7 replies to this topic

[Pyro-centric]

I may be given some out of date products.  Smoke is dead easy to use. I wondered if others use in any of the above in shows or in any other interesting way.  A 15,000 candela hand held flare is bright, has any one used the distress flare on the ground? a mere 60,000 candela. All suggestions and comments welcome.

[Karl Mitchell-Shead]

Use solas material quite a lot in shows, (hand flares and para flares) one thing to be aware of, the hand flares are VERY smokey!

[Robert Blackman]

I once owned a Jap 4x4. It came wih a red hand held flare. I found a few more that were battered and had been semi submerged in water. A quick inspection and they worked fine. Just don't use them on the beach

[Mortartube]

Hand flares are good when behind something such as trees or vehicles etc so the flame is not directly visible. Parachute flares are pretty quick. No second chances if you fiddle about with them and they go wrong. They have a large lump of metal that comes back to earth that the motor and flare is built into, so you need to be very careful where you use them. Also if you use them within about 5 miles of the coast, they WILL be visible from out at sea and may have mariners reporting distress signals to the coastguard. When I worked at WELLS the red flare was removed and a squat waterfall stick or blinker Bengal was added instead. These were used on the opening display for the Channel tunnel. The waterfalls are pretty good when fired en masse!

 

How do you propose to fire the hand flares? As they should be used or fuse/electrically!

Edited by Mortartube, 29 December 2014 - 10:26 AM.

[Arthur Brown]

OOH! I DO like the idea of parachute waterfalls and strobes.

 

Not sure what the regulation range is but I'm tempted to say don't fire them within 10 miles of the coast, so that they don't get seen as indicators of distress. 

[Pyro-centric]

Thank you for the responses.

 

Some brands of Para flare have plastic housing for the parachute and rocket motor.  I have seen the 'cute and flare out and just the fired the rocket off in the past. 

 

Mine would be hand fired if used.  Love the idea of Bengals or waterfalls.  A friend imported a jap car and found a similar flare in his car, that still worked too.

 

As for distance seen, an Aussie training video about use of distress flares says they can be seen up to 40 km at night !

[GreenCopperFlame]

Depends on what you want to use it for mate. If you are looking for some props for a show, they should do the job. Just make sure your family isn’t standing in the audience downwind of you. And if they are, make sure they don’t mind a little smoke ;-)
I had a drunk friend picked up almost 50 km off the coast by the coast guard for lighting one off … with decent visibility it should make for a good signal.

[Mortartube]

Although not a distress signal. I was told about a Chinese shell that was called "Fighting Drum". It had a parachute with Chinese crackers attached. Fired en masse, they were reportedly very novel.