the antverpian pirate

Youre right i also have had those sacks with granulas in packages that contained items that cant stand moisture ofcoarse i alyet threw them away but i bought such a tablet and i alyet have a good idea on how to place it. They are indeed not so cheap but one tablet is almost 10 cm in diameter and 4 cm in with so as long as i can preserve it it wil last al long time. I am thinking of taking a box for a rol of photofilm those small round things with lids. Then i want to puncture the topside so there are a couple of holes in it and i wane place a small screen somwhere in the midle beneath the holes so i can lay the tablet on it and if there is exces water wich the tablet cant hold it wil drip down in the bottom of the container. Only god knows where so much water will come from but then i have a nice reusable container i only need to make shure that i secure the lid good. Those reusable (am i writing this right )granulas sound nice ive heard that they are used in an aplication for shoes to absorp the sweat and then you drie them on a radiator but ill see how long those tabs last and if i come across more of those sacks i will keep them. The tablets i have here contain calciumchloride and they should smell neutral says the package. Pirate

I don't know but shouldn't the fuse with BP/AL burn faster then the normal fuse? I know you tested it so if you say it's the same burn rate as normal it is, but I mean theoretically. And your funnel - is it fixed or is there some kind of vibrating thingy on it so it shakes it's contents a bit so you don't have to do it yourself ? Could you please post some pics of your Machine because i'm quite curious and maybe it also helps other people who read the forum to build their own or am I totaly blind and have it seen completely over the pics. Pirate

Hehe Ive heard about it before that they use permangate to kill bacteries on fish(Koi's) by throwing a litle in the water and on that site they also said that it is possible that it makes purple spots on your skin if you come in contact with it. But since blaf used to bathe in it it's probably pritty safe, i also dont think Blaf his parents wanted to kill him so they didn't throw it in without knowing what they where doing. Ofcoarse you do have to be careful with it like al chems especialy iff there poiseness in certain quanteties :wink: Ps: My mail should be on the way i think that the option to send a copy to my own mailbox was on but i haven't received anything yet so let me know if you dont get it Pirate

Thats always good to know that it works. :wink: Thanks for the tip on burning the parafine out thats gona be usefull. Well long ago when i still was in school we used to scrape of graphite from our pencils and we made lines from about 5 cm and then we put 220 v on both ends of the line. And it conducted nicely and burned up you could see all of the inside of the line get hot and red because of the generated heath the only problem was that our teacher didn't like it that much it kinda smelled and left a black mark on our piece of wood So ill just try it out and post the results here Pirate

Ah so permangate on it's own is compltely harmless i dont mean the poiseness part but for grinding thats good to know thanks :wink: And in 50-60 years ill probably be dead anyway so lets alyet forget about the respirator then i dont like to wear those things anyway (just kidding) I knew it was a stupid question but yeah sombody has to sacrifice himself to ask :oops: Its just im rather safe then sorry its like with my motorcycle i can drive pretty good i can scrape my knee easely but i still am reading and studying on how i can do it better and safer. :wink: Pirate

Aha now there springs somthing to mind my mom has a lot of those plastic containers for storing food in al sorts of shapes and sizes maybe i can borrow some. And what do you use to get the moisture out off the air desicator granules i dont know the word's but i know what you mean with it but where do you get it. Ive looked at a onlineshop for home contruction and there they have this box to get moisture out of the air in the top of the box is a bag with also a sort of those desicator granules and beneath it a reservoir for the water that drips down from the bag. Would it be possible to open the bag take some granulas out of it and put those in a litle box with some holes in it and glue that to the lid of your big box. The only thing im wondering about is that the type of granulas or whatever is in those bags are the right ones for the job because they do get the moisture out of the air but they release it again in the reservoir or do these type of bags just continue to get the moisture out of the air and only leave the exces water out or somthing like that. This afternoon i have to be in that shop so ill aks some sales person or thay have some extra info for me but its such a wholesale store so there staff aint that specialised most off the time but i doesn't hurt to try. Here is a link to the stuff maybe the pics explain it better then i do :roll: http://www.brico.be/wabs/catalog2006/catal...=252265&param=1 Apperently there are types with tabs and others with bags so they like to make it difficult and im also not going to take the ones with extra parfume although that might be a nice effect.

I may have a dumb question but if somewone could help me with it it would be greatly apriciated. When you mix this type of flash you should be carefull i know that but i have KMnO4 and it's not a powder its more like a bunch off fine flakes to coarse to use directly in a comp. But how do you get em finer can you just grind it with a pestle and mortar or is there another way to do it because KMnO4 is poiseness and im not realy intrested in inhaling some very fine dust ofcoarse you can put on a respirator and gloves and so but is there a better way then with the pestle and mortar Pirate

I have another question for you Blaf the graphite you use is from dead batteries you say but is it possible to use the graphite from pencils if you make a fine powder of it because i have a bunch of those graphite sticks for in reusable pencils. I read on brainfever his site that he makes a slurrie of graphite with nc laquer and then he dips his wires into the slurrie. And after that dries a bit he dips it in a pyro comp for example bp wit water and dextrine and finaly he dips it in pure nc laquer to make it waterresistant. Is that also the way you do it or do you have another technique. Pirate

Wel to be totaly honoust i didn't read the test completly yet thats why i'm trying to find it again, but it does make sense how you explain it with the conductivity of carbon and the non generating of heat. Probably i shouldn't say this but be carefull while youre testing :wink: I also got another question for you blaf or if somewone else knows the answer they also may say it offcourse. What is the best way to stock bp or meal in what kind of jar glas plastic, airtight or open in case of accidental deflagration or shouldn't you store bp or meal for the risk of an accident? Its just i have about a 100 grams meal at the moment and i want to make some rockets so im planning on making some more meal and rolling a lot of engines so that i can make a bunch of them and try out some different things because i live in the middel of a city it aint so easy to take a walk and testfire some stuff but now im wondering at how safe it is to have that stuff lying around (in a safe compartiment where nobody can touch it but still i dont want nothing to happen) Pirate

Ok, we won't talk about work no more, I promise :wink: Pirate

You're right i also heard that about bp that it is one of the safest comp's to work with. If i aint mistaking there is a link on the forum to a test on static electricity in combination with bp and for as far as i know they waren't able to ignite bp with static electricity ill take a look iff i can find it.Hmm i don't seem to be able to find it again sry. My media (lead ball's)where indeed covered in bp so I let it dry and milled it again and then my lead ball's(not my own) where clean again or clean enough so that i didn't lose to much comp. Actualy i should have weighed it again to see how much comp i lost but i alyet did some burn test's so ill have to do it with my next try. And Exhile it would be greatly apriciated if you could explain some more :wink: Pirate

It's the same here, I'm also much more active on the net when I'm "working". Those poor bosses of ours what bad employees they have Ah that's very kind off you to get Exhile to help me. Pirate

So I realy have the fatboy fuse :oops: Yep it burns nicely also good pics and there is a big difference with and without flash(what kind of flash do you use, I've got the KMnO4 type ok, sorry bad joke) And a good idea to hold the fuse with pliers. When I was testing my fuse I put a small piece on my working table and lit it. I really was suprised that fuse on it's own had so much thrust, it was flying around my room like some kind of drunk fly.

Ah, ah, with a pestle and mortar, learned something again thanks :wink: Euh, sleep :roll: once in a while, I also need to do that No I just start working pretty early and I have to sit behind a pc when I'm not driving around with the company car so I have a lot of time to surf the net. Pirate

Im also gona try dry milling this afternoon. Last weekend i wetted my meal a bit but it didn't worked out that well because my comp was sticking to my media so i did have some nice stars but that was not my intention.In the beginning it was just a litle wet so it still was powder but with my latex gloves on i didn't feel it was a bit wet so i wetted the comp some more and then it went wrong. Then about the acetone so you use it instead of water so when i want to make stars and i use shellack then i should use acetone/alcohol or only acetone or am i missing something here. I also would be greatfull Exhile if you could explain some more :wink: Pirate

I've got another question - how do you crush the cakes? Probably a stupid question but I don't know the answer for sure so its better to ask then to experiment, right. Do you put them in a box of some kind and beat them with a rubber hammer or something or is it more complicated? Pirate

Thanks for the info on rubbing alcohol then ill go take a look in some paintshops luckely for me i have one right across my street. Thats one advantage of living in a city but finding safe testing grounds is more difficult. And thats a nice pic you posted it shows the difference of the grain sizes real good :wink: Do you use the water/alcohol mix for ball milling , pressing and making stars and so because a litle while back in this topic exhile said that he used acetone so that the kno3 doesn't crystalise out on the sides of the composition. Or does the alcohol has the same effect on the kno3 as the acetone :? Pirate

Ah that's one nice looking and burning fuse you got there Blaf :shock: It even looks like it's burning better then my bought fuse does. If I may ask what diameter is your fuse, the one I bought is 2.15mm thick while the fuses on my commercial fireworks that I have lying around here are about 1.65mm. Pirate

Ok sorry for rushing and questioning if the Machine works :oops: But you know how it is with the eagerness of youth. Pirate

I'm trying You know a lot of pyro and build your own tools so if it doesn't bother you too much I'm trying to learn as much as possible :wink: And you do have a good point that those shops will try to sell a couple of meters instead of a small piece. Lets hope I find something. Maybe in a plumbers shop, there I've bought a couple of shorter pieces before but they where about 5 cm in diameter. Maybe they also have bigger ones. Pirate

Hey Blaf Ok, now I have an idea where to search for the stuff. Thanks again. And you're right, black is indeed the most businesslike altough yellow also would have been nice The plastic drain pipes won't be such a problem. I think I know a couple of shops where I can get them but the piston is gonna be more difficult. I do know a shop where they sell bearings and stuff so I'll ask there and lets hope they have it. And you found the right stuff for your press so you had a bit of luck so I hope I'll be as lucky as humble you :wink: Pirate

I'm already astonished by your machines, you really have some skills working metal and pyrotechnics :shock: Did you have a training as engineer or something or are you just that good with your hands? But take your time to finish it but please post the pics because I'm dying to see what the complete machine is going to look like and if it works properly of course altough I don't think I have to doubt it'll be working :wink: Pirate

Ok thanks :wink: Then i have to search around for some ethanol i found one site where they sell it but it is about 20 euro's for 70 cl so it's pretty expensive. Maybe iff i search some more i can find a better deal. The rubbing alcohol what is it normaly used for, the ethanol i can get is for making youre own alcaholic beverages (kindoff like whiskey but then with fruit flavour and so ,i dont know the english name :oops: ) Pirate

Ok that's good to know that the springs are really important, then I have to make sure I also fit them when I build my own press. And for the shield shouldn't it be possible to take the plexi from an old passenger train and just put two or three windows behind each other. Of course, you first give them the right dimensions and then bolt them on the press. Or do you really need a piece of plexi that's made out of one piece? Pirate

This water /acetone mix you guys are talking about what percentage water /acetone do you use? And is it possible to use a water/ethanol mix or can you only use that one for the binding of stars and for the binding of stars do u absolutly have to use ethanol or can you also use methanol or is that impossible because of its inpurities? Sorry for the loads of questions but i like to now what im doing. Regards Pirate