Turbo Pyro goes LIVE at 12:00 Noon Eastern time today, June 19th
Turbo Pyro goes LIVE at 12:00 Noon Eastern time today, June 19th. You’ll be able to get in then.
Here’s your link for Turbo Pyro:
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I DON’T KNOW WHETHER YOU HEARD THIS YET
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I’ve added *more* stuff to Turbo Pyro. I want to make sure you have fun with your projects, so I added a bonus Smoke Bomb Kit and project–Making Jumbo Smoke Canisters eBook (including videos).
Be sure and get online fast and place your order. Again, there are only 400 Turbo Pyro Supplies Kits available.
Grab yours here:
P. S. You get instant access to the Turbo Pyro eBook and the Smoke-Making eBook right after you order.
P. P. S. Be sure ahead of time your credit card has enough $$ left on it to make the charge. Otherwise you may miss out. (V, MC, Amex, Disc.)
Harry
Making Homemade Fireworks Mines
There is a beautiful photo on the cover of Dr. Takeo Shimizu’s Fireworks, The Art, Science and Technique (FAST). At the top of the picture is a huge, double-petaled, fireworks-shell starburst, with several smaller star-flowers between it and the ground. And, at the very bottom of the shot is a spray of stars shooting upward from the ground where the shells were fired: a mine.
Similarly, the back cover of Hardt’s Pyrotechnics shows a rainbow of 5 colored mine-shots, with corresponding colors of small and large starbursts over each one.
Fireworks mines, or star-mines, can be used in conjunction with aerial shells to create such an effect, filling in the low sky as the shell bursts fill the middle and high sky.
These devices are also very effective during a fireworks display when they are fired as a mine-run: a series of firework mines fired in sequence from various spots on the field in harmony with beats of music in the soundtrack.
A single mine, a mine-run, or a wall of simultaneously fired mines all serve to bring the audience’s attention back down to the ground, providing contrast and variety during a fireworks display.
For precise timing of electrically fired mines, putting the electric match right down in the lift powder eliminates the objectionably noticeable, split-second delay, which occurs when a length of quickmatch leader is ignited by the electric match.
If I am going to put the e-match into the lift powder, I still attach a couple of inches of quickmatch to the electric match, with the e-match’s protective shroud in place. This ensures that quite a bit of flame will be introduced into the lift powder, and it further protects the e-match from premature ignition due to shock or friction.
One of the clubs I belong to, The Bluegrass Pyrotechnics Guild, has assembled and fired literally thousands of 4-inch mines over the years for our displays at the PGI annual conventions. These devices can be very easily constructed, and they provide a nice hand-made touch to a fireworks show.
In this article I’ll detail two methods of constructing 4-inch firework mines. But, these methods can be applied to any size mine, from 1-3/4-inch through 6-inch models. Simply by varying the size of the stars, the materials used in the assembly, the amount of lift powder, and the size of the mortar from which they are fired, mines can be tailored in size to any effect and any venue.
Each 4-inch mine will use about one pound of stars. I like to use 1/2-inch stars in 4-inch shells and mines, and in mines, I prefer a fast-burning star, which burns out before it reaches apogee and begins to fall back to the ground.
For this project I’ll use two variations of one type of star, commonly known as Gold Spider Web (Ofca’s Volume 5, Mastering Cut Stars the Easy Way) or Chrysanthemum 6 (Shimizu’s FAST). This is a very fast-burning charcoal streamer star which is easy to make, and which produces bright streaks of sparks in the sky.
So the final working formula was:
| Chrysanthemum 6 | Ratio | 16-ounce batch |
| Potassium nitrate | 0.55 | 8.8 ounces |
| Charcoal, airfloat | 0.33 | 5.3 ounces |
| Sulfur | 0.07 | 1.1 ounces |
| Dextrin | 0.05 | 0.8 ounces |
The individual chemicals are screened through a 100-mesh screen, and any that will not pass the screen are milled in a coffee grinder
until they will pass. (I have a grinder that I only use on oxidizers like the potassium nitrate, and one for fuels such as charcoal. Except for when I am ball-milling black powder, I never mill complete compositions, only individual chemicals.)
After I screen the chemicals individually, I mix them through the 100-mesh screen, and then shake them in a closed plastic tub. 1.3 ounces of water is added (+8%) to the composition, and it is thoroughly shaken in the closed tub once again. The dampened pyrotechnic composition is then pushed through a 20-mesh kitchen colander to completely incorporate the moisture into the composition.
I use my 1/2-inch star plate to press 1/2-inch diameter by 1/2-inch long stars, as detailed in Fireworks Shells in 2-1/2 Days: Part 2, which I dry overnight in the drying chamber.
The stars are then primed, as shown in Fireworks Shells in 2-1/2 Days: Part 3, and dried overnight again.
I make two, 16-ounce batches like this, and one 16-ounce batch of the same composition with 3.2 ounces (+20%) of 10-185 mesh spherical titanium
(CH3001) added to the composition after all the 100-mesh screening is done. I never put any metals through my fine screens. The addition of this titanium will produce bright silver-white sparks as the stars burn, creating a silver-streamer star.
So, with these three, one-pound batches of stars, I can now proceed to make three, 4-inch mines.
There are some extremely simple ways to assemble mines. “Bag Mines” can be as simple as a paper bag with some lift powder in a baggie on the end of a fuse-leader inserted into the bottom of it. Then some stars are poured in, the neck of the bag is tied closed and she’s ready to fire.
In Introductory Practical Pyrotechnics, Tom Perigrin shows how to make a simple mine by installing a baggie of lift on a quickmatch leader, sliding that into a cardboard-tube mortar. Then dropping in some stars, bundled in some tissue paper, into the tube.
These simple mines are functional, but they’ll typically not fire all the stars out the top of the mortar together and in a straight column of fire. Because there are some stars to the sides of the lift powder, they get fired a bit sideways and bounce around a bit in the mortar before they exit. Some of these stars can “ploof” out of the gun and drop onto the ground.
So, I like the following slight variations on the simple-mine theme. They are more effective at getting all the stars lit and out of the gun in a straight-up spray of stars.
Typically, firework mines use the same amount of lift black powder, and the same amount of stars, as a cylindrical star shell of the same diameter. I like to refer to the charts on Pages 138-140 of The Best of AFN II to determine these amounts.
For a single-break, 4-inch cylindrical shell, 1.5 – 2 ounces of commercial 2FA black powder is recommended for the lift powder. I’ll use 1.75 ounces in these mines.
I have made three 24-inch lengths of homemade quickmatch for the mine leaders. Similar lengths of commercial quickmatch (GN3001), or super-fast paper fuse (GN1205) (wrapped in aluminum foil duct tape), can also be used as mine leaders.
I then weigh out the three 1.75-ounce loads of 2FA lift powder, and put them in individual plastic baggies. The one-inch of black match protruding from the quickmatch leaders is folded back on itself, and then inserted into a baggie of lift. Masking tape is used to seal the baggie around the leader, and the extra plastic trimmed off with scissors. Then a final wrap of masking tape seals the baggie/tape to the quickmatch.
If I’m only going to make a few mines, and I want them to be top-quality, I build them this way.
First I make a “piston” to go between the stars and the black powder lift charge. Here’s a photo-essay of that process. It uses two 4-inch kraft discs (DK3401 or DK3500), a 2-inch length of 3/4-inch ID tube (TU2053 or TU1065 or TU1068), and a 2-inch length of 3-3/8-inch or 3-1/2-inch OD tube (TU2300).
Places like HarborFreight.com sell the sets of hollow gasket punches for ridiculously low prices. I much prefer to make the holes in discs with the punches instead of with a drill.
This piston will allow the lift-gasses to pass through it, igniting the stars, and will evenly push the stars out of the mortar and into the air in a tight column.
The center holes in the discs are 1/2-inch diameter and are large enough to allow the quickmatch leader to be threaded through them. The other holes are 3/8-inch diameter, keeping these holes smaller than the size of the stars that I am using.
Now, I position the piston on an 18×24-inch piece of kraft paper as shown. The paper is rolled up around the piston and glued to itself with hot-glue. Then the end with the baggie of lift powder is gathered together, tied with string in a clove-hitch knot, and trimmed with scissors. This is my mine casing.
Kraft paper is available from stores like Staples or Costco (white butcher paper), on-line from places like ULine.com, or paper grocery bags can be used.
Now, it’s a simple matter of dumping the pound of stars into the open end of the mine casing, gathering the kraft paper around the leader, and tying it securely in place.
When filling a mine like this, I like to keep the depth of the stars equal to the diameter of the mine. So 3-4 inches of stars in this mine is my goal.
A piece of Visco fuse is inserted and secured into the end of the leader, which is then S-folded. A safety cap can be installed over the fuse, and a band of masking tape sticky-side-out, followed by a band of tape sticky-side-in, secures the bundle until the mine is to be loaded into a mortar.
Here are shots of the two mines made this way. They had different types of charcoal in the stars, commercial airfloat and homemade poplar airfloat, but I didn’t see any significant difference between the two.
As you can see, the piston pushed all the stars out evenly, and very high. Nice, bright, fast and dramatic mines.
The above “high-quality” method produces very nice, traditional firework mines, but it is a bit time-consuming. When the Bluegrass guild wants to construct several hundred mines in an afternoon, we’ve developed the following system. It is quick and easy, and while it does not allow the use of quite as many stars, and the quality of the mine-display is not quite as nice, it is a very effective method for producing large quantities of mines quickly.
We start with the same lift-bag/leader configuration as shown above.
Two disposable plastic drinking cups are used for each mine. For these 4-inch mines, cups that are 3-5/8-inches in diameter at the top are ideal.
One of the cups has its bottom perforated with a hot, pencil-tip soldering iron. I’ve tried using a drill for this operation, but often the cup-bottom will crack when doing so.
The mine leader is inserted through the center hole in the cup. That whole assembly is placed into the second, intact cup, and the perforated cup is filled with stars. In this case, it held 12 ounces of the stars.
Then the assembled mine is sealed with four, 9-inch strips of aluminum-foil duct-tape. The leader is completed with Visco fuse and S-folding as shown with the paper-cased mine in the Method #1 above.
This mine was made with the silver-streamer stars, which contained spherical titanium. While it did not contain the same quantity of stars as the previous two mines, and it did not fire quite as high as they did, it was still a very nice, bright mine.
Here is a link to a video of the three mines in action. They were all impressive, firing 30-40 feet into the air, and producing unique effects.
While these are simple devices, they can be crafted with care, and will add variety to a fireworks display.
Have fun with them, and remember, “A mine is a terrible thing to waste.”
(I hope that line at least elicited a groan or two, if not a chuckle. My wife, Molly, only gave me that blank “wife’s” stare, and that curled-up lip, when I said it to her.)
Until next time, Enjoy!
Ned
How to Make Wonderful Zinc Firework Stars
Now and then on the pyro discussion lists someone will bring up the subject of zinc stars. Usually several folks will chime in with, “Oh, man, those stars are some of my favorites, so subtle and beautiful.”
In Chapter 15 on Fireworks, of Alexander Hardt’s Pyrotechnics, (this chapter written by Barry Bush after Dr. Hardt’s death), it is stated, “Good zinc stars are blue-green with tails of delicate gold, and seem rather exotic today.”
This is a color star where the color is produced by an elemental metal, rather than a metallic salt, such as when a blue is produced with a copper oxide or carbonate. So, this blue-green color star may be among the oldest firework star colors that were produced.
Back in the early 90’s when I first started making stars, there was not much fireworking information available. I was able to get my hands on a copy of the then recently reprinted Pyrotechnics, by George Weingart. Some of my first star-making efforts were based on a few of the formulae contained in that book, and perhaps my favorite of them was the Granite Star.
An added bonus is that this is one of the easiest cut stars to make that I’ve tried.
| Component | Parts | Percent | Decimal |
| Potassium Nitrate | 14 | 22% | (0.22) |
| Zinc dust | 40 | 62% | (0.62) |
| Fine charcoal | 7 | 11% | (0.11) |
| Sulfur | 2.5 | 4% | (0.04) |
| Dextrin | 1 | 2% | (0.02) |
| Totals | 64.5 | 101% | (1.01) |
(The percentages, because of number rounding, actually add up to 101%, but that’s OK, and they’ll work just fine. The percentages of each individual chemical in the star composition are calculated by taking the original number of parts of that chemical, say 14 parts of KNO3, and dividing that number by the total number of parts, 64.5 in this case. 14/64.5=.217, which can be rounded to .22, which is 22 hundredths or 22%.)
Note: You may be saying to yourself, “I wonder why he’s including those decimal numbers after the percentage numbers.” I’ll show ya in a minute. The decimals are much more useful than the percentages.
Harry Gilliam, in the last blog post, published the formulae that he inherited from the Kosankes when he purchased the business that became Skylighter. In that list of formulae is one called Pearl, and it is a slightly different version of a zinc star:
| Component | Parts | Percent | Decimal |
| Potassium Nitrate | 35 | 35% | (0.35) |
| Airfloat charcoal | 15 | 15% | (0.15) |
| Zinc dust | 40 | 40% | (0.40) |
| Sulfur | 5 | 5% | (0.05) |
| Dextrin | 5 | 5% | (0.05) |
| Totals | 100 | 100% | (1.00) |
I always like to look at star formulae and see how they differ from each other. It can be seen that the second formula uses less zinc powder, more KNO3, and slightly more charcoal, sulfur and dextrin.
There is a formula in Hardt’s book that is similar to the Kosanke formula above, but the zinc is increased to 45%, and some Meal D black powder is used in it, as well as potassium nitrate, charcoal and dextrin.
I, personally, have only made zinc stars using the first formula, from Weingart, the Granite Star.
In a recent discussion in the Passfire.com Forum, a fellow fireworker, who has worked quite a bit with this star, recommended that the charcoal used in the formula be half airfloat and half 80 mesh. This improves the charcoal tail that the star leaves behind as it burns. Back in the ’90’s when I made the star, I’d only use airfloat, so this is another area of experimentation as an individual fine tunes the formula to his own personal tastes.
These stars light easily, especially when made as cut stars with all the corners and edges to take and hold fire, so I’ve always just primed them with a “scratch-mixed” (mixed by hand, no milling) black powder prime, simply screened through a 40 mesh screen.
| Component | Parts | Percent | Decimal |
| Potassium Nitrate | 75 OR 15 | 75% | (0.75) |
| Airfloat charcoal | 15 OR 3 | 15% | (0.15) |
| Sulfur | 10 OR 2 | 10% | (0.10) |
| Dextrin | 5 OR 1 | +5% | (0.05) |
| Totals | 105 OR 21 | 105% | (1.05) |
Note: This is simply 75/15/10, KNO3/charcoal/sulfur (the classic black powder proportions), with an additional 5 parts of dextrin added as a binder (additional 5%). One of the few formulae that I can always remember off the top of my head is the 15/3/2/1 parts proportion of this composition. If I want to make 21 ounces of prime, I simply weigh out 15/3/2/1 ounces of each chemical and screen them together.
This is a very heavy and dense star, perhaps the heaviest I have ever made. (I haven’t made stars using gold powder yet!) A 4″ ball shell will use a little less than a pound of these primed stars. A 4″ mine would use about the same amount. In my small-scale, hobbyist fireworking endeavors, I actually like making stars a pound at a time, especially when experimenting with new formulae.
Using the first formula, above:
| Component | Decimal | Batch Weight |
Weight | ||
| Potassium Nitrate | 0.22 | x | 16 oz. | = | 3.5 oz. |
| Zinc dust | 0.62 | x | 16 oz. | = | 9.9 oz. |
| Fine charcoal | 0.11 | x | 16 oz. | = | 1.75 oz. |
| Sulfur | 0.04 | x | 16 oz. | = | 0.65 oz. |
| Dextrin | 0.02 | x | 16 oz. | = | 0.3 oz. |
| Totals | 1.01 | x | 16 oz. | = | 16.1 oz. |
Now do ya see how handy those decimals are? Of course, any final batch size can be plugged in instead of the 16 oz. A 32 oz. batch, or a 100 gram batch, can be calculated just as easily.
The charcoal can be all airfloat, or it can be half-and-half airfloat and 80 mesh, as mentioned above.
What the heck is zinc, anyway? I don’t know about you, but zinc is not one of those chemicals I’m all that familiar with. In the back of my head all I kinda knew about zinc was that it was coated onto the steel garbage cans of my youth to keep them from rusting. Galvanization they called it. Same stuff that’s on the steel ductwork leading to and from my furnace. I actually had to look zinc up to verify that it is, indeed, an element like gold and copper. Shows ya how much of a chemist I am.
An interesting thing about the zinc powder that we use in Granite Stars is that it doesn’t stay powder for long. It forms clumps. Either at the supply house, or in our storage, zinc powder will become zinc clumps, because it oxidizes in moist air.
Unless these clumps have been allowed to harden for years, they can be broken up simply by rubbing them on a 100 mesh screen. I recently received a shipment of zinc dust which had formed these clumps, and I was quickly able to return the metal to a dust through my screen.
Note: Zinc is reportedly not toxic, but I can tell you from experience that it is irritating if it is inhaled during the above screening process, or during the manufacture of zinc stars. I mean Really Irritating in the nasal passages. I’m not saying this as some kind of CYA. Wear a good respirator when working with zinc dust. Really, no kidding.
I use a good, $25 respirator, from Home Depot which is rated for fine dusts as well as fumes.
Zinc stars burn relatively slowly, and if they are made too large they will burn all the way to the ground, especially if used in a mine. Therefore, I like to make the stars a bit on the small side. For 4″ shells and mines, I like to cut the stars 5/16″ square, and once they are primed they end up being about 3/8″ square. For a more dense spray of stars, they could even be cut 1/4″ and this would work well for smaller shells as well.
I am working outdoors and away from any sources of ignition.
I have screened 21 oz. of my BP prime through my 40 mesh screen and I have it in a closed container. I always keep every flammable composition in closed containers until they are actually being used. This minimizes the amount of exposed materials in case there is a stray spark or fire.
I have screened my 9.9 oz. of zinc through my 100 mesh screen.
I weigh the rest of my chemicals into individual containers, add them all together with the zinc, and screen the complete star composition 3 times through my 40 mesh screen to completely pulverize and mix the components.
Then I weigh the composition in a plastic bucket to make sure that it totals up to the 16.1 ounces of weight that it should, thereby insuring that I didn’t make any mistakes when weighing the individual chemicals, or leave one out completely. This step can prevent a lot of mistakes and wasted chemicals.
I put a lid on the bucket and shake it to further mix the ingredients.
Then, with rubber-gloved hands, I start to work water into the composition until workable putty is developed. It’s OK to start adding water out of a jug a little at a time, until the composition starts to get dampened. But, the final increments of water ought to be added by spraying it out of a little, plastic spray bottle. This prevents the addition of too much water, which makes for a pain in the butt. It’s always easier to add a bit more water than it is to remove a little.
As I add the water, the comp will clump-up, form a hard ball, and finally, when enough water has been worked in, it forms a nice, workable ball of dough which will flatten out smoothly when patted with a hand. My one-pound batch of star-comp required 2.6 ounces of water to get to this point, which is about an additional 16% (0.16) by weight.
I have two, 14″ x 17,” 3/8″ thick, black-plastic cutting boards from Kmart or Target that I use to cut stars on. I’ll take one of the cutting boards, cover it with wax-paper, put the star dough-ball on it, and put 5/16″ spacer dowels on either side of the comp.
Then I’ll flatten the ball by hand a bit and cover it with another piece of wax paper. Then, using a rolling pin or a rocket tube, I’ll further flatten the comp until it’s just as thick as the spacer dowels, 5/16″ in this case.
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Now, the top piece of wax paper is removed and set aside, and the spacers are removed, too. The tub of star-prime is opened and some of it is evenly dusted onto the pancake using a small cup or a measuring spoon.
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The piece of wax paper is replaced on top of the pancake. Then fold the edges of the bottom and top pieces of paper together a couple of inches.
You’ll see how helpful this step is in a minute. Then place the other cutting board on top of it all, press down a bit to compress the prime onto the pancake, and lift both cutting boards and flip them over, keeping the folded edges of the wax paper down so that the loose prime can’t fall out from between the pieces of paper.
Remove the top cutting board and the top piece of wax paper. Now, dust the exposed side of the pancake with prime so that both sides have been coated in the prime.
Now we’re ready to do some star-cutting. I love the knife that a fellow pyro turned me onto years ago, that I use for cutting stars. It’s a thin-bladed, very sharp, very straight edged, meat-slicing knife from McMaster-Carr. It costs $26 nowadays, and is part number 3851A11.
I cut and filed off the little plastic handle extension that hung down below the edge of the blade so that I could press the blade all the way down to the cutting board.
I start cutting the pancake of star comp into strips 5/16″ wide, sliding the strips aside and flipping them over so that the primed edges are against each successive strip.
Note: The star comp can try to stick to the knife during this process. If a strip is clinging to the knife, it’s easy to raise the knife a bit and rap its end on the cutting board, knocking the strip downward and off of it.
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Then I sprinkle more prime on the strips, put the wax paper on the strips, fold over the edges of the two layers of paper again, put on the other cutting board, and flip the whole deal, keeping the folded paper edges down again. The top cutting board is removed as well as the top piece of paper, and that side of the strips is now dusted with prime.
Star prime is your friend in this process, and later on when you use the stars in a device. Don’t use it sparingly. Use it liberally. Bam. Just like that cooking guy, what’s his name? Emeril, yeah, that’s it.
The strips are now cut into 5/16″ cubes, with the rows of cubes being flipped over as much as possible to keep primed edges touching each other.
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Now, it’s easy to raise the edges of the wax paper and roll the stars onto each other, breaking up any that are clinging to each other, and fully coating all the cut sides with prime.
I like to dump the whole mess into a large plastic container, swirl them around a bit, and lightly spritz the stars with the water sprayer until they have fully gathered all of the star prime onto themselves. If I get them a little too wet, I add more prime, until a nice, thick, consolidated layer is on them.
In this instance, this one-pound batch of 5/16″ stars used 6 ounces of the star prime.
Note: The above process is actually the beginnings of a simple, hand-rolled, round star production method. In a future article I’ll use 1/8″ zinc stars as the cores upon which to roll some round charcoal stars. These zinc stars make easy-to-handle, dense star cores for this procedure.
Then I spread the stars out onto a drying screen to dry in the warm air, or to be put into the drying chamber detailed in the Project Plans on the Skylighter website.
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For purely scientific reasons, and not at all because I was impatient to see these babies in action, as soon as the stars were dry, which took about a week in the open air, or a few days in the drying chamber, I took a few of them out and fired them out of the star testing gun. Man, they are purty!
Note: the 5/16″ stars, which ended up being about 3/8″ including the prime, worked well in the 1/2″ star-gun tube, and required a flat 1/8 teaspoon-full of FFG sporting grade black powder to lift them. I also have some 1/2″ stars which work well in the 5/8″ tube, and require a heaping 1/8″ teaspoon of the lift powder.
Since cut stars may not drop smoothly into the star-gun tubes because of their edges and corners, I use a thin dowel to push them down into the tube and to make sure they are seated against the lift powder.
In the next blog article, I’ll be using these stars to make a really nicely performing 4″ plastic ball shell. I hope you can hang around for it.
See ya then, and Stay Green,
Ned
How to Make Yellow Glitter Firework Stars
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Click Picture to Enlarge
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Photo Courtesy of Tom Handel
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This is a gold brocade firework shell. Glitter firework stars are hard to depict in slow-shutter-speed fireworks photographs, but you can get an idea of how silver glitter firework stars might look like in the sky if you enlarge the photo above (with a click).
Here’s a good formula for making yellow glitter firework stars from Bob Winokur. Bob wrote the greatest treatise on making glitter firework stars and comets, Pyrotechnica 2. It’s probably the most complete study of glitter firework stars ever done. This article ran in the August 1992 issue of the First Fire, the Florida Pyrotechnic Arts Guild’s exceptional newsletter. Thanks to FPAG for letting us use this, and Chris Miller, for writing it.
Yellow Glitter Firework Stars
by Chris Miller-WPA
I originally got this formula from Dr. Winokur a few years ago as a universal (good for all occasions), “state of the art” yellow glitter. It has a long delay and can be used in any size firework star, from 1/4″ t o 3.” Firework stars 5/8″ and smaller tend towards the “glitter cloud” effect and are great in shells by themselves or mixed with color firework stars in a volume ratio of 3:1 or 4:1 (color : glitter). Firework stars 3/4″ and larger leave long, beautiful tails and are particularly suitable as either regular comets or crossettes.
Assuming the ingredients are lump-free, sieve the mix three times through a 20-mesh screen (window screen works fine) and bind with 8% water. This isn’t a lot of water so you should knead it for several minutes to insure that the water is well incorporated. Because of the antimony sulfide, I wear a respirator when mixing the dry ingredients and latex gloves when adding the water (I’m told antimony poisoning is akin to lead or barium poisoning-very unpleasant and I don’t want to find this out first hand!)
Priming is not required for these stars although some people like to prime the stars when going for the cloud effect. It is also a good idea to lightly prime the exposed face of crossettes made with this glitter formula because there is a lot less exposed ignition area on a crossette compared to a regular firework comet of the same size. Priming is cheap insurance against one or two of the stars being blown blind and diminishing the symmetry of the break (not to mention wasting all that labor that goes into making each crossette that didn’t work).
| YELLOW GLITTER FORMULA | ||
| Chemical | Parts by Weight | |
| Potassium Nitrate | 48 | |
| Airfloat Charcoal | 9 | |
| Sulfur | 11 | |
| Aluminum (12-20 micron, atomized) | 9 | |
| Antimony Trisulfide, Chinese Needle | 10 | |
| Sodium Bicarbonate or Sodium Oxalate | 9 | |
| Dextrin | 4 | |
