110 replies to this topic

[mike_smith919]

WOW! Thats one proffesional looking guide, the cake wasn't bad either lol.

Good job, I now have another project to add to my to do list.

Mike.

[paul]

At last! The tutorial is finished, taken longer than the cake itself

http://www.pyrobin.c..... tutorial.doc

Let me know what you think. Any comments good or bad (constructive criticism) would be much appreciated. This is my first tutorial after all.

Dean

Thats simply one of the best tutorials I´ve seen so far.
You go into EVERY detail and explain everything in an
easy-to-understand way.

Perfect!

[portfire]

Thats simply one of the best tutorials I´ve seen so far.
You go into EVERY detail and explain everything in an
easy-to-understand way.

Perfect!

Thanks for your comments guys, much appreciated

They will probibly small updates as I come up with differant ways of fusing, as this is the most important part. If you follow the fusing method of the Z rows, you should get 2 shots per second, but I have a couple of ideas, and hoping I can get up to 5 shots per second. Once I can get a good consistant shot rate I'll be attempting an 'X cake', but as we all know we can't rush these things, so don't expect it anytime soon

Dean

[Arthur Brown]

I've had problems getting hot melt glue to stay hot enough to do several tubes at a time, - seems fine for single tubes though. I found PVA glue from B&Q cheaper, easily available, and very strong. Trouble is it takes a day to harden properly.

[portfire]

I've had problems getting hot melt glue to stay hot enough to do several tubes at a time, - seems fine for single tubes though. I found PVA glue from B&Q cheaper, easily available, and very strong. Trouble is it takes a day to harden properly.

As you know, hot melt glue will stay plyable for 10-15 seconds. If your gluing 10 tubes it gives you enough time to press the tubes down on to the wooden arch, same go's for the carboard supports. If thats the point you were getting at ?

[Arthur Brown]

Must indicate different hot melt glue or gun then! My glue stayed soft for 1 - 2 seconds. Literally only one tube could be stuck at a time. That's why I tried PVA.

Edited by Arthur Brown, 11 May 2008 - 11:44 AM.

[portfire]

Must indicate different hot melt glue or gun then! My glue stayed soft for 1 - 2 seconds. Literally only one tube could be stuck at a time.

IMO thats an advantage, you'll be able to get a cleaner finish. My glue gun is just a standard B&Q one with standard white sticks, as you've seen.

Edited by portfire, 11 May 2008 - 02:24 PM.

[portfire]

Thanks to someone over at APC, the tutorial is now available in a MUCH smaller to download pdf file

http://pyrotechnics....0tutorial_1.pdf

[portfire]

Here we go again, 120 Shot Z Mk2.

My fusing, flame protection is getting there. The first 2 rows both fired together, but there should have been a 4 second delay between them, they were both 'fire all' BTW.

Sequence should have been- 1st row, 'fire all' w/ Buell Reds, 4 second delay, 2nd row 'fire all' w/Veline yellow (It was actually Veline Red, but I subed the SrCO3 for Cryolite), then a 4 second delay before the cake went into Z mode, then the last row 'fire all' w/D1.

The stars were around 12mm rolled, changing effect 3 times, from Chrys#6-D1-to either red or yellow, came out quite nice I think, although they could have done with a couple more mm of Chrys#6.

Pre-fire




Video
http://www.pyrobin.c... z cake mk2.mpg

It says 100 shot, but it's 120. (still got birdflu and the headache to suit )


Anyway, I feel the teacher has become the student, Digger would you like to take the stage

[karlfoxman]

Great cake! Really nice and I appreciate the amount of work that you must do to make it work well as it clearly does. Very well done, loved it! I have used those Veline modded Yellows, very nice colour from them. Still wanna see you make a rainbow cake! If you do, Ill have at least 6 of them please!

[digger]

Anyway, I feel the teacher has become the student, Digger would you like to take the stage

Thanks Portfire although I would not go quite that far, your cakes look exceptionally professional. I have to say thanks for the talk you gave at the convention, it gave me a few ideas on improving my cakes. I do like the speed at which the rows fire using your fusing method and I especially like the fire at once rows (You may see that coming to one of my cakes soon).

Well here is a cake that I put together for the show (300 shot).



The following formula were used to produce 12.5mm pumped (star plate) stars for the cake

Winokur 31, Ellern electric streamer, Veline green +3% Ti, Veline red +3% Ti, Veline Maroon, Perigrin Orange #3, 1 gram flash salutes +10% Ti, 2 gram flash salutes. I am sure there was one more, but I forget what it was without looking at my records.

So CLICK HERE to see the results (thanks to another forum member for the footage, you know who you are).

Well I have a plan for the next one, it may be a bit different so watch this space!!.

Digger

Edited by digger, 17 June 2008 - 06:05 PM.

[Pretty green flames]

Oh wow, both these cakes look great. I really have nothing else to say except, keep up the great work.

[dr thrust]

i had the pleasure of seeing both these cakes in action and check them out pre firing and they are a work of art taking many many hours to build, a real labour of love id say!, may i ask how you made your tubes digger? they looked/ felt very strong for there wall thickness

[phildunford]

Yes, was there too and can confirm the effect was superb!

Very even firing and great colour saturation.

Theres more footage of it at the end of my video of the evening at:

Youtube

Not so complete as the other, but a bit closer.

Love one of the youtube comments - "wow, I wonder where i can buy these " - if only he knew!

[digger]

i had the pleasure of seeing both these cakes in action and check them out pre firing and they are a work of art taking many many hours to build, a real labour of love id say!, may i ask how you made your tubes digger? they looked/ felt very strong for there wall thickness

Yep they sure take some time to build, you asked how long the cake took me to build at the show. Well as you know everything apart from the fuse was done from scratch, after having a think about it the total build time for that cake was 30 hours!!

As to how I roll the tubes, I simply take a sheet of A4 160gm colour card (thicker and more absorbent than white) and cut in half down the length then using a mix of 75% PVA 25% Water I roll one half over a stainless steel mandrel. Hey presto a tube. When dry I plug them using bentonite in the usual way. For my rocket tubes I use the same process the only difference apart from the 26mm ID instead of 14mm ID for the cake is that I add a second layer over a dried first layer to give a wall thickness of 2mm and not one CATO with them yet. I have pushed the casings to nearly 4Kg of thrust although on the vid at these levels the casing starts to balloon at the end of the burn.