--- On Wed, 5/19/10, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax <a...@lomaxdesign.com> wrote:
> > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMQEiRWoiJw > > > > Is it practical? No. Was it fun? Oh yes. > > Better page: http://www.sparkbangbuzz.com/flame-amp/flameamp.htm I know Nyle's pages are better than mine, that's why I linked to him from my own page. And he was the inspiration for what I did. ...I tried? It seemed interesting at the time, I guess. > I'm sure some are. I made a crystal radio that was powered > from loose RF floating around, I must have been about 12 or > so. I was more interested in stuff that went bang. I don't > recall how I happened upon a flash explosive that was > aluminum powder, sulfur, and potassium permanganate as the > oxidizer. Cool stuff. Back home, when I was a kid, I was into model rockets. But it seemed boring making something from a kit. So I set about making my own rockets and engines. For fuel, I had a few different things. The most common was common sugar and potassium nitrate, melted together in a 40/60 ratio, then cast into PVC pipe lengths, which were then capped and provided with a nozzle cast from Durham's water putty. A teenager at that time, I had this ragtag collection of assorted hangers-on from, of all places, the local Baptist church. These guys, and sometimes girls if we were lucky, would come over and help manufacture rocket engines. We had this test stand, if you can justify calling it that, which was a highly technological device consisting of a piece of 3" steel pipe set vertically into concrete in the middle of the yard. We'd drop an engine in, lit, and run for cover. Sometimes they worked. Sometimes.......... I guess one of the worst incidents was an experimental engine composed of potassium nitrate, magnesium dust (!) and a binder of polyurethane. The geyser of fire and oily, acrid smoke that issued from that test stand was ungodly. If I remember right, it was me and Jerry who were there when it happened. When you see fire flow like a liquid... time to make an exit, stage right. > Anyway, I'm an American kid, still, I'm just older.... Ditto. > Well, I can understand, but I don't really miss that. > Heathkits were cheap, main point for me at the time, I built > quite a few, but assembly costs are now so low that a > Heathkit to do what I can easily buy fully assembled and > tested, etc., would be much more expensive. Yes, assembled is cheaper now. Sometimes, late at night, I wonder if that's really better. Where's it made? In the USA? Or by someone slaving in a third world nation, with no chance of anything better? My dad told me stories of taking the tubes from his old TV down to the drug store and testing them. He'd replace the bad one, and back to The Honeymooners it was. Now, you just go to Wal Mart and buy a new TV. In some ways, this is good... an electronics cannibal such as myself finds garbage day to be a great boon to my assets of stuff. On the other hand, I think we're instilling a sense of nonappreciation for what has been made. "Screw it, it's cheap, I don't care if I break it, I'll buy another one." Put another way, nothing is made with sockets any more. It's all hard-soldered. There are no VCR repair shops any more. Nothing is repaired, just discarded and replaced. What is the environmental impact of this? > I'm selling the material, $27.80 per 9x12 cm. sheet. Be the > first on your block.... Interesting stuff. If I had the money and time, I wouldn't mind doing a few CF experiments here. --Kyle
