optimus Posted January 5, 2007 Posted January 5, 2007 I noticed this weird looking formula from Baechle's pyrocolour harmony the other day, and instantly wanted to create the effect.... (Source unknown, in C.B Allen) Potassium Chlorate 50Sulphur 25"French chalk" 20 (hydrous Magnesium silicate - Talc)Copper Oxide (black) 3Dextrin 3 Here's an extract from the description: "the star pellet itself smoulders with a dull red-orange glow, and no visible flame. An invisible gas with heat ripples flows off the surface, and ignites at a distance behind the star. The flame is exceedingly dim, a very deep violet colour and is totally transparent" The only talc I had at hand was a very old 'powder puff' kind of affair, and obviously had impurities like perfume and other things. I made a very small batch (taking great care to avoid friction!!!!). It burnt with a very bright blue flame and scattered slaggy talc everywhere - quite a cool effect but not what I was looking for. Has anyone got any experience with this formula, or similar ones? The notes also mention that the effect is exhibited in a few other stars... Any ideas where I can get pure talc? All the pharmacy stuff I've seen has had these impurities.
FrankRizzo Posted January 6, 2007 Posted January 6, 2007 Buy the most generic non-scented baby powder you can find. Sounds like a very interesting effect. The pucker-factor of potassium chlorate and sulfur will probably keep me from experimenting with that one.
optimus Posted January 6, 2007 Author Posted January 6, 2007 I've just ordered some pure talc from a resin-casting supplier (Thanks for the tip James!). Funny where you can find pyro ingredients! The Chlorate/Sulphur incompatability is worrying, but I'm being very careful and keeping batch size way down. It helps to have extremely accurate scales! I'll post my results when I've tried ther comp with the pure talc.
cplmac Posted January 6, 2007 Posted January 6, 2007 What are you going to do with it? From the description it doesn't sound like it will be useful in a shell.
optimus Posted January 6, 2007 Author Posted January 6, 2007 I was thinking along the lines of relatively close-proximity effects like small mines, cake inserts, fountain microstars, or bengal flares.... I don't really know what it will be suitable for until I've done more tests... It's listed as "exemplary" so it must have some use - at the very least as a violet flare.
Mumbles Posted January 6, 2007 Posted January 6, 2007 The Magnesium Silicate will be somewhat basic, so it will help to prevent the Sulfur-Chlorate reaction.
optimus Posted January 8, 2007 Author Posted January 8, 2007 The Magnesium Silicate will be somewhat basic, so it will help to prevent the Sulfur-Chlorate reaction. That's good to know. I still have a healthy fear of the stuff though The talc also takes up more than half the composition by volume - do you think this reduces sensetivity? cplmac, funny you should mention ghost mines... here's the last sentance of the notes: "This colour is the most like a "haunted house" or ghostly effect of any in the author's experience"
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