17 replies to this topic

[Aussie Pyro King]

Hello guys, I'm new to this forum and come from Australia. Here it is much easier to get chemicals and fuse than in U.K but I am having construction problems.

I have been seeing crosette stars in the local displays and would like to make some for my own 3" shells. I have seen the pump on Wolter Pyro Tools and it is very expensive. Please help the newbie

[Pazza]

Dan Williams has a great 'how to' on making your own crosette pump, as well as many other excellent tutorials for making devices and tools.

Check it out here:

http://www.wecreate4u.net/dwilliams/

[bernie]

Expensive? Any tool purchased from Rich Wolter is money well spent. Keep us posted on any attempts to make your own.

[alany]

Hello guys, I'm new to this forum and come from Australia. Here it is much easier to get chemicals and fuse than in U.K but I am having construction problems.

It is? Care to share? I'd kill for visco and easier/cheaper access to potassium perchlorate and dark flake aluminium!

I have been seeing crosette stars in the local displays and would like to make some for my own 3" shells. I have seen the pump on Wolter Pyro Tools and it is very expensive. Please help the newbie

Crossettes are not far down my list of things to perfect next, mines and candles are my current obsession. I really like mag-red crossette barages, the effect is great. I am not a huge fan of crossettes in shells however, I think it gets a bit too busy and the orientation is all randomised, while shot from mortars they generally break 'palm tree' style. I was thinking about giving them a rope tail to control their attitude?

We actually discussed crossette pump construction in the past IIRC, Matt from WA was talking about it. I suggesting making the core and splitting gores from timber and metal scrap. It will end up on my website if I have any luck in the future, but I may just purchase one because it is a fairly involved piece of machining to do completely in metal which would be better than some timber hack. My biggest problem is lack of a sufficiently energetic break for the small sized crossettes I'd be making (say 25 mm or less).

[bernie]

I know shipping is pretty hard on you guys. The way Wolters pump is designed makes pumping crossettes move along about as fast as it's gonna get. Those of you that subscribe to Passfire can see how it operates. Simply pull the piston back in the sleeve, jam it into your bucket of comp blah blah....

Go ahead and treat yourself.

[alany]

I would buy all my tooling from Wolter, but he doesn't offer credit card payments, like PayPal. I have to send him a cheque, which is a bit of a challenge.

[Aussie Pyro King]

Do you live in Australia and can't get visco or potassium pechlorate? I live NSW, just south of Sydney and I have a local chemical suplier that sells all chemicals imaginable! I get the visco from The Fireworks King, ACT Fireworks or Redback Fireworks in Canberra (about 3 hours drive). Its $AU2 a metre for visco and they also have quick match and sticky match. You can also buy 100 metre rolls of visco for $AU70.

Jared

[MrBungle]

I have been drooling over The Fireworks King's website for a couple of years now, but I've never bought anything because I had assumed they would only sell to Queenslanders.
I should email them to see if they will ship visco to WA.
Thanks Jared.

[Aussie Pyro King]

The Fireworks King is not in Queensland, its in Canberra and it sells openly to anyone with no need of any licences and has a courier delivery service to all of Australia (I think)
For me, its $25 postage per carton but I assume it will be a fair bit more for you.

You could always drive there

Jared

[MrBungle]

Oh sorry, I just assumed they were a Qld company coz of this:
""Queensland Residents are not permitted to purchase fireworks in Queensland from anybody who is unlicensed to sell in Queensland.""
My wrong...

Isn't it interesting how in most of Australia's states, things like Fireworks, xxx porn, some alcohols, cannibis for medical use, pokie machines etc etc etc, is illegal --- except for Canberra/ACT .... where all the federal politicians live, work and play....

Simon

[dfk]

""Queensland Residents are not permitted to purchase fireworks in Queensland from anybody who is unlicensed to sell in Queensland.""

All this is saying is that you can't buy from anyone who dosn't have a license to sell.

Pokie Machines?? I have no idea what this is but it sounds like its a good thing their illegal.

Edited by dfk, 28 January 2004 - 07:52 AM.

[alany]

Do you live in Australia and can't get visco or potassium pechlorate? I live NSW, just south of Sydney and I have a local chemical suplier that sells all chemicals imaginable! I get the visco from The Fireworks King, ACT Fireworks or Redback Fireworks in Canberra (about 3 hours drive). Its $AU2 a metre for visco and they also have quick match and sticky match. You can also buy 100 metre rolls of visco for $AU70.

I got several kg of Potassium Perchlorate from Canada, but a local source would be greatly appreciated!

I tried ordering from Redback several times, they ignored me twice and then told me their courier would no longer ship to NSW on my most recent attempt. I've never tried Fireworks King, their site is *horrible* and seems to be exactly the same goods asRedback with the exception of more pro stuff. ACT Fireworks never answered my emails.

I can't see sticky match listed, but I'll place an order for some visco and quick match now and see how it goes.

[Aussie Pyro King]

I have never ordered from them myself. I just do the 3 hour drive. The guy at The Fireworks King was really cool! I asked for 10 metres and he took a 20m roll and started measuring it and kept dropping it so he gave me the extra 10m for free! He also threw in free rockets. I suppose he's making a huge profit if he can afford to do that.

Do you live near Wollongong? We have a good chemical supplier but its not cheap. They sell openly to the public and don't ask questions. They've got everything i've ever asked for and if they don't they order it in free of charge. The place is called MC Scientific. There is also a cheap place called Silform Chemicals in Paramatta but i think they might only sell to schools (which is fine for me) hehehe.

How did you get perchlorate into the country from Canada?

[alany]

We should probably take this discussion to email because it is rather off-topic in a UK forum...

I live in the northen beaches area of Sydney, so trips to Canberra are not out of the question, but still a fairly out of the way. A trip to the gong isn't very difficult though! I couldn't find Silform online, do they have a website?

The bloke just stuck the perc' in a 10 litre pail and mailed it in a box. Got here in about a month, much to my suprise. Someone in the US sent me a pound of magnesium turnings in a padded envelope by air, which would probably have landed them in federal prison if caught, I didn't realise it was going air, because the shipping was only $10 USD but it arrived in only 5 days! Mg is ment to be shipped surface by UPS now, even solid chunks of the metal.

I've never had problems with stuff from skylighter either, but paying $50 USD each time for shipping is getting pretty painful and it takes *three or four months* to get here by surface, which is just insane when it is ment to be 4-6 weeks.

[MrBungle]

All this is saying is that you can't buy from anyone who dosn't have a license to sell.

Pokie Machines??    I have no idea what this is but it sounds like its a good thing their illegal.

I understood that ofcourse, but I also mistakenly read it as saying they were a licenced Qld company in Qld.... easy to do when your just quickly flicking around websites half taking things in.

A pokie machine is one of those things you drop(poke) coins in, and then pull a lever and you get 3 lemons, or 1 lemon 2 stars etc etc. Las Vegas is full of them I believe, as are lots of clubs/bars and pubs in some Australian states.

I've never had problems with stuff from skylighter either, but paying $50 USD each time for shipping is getting pretty painful and it takes *three or four months* to get here by surface, which is just insane when it is ment to be 4-6 weeks.

$50US ?!?!?
Hmmm, there goes that idea.
Thanks for the warning.

Simo