Veline Color Stars

[Seymour]

For lighting coloured stars with a much higher metal content than Veline, (therefore much harder to light), I do a two step method.

 

To light the coloured composition I use

 

60% Potassium perchlorate

10% Charcoal

10% Red Gum

10% MgAl

5% Red Iron oxide

5% Gum Arabic

 

Then, to light that,

 

75% Mill dust (BP)

10% Potassium perchlorate

10% Magnalium

5% Gum Arabic

 

 

Fairly thin layers of each are all that is required to light some very very stubborn stars at high speed.

 

This is overkill, but with primes, that may be good.

[AdmiralDonSnider]

Thanks for your inputs!

 

No one uses Veline´s superprime? Robert Veline says that his superprime will light the system stars, but he also says something like "the solvent for the prime must be water to make it work". I wonder if he slurry-primes his stars...?

 

I usually shake the damp cut stars in a container with the dry prime - and try avoid two stage priming, due to the necessity to rewet the stars after drying.

[Mumbles]

I use the super prime sometimes. I've been trying to get back to using a KNO3 based prime though. I wet the stars pretty well, and shake/roll them with the prime as you do. They're usually wet enough afterr prime addition to add the green meal layer right on top without re-drying. I've had trouble getting them to light without the green meal.

[AdmiralDonSnider]

That sounds interesting. I assume plain BP won´t light them, right?

 

Another possibility could be to make a slurry of superprime or another metal containing prime with water, or better, with NC-lacquer, and to roll the stars in BP while the first layer is still wet. I dont´t know how quickly the slurry would deform the stars if water is its solvent. On the other hand, using NC can turn out pretty expensive when larger batches have to be primed.

 

@Mumbles: Any ideas for the KNO3 based prime you mentioned?

Edited June 22, 2009 by AdmiralDonSnider

[lodcomm]

It would probably work better, but you would have to coat it. ewest I thought that blue looked pretty damn good to be honest. I was curious about the Veline system, great question.

 

 

What is/are the accepted methods for coating the fine mesh Mg?

 

 

tnx

[Weasel]

You have to coat it with Potassium Dichromate, a very nasty chemical. I think there is a tutorial in the tutorial section on how to do this.

[Seymour]

Actually, unless you are using Ammonium perchlorate, coating with linseed oil is more effective. It is however more messy, and takes longer, as well as the right stuff being hard to find.

 

Dichromate works fairly well (and is the only thing to coat with if you are using AP), but if you are just using it in non-AP compositions and you want to avoid hexavalent chromium, alternatives exist.

[Ventsi]

Is there a white that would go well with the system? I mean not stand out or be overpowered.

[GalFisk]

Have you tried making stars out of the base mix (for red/orange/blue) without the colorant? You can try leaving out the parlon as well (unless you use it for binding), and using more red gum (not sure how much you need to replace the fuel value of parlon).

[FREAKYDUTCHMEN]

Ventsi,

 

If you put green, blue and red together, 33.3%-33.3%-33.3% you should get a good white. 35-35-30 should work too. White has a pretty white range.

[smartie66]

Has anyone tried to replace the perc in Veline´s comps with chlorate?

 

How dangerous would the combination of MgAl and chlorate render the stars?

 

Hi Don,

 

I did it.

 

Yesterday I shot 4 different blue stars with the star gun, here are my results:

 

1.) Veline blue (CuO based) with kclo3(!) instead of perc -> very very deep and beautiful blue color, was really a big difference comparing to the other 3 formulas.

2.) Hardt#4 (CuO based) -> Ok

3.) Hardt#5 (CuCO₃ based)-> Ok, slower, longer burning time

4.) Conklin blue #2 (CuCO₃ based) -> Ok

 

I used my own homemade MgAl ( ~ -120mesh) for the veline compo.

 

May it's dangerous, I know! I made a shock and friction test, but I did not recognize more brisance as the ordinary organic chlorate mixtures without metal fuel.

[Peret]

Veline prime on its own burns a pretty intense white. It would probably need to be slowed down a bit - you could leave out the dichromate, which I think is there as a catalyst.

[FREAKYDUTCHMEN]

Primes with Kdich has lower ignition temperature and is more resistant to high wind velocity.