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- PYROTECHNIC MANUAL 1986
-
- Sysop : this manual may posted on any bbs or a.e. as long as this material
- remains unaltered.
-
- Disclaimer : Turbo jr. and Alcove town sysops take no responsibility on how
- accurate this information is, and we are not liable for any accidents or usage
- of these documents.
-
- Section one : making elementry gunpowder.
-
- Obtaining the materials ;
-
- To make a form of gunpowder you'll need to first obtain some pottasium nitrate
- (better known as Saltpeter ), flowers of sulfur ( also known as just sulfur),
- and for our purposes, crushed charcol briquets.
-
- To get saltpeter you must visit a local drugstore, they should have some on a
- shelf someplace, if they don't try another drugstore. If the pharmiscist won't
- sell it to you, tell him that you cat is throwing fits, or you need it for an
- indothermic science project. Saltpeter is used as some kind of an diuretic and
- is used on horses alot, meaning that if you can't get it at a drugstore, try a
- local farm supply store, or a vet. You can also sometimes get it from a
- chemistry teacher or a chemical supply company, I wouldn't count on it though,
- since they usually have had 100's of others ask for the same thing and they
- have an idea what you're going to use it for.
-
- Sulfur is fairly easy to obtain, almost every drugstore stocks it,
- if they don't have it they probably ran out of it.
-
- Charcol is the easiest to get, what you need is plain charcol briquets ( the
- kind you use on your grill !!! ) You can get charcol from any good supermarket
- or hardware store, sometimes a drugstore will also have it.
-
- Making the mix
-
- The proportions for our gunpowder varies greatly, depending on what results
- you wish. For example, if you add alot more of a substance than another, you
- might create a very fast burning powder, while if you mix just more of one
- subtance than another, you might get a long burning, flare type of powder. The
- results also depends on the quality of your substances.
-
- Before you start to mix the chemicals, you must crush the charcol briquets
- into a fine dust, the more crushed it is the faster the powder will burn. I
- usually crush a single briquet at a time by placing it into a heavy duty
- plastic bag ,closing the opening shut, and pound it with a hammer until it is
- crushed. If a hole forms in the bag, pour the dust,and chunks of charcol into
- another bag and continue crushing until it is all a dust.
-
- The usual proportion to go by is ;
-
- 3 parts saltpeter
- 1 part charcol dust
- 1/3 part sulfur
-
- Of course as mentioned earlier, you should try different amounts to discover
- different results. Always keep a record of your tests for future reference.
-
- A 'part' can be any measurement - cup, teaspoon, gram,
- onces, etc., even though going by weights is the best.
-
- Besure to mix well.
-
- 10,9,8,.....,zero IGNITION
-
- To ignite the mixture, it is best to buy some fuse. I buy mine from a local
- hobby store. You can make your own (very low grade, el cheapo) buy saturating
- (dissolve a substance until no more dissolves) some warm water with saltpeter,
- then soak a piece a paper toweling or linen in it. Take it out a allow to dry.
- Once dry it should be brittle, be sure not to break it or cause the dried on
- saltpeter to fall all over the place. Test it by igniting a small piece with a
- match, it should burn very slowly, and might even go out (a sign of
- cheapness).
-
- To test it, you can either;
-
- 1...Pour the mixture into a paper cup, insert a wick, and light.
- 2...Pour the mixtute into some paper toweling, crumple it around the mix, and
- light.
- 3...Do it anyway you want, I really don't care
-
- USE of the gunpowder.
-
- Putting the gunpowder to good use really depends on your imagination. For
- instance you can pour some of the mix into a glass container with a screw top
- lid. Add a firecracker (not nessecary, only if your mix is a slow burner.) Cut
- a hole in the lid ( just big enough for a fuse ). Insert a fuse long enough to
- reach the mixture. Screw on the cap. Seal off any small openings with glue.
- Light it, and BOOMIE.
-
- Another thing you can do is, cut a small hole in a tennis ball ( big enough
- for
- fuse ) , pour in some mixture, insert fuse, Light and you have a sort of a
- sparkling founting or a torch.
-
- Of course there are all kinds of other things ( evil or good ) you can do,
- I'll
- leave the thinking up to you.
-
-
- Substitute
-
- For an interesting flare effect or a faster burn, you can replace the charcol
- with a very fine dust of a metal. I haven't tried this often, but using a
- powdered aluminum creates an amazingly bright flare. But of course, there are
- problems with that, it goes out rather quickly. Alot of the newer store bought
- gunpowers use a zinc powder, I think. I can't tell you where to get powdered
- metal other than chemical supply companies or a chemistry teacher, sometime
- you
- can get some out of a metal working shop, but the metal from there is usually
- not fine enough. If any one has any suggestions or interesting effect leave me
- some e-mail about it, or write an article about it !!!
-
- Also adding different salts and/ or chemicals to the mix can create a
- different color flame, if used as a flare. Salt causes a yellow color. I will
- include a list of the different effect in my second article, maybe.
-
- The End