71 replies to this topic

[1145climber]

I think rolling stars is like making a snowman, you dont need a canon ball to start the snow man.

hahahah, i like the analogy.

i still dont understand though, what is the benefit of using seeds or whatever as your cores? wouldnt it make more sense to just used a pumped star, so that every last bit burns? is it because they roll easier?

[Phoenix]

Mainly because they're cheap and easy to get.

I'd advise against using lead for cores. It is supposed to be easier to roll with, but millet isn't really difficult. Even if dumping permenantly toxic material onto your surroundings doesn't bother you (which it should) lead cores will make your stars unnecessarily heavy.

[Yugen-biki]

Rolling on seeds directly is much faster then first make small pumped stars and roll them big.
Very little seeds are used if you compare the wheight of the seeds and the comp rolled on them. I'm sure we are talking about tenth of a percent.

[1145climber]

ohhh, aright, i get it. and yeah, at least im not the only that thinks using lead is bad and wrong and all that. thanks.

[seymour]

If you want your stars to be completely burning you can press slightly damp comp through a screen (like making pulverone) onto your roller and use them as star cores.

Edited by seymour, 27 May 2005 - 06:40 AM.

[miniskinny]

I have a good suggestion, in fact a method that I have been using to roll my stars. I use the Air-Soft pellats, I bought 10k of them for like 20 dollars; small plastic balls.

[Erwin]

Aren't those way to big?
I'm planning on making a starroller in the future to, for making color/effect changing stars.
Think I'll go with some sort of small seeds, need tot test for myself whioch ones soak up to much water and grow whoch can cause the stars to break and crumble.
Or start with microstars or something similar.

[newtoolsmith]

Hi Friends,

Im going to make stars of a Strontiumnitrate/PVC/Al formula on the one hand and Bariumnitrate/PVC/Al on the other.

Some boric acid will be added but I still dont want to make the stars dextrin bound because I noticed some heat when such a comp got wet. Of course I dont want self ignition at all.

Can I use Shellac solved in alcohol as binder without adding a binder to the comp?

I thought it should be enough to spray the binder/alc mixture onto the rolling stars.

How much shellac should I solve in 1 litre of hot alcohol? Will it stay solved when cooling down?

PS: pictures of my new star roller machine will folow, I just have to find out how to...

MfG
newtoolsmith

[fishy1]

I've never used cores for rolling stars, I just get the comp in my rolling pan, spray on some water/(water/meths) and shake it about, and stars up to about 5mm just come to the top of the mixture. Then, I can roll these stars up in size to whatever I want.

[Anders Greenman]

I've been using sago grains in the past time and it works excellent. They tend to stick together in the start, but when lighthly sprikled with bentonite and coated with a thin layer of composition, they rolls as good as any core i've ever seen. The fallout danger and pollution is eliminated and they're very cheap and aviable to. At least i Norway. They may have another brands in the UK, but they consist of potato flour an are mainly used for a special kind of soup.

[newtoolsmith]

Hello again,

the same question as above:


Im going to make stars of a Strontiumnitrate/PVC/Al formula on the one hand and Bariumnitrate/PVC/Al on the other.

Some boric acid will be added but I still dont want to make the stars dextrin bound because I noticed some heat when such a comp got wet. Of course I dont want self ignition at all.

Can I use Shellac solved in alcohol as binder without adding a binder to the comp?

I thought it should be enough to spray the binder/alc mixture onto the rolling stars.

How much shellac should I solve in 1 litre of hot alcohol? Will it stay solved when cooling down?



Never tried this or similar things?



By the way, I use rape seeds as cores - for only one Euro you get over a million of them! That lasts very very long.


MfG
newtoolsmith

Edited by newtoolsmith, 05 September 2006 - 09:07 PM.

[Yugen-biki]

Hello newtoolsmith!

Yes you can use shellac in alcohol, but I can't say how much you'll need to get it to stick together. The principle is the same with NC-lacquer. But in my experience it is easier to have the binding agent in the comp and spray a dislolver on the stars.
I sugest that you use about 5% shellac in the stars and spray a alcohol water solution with at least 70% alcohol in it. That worker fine for me when I made green stars, similar to yours, but with MgAl, parlon and some C if I remember correctly.

[BrightStar]

Hmmm... just spent a long couple of hours trying to teach myself how to roll stars....

The comp was Veline Red (bound with +4% dextrin), the solvent 25% IPA in water. I started with half a teaspoonful of 2mm lead shot (I know, I won't do this in the long run, but that's not even one shotgun cartridge worth....) Getting an initial coating on the shot wasn't too tricky, but once they reached about 3-4mm in size they just wouldn't grow - as much comp was sticking to my wok as to the stars.

I gave up for the night and tried a new method on the previous night's stars - using one part of the wok for dampening, and another for adding comp. This worked better and I now have about 140 or so 6mm red stars. This used up 100g comp - suggesting that to get them all up to 12mm in size could require another 700g of comp ??? This seems a lot.

So friends, a few questions please... Is it usual to have to roll stars in stages? Should I dry them at 6mm before rolling up to 12mm? Any ideas how many of these 12mm stars I might need for a 4" ball shell? Any other tips?

Edited by BrightStar, 29 March 2007 - 04:33 PM.

[karlfoxman]

Brightstar, I have rolled a few stars before. I have David Blesser's round stars DVD and its a real help! He goes into alot of detail. One thing I picked up is to spray any left over comp that has got on the pan and roll the stars over it till its gone. Also the % of alc makes an impact on how well the stars roll. I suggest if you can to buy the dvd and book from AFN. And yes you need to roll then dry, up to 5mm or so first then every 5mm should be ok. Or the stars will never fully dry, Im by no means an expert on rolling stars but I have managed to roll nice round stars.