[HN Gopher] How to make colored fire at home (2020)
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How to make colored fire at home (2020)
Author : squircle
Score : 101 points
Date : 2024-06-10 12:02 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (sciencenotes.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (sciencenotes.org)
| h2odragon wrote:
| possibly of use:
|
| https://www.skylighter.com/collections/coloring-agents
|
| https://www.pyrochemsource.com/Fuels-Colorants_c_16.html
| eps wrote:
| ... and not a single photo.
| cpach wrote:
| There was an illustration though :)
| dr_dshiv wrote:
| Don't miss the black flame! https://sciencenotes.org/how-to-make-
| black-fire/
| huhtenberg wrote:
| Yeah, that's cheating :)
| croon wrote:
| That one we'd like to do at home, if I could get my hands on an
| LPS lamp, there's a lot of wrongly marked bulbs out there,
| afaict.
| sva_ wrote:
| Just look in a growing shop. Isn't that what they use?
| genter wrote:
| No, they used HPS. Although now replaced by LED.
| sva_ wrote:
| Ah, fair enough. Doesn't seem so hard to find a legit one
| though. Searching for Philips SOX gets me a lot of
| results for example.
| hi_hi wrote:
| Very cool. Reminded me of this post about Sodium Vapour Lights
| used in old school special effects chroma keying.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39962615
| nelox wrote:
| They forgot phosphorus
| dr_dshiv wrote:
| I'm thinking of producing an "Alchemy Set" for kids. Like a
| chemistry set, but... more esoteric. I work with these experts in
| Alchemy from the Embassy of the Free Mind in Amsterdam.
|
| If you are into this sort of thing, any experiments you'd hope to
| see in the set?
| croon wrote:
| My daughter (6) loves experiments, but honestly all the
| chemistry sets and similar we've bought have been quite boring,
| except for the bog standard baking soda/citric acid/green
| coloring snot volcano.
|
| I like chemteacherphil on YT, who does a lot of visually fun
| experiments, many involving fire, and I would definitely buy
| packaged products of some of those, instead of trying to source
| chemicals/metals/tools for home (not having access to our own
| lab).
| alt227 wrote:
| Thanks for pointing out chemteacherphil, looks like the exact
| type of thing Im looking for to watch with my kids.
| 7952 wrote:
| My nephew is into this. The great thing about the bicarb
| style ones is that he can actually play with the ingredients.
| And this is what "experimenting" should be. Trying things out
| and seeing what happens. The fun is finding out what happens
| when you use the kit in an unexpected way and make a mess on
| the ceiling.
|
| The problem with the more exciting/interesting experiments is
| that play has a larger potential blast radius. And
| understandably adults impose more limits which then leads to
| less actual experimenting. And that actually makes it less
| fun.
|
| Because the best experiment is to start with random chemicals
| and seeing what happens. Not a carefully curated set with
| predictable results. The boring failure and the unexpected
| result are all part of the fun.
| 101008 wrote:
| You are right. You described the difference between a
| experiment and a recipe.
| TheNewsIsHere wrote:
| > My daughter (6) loves experiments, but honestly all the
| chemistry sets and similar we've bought have been quite
| boring [...]
|
| I had chemistry sets as a kid, and I think I agree with this.
| As an adult I understand why these sets are boring, and
| honestly I'd be more likely to play with these sets as an
| adult. The instructions and guides weren't really very
| creative and they weren't engaging.
|
| At the same time, the chemistry sets of the (for example)
| 1950s were absolutely batshit insane and are rightfully taken
| off the shelves.
|
| It's a shame there isn't much of a middle ground other than
| finding YouTube demonstrations. Then again I haven't looked
| for a chemistry set lately...
| CoastalCoder wrote:
| The article's safety information doesn't mention the possibility
| of intense UV. Is that a risk with any of these chemicals?
|
| I thought of this because the list includes magnesium sulfate.
| IIRC, burning magnesium _tape_ generates enough UV that you
| should have eye protection.
| perihelions wrote:
| I don't think there are any combustion reactions here (besides
| the source flame), since these are already fully oxidized
| salts. It's only internal electronic transitions of the metal
| ions.
| CoastalCoder wrote:
| I don't know much about chemistry, so I don't really
| understand the significance of that.
|
| Is the idea that there's no highly energetic reaction, and so
| nothing to produce the energy levels needed for intense UV?
| mecsred wrote:
| Not my area of expertise but I believe the explanation is:
| the radiation profile is blackbody radiation proportional
| to the heat of the flame. The metal salts color the flame
| by absorbing light and re emitting it according to their
| electron transitions. However the don't add additional
| energy so there will be no UV light, since the original
| flame doesn't produce (almost any) photons that energetic.
| Magnesium burns much hotter and emits uv directly from
| blackbody profile.
| marcosdumay wrote:
| It's a small fix, but the original flame emits mostly UV
| light. It's just almost harmless low energy UV.
|
| The issue with magnesium burning is that both the UV
| light is way more energetic, and it tends to also be very
| intense.
| kragen wrote:
| no, because the fire is too cold
| daralthus wrote:
| One of the magical experiences growing up, with my mom working in
| a food safety lab, was playing with the different coloured fires
| (and the pipettes of course).
|
| I only later learned about spectrometry: roughly, the flame's
| light is split into a rainbow with a diffraction grating and the
| colours become a barcode for the chemicals that burn.
| Metacelsus wrote:
| "If you use alcohol as a fuel, please remember that it is much
| more flammable than wood. Never add alcohol (or any liquid fuel)
| to a burning fire, or it will react much [like] lighter fluid"
|
| This should be at the beginning of the article, rather than the
| end. People have suffered severe burns on multiple occasions from
| doing the "rainbow fire experiment" and adding alcohol directly
| to the flame.
| kragen wrote:
| i add alcohol directly to flame all the time, and even burn it
| on my skin. there are real risks to be careful of, but i think
| you are exaggerating them
|
| alcohol is great for this kind of thing for several reasons:
|
| - you can extinguish a spill with water
|
| - its low boiling point protects your skin and other materials
| from high heat, but only when they are wet with it
|
| - you can mix a little water into it to enhance this surface-
| protecting effect
|
| - unlike many organic solvents, its toxicity is quite low
| (ethanol and isopropanol, not methanol)
|
| - it produces very little carbon monoxide or soot
|
| that said, it can still spread fire quite far quite fast, and a
| house fire can go from the size of a small campfire to deadly
| flashover in under a minute, so be very careful
| Log_out_ wrote:
| May contain highly carcinogenic substances
| kragen wrote:
| may, but doesn't. christ
| philipkglass wrote:
| The colors will be purer if you use ethanol (denatured alcohol,
| 190 proof Everclear or equivalent) as fuel. High concentration
| isopropyl alcohol has a yellow tinge to the flame from soot
| formation. Methanol (sold to the public in the US in convenient
| small bottles as Heet Gas-Line Antifreeze) is also very good and
| may be easier to obtain in some areas than pure high-proof
| ethanol.
|
| Sodium chloride, lithium chloride, copper chloride, and boric
| acid give the most intense colors. But sodium chloride's orange-
| yellow color is a bit boring compared to the others.
|
| A few milliliters of the alcohol mixture can be ignited in a
| shallow stainless steel dish with relative safety and there will
| be no color interference from carbonaceous fuels yellowing the
| flame via soot.
|
| If I had to pick just one to try, I'd suggest boric acid. The
| green flames it produces are unlike any "ordinary" fire and boric
| acid is easy to find. Here's a short video with a good view of
| how the flames look: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1jHVk6oqjU
|
| The first night that my now-wife met me in person, I showed her
| colored fire like this in the fire pit at my apartment complex.
| She originally meant to visit for just a few days but we've now
| spent 21 years together. I'd say that the demonstration was a
| success.
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