nordicwolf Posted March 19, 2022 Posted March 19, 2022 Hello, I love searching this forum. Lot's of good stuff. Lately I have been playing with color microstar gerbs using 60:30:10 bp in 1" ID tubes. Changing spindle diameter from 0.29 at the tip / 0.33 at the base as was built by one of the vendors, to just a clay plug opened with a drill bit, to no plug at all / unchoked. I will post a video soon (I still have trouble getting that to work right.) While I am somewhat satisfied with the height vs duration, the lower flying stars get lost in the smoke. Seymour posted earlier in this thread:Ammonium perchlorate 63Copper benzoate 19Titanium 10Copper (II) oxide 4Nitrocellulose 4The NC is not really needed, it's just a convenient binder (and it does increase the flame size). Is that mix for a gerb base? and for the NC can I use NC lacquer? I have about a pint of it used for crackle dragon eggs and would love to find another use for it, especially if I can make a fountain base with far less smoke. When I see "binder" I think of star. Maybe that mix would make a good star as well? Latest thing that came to mind was maybe instead of 60:30:10 as the base, get rid of the sulfur and just use 60:30 KNO3/Charcoal. Just rambling here, but thanks for any suggestions. Oh - so for the AP / Hexamine / Ti mix...would that have enough thrust to throw 0.25" microstars in the air? Or is it only good for Ti or other metal flakes due to their low mass and presumably weak thrust of the AP mix? Thank you.
nordicwolf Posted April 3, 2022 Posted April 3, 2022 So I made an AP59, Hex16 mix and pressed it into a 3/4" fountain using standard gerb tooling. In hindsight I may have pressed it too hard at 3400PSI on the comp. The microstars burned up in the tube. Only one or two got out at the beginning, but in general the flame was the color of the stars. Maybe if I pressed at 1000PSI they might launch? Maybe I try 1000PSI, or maybe I just hand tamp into the AP comp. Any ideas on how to get the stars to burn outside of the tube? They are abouy 0.22" and escape the tube using BP as a driver but burned up inside the tube with the AP driver. Thanks!
SharkWhisperer Posted April 3, 2022 Posted April 3, 2022 So I made an AP59, Hex16 mix and pressed it into a 3/4" fountain using standard gerb tooling. In hindsight I may have pressed it too hard at 3400PSI on the comp. The microstars burned up in the tube. Only one or two got out at the beginning, but in general the flame was the color of the stars. Maybe if I pressed at 1000PSI they might launch? Maybe I try 1000PSI, or maybe I just hand tamp into the AP comp. Any ideas on how to get the stars to burn outside of the tube? They are abouy 0.22" and escape the tube using BP as a driver but burned up inside the tube with the AP driver. Thanks! Pix/video? Packing gerbs at that pressure (3400 psi on the comp?)? Probably turned your "microstars" to dust... Pretty difficult to assess without pix. And .22" aka 1/4" is hardly a "microstar". Also unclear if "AP59, Hex16" is your complete formulation or not. Not really sure exactly what you did here, or what it looked like... 1
nordicwolf Posted April 3, 2022 Posted April 3, 2022 I will try to upload. Always a struggle for me to get an inline pic or video to work right. With BP-based driver comp, 3400PSI has worked without problems getting the little stars in the air, but I do not dispute that fact they may have been crushed to dust with this comp. AP-59 plus Hexamine 16 was the base comp. That is all I mixed, screen mixed 4 times through 40-mesh screen. I spritzed maybe 0.5% denatured alcohol by weight into the container and shook it around, only to knock down dust. I put the comp in the tube, added 5 little stars, then pressed an increment. Each increment was a rounded 1/2 teaspoon (same as I do with BP base comp). Today I will try again reducing the pressure to 1000PSI and see what happens. Thank you.
deepakpyro Posted April 3, 2022 Posted April 3, 2022 (edited) HiI want to make an indoor fountain by NChave you any idea to how should i powder NC and what percent of Ti and NCcan I use Iron insteadDo you have access to powder NC, if yes smokeless fountain is possible.Try using 7.5/1.5/1 - NC/ti/oxidiser Ti should be more than 150 mesh and you can play with mesh size for desired hanging time. AP is preferred oxidiser consider its burning properties. If not available try to use Potassium Nitrate or KP. You have to try and make few trials and fix on your oxidiser ratio in formula as per available material. Simple rule more oxidiser more smoke and faster burning rate. This formula best serves as indoor birthday fountains. Still working on formula for gerbs to achieve good height. Will update if i am having any progress Edited April 3, 2022 by deepakpyro
nordicwolf Posted April 3, 2022 Posted April 3, 2022 (edited) I could not figure out how to get .MOV to upload and display on this forum. I do not have a youtube account right now. This was recorded on old iPhone6. You can see one purple star escaped. I want them ALL to escape! As to powder NC, I have heard of it but do not know where to get it in the United States. Is single-base smokeless powder suitable for use as "powder NC"? I have a jar of double-base but not single base smokeless powder. Thanks! Edited April 3, 2022 by nordicwolf
deepakpyro Posted April 3, 2022 Posted April 3, 2022 (edited) As to powder NC, I have heard of it but do not know where to get it in the United States. Is single-base smokeless powder suitable for use as "powder NC"? I have a jar of double-base but not single base smokeless powder. Thanks!NC powder should be 20-30 mesh size. i don't think single base works as alternate. Single base will not mix homogeneously with Ti and oxidiser. That will produce chocked flame output. So try to obtain industrial grade NC Edited April 3, 2022 by deepakpyro
Richtee Posted April 3, 2022 Posted April 3, 2022 I could not figure out how to get .MOV to upload and display on this forum. I do not have a youtube account right now. This was recorded on old iPhone6. You can see one purple star escaped. I want them ALL to escape! As to powder NC, I have heard of it but do not know where to get it in the United States. Is single-base smokeless powder suitable for use as "powder NC"? I have a jar of double-base but not single base smokeless powder. Thanks! Double base and acetone..Boom! NC! Oops- prolly a poor choice of descriptors there
SharkWhisperer Posted April 4, 2022 Posted April 4, 2022 (edited) I could not figure out how to get .MOV to upload and display on this forum. I do not have a youtube account right now. This was recorded on old iPhone6. You can see one purple star escaped. I want them ALL to escape! As to powder NC, I have heard of it but do not know where to get it in the United States. Is single-base smokeless powder suitable for use as "powder NC"? I have a jar of double-base but not single base smokeless powder. Thanks! Pyrochemsource usually has moist NC solid, as cotton with 12% nitration status, for $16/pound but he was out of stock when I looked last week. Though I will never do business with them again because the Purrington family is shady as hell, Firefox has it listed online; same stuff, same price. Good luck ever receiving your order, but your credit card will be charged the same day for sure! And enjoy sharing your ID with them and the ATF because of their legal shenanigans they created for themselves selling diy M-80 kits a while back. Not sure how you'd get it into a reliable powder though--probably smart to do it damp given the ignition hazard. They're cotton filaments so maybe a razor blade? I've got a pound buried in a freezer somewhere yet to be dried out and used/tested. Any of the Hodgdon IMR (improved military rifle) smokeless powders are single-base/NC. I use IMR 3031 for lacquer sometimes. Works in .30-.30s, .308s and .223, too. Also unsure how you'd break those thin wafers down into a finer powder, but you could probably sort that out somehow. Given most smokeless' slowish burn rate unconfined, it may or may not work as-is. Would have to try it. Price is probably double what it was a few years ago when I last stocked up, as with anything ammo/reloading related. I paid around $20 a bottle and think it's going for around $41 now direct from Hodgdon. Dang, they're out of a lot of products, too... https://shop.hodgdon.com/imr/imr-3031 Edited April 4, 2022 by SharkWhisperer
Richtee Posted April 4, 2022 Posted April 4, 2022 . Dang, they're out of a lot of products, too... https://shop.hodgdon.com/imr/imr-3031And that’s all I wanna do...ATM is paint the sky. Silly people. I already have enough ammo I figger. 1
nordicwolf Posted April 4, 2022 Posted April 4, 2022 I tried again with AP-59, Hexamine-16, this time pressing to 1000PSI on the comp. No real change in performance. I got 2 red stars out, that's it. Seems maybe the problem is the mix burns so slowly it consumes the tops of the stars before there is a chance for pressure to build and shoot them out. I might try a more aggressive mix such as the one in elsewhere in this thread (AP 78.5, Hexamine 11.5, Ti 10) but leave out the Ti and instead use small stars. I suppose the worst thing that can happen is colored flame or if I give up I put the Ti back in and enjoy the silver smokeless gerb which started this quest.
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