38 replies to this topic

[Wyvern]

Chlorate whistle? Isn't that very dangerous? As far as I am aware you can't make chlorate whistle with sodium benzoate! It wont whistle.Dont take my word for it but that is what I've read elsewhere. It must be perchlorate. With regards to perc / benzoate whistle as I understand it the sodium benzoate itself is not hydroscopic but when mixed with perc, sodium perchlorate is formed which is hydroscopic.

Perhaps any chemists out there might like to correct me if i'm wrong

Cheers

It is more dangerous than perc whistle hence only a very small batch was made and very carefully pressed into a tube, i can say for sure that it does whistle though.

[karlfoxman]

Im suprised they whistle if your doing it by hand, normally you need quite a bit of pressure to make a decent whistle. I must say I have never seen a Potassium chlorate and Sodium benzoate whistle formula. What is the actyual formula your using? They also dont like mechanical action, all those bits of composition between the ram and the tube are just waiting to have enough friction to ignite.

[Wyvern]

Im using 65% Chlorate / 35% Benzoate +1%Fe2O3 +3% Vaseline, they are pressed using a vice with a piece of 15mm lexan guard in 1teaspoon of mix added at a time. i find this packs it very tightly and gives a nice "shiney" finish to the end of the rocket. i also wouldnt use and added metals in this comp in fear of a spark.

This mix was purely a one off experiment, i'm not keen on chlorate comps for obvious reasons i would rather refine my perc whistle so it works properly however the whistle from this was far superior to the one from the perc comp and also burns a lot more energeticly

[maxman]

I have never used whistle to break a shell because i aways thought it didnt burn fast enough?... it burnt just like your test clip maxman.. i look forward to seeing your whistle perform in a shell...

Just made a new small batch of Pink whistle as my previous attempts at a dry mix failed to produce a comp that was even as fast as meal!

Sasman, How much of this Whistle would you use in a flash bag to break a 3" Gamon ball shell?
I'm going to try it the spanish way by just loading the stars in the top of the TAPA shell. Should I just use a flash bag with the whistle in or mix the stars in with meal coated crispies?

[Wyvern]

Just made a new small batch of Pink whistle as my previous attempts at a dry mix failed to produce a comp that was even as fast as meal!

Sasman, How much of this Whistle would you use in a flash bag to break a 3" Gamon ball shell?
I'm going to try it the spanish way by just loading the stars in the top of the TAPA shell. Should I just use a flash bag with the whistle in or mix the stars in with meal coated crispies?

Whistle powder when burned unconfined wont burn very fast at all however when it is confined inside the shell it will be fine.

[sasman]

Maxman i have never used whistle but i would go for about 3 to 5 grams should make a nice big break on a 3" shell. I thought the same as you it does not seem to burn very fast..But that sample looked ok to me .. should work ok ..I have not used a flash bag yet either... I have either coated my burst charge with the booster or for last few shells i have made, just added a small scoop of booster in each half of the shell.. seems to work ok...

Good luck...

[maxman]

I found that because the flash bag was bigger than I guessed (since I think whistle has more powder by volume than flash) I could not then load my 3/8" stars through the top of the shell as it was partly blocked by the bag! I have continued to make the shell the passfire way using a food baggie for all the stars but I am really short on lift powder so I have not used any 4FA as reccomended between the stars! This could be a mistake! I have used 3/8" emerald green and davies white. Both have been primed though. I have used 6 gram whistle in a bag. Either there will be one almighty bang and all the stars blown blind or it will work. We'll see later or poss tomorrow night!

[BrightStar]

There's lots of ongoing discussion here on whether whistle mix is really fast enough to be of any use in boosting break charges...

Essentially, it all depends on the strength of the confinement - or the pasting of your shell. Here's a quick demo of a well made granulated benzoate whistle. This burns in the open like a slowish BP, but only 0.6g well confined behaves as shown:

0.6g whistle booster test (divx avi, 1,409 KB)

The report is louder than a gun shot and the paper tube is shredded into confetti over a 3m radius, quite unlike a BP burst that just pops the end plugs.

Now to make a few shells - the neighbours patience with my ground tests is running a bit low...

Edited by BrightStar, 08 September 2007 - 12:03 AM.

[cplmac]

I think the quality of the whistle comp has a lot to do with it. I've never made a batch of whistle that didn't burn much faster and more energetically than meal, and chlorate whistle is practically flash fast. That seemed like a really fuel heavy mix Wyvern, how did it perform?

[Wyvern]

I think the quality of the whistle comp has a lot to do with it. I've never made a batch of whistle that didn't burn much faster and more energetically than meal, and chlorate whistle is practically flash fast. That seemed like a really fuel heavy mix Wyvern, how did it perform?

The Batch of chlorate whistle performed quite well, as you say is was fuel heavy and wasnt as fast as it could have been but it gave a much better whistle than my perc whistle did at the time although since i started drying out the benzoate it is far better.

[maxman]

There's lots of ongoing discussion here on whether whistle mix is really fast enough to be of any use in boosting break charges...

Essentially, it all depends on the strength of the confinement - or the pasting of your shell. Here's a quick demo of a well made granulated benzoate whistle. This burns in the open like a slowish BP, but only 0.6g well confined behaves as shown:

0.6g whistle booster test (divx avi, 1,409 KB)

The report is louder than a gun shot and the paper tube is shredded into confetti over a 3m radius, quite unlike a BP burst that just pops the end plugs.

Now to make a few shells - the neighbours patience with my ground tests is running a bit low...

Brightstar, so far my tests have shown that the whistle booster I have used in my 3" plastic ball shells has made no noticeable difference to my breaks! I keep asking but so far no one has posted any videos of their whistle burning loose except me. I would love to see the speed of what others are using.

I was under the impression that whistle was called "organic flash" being that it is not far behind flash in strength and sensitivity?? The whistle I have made so far seems on a par with good lift powder only!

Passfire says that flash is the most powerfull followed by whistle, H3, KP,BP so surely it should give me the break that I want. Could I use whistle on a carrier? H3 is used on a carrier isnt it? but flash not??

[Wyvern]

Well here is my Perc/sodium benzoate whitle powder burning.


And Here in a rocket


I have just made 2 more rockets which i will hopefully launch tonight, 1 with dragons eggs in and the other is an attempt at cplmac's step rocket
Wish me luck

[marble]

Rocket was nice

Next time put a small salute so we can roughly work out the height it reached

[maxman]

Well here is my Perc/sodium benzoate whitle powder burning.


And Here in a rocket


I have just made 2 more rockets which i will hopefully launch tonight, 1 with dragons eggs in and the other is an attempt at cplmac's step rocket
Wish me luck

Thanks for that Wyvern. Did you mix that wet or dry? It looked pink so it would have had the red iron oxide in correct? Was it an unmeasured amount? When you said it wasn't granulated how do you granulate it? After wet mixing I just pushed through a 20 mesh screen so it wasn't hard granules

[Wyvern]

It was Dry mixed 70/30 Whistle with +1% Fe2O3, after i usualy wet with Acetone and do the same as you to granulate it and yes indeed they are not hard and can be crushed between fingers.

On the Break charge subject i was talking to someone the other day who uses a whistle/flash hybrid powder 70/20/10 perc/benz/Al, it sounds a bit dodgy to me maybe one of the guys who knows more than i can comment