Posted: 7/5/2017 7:39:10 PM EDT
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Every Independence day celebration gets a little more crazy with the fireworks. At this point i don't know why there arent any serious injuries. With that in mind i'd like to automate or at least move the igniting task to something safer (and a little more remote).
Any of you guys fireworks pros or have any experience with lighting up mortar fuses electronically? |
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Ni Chrome wire and a 6v cell. Get a cheap switch and some 2 conductor cable. Not that hard. Basically model rocket ignition gear. |
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I don't think the commercial systems are cheap. Our small town puts on a good show but they have 4 guys setting off the professional mortars with red road flares.
Something like a model rocket ignition system would work. Estes' sucks though. I ended up making my own. Downside to this would be the setup. You could run bunch of wires and switch out what is connected to the box or take a minute or two to move it and attach a new igniter. Youtube has some ideas as well. |
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When I was a kid we would take tiny rolled up threads of steel wool attached to two wires, and use a 9 volt battery. 0000 steel whool, small amount twisted up and wrapped around the fuse. Lawn mower battery and a relay controlled via a momentary push button. If you want a garunteed ignition, geind up a couple sparklers, sprinkle the sparkler poweder into the steel whool before twisting it up, then wrap it around the fuse and wrap a small piece of aluminum foil over the steel whool. Old cat5 cable gives ya solid core wire to shape into small hooks which are easily placed into the steel whool and you have the choice of any length if pulling from a spool. |
| Family time on the fourth demands good quality fireworks. One can buy all the nuts and bolts and assemble them yourself the instructions are there and the people that sell them to you will show you how. All of this in/ustabe in MT. One or all members help assemble, one guy a week. Attach wires to a "board" and hook it up to truck batteries. Easy stuff. You will need input from everybody as to the MUSIC you can "sink" to the show, we chose a bunch of Jessie Cook stuff. You will also need a backhoe and piping to stand in the ground, ours dug to 3-5ft These are 3" up to 10" and are the real thing. Very fun. |
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https://shootfirefly.com/ |
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Every Independence day celebration gets a little more crazy with the fireworks. At this point i don't know why there arent any serious injuries. With that in mind i'd like to automate or at least move the igniting task to something safer (and a little more remote). Any of you guys fireworks pros or have any experience with lighting up mortar fuses electronically? There's a metal thing with this flammable black goop on the tip that ignites when electricity passes through. When that black stuff ignites, it burns the solid rocket fuel of model rockets which then launches the rocket into the sky. 
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You might want to check this out.
256 Channel Firework Controller Use two cheap 16-relay boards to multiplex and remotely control up to 256 channels of firey madness Link |
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You might want to check this out. 256 Channel Firework Controller Use two cheap 16-relay boards to multiplex and remotely control up to 256 channels of firey madness Link have another board with a single nail in it.run a wire from the single nail to each ignigter hooked up to your fireworks. Run a wire from the other lead of each igniter to a different nail on the board witness the row of boards. Take a car battery and connect the negative to the single nail. Run a heavy lead to a metal bar with an insulated handle. Run the bar along the row of nails to trigger the fireworks, as slowly or quickly as you want... |
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OP if serious about getting into some nice synchro and choreography
the basic cobra systems which are easily expandable to pro level is a great place to start there are cheaper systems that will let you shoot wireless but if you are the least bit serious then start with a cobra system . link http://cobrafiringsystems.com/ a good place to read about using the systems is pyro fan link to cobra forum http://www.pyrofan.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?66-Cobra-Firing-System consumer E=match is now available without needing any ATF permits and storage requirements i currently run the 185R2 with several modules now. our club can put together over 100 mods to shoot huge shows now. at the same site I posted with the forum there are subforums with clubs around the country |
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I don't think the commercial systems are cheap. Our small town puts on a good show but they have 4 guys setting off the professional mortars with red road flares. And you are right, pro boards are (well, were) quite expensive. I only ever did an electrical shoot once - it was shot from a barge in the middle of the Potomac, so there was no room for shooters. God what a pain in the ass. Control board was intrinsically safe, it took forever to set up, a bunch didn't ignite, and one went off randomly in the afternoon as we were seeing up. The fire Marshall came storming in, threatening us with arrest for setting off pyro outside of the permit boundaries, until we showed him that there were no batteries in or near the board. Some of the problems were likely the crewchief and board operator. But give me a fusee and a wide open field any day. And fuck music - if you are doing it right there's pyro the air at all times, and the crowd wouldn't hear the tunes anyway. Now get off my lawn! Or at least move 70' away for each inch in diameter of the largest mortar tube. |
Terry could have used something like that.
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You could use model rocket launcher fuses. There's a metal thing with this flammable black goop on the tip that ignites when electricity passes through. When that black stuff ignites, it burns the solid rocket fuel of model rockets which then launches the rocket into the sky. [url]http://img.hobbylobby.com/sys-master/root/h12/h4c/h00/8925787553822/354738[5].jpg[/url] 
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As was posted, you want e-matches. You can get them straight from China on eBay. All sorts of lead lengths and all sorts of quantities.
Next you'll need some sort of electronic ignition system. As was mentioned there are off the shelf ones or you can build your own. With the off the shelf stuff you can get as expensive and complex as your imagination and wallet will allow. Again, you can get some straight from China on eBay. No idea how good these are as I went with a simple wired, push button home built ignition system. Runs off a small 12v 7ah battery and uses a couple strands of 22/10. Lastly, you'll need a mortar rack of some sort. A lot of folks line their tubes up into narrow rows or blocks of tubes. I wanted mine a little more spread out so it could be more easily reloaded. Has 40 tubes and a couple extra wire terminals for igniting repeaters and rockets. This is the only photo I've got handy of it but it was from mid build so you don't see all the e-match wire terminals. 
When getting tubes, do NOT use white PVC! If you have an in tube detonation, it will turn into shrapnel. Use HDPE tubes correctly sized for your shells. If a shell detonates in that, it will just split. Also, if it isn't correctly sized, your shells won't get the loft they need and detonate too low. I got my tubes, pre-plugged and correct size, from Pyroboom. |
| That looks awesome. I want to make my own rack sometime. We really like the Excaliber canister shells. A tight fit is very important. We had a couple very small canisters blow up this year and that is exciting. A tiny mortar shell is still hazardous at 20' away. |
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I would also like to fancy it up a bit.. set up some tubes and have groups of them go off at the same time, or at least some type of choreography. |
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That looks awesome. I want to make my own rack sometime. We really like the Excaliber canister shells. A tight fit is very important. We had a couple very small canisters blow up this year and that is exciting. A tiny mortar shell is still hazardous at 20' away. Quoted:
That looks awesome. I want to make my own rack sometime. We really like the Excaliber canister shells. A tight fit is very important. We had a couple very small canisters blow up this year and that is exciting. A tiny mortar shell is still hazardous at 20' away. I shot Vienna the year before that. The site was bad. It was a baseball field next to a library - we set up on the diamond, the crowd was just past the outfield fence. We were limited to a very small space due to the setbacks from other structures (70'/inch diameter of the largest mortar), and everything was just too close together. The next year (when the accident happened) Shaefer literally sent his best crew (for a not very large shoot) because that site was so risky. But there's fuck all you can do except run when the cake blows up and the tubes start firing in all directions horizontally, also striking and overturning the OTHER pyro that was set up. I was on a shoot in New Jersey that night, and the same thing happened to some of our finale cakes. Apparently the about 1/4 of the cakes had the load put in the tube upside down - salute on the bottom, launching charge on top. Either horrible QC or industrial mischief. I also learned 2 valuable lessons: first, that if it rained that day, you WILL have low breaks regardless of how well you protect the pyro, just because of the humidity seeping into the launch charges. And second, some fire marshals are government employees like any other - when it comes down to it, they will choose their job. It had been raining all day, there was a short break between storms, and the city manager told us to proceed. The fire marshal *knew* it was dangerous and was going to red tag the show, but the city administrator leaned on him, and the show went on. It was a clusterfuck of epic proportions, and would have been the shoot everyone talked about at the picnic - but for Vienna (well, and another crew where one of the guys hooked up with a local chick at a bar and used suntan lotion as anal lube). In addition to one of our 3" finale boxes blowing up (in this case, the rain was fortunate and it didn't do much), we had breaks at 75', 25', head height, in the tube - I still have a tee shirt with a radial scorch mark where a star hit someone square in the chest. A 6" mortar launched, but didn't burst, coming down whole - picture a 10# cylinder of wet black powder and metal oxides falling from 500-600'. And God knows how many stars failed to ignite and just dropped to the ground. I know it was at least 3, because after packing our shit up until 0300 in torrential rain, policing the area as best we could, and arriving home at 0700, the fire marshall called and demanded we go back to NJ because they had found 3 explosives. I wasn't in any condition to drive anywhere - I almost crashed the truck a bunch of times going home. My crewchief (actually my cousin in law) told the fire marshal to call Kimmel, who proceeded to rip him a new asshole, and "Won't invite us back? Fuck you I already ripped up our contract and I'm not coming back there if you begged me!" They wound up getting the bomb squad out there to pick up 3 2" diameter balls of soaking wet paper and black powder. Turns out they did the shoot next year - the Fire Marshal, the City Manager, (and the city employee he was fucking and whose daughter *really* wanted to see the fireworks that night) had all been fired, and they got about 2/3 the show for 50% higher price. (And yes, I was NOT happy that Shaefer didn't call off the show - he could have, in the contract. He relied on the crewchief to make the call, and as much as I love my cousin in law, he shouldn't have been put in that position. I was ready to go into the City Manager's office and go nose to nose over the contract, but I didn't have the authority. And my crewchief was so overwhelmed by that point (there was WAY more that happened that day than just the rain) that he basically said "Fuck it, we're foing." {no, not an arfcommer, but the sentiment was there}) Anyway, long winded moral is that I'm in favor of doing stupid shit with pyrotechnics (believe me, I didn't do it for 3 summers for the pay). But please, Please, PLEASE be careful. Kimmel Shaefer could be irascible and stubborn, but there's a quote in the link that everyone should heed: "I have to take liability. It was our fireworks show." |