Memorial Day report
- From: robgood@xxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: 30 May 2006 14:18:16 -0700
As last year, our friends in Penna. had us for a Memorial Day weekend
barbecue. Their location is fitting, because it's close to the Grand
Army of the Republic Hwy., and that Civil War vets ass'n was
influential in the adoption of Decoration Day.
My fountain performed fine, but with a funny after-effect I've seen
before. After a starting effect of my red Ti fountain, it's the same
compo as Clark's giant "steel" fountain -- KNO3 5, red gum 1, brake
turnings 1 -- in a smaller case (1.5" ID instead of 2"). Once the
sparks are exhausted (the crowd really liked the rapid buildup of the
jet), the burn winds down with a ghost-like pale violet or blue flame
that's sparkless. I'd like to know what's doing that. The compo is
charged as a dough with alcohol, but I doubt there'd be enough alcohol
left for that to be an alcohol flame, unless a real lot of it soaked
into the cardboard case (core from a roll of plastic bags). I didn't
smell any.
However, remember my satisfaction with my recent match making? Fine
under the low humidity conditions I'd tested under, but unfortunately I
took my smaller items out of the gasket-lined ammo box way too early
under very humid conditions. (The lawn was noticeably dewy.) Most of
the pieces I'd fused with my bare match used a double string (parallel
strands of match), but the aforementioned fountain used only one. And
it hung. And hung. Minutes went by before the fountain's initial
effect finally took. If you'll remember, I used Linit liquid starch
rather than dextrin in the match. The items fused with double strings
didn't hang.
I was afraid a 5-tube item I'd made with connections of single strings
of homemade match between them would hang, but it didn't. Even though
the match connections were very close to the dewy grass, and even with
an hour of "marinating" while awaiting darkness, and even though I'd
had some concern even while making it because powder was flaking off
and baring much of the string, the very short distances that had to be
covered between the tubes must've saved it.
The 12-tube item was visco fused between tubes (both of these "cakes"
started with a candle match-fused from the top), and like one of the
two versions I'd made before (same tubes reloaded), one of the
redundant "rescue" fuses caught and upset the firing order. Not that
the audience cared, but because I've now had this problem 2 of 3 times
and no hangs, I think I'll skip the redundant fusing next time. Also,
I think I'll use more lift so the whistle inserts don't wind up burning
on the ground like at least one of them did this time. Of course it
may have rocketed itself to the ground.
My film cannister shell was a test of my first use of homemade piped
match. Double string, worked fine, even with little clearance in the
gun. Did break low (early), however. I can't get hot melt glue around
the fuse on the inside of the end the way I make FCS, because I put on
the cap after loading and fusing. (I can't fit a fused cap on a loaded
shell.) And even if the glue around fuse on the outside was
sufficient, there might've been a fire leak via the cap due to sloppy
hot melt glue coverage there or loosening during loading into the
mortar, which was tight with the piped match there. (Previously I'd
side fused the mortars for the FCS, as I do for the 1.75".) Crowd was
ga-ga anyway.
Then came a couple of 1.75" cylindrics. Once again, the blue wasn't
prominent in my white-to-blue-to-red stars, even though I waited for
darker sky than last year. One of the stars distinctly changed from
white directly to red without a bit of blue showing. Audience was
impressed anyway.
My second 1.75" was my 2nd attempt at a 2-break (not counting my
shells-of-shells). New Year's, the 2nd break apparently didn't take.
This time I succeeded in getting both breaks off. However, my choice
of contents could've been better. The first break was go-getters, some
of which burned to the ground. The 2nd break was commercial gold
strobes. The effect of break-break was diminished by the length of
burn of the 1st break's stars, and the bright metal-fueled go-getters
outshone the gold strobes. The reason I chose go-getters for the 1st
break was the fact that my previous attempt had the 2nd break not
light, so I figured I'd break the 1st break this time extra gently and
wanted self-propelled stars to get some spread. The reason I chose
gold strobes for the 2nd break was my not wanting to waste my homemade
stars on a break that might not ignite. So art was sacrificed for
reliability. Plus I made the delay between breaks short for safety,
also at the sacrifice of some esthetics.
I've switched my 1.75" cylindric shell and 2nd break construction
technique to be closer to traditional. Although for the 1-break shell
I still used my pre-glued cap-and-plug combination (layers of cardboard
circles hand cut & glued together), otherwise I've switched to using
only plugs, gluing them in with outer turns of paper. I think this way
I get a good fire seal and fit to the mortar without noticeably
sacrificing strength of ends.
I finished with my 3" fireflies, which never fail to wow the audience.
However, with the mortar angled away from the audience, I miss the
mixture of awe & distress as when the break surrounds the audience with
sparks threatening to land on them. Still using commercial piped match
on these bottom fused cylindrics. This one was with a thinner grade of
recycled kraft (so I could get on more layers without being too tight
to the mortar) and vinyl wallpaper "paste" for pasting in. Plenty of
room for the match to clear the shell in the mortar this time.
However, the cans I rolled (I make glued cans as in Ofca's method and
an end plug to fit, rather than rolling around a pre-made end plug)
came out well out of round with this paper. (Harder to pull off the
former than with postal wrap.) I'd thought that the string & pasting
of strips would round it out, but it didn't. So the fit to the gun was
roomy but sloppy. Seemed to lift high enough.
Then our host and another guest shot some commercial consumer works.
The regularity of the stars and breaks (plus possibly better ignition)
of shells I still can't match overall, but one of the 1.75" balls (I
think it might've been Artillery Shell brand) broke very off-center,
noticeably worse than my cylinders.
Robert
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