gislasn Posted March 12, 2011 Posted March 12, 2011 Without going into a long explanation of why I need to shoot 100 JTek e-matches in parallel (along a 1500' 18-gauge SS wire, with 6.5 ohm/1000' resistance), suffice it to say that we shoot so many long fronts like this that we inevitably end up losing a few series circuits (and thus, entire fronts) when we do it that way (due to a broken connection here or there from all the fireworks going up). Does anyone have any practical experience of how this would be possible (doing 100 in parallel)? I realize that the current required to fire all these in parallel would destroy our wires if it was continuous, but to fire the e-matches, it only has to be sustained for <50ms or so, and it seems like this short of a duration wouldn't heat them up too badly. Due to line resistance, to get 5 volts to the last e-match in the line (1500' long), I need about 110V at the beginning of it. Would a giant CD unit work (very large capacitance)? Or 110V AC current? Thanks in advance for anybody's thoughts.
Arthur Posted March 12, 2011 Posted March 12, 2011 I've seen similar done with a P45 system over about 100m even with 10 igs there is a ripple effect as the igs fire in order from the feed end. each ig can only fire after the one before it has gone open circuit. My method is to wire two lengths of cable with alternate effects wired in series, then parallel the two circuits. You may get a 50% fire but the audience don't know. I also use jelly filled crimps the ensure that the connections stay good til shoot time. You could use four wires and 25 devices on each if you want.
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