Phoenix

[EDIT - some of the compositions I had thought were safe are not. See the topic "Chlorate Safety" in Pyrotechnic Chemistry for more details. In fact, buy TIF 10 before you try any chlorate composition]

I now have a small amount of potassium chlorate, so I tried a couple of colour compositions today (with what I had lying around, my order of other colour chems isn't here yet). I mixed around one gram of each, and lit a small pile and a small lance made from each, just to see what they did.

I tried the following "blue":

Potassium Chlorate.......60
Shellac..........................30
Black Copper Oxide.......10

Didn't work at all. Burnt with a big yellow flame (not a sodium yellow - a burning shellac yellow).
[EDIT This composition is not safe. Chlorates and any metal oxide, especially copper, are incompatible. Do not attempt to use this composition]

Then I tried this:

Potassium Chlorate.........................60
Skimmed Milk Powder ("Lactose")....20
Black Copper Oxide.........................20

This burnt with a very, very pale blue flame. More of a cold white. Looked a little better from 15m away, but in no way superior to a modified BP white star (which always struck me as being a pleasant pale blue)
[EDIT This composition is not safe. Chlorates and any metal oxide, especially copper, are incompatible. Do not attempt to use this composition]

Then I tried Jerronimo's Copper Sulphate blue. This gave a nice result, with a fairly deep blue flame. However, whilst some people say sulphates can be used relatively safely with chlorates, others maintain that they cannot. This put me off actually using this composition, and I only mixed it for the purpose of experimentation. Not only that, but I guessed that the fact that copper sulphate is soluable and hygroscopic could cause it to form traces of copper chlorate with the potassium chlorate. Anyone know if this is the case?

My final attempt at blue was based on the above sulphate comp, and was as follows:

Potassium Chlorate.......50
Copper Oxide................25
Sugar............................25

This burnt faster than the sulphate comp. The blue was much paler, but it was still a bright light. It was improved by viewing from a distance. I may try making some stars from this to see how it performs in the air, as it was the best of the "safe" comps.
[EDIT This composition is not safe. Chlorates and any metal oxide, especially copper, are incompatible. Do not attempt to use this composition]

Finally, I tried a pink comp, based on the one in Weingart's "Pyrotechnics."

For comparison, here is Weingart's original formula:

Potassium Perchlorate.........16
Shellac..................................4
Plaster of Paris......................3

And here is the formula I tried:

Potassium Chlorate.............70
Shellac................................15
Plaster of Paris....................15

Again, Plaster of Paris is a sulphate, so I believe the safety of this formula is questionable. I do not intend to actually use it, unless Plaster of Paris is exempt from the usual rules in any way (Do any of the chemists know if this is the case). I really would like to use this if possible, as it lived up to Weingart's description of the Perchlorate formula wonderfully - it was a really beautiful deep pink colour, and very bright. I don't have any pure calcium carbonate at the moment, but I'll see if I can obtain some from somewhere (without having to mail order it). A carbonate based composition should be about as safe chlorate colour comps get, and if it functions similarly to this I'll be very happy.
[EDIT - This composition is indeed unsafe, and the compatability of chlorates and calcium carbonate is questionable too]

Does anyone have any OK to good blue comps that don't need a chlorine donor, and are agreed to be reasonably safe? Same for calcium carbonate pink comps. I will try Jerronimo's red comp when my strontium carbonate arrives. I guess barium carbonate greens are a no-no until I get a chlorine donor...