Updup Posted March 26, 2011 Posted March 26, 2011 As many of you know, I've been working on a 21 gun salute cake, three volleys of 7 whistle salute inserts. Each insert is plugged at one end by chinese clay, and the other by hot glue, they are each wrapped up in strapping tape, and then are finished with a layer of pasting. Pictures can be found hereMy questions at this point are: 1. What should I do to prime the visco ends? What I would normaly do, is notch each fuse long way, and dust it in meal. I'm not sure if dipping them in NC/BP slurry would be better though. 2. Lifting. Should I weigh an insert and use the usual 1/10 for lift? I want them to get up there, but not kill the cake, since 7 will be lifting at once. Thanks!
dagabu Posted March 26, 2011 Posted March 26, 2011 I hate to say it but it looks like testing is the order of the day. The salamis you are shooting are really long, filled with flash, the tubes appear to be recycled spiral wound and rather soft, the visco is at the top and depending on which way they tilt when fired, may not take enough fire to light even with good priming. I think you need to test one and see if the tube doesn't blow out.
Updup Posted March 26, 2011 Author Posted March 26, 2011 I hate to say it but it looks like testing is the order of the day. The salamis you are shooting are really long, filled with flash, the tubes appear to be recycled spiral wound and rather soft, the visco is at the top and depending on which way they tilt when fired, may not take enough fire to light even with good priming. I think you need to test one and see if the tube doesn't blow out. The tubes are in fact recycled, however they are form old cakes, convolute and pretty strong, some of the tubes in my cake are thin but from a high quality cake, and are rock solid, and the others are from a cheap cake, soft in comparison to the other, but quite a bit thicker Filled with whistle, not that it makes a huge difference. Visco will be at the bottom, I just had them on the cake upside-down for the picture. What do you think would be better, NC/BP, or dry meal globed on?
dagabu Posted March 26, 2011 Posted March 26, 2011 I use NCL mixed with fines (real thin like heavy whipping cream), dip the visco about 1/16" into the slurry and then into a tub of 7FA or meal-D. The dry BP on the outside takes fire very well and the slurry keeps the heat on the end of the visco. If you are going to turn them over when you fire them, how are you going to deal with the air cavity that the visco makes on the bottom of the tube? Also, what method of fire blocking are you using on the visco? Lift fire has a tendency to find its way past visco when pointed into the lift. I found it necessary to hot glue the visco inside the insert and outside to block the fire. It looks like 3 seconds per inch Chinese visco, you have about 2-3 seconds for these to pop or they will be coming back down on you. Sorry if I am too direct, my social skill meter went out the window with my flu meds
Updup Posted March 26, 2011 Author Posted March 26, 2011 (edited) I use NCL mixed with fines (real thin like heavy whipping cream), dip the visco about 1/16" into the slurry and then into a tub of 7FA or meal-D. The dry BP on the outside takes fire very well and the slurry keeps the heat on the end of the visco. If you are going to turn them over when you fire them, how are you going to deal with the air cavity that the visco makes on the bottom of the tube? Also, what method of fire blocking are you using on the visco? Lift fire has a tendency to find its way past visco when pointed into the lift. I found it necessary to hot glue the visco inside the insert and outside to block the fire. It looks like 3 seconds per inch Chinese visco, you have about 2-3 seconds for these to pop or they will be coming back down on you. Sorry if I am too direct, my social skill meter went out the window with my flu meds Fines? And NCL without any BP mixed in? The visco should be 2.5 seconds an inch, I have extra fuse on them so that I cant cut them to length and get fresh powder when I'm ready to prime them. the fuse goes down about through about 3/8" of hotglue inside the plug, overall about 1/2" is inside the tube, before it hits the powder, so I figger I cut them down to about 3/8" on the outside of the tube, so about a 2.2 second delay. With only 2/8" to 3/8" sticking out, the "Air cavity" should be all lift. Is it bad to have an air cavity? I'll be sure and put some extra glue around the outside of the visco to prevent fire leacking through. Though I'm not too worried, I have a cupcake wrapper, then 1/4- 3/8" hotglue plug, then paper towel sealed to that, then a bunch of strapping tape, and then a layer of pasting. EDIT: Also here is a video of one of the salutes on a rocket (quite a bit louder in person mind you) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2I9aA1EquyE And lets pretend the power lines aren't there Edited March 26, 2011 by Updup
dagabu Posted March 26, 2011 Posted March 26, 2011 Fines? And NCL without any BP mixed in? The visco should be 2.5 seconds an inch, I have extra fuse on them so that I cant cut them to length and get fresh powder when I'm ready to prime them. the fuse goes down about through about 3/8" of hotglue inside the plug, overall about 1/2" is inside the tube, before it hits the powder, so I figger I cut them down to about 3/8" on the outside of the tube, so about a 2.2 second delay. With only 2/8" to 3/8" sticking out, the "Air cavity" should be all lift. Is it bad to have an air cavity? I'll be sure and put some extra glue around the outside of the visco to prevent fire leacking through. Though I'm not too worried, I have a cupcake wrapper, then 1/4- 3/8" hotglue plug, then paper towel sealed to that, then a bunch of strapping tape, and then a layer of pasting. When you make BP, use a 100 mesh screen and run the powder over it, you will get "fines" that will pass through it. Keep in mind that commercial powder has graphite on it and the fines taken from it will not burn well if at all. If you make BP, the "fines" will be -100 mesh and when mixed with very thin NCL, you get a slurry that has teeny-tiny grains of BP in it. Yes, 3/8" of a good hot glue fillet should work nicely An air gap between a shell and the lift can severely reduce the height of the shell lift. Also, keep in mind that loose whistle in a shell is "liquid" upon lift and can push down and against the bottom walls.
Updup Posted March 26, 2011 Author Posted March 26, 2011 When you make BP, use a 100 mesh screen and run the powder over it, you will get "fines" that will pass through it. Keep in mind that commercial powder has graphite on it and the fines taken from it will not burn well if at all. If you make BP, the "fines" will be -100 mesh and when mixed with very thin NCL, you get a slurry that has teeny-tiny grains of BP in it. Yes, 3/8" of a good hot glue fillet should work nicely An air gap between a shell and the lift can severely reduce the height of the shell lift. Also, keep in mind that loose whistle in a shell is "liquid" upon lift and can push down and against the bottom walls. Okay NCL with a tiny bit of black powder in it. No air gap, got it. Does the liquid thing appliy if the whistle isn't loose?
dagabu Posted March 26, 2011 Posted March 26, 2011 Well, if the whistle is compacted or pressed in by hand nice and solid, only the whistle fuel that touches the visco will fully ignite and then only the powdered whistle that is airborne that the fire reaches will add to the pop. This is one reason that whistle is so much quieter then flash. In a witness-box back about two and a half years ago, I was working on my version of "dark" flash, I loaded up a 1" tube with 10 grams of whistle, time fuse, hot glue plugs on both ends and spiked with hemp twine. The box was a Gaylord (40" x 48" x 36" multi walled cardboard box) and when the tube popped, the top plug passed through the top cover, the paper tube did not even dent the walls and I was able to recover just over 3 grams of whistle from the box and there was more that I couldn't collect off the walls. If I were to hypothesize, I would say 4 grams or more un-burnt whistle was left. Now this was good whistle, granulated, no white spots, red iron oxide, good stuff. I did the same test with 70:30 flash and I found no remnants of un-burnt flash and the top plug did not exit the box! And just like the whistle, the paper tube did not leave marks on the Gaylord. I abandoned using whistle for reports and have gone with flash from then on. I do still use some whistle to boost BP but that is just sprinkled on top of the powder. I have never lit a shell in the Gaylord so I am not sure if it all lights or not.
Updup Posted March 27, 2011 Author Posted March 27, 2011 Well, if the whistle is compacted or pressed in by hand nice and solid, only the whistle fuel that touches the visco will fully ignite and then only the powdered whistle that is airborne that the fire reaches will add to the pop. This is one reason that whistle is so much quieter then flash. In a witness-box back about two and a half years ago, I was working on my version of "dark" flash, I loaded up a 1" tube with 10 grams of whistle, time fuse, hot glue plugs on both ends and spiked with hemp twine. The box was a Gaylord (40" x 48" x 36" multi walled cardboard box) and when the tube popped, the top plug passed through the top cover, the paper tube did not even dent the walls and I was able to recover just over 3 grams of whistle from the box and there was more that I couldn't collect off the walls. If I were to hypothesize, I would say 4 grams or more un-burnt whistle was left. Now this was good whistle, granulated, no white spots, red iron oxide, good stuff. I did the same test with 70:30 flash and I found no remnants of un-burnt flash and the top plug did not exit the box! And just like the whistle, the paper tube did not leave marks on the Gaylord. I abandoned using whistle for reports and have gone with flash from then on. I do still use some whistle to boost BP but that is just sprinkled on top of the powder. I have never lit a shell in the Gaylord so I am not sure if it all lights or not. Ahh bugger... You have a point. I made three extra inserts after reading your above post, one thats an exact clone of my other 21, one with half whistle half air, and the last one contains lift dusted with whistle. I was going to test them out today, but I got distracted and climbed a house instead =/. I'll post results when I go back. I fear the black powder one will preform the best, in which case I have 21 useless half salutes =/, or a ton of rocket headers. And I'd have to make 21 MORE inserts, what a pain. You said that happened with granulated whistle mine isn't even that.
Updup Posted March 29, 2011 Author Posted March 29, 2011 Here are the test results: The first one was loose whistle; it had plenty of room to move around and was not packed at all. Made a nice sound, relatively deep noise, and lasted pretty long. Second one was made the same way my other 21 salutes were made, full of whistle, slightly packed when I put the plug in. I think this one was the loudest, however, this one split the PVC, so that might have unfairly added to the noise, again a relatively deep long lasting noise. Third was granulated black powder, with a fair amount of whistle dusted over it. I thought this one would be the loudest, and although it was loud, it was a higher pitched sharper noise then the two whistle salutes. I personally think the one filled with whistle was the best, and so I'm going to load up the cake with 'em. I do want to know your thoughts though. What salute did you think was the best? Do you like high pitched sharp sounding salutes? Or more of a deep echoing salute? The close up shot was taken from a Sony Handycam HDR-SR1, It has 80x optical zoom, so the camera was at a safe distance. And the other camera was just my Kodak easy share. Please watch in HD http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsNjEMB5TOs
Mumbles Posted March 29, 2011 Posted March 29, 2011 What would drive you to think that putting salutes in or on PVC is a good idea?
Updup Posted March 29, 2011 Author Posted March 29, 2011 What would drive you to think that putting salutes in or on PVC is a good idea? It not, and your right, there was earth between me and the salute though, I wasn't going to take chances with PVC or clay plugs. I felt that worst case senario some PVC would take out a camera, although to tell the truth, I didn't think they would break the PVC just setting on top.
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