That is odd. I have never heard of commercial firework manufacturers using plastic hemis. I suppose it does reduce time, but I would imagine the fallout factor from firing some few hundred shells would be more than enough to make them stick with paper. I suppose most of the commercial balls shells I have seen are chinese. Perhaps the spanish do it differently.
I have seen quite a few plastic ones, at shugborough i know they used them because one landed near us i think it was part of a nice 6 incher!! I am not sure where they come from, i dont think the chinese use them. The middle picture is a give away that its made from 4 parts, look at the bottom right corner. Part of the outer hemi is broken off and reveals the next hemi under it. I have seen the construction of this type of shell on the freakpyromanicas web site and i have a few of the plastic shells i guess from the same plastic firework company in spain.
Find me some more Karl, interesting stuff your finding there.
Karl2
Edited by karlfoxman, 12 November 2005 - 10:50 AM.