4 replies to this topic

[David]

Quick rundown for the year!

Things look pretty stable, which is nice. "New Spec" is here to stay, and to be fair, it's pretty decent. Gone are the flashy bangs of yesteryear, but still, there is some quality stuff out there. 1.3G and mesh helps (and have saved big rockets) and so there is quite a good selection of decent stuff to choose from.

Some highlights by name include War Hawk Rockets, Epics Magneto, Hawk and White Tiger Rockets , Brothers Maximum showtime and Kingdom Rockets. Bright Star (guy fawkes) have some nice little 36 shot cakes.

Pyro "on the web" is looking good- Epic have a blog I sometimes write things for, UKFR now has a section where people can add footage of stuff they sell and the public can comment both I find useful.


I guess the only sticking point is the current price of fireworks. Unfortunatly, due to reasons beyond the control of sellers, prices of quality items have really gone up now . Thus, say, £100 gets you a lot less pyro than 5 years ago. Epic and JTF remain discount sellers, likewise some other shops sell stuff at a reduction of the RRP, whereas others in all honesty make little appeal at RRP.

On the positive side, rockets don't seem to be any more expensive now - including meshed ones- so rockets are better vlaue than ever.

At the end of the day, whether or not fireworks are "worth the money" will always be totally subjective, but for me it's a moot point as I don't have the disposable income I once did. I'll be spending a little bit of course- couple of packets of war hawks no doubt! Might be tempted to try some Sky Snipers too.

Edited by David, 01 October 2012 - 06:08 PM.

[Creepin_pyro]

Thanks for the writeup David, do you have any recommendations for new CAT2 stuff? I used to always get a few bits from Kimbolton's CAT2 range but prices have gone up a bit too far...

[David]

Hiya- not sure what I can recommend really. Royal Party do a decent Cat 2 nine pack I think, and Absolute have some good stuff I hear.
UKFR would be a good place to ask.
....

Also, have editted my previous post slightly. The appears to be one or two issues with a site I made reference to.

[David]

Quick update- seasonals sellers just seem to get worse year on year. Sad but true. It's questionable how long such businesses will go on. For sure, there WILL be some exceptions, and this refers obviously only to the ones I have seen. But today, the last Saturday before the main bonfire Saturday, about half I passed (on quite a large tour round) where not even open.

Moreover, those that were open seem to be stocking what are, to my mind, second rate brands. Again, there will be good exceptions (I would hope) but thats the general impression I got.

The positive is there is some good stuff around too- and some VERY good stuff- from dedicated specialist sellers. More on that later!

[David]

And to continue... from what I've seen, there is some really good stuff around, which is excellent. Pick of the crop so far is probably War Hawks- at around £15 for 5 they rank alongside some of the best value fireworks of all time (taking current prices into account) - massive clean breaks, and proper volume.

Likewise, there is some decent small 1.4G around too - Bright Star does a rapid firing 19 shotter called Report Flash- which is neither reports nor flash, rather it is grenn and red comets and bp bursts, but is a cool rat-a-tat style effect. I paid about £2.50 for it, which is decent.