what do you get when you combine parts
from an old battery pack with some
common household ingredients mix them
together and you get these a batch of
super cheap and easy to make smoke
flares
[Music]
most hardware stores have recycling bins
for disposing of old batteries that’s
where I got this one for free I’m going
to start by removing the screws and
these ones require a corks bit so once I
found the right size the six screws get
removed and then with a little wiggle
the top assembly pulls right out with
that removed I’ve got access to the 15
cells that make up the battery pack and
I’m going to need to get them apart so
the tape comes off and the connector
bands are all removed so that I’m left
with a total of 15 subsea NiCad
batteries they’re just over one volt
each and some of them are still good but
it’s actually the casing that I’m after
the battery easily pushes out now
leaving me with a clean casing that
should work great for the body of my
smoke flare it even has a flat bottom
that’ll come in handy later on okay all
the batteries are shelled and I’m going
to use some cardboard for the next step
but before I do I’ll pack these
batteries back into the casing and send
them back for recycling alright to
finish these casings all add a bead of
hot glue to the flat part on the bottoms
and press them down on the cardboard to
cool down that gets repeated with all
the other casings and I’m leaving a bit
of a gap because these will need to be
cut individually later on now it’s time
to make the composition that will give
us our smoky flare I’m using 60%
potassium nitrate stump remover and 40%
table sugar being very careful not to
mix them too much
this is poured very gently into a pan
set on medium heat and I’ve made about
400 grams of the composition it hopes it
will fill all the containers after a few
minutes I’ll begin to fold the mixture
into itself because you can see the
sugar on the bottom is beginning to
caramelize I’ll continue folding in
gently until the mixture is melted and
absorbed all the white powder and at
this point it should be running enough
to pour into the casings
okay I’ve readied this casing as well as
a piece of homemade fuse cord that I
made in a different project using a
small spatula the liquid is poured into
the casing and the edge of the pan wiped
clean to prevent too much dripping the
last step is to add the fuse making sure
to push it all the way to the bottom and
now we can let this cool until it
hardens the same thing is done with all
the others and when they’re cooled and
cut apart the batch is complete this is
a fairly slow burning fuse and will give
me plenty of time to get away so when
it’s lit I’ll watch from a distance to
see if our smoke fountain will
work alright it looks like it is working
and now here comes the smoke for its
size it actually puts off quite a bit of
smoke burning for around 15 seconds
until all the fuel is used up the casing
is completely toasted as well but the
cardboard base is intact and its
prevented the concrete from getting any
scorch marks here goes another one and
you probably noticed I’m doing this
outside in an open area that’s because
there’s plenty of ventilation for when
the smoke starts to get thick you don’t
want these going off in a confined area
because you can see how a thick smoke
could build and linger just for fun I
tried making another batch with a 60%
ratio of sugar to see if it would burn
slower
unfortunately it burns so slow it was
painful to watch
there was some smoke but all in all it
kind of looked more like one of those
black snake fireworks instead next I
tried making a batch where the
ingredients were mixed together
extremely well and experiments with
various homemade fuses
I even tried adding sawdust to see what
that would do well it wasn’t a good idea
I think the sawdust added air pockets
that made them go completely ballistic
these were more like unguided Rockets
than anything because they burn so fast
I couldn’t get them to stay still so
remember to get a nice balanced burn
with plenty of smoke like this it’s
important that you have the right
ingredients the right ratios and the
right mix every batch is a little
different so be careful and be saved
well there’s the technique I used for
some cheap homemade smoke flares if you
liked this project perhaps you’ll like
some of my others check them out at the
king of random calm
[Music]
you
[Music]
from an old battery pack with some
common household ingredients mix them
together and you get these a batch of
super cheap and easy to make smoke
flares
[Music]
most hardware stores have recycling bins
for disposing of old batteries that’s
where I got this one for free I’m going
to start by removing the screws and
these ones require a corks bit so once I
found the right size the six screws get
removed and then with a little wiggle
the top assembly pulls right out with
that removed I’ve got access to the 15
cells that make up the battery pack and
I’m going to need to get them apart so
the tape comes off and the connector
bands are all removed so that I’m left
with a total of 15 subsea NiCad
batteries they’re just over one volt
each and some of them are still good but
it’s actually the casing that I’m after
the battery easily pushes out now
leaving me with a clean casing that
should work great for the body of my
smoke flare it even has a flat bottom
that’ll come in handy later on okay all
the batteries are shelled and I’m going
to use some cardboard for the next step
but before I do I’ll pack these
batteries back into the casing and send
them back for recycling alright to
finish these casings all add a bead of
hot glue to the flat part on the bottoms
and press them down on the cardboard to
cool down that gets repeated with all
the other casings and I’m leaving a bit
of a gap because these will need to be
cut individually later on now it’s time
to make the composition that will give
us our smoky flare I’m using 60%
potassium nitrate stump remover and 40%
table sugar being very careful not to
mix them too much
this is poured very gently into a pan
set on medium heat and I’ve made about
400 grams of the composition it hopes it
will fill all the containers after a few
minutes I’ll begin to fold the mixture
into itself because you can see the
sugar on the bottom is beginning to
caramelize I’ll continue folding in
gently until the mixture is melted and
absorbed all the white powder and at
this point it should be running enough
to pour into the casings
okay I’ve readied this casing as well as
a piece of homemade fuse cord that I
made in a different project using a
small spatula the liquid is poured into
the casing and the edge of the pan wiped
clean to prevent too much dripping the
last step is to add the fuse making sure
to push it all the way to the bottom and
now we can let this cool until it
hardens the same thing is done with all
the others and when they’re cooled and
cut apart the batch is complete this is
a fairly slow burning fuse and will give
me plenty of time to get away so when
it’s lit I’ll watch from a distance to
see if our smoke fountain will
work alright it looks like it is working
and now here comes the smoke for its
size it actually puts off quite a bit of
smoke burning for around 15 seconds
until all the fuel is used up the casing
is completely toasted as well but the
cardboard base is intact and its
prevented the concrete from getting any
scorch marks here goes another one and
you probably noticed I’m doing this
outside in an open area that’s because
there’s plenty of ventilation for when
the smoke starts to get thick you don’t
want these going off in a confined area
because you can see how a thick smoke
could build and linger just for fun I
tried making another batch with a 60%
ratio of sugar to see if it would burn
slower
unfortunately it burns so slow it was
painful to watch
there was some smoke but all in all it
kind of looked more like one of those
black snake fireworks instead next I
tried making a batch where the
ingredients were mixed together
extremely well and experiments with
various homemade fuses
I even tried adding sawdust to see what
that would do well it wasn’t a good idea
I think the sawdust added air pockets
that made them go completely ballistic
these were more like unguided Rockets
than anything because they burn so fast
I couldn’t get them to stay still so
remember to get a nice balanced burn
with plenty of smoke like this it’s
important that you have the right
ingredients the right ratios and the
right mix every batch is a little
different so be careful and be saved
well there’s the technique I used for
some cheap homemade smoke flares if you
liked this project perhaps you’ll like
some of my others check them out at the
king of random calm
[Music]
you
[Music]
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