics courses as far as I'm aware. Now I'll have something to thrust in their faces & shut them up.

I live in Britain, so I'm not sure if this'll work for me, but I'll definitely try it!

 

[shockwave88]

. Second is use long fuses and run the fuck away. .

I lolled

 

[Glutton]

I always end up making something nice for fourth of July. I have access to limitless amounts of free iron oxide powder But carefulness is always important.

I got in trouble for making an exploding r/c car when I was 14. Luckily they only charged me with reckless burning, and I just had to do community service. Coulda been alot worse.

 

[ossumguywill]

I always end up making something nice for fourth of July. I have access to limitless amounts of free iron oxide powder But carefulness is always important.

I got in trouble for making an exploding r/c car when I was 14. Luckily they only charged me with reckless burning, and I just had to do community service. Coulda been alot worse.

the trick with the RC car is not to get caught, and usually a safe place is one where you won't get caught. I'm thinking a big dirt field, plenty of that around here :evil: . Also, where you get your iron oxide? I have to buy thermite stuff on ebay.... also any tips for a better ignition source than magnesium? It never works for me, and fireworks work maybe a quarter of the time.

will

 

[photonaholic]

gee when I was a teenager I blew up real cars (junkers)

That was what started the feud with my neighbors.

way back around 1979 their oldest son had a hopped up VW beetle sitting in the yard.

The mother had told her son "get that piece of crap out of my yard, or I will have it towed"

So in a clever attempt to keep his car (he actually wanted the upgrades out of it) he called over to a young Wayne (me) and said "hey Harvey, want this car?"

So of course I said yes....

We hooked onto it with my dads garden tractor and pulled it 150 feet till it was over the property line. (Now mind you Chuck had no intentions of literally giving me this car, he figured what was a 14 year old nerd going to do about it when he took it back)

The next morning I hooked onto it again with the garden tractor and pulled it a few hundred feet further onto our property, then I came into the house and I found this big heavy *** ******, I took it apart and removed all of the insides leaving this big hollow shell that was rated for some unreal PSI bursting pressure.

My friend up the street had a bunch of black powder, his father was into muzzle loaders, so there was always 5 or more 1 pound cans of it in his ammo room.

so we stole about 3/4 pound of his dads black powder and put it in a plastic bag, then put this inside that *******, ran some wires, yada yada....

then I placed this thing inside that VW with a glass jar filled with gas.

BOOM that bug went up in a ball of fire, destroyed about everything.

The next day Chuck showed up with his buddy and a tool box looking to strip that car down, only to find a roached out cinder.

so the feud began, it drags on to this day.... Only his parents are retired and home 24/7 now.

They petition against my track, complain about my reptiles, and are just intolerable.

When mom passed away and left me this place, I moved back in and they have been impossible to live next door to since.

 

[Glutton]

Yeah, I was an idiot and drove it around in my parking lot when I blew it up. It was funny to see the look on my unsuspecting friends face...not so much the look on my neighbors faces though.

 

[ZRTMWA]

Just turned 17, that pyrotechnicians class sounds awesome! I wish my parents would let me buy flash powder. I would use it as responsibly as a teenager with explosives can jk. I'm always very serious when it comes to blowing up stuff. Anyone else here tred to make a potato gun? I got it all made up but it wouldn't ignite the propane. Something to do with having 4% propane and 96% oxygen I think.

 

[digital_blue]

I've blown up a few cars back when I was about 16. The first car was simply filled with propane gas. It wasn't too spectacular(just broken windows and a fireball) since I wasn't considering stoichiometric ratios.

The second was done with 8 garbage bags full of an oxy-acetylene mixture from a torch. The entire roof had "peeled open" like a sardine can and the doors were literally ripped off the hinges.The blast was also stupidly loud, I lost my hearing for about 3 days.

My third attempt (realize I said attempt) was experimentation with using gasoline fumes. This is a serious DO NOT TRY AT HOME! We had a jerry can of aviation gas and we thought it'd be a smart idea to use a hotplate to vaporize the gas inside the car. We ended up setting the car on fire instead of a spectacular explosion.

 

[ossumguywill]

@photonaholic
Haha, he should have been more clear. It's not your fault you blew it up. At my school, the tradition is that a senior will spend 3 months in the second semester on a big project and then do a presentation. One kid did firefighting, and for his presentation he filled a car with gasoline and put it out. It was very cool, the glass expands from heat then explodes outwards.
@Glutton-My friend is into parkour, so when he visited his relatives in NYC, to test their skills they set off 3 bottle bombs in a parking lot then parkoured away from the cops :crackup: they made sure to do it an area where no people or cars were around, so no damage done (thankfully, they could have hurt themselves)

@ZRTMWA
You have paypal, don't you? Paypal doesn't check to see if you're over 18..... and about the potato gun, the most common problem is a poor ignition system. You should try getting a piezo barbeque lighter, they have a little metal enclosure with the spark terminals at a set distance that is designed to deliver the right sized spark, with the right current to light gases like propane or butane. It works better than any of my homemade spark gaps.
@digital_blue
oxyacetylene is a crazy gas, have you ever tried making oxyacetylene suds (push the gas through soapy water) and then shooting it with a fire arrow? I havent, but I know someone who has... he made it sound REALLY crazy. Like blow a hole through the fence next to the explosion crazy.

 

[digital_blue]

Your soap suds idea may not work too well since acetylene is a "heavier than air" gas; it tends to "sink" and you'll have a hard time getting it to rise out of the container you're bubbling it through...

 

[ColdStl]

I've built this one, but I used an old stun gun and a triple stage ignition setup...

I have never shot incendiary devices from mine. It must be cool to live in Norway.

 

[ossumguywill]

Your soap suds idea may not work too well since acetylene is a "heavier than air" gas; it tends to "sink" and you'll have a hard time getting it to rise out of the container you're bubbling it through...

He took a bathtub, and filled just a few inches with soap water. He laid pipe with holes in it along the bottom, then pumped oxyacetylene through the pipe. It filled the tub with acetylene suds, and like you said, it started to sag when it came out and then it spilled over. At this point he shot the fire arrow into it, and the blast blew some of the boards straight off the fence next to the tub.

will

 

[ZRTMWA]

...
@ZRTMWA
You have paypal, don't you? Paypal doesn't check to see if you're over 18..... and about the potato gun, the most common problem is a poor ignition system. You should try getting a piezo barbeque lighter, they have a little metal enclosure with the spark terminals at a set distance that is designed to deliver the right sized spark, with the right current to light gases like propane or butane. It works better than any of my homemade spark gaps...

I did pull apart a BBQ igniter not sure if it was Piezo. I linked it up so it had dual ignition, in other words two sparks, which should've led to higher pressure in the chamber. I could clearly see two sparks whenever I tested it but it would never ignite the propane or WD40 or whatever I tried.

I've built this one, but I used an old stun gun and a triple stage ignitor setup...

I have never shot incendiary devices from mine. It must be cool to live in Norway.

That is absolutely awesome. Makes me wish mine worked...

 

[ColdStl]

I did pull apart a BBQ igniter not sure if it was Piezo. I linked it up so it had dual ignition, in other words two sparks, which should've led to higher pressure in the chamber. I could clearly see two sparks whenever I tested it but it would never ignite the propane or WD40 or whatever I tried.





That is absolutely awesome. Makes me wish mine worked...

IIRC those bbq ignitors from Lowes/HomeDepot cost about ~$9. A cheap stun gun cost under $20. They are easy to modify with pliers, solder (or use the crimp style connectors), wire and a little bit of heat shrink tubing. I wired in a 6v 80mm brush less fan to help mix air/fuel, and to clear the residual fumes after firing it. Most everyone I have talked to usually refers to the spud gun guy's website, I copied the design from The Monkey Base (bigger guns).

Also... The spudfiles (I think that is the website) has a page that shows the law concerning the construction/ownership of spud guns, and their legality. It's still a good idea to check with your local LE agency.

 

[HIMNL9]

Uh ..... and i always tought i was the only one crazy enough for play with some of these things, make self-detonating gas bombs, make my own fireworks, do insane experiments for fun ..... glad to see that i'm in good company :crackup:

(but remember, always safety first )

 

[ossumguywill]

^by the self-detonating gas bomb, do you mean the one that involves a condom and a jar?

I did pull apart a BBQ igniter not sure if it was Piezo. I linked it up so it had dual ignition, in other words two sparks, which should've led to higher pressure in the chamber. I could clearly see two sparks whenever I tested it but it would never ignite the propane or WD40 or whatever I tried.

The igniter that I used had a big old red button and we designed to be installed in the barbeque, not from one of those handheld lighter things. Those barely work. The one that I got gave a nice, big, bright spark.