Ubehage Posted August 17, 2015 Posted August 17, 2015 (edited) ---Can an admin move this to HE or Chemistry? Where this propably belong--- I have just discovered, that the last batch of Bismuth I bought, was of a very poor quality. I looks like all the yellow has been washed off - it looks much more white than yellow.And, it tends to clump a lot, into rock-hard balls of various sizes. Also, when I break up the clumps, it looks to be a lot finer powder than the Bismuth I used to have. Anyway. Having bought this at a respectable Pyro-shop, I decided that it had to be Bismuth Trioxide, so I tried to make some crackling stars.However, this did not work as intended. I used the 37.5-37.5-25 formula, and I ended up with a SERIOUS flashpowder!It does not explode, as I had imagined. It burns, just like Flash. But about 10x brighter, and twice as fast.I made 3 batches - all of them did exactly this. For the time being, I have decided not to mess with it, as long as I don't have the knowledge to explain "why and how".I hope some of you might be able to shed some more light on this subject, and tell me if I should burry this deep underground, or if I have found a type of functional Flash Edited August 17, 2015 by Ubehage
mabuse00 Posted August 17, 2015 Posted August 17, 2015 I have just discovered, that the last batch of Bismuth I bought, was of a very poor quality. I looks like all the yellow has been washed off - it looks much more white than yellow.And, it tends to clump a lot, into rock-hard balls of various sizes. Also, when I break up the clumps, it looks to be a lot finer powder than the Bismuth I used to have.Bismuth trioxide can form different crystal structures. Did your dealer state any purity grade? Please give more details. WHAT behaved like a "SERIOUS flashpowder" - the finished egg granules or the unbound powder?I would expect that from the latter, that would be OK. One has to treat it with respect of course. DEs are one of the more dangerous mixtures...
Ubehage Posted August 17, 2015 Author Posted August 17, 2015 (edited) Bismuth trioxide can form different crystal structures. Did your dealer state any purity grade? Please give more details. WHAT behaved like a "SERIOUS flashpowder" - the finished egg granules or the unbound powder?I would expect that from the latter, that would be OK. One has to treat it with respect of course. DEs are one of the more dangerous mixtures...All the other batches I made with my old purchase of Bismuth Trioxide, all behaved like DE, even when in powder-form: Meaning, they popped/exploded.Delay, sound and volume of exploded batch would differ. I learned how to control that But with this batch, it just burns. Actually, it goes *POOF*, just like FP.I did not make any eggs of this. I thought to myself, that the Bismuth was not what I expected, and the composition did not burn as expected.So I didn't do anything, other than burn it to get rid of it.200 grams would be gone in about a quarter of a second, with a relatively big bright-yellow fireball that would disappear as quickly, into white smoke. It's not what I expected. But it might be normal.. I don't have enough experience to take any chances. Edited August 17, 2015 by Ubehage
rogeryermaw Posted August 17, 2015 Posted August 17, 2015 white smoke is not right for that comp. all the bismuth d.e. i have made produced a yellow-brown smoke. there are plenty of simple tests that can be performed if you have some basic chemistry apparatus and a few chems, but from your description, you may have been sent the wrong chemical or something severely contaminated. 1
schroedinger Posted August 17, 2015 Posted August 17, 2015 Sounds like something is wrong with your flash, 0.25 g of my flash allread poop in the open. Did you test how it performs if confined?
Ubehage Posted August 18, 2015 Author Posted August 18, 2015 Sounds like something is wrong with your flash, 0.25 g of my flash allread poop in the open. Did you test how it performs if confined?I thought about it. It looks like the perfect composition for salutes. BUT... For all I know, it does not behave as I expected. And one of the chemicals is not as I expected. So I decided just to leave it, and order a new batch.
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