633 replies to this topic

[al93535]

Yugen-biki: How many layers of your perc+c prime do you roll onto your stars?

[Yugen-biki]

It dempeds on the star.
I prime hard lit stars with two layers or more. First a hot prime, like Veline?s, and then one layer of perc+c prime. If they don't light (I have found that perc+c prime may be hard to get going some times) a layer of BP may be rolled on instead of the perc+c, or ontop of it. This depends on the chemical compabilities of the star and BP!
If the stars are more easily lit, the hot prime is unnecessary.
In the end a layer of about 2mm, on the radius, is rolled on with all the prime.

Each prime is rolled on only one time. If the thickness of prime rolled on is small, no "drying in" problems will form.
The stars are let to dry between the different layers of prime.

[Yugen-biki]

Some time ago I said that I would try blue stars made with ammonium perchlorate and comapre them to potassium perchlorate based ones.

A few month ago i tested some NH4ClO4 based stars found in skylighters newsletter. It din't say who had made it but it was very similar to one by Lancaster. The compositiun was as follows:
KClO4 38%
NH4ClO4 29
CuCO3 14
Red gum 14
Dextrin 5

The second one was one by Shimizu ( you can find a video of this star lit on the ground here or look it up in my pyro home page: "http://www.a0tu.com/...ediafolder/Blue perc.avi" ):
KClO4 66,5%
Red gum 9,9
Cu(II)O 13,4
Parlon 5,4
Dextrin 4,8

I dont have any pictures or videos at the moment (will be up on my homapge when it's ready). But I can tell you all out there that the grass isn't greener on the other side. In this case blue :-)

The ammonium based one gives of more blue light but ceeps the blue color. The prc based one is a bit mocre white in the flame. The shade of blue is about the same.
In the end they are very similar. The ammonium based one has the apperance of being larger. This has to do with the larger flames produced with ammonium perchlorate i guess.
So if you can't get your hands on ammonium perchlorate don't be sad. It is possible to make good stars useing perc.

I'm sure a lot of peolpe has a lot to say about this subject. But to remind you all out there, this is what I have concluded on the material I have worked with. I wellcome thoughts and reflections about the subject.

Edited by Yugen-biki, 21 August 2005 - 05:28 PM.

[karlfoxman]

I have been working on some pastel shades of various colours, i tested a green composition this afternoon. The formula is as follows:

Potassium perchlorate - 35
Barium carbonate - 20
Aluminium atomized 323mesh - 20
Saran resin - 20
Dextrin - 5
Boric acid - +1

This was my own formula and will be adjusted to get the perfect results i want, when a loose test pile was burnt it creates a lovely pastel pale green and short silver sparks. I have primed pumped stars drying now and the are primed with:

BP ballmilled - 80
Mg/al 60mesh - 10
Al powder - 5
Dextrin - 5

I am hoping this will light the star, i will post some pictures and video of them in action......

If you try to make these please use the correct gear! Barium carbonate can be nasty stuff...DO NOT TAKE CHANCES!!!

Karl

[sasman]

Some time ago I said that I would try blue stars made with ammonium perchlorate and comapre them to potassium perchlorate based ones.


I dont have any pictures or videos at the moment (will be up on my homapge when it's ready). But I can tell you all out there that the grass isn't greener on the other side. In this case blue :-)

The ammonium based one gives of more blue light but ceeps the blue color. The prc based one is a bit mocre white in the flame. The shade of blue is about the same.
In the end they are very similar. The ammonium based one has the apperance of being larger. This has to do with the larger flames produced with ammonium perchlorate i guess.
So if you can't get your hands on ammonium perchlorate don't be sad. It is possible to make good stars useing perc.

I'm sure a lot of peolpe has a lot to say about this subject. But to remind you all out there, this is what I have concluded on the material I have worked with. I wellcome thoughts and reflections about the subject.

Yugen Have you done any video of a Ammonium Perchlorate blue yet?..

I am dissopointed in reading that your AP blue is not much better..The blue in your video is about the same as the KP blue i made and i was not impressed in it at all.. i wanted a nice dark blue.. thats what i am hoping AP would be like...Have you tried a chlorate blue?...how does that compare ?..

Although i dont want to mess with chlorate if possible..anyone else got an AP blue video?..I have seen somewhere on a russian pyro site different blues greens reds etc...and none of the blues were very impressive..Although when viewed at the correct distance they would look better..colors dont seem to capture well on video they tend to look to bright but it can give you a rough idea what it should perform like?

[Yugen-biki]

What I ment was that you don't need to get ammonium pechlorate go be abel to make a good blue star. The ammonium perc containing star I have tested gave of more blue light then the potassium perc based. This gives a better looking star.

If ammonium perc is harder for you to get the potassium perc you don't need to be sad. But If you can get it you should use it. But ammonium perc has incompabilities with chlorates(!) and KNO3 which makes it harder to work with. But the red and blue amonium stars I have tested both needed a prime, thus helping the problem. But I would take bigger precautions if I ever were to combine ammonium perc stars with H3.

The movie in my older post was a potassuim perc based blue. The color is not as good as in the reallity. I have a lot of things to do, but I'll try to find time to make a ammonium perc based blue peony shell to be put up on the homepage sometime in the months coming.

[Mumbles]

Ammonium Perchlorate has far to many incompatibilities for me to use it much, although I have it practically freely available to me.

One incompatibility a lot of people forget about is ALL copper compounds. Yes, thats right, I said all copper compounds. In some general chemistry courses, you may have learned about ligands or complexes. Tetraamine copper (II) is a widely used complex because of it's vibrant colors. It forms from copper salts and ammonia or ammonium salts. It just happens that this class of compounds has some explosive members. Chlorate, Nitrate, PERCHLORATE, and Persulfate are the most widely known ones. Notice how one stands out more(because it's in all caps)? Ammonium Perchlorate with any copper salt will form some Tetraamine Copper (II) Perchlorate (TACP for short). Even if the salt is insoluble there will still be some formed due to Ammonium Perchlorate being acidic. There is good news though. If the composition is bound with a waterbased binder the explosive properties are nullified. Only when anhydrous is it dangerous.

[completebeginner]

Has anyone tried this formula?

Red star #3
Source:
Comments:
Preparation: Dissolve shellac in boiling ethanol, and add the other ingredients.

Potassium chlorate................................65
Strontium carbonate...............................15
Shellac...........................................20

because i just recently found a supplier for all of the chemicals. and i was also wondering if anyone has tried replacing the strontium carbonate with barium carbonate to make green i remember seeing the formula somewhere but i cant seem to find the right proportions.

I would use a perc based star but i dont have any sources for it but i do have sources and would really like to make a colored star.

Edited by completebeginner, 08 November 2005 - 04:10 PM.

[BigG]

Has anyone tried this formula?

Red star #3
Source:
Comments:
Preparation: Dissolve shellac in boiling ethanol, and add the other ingredients.

Potassium chlorate................................65
Strontium carbonate...............................15
Shellac...........................................20

because i just recently found a supplier for all of the chemicals. and i was also wondering if anyone has tried replacing the strontium carbonate with barium carbonate to make green i remember seeing the formula somewhere but i cant seem to find the right proportions.

In general - we try to avoid Chlorates. They are the number one accident maker and most manufacturers are switching away from them. There are far too many issues with Chlorate comptibility - those have been discussed in length in the past. Read elsewhere.

[Jerronimo]

I agree that perchlorates are safer to work with, and chlorates should not be used by the beginning amateur.
but I see no problem in using it when you take the right precautions.
In colourdepth,brightness and burnspeed KClO3 still is the better oxidiser compaired to KClO4.

The maltese still use it, even for their bottomshots.

[paul]

Clean your workplace with water and a cloth, clean your tools and most important: Use an OWn milling jar if you want to mill charcoal or whatever you need else in a chlorate star.

As long as you avoid every single trace of sulfur, it?s ok. The only Problem I think is the break charge. You HAVE TO use H3 or KP then. BP will be too risky even with a piece of thin paper or whatever between it.


Stay safe!

paul

[completebeginner]

i have a few more questions about these formulas. first, if i were to take this mixture and press it into a hummer type of thing would it ignite from the pressure? does the fuse in american visco contain sulfur? when i make the above formula i showed could i boil the ethanol, add the shellac, take it off the hotplate and then add the other ingredients for added safety?

[paul]

First of all:

DON?t ever press, ram or strike chlorate compositions!

2) Yep, american visco contains sulfur due to it is fille with a black powder like composition

3) Why bothering with boiling etc. Just get your shellac finely powdered before. Afterwards put the chemicals together but don?t rub them or something. THEN add ethanol in small increments and mix it with your hands (gloves!)
Then leave the stuff for a while to give the shellac a chance to get solved by the solvent and then put it into a starframe and cut it.

I don?t know if this comp. is capable of being rolled or something but for cut stars it should work well.


greets,

paul

[completebeginner]

so my visco comeing from the states cannot come into contact with my stars, well at least the core cannot

[karlfoxman]

Right guys....pillbox stars!

Who has had experience in making them, they seem a lovely type of star and i want to start making them for shells. I have never seen a pill box star shell in action before. Also what defines the star composition? Does it need to be fast burning or slow burning? I have 6 of them ready for a 4 inch shell just to see what happens, they are a calcium carbonate orange formula.

Cheers