Making Sparklers – (Improvised Hand-Held Fireworks)

when it’s time to celebrate with
fireworks you could just buy them or you
could improvise and make your own in
this project we’re making these handheld
sparklers that will burn for up to a
minute and cost less than a penny each
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for this project make sure you have some
clothes pins some safety goggles and a
thick pair of gloves we’re going to be
making some simple handheld sparklers
that are just dangerous enough to add a
little pyrotechnic thrill to your next
celebration
you may notice these sparkle sticks are
almost exactly the same as the
slow-burning fuses that we made in a
different project we use those to ignite
some homemade smoke flares which you can
see in another project video alright to
get started let’s pour 60 milliliters of
water into a pan set on medium heat this
white powder is a mixture of thirty six
grams potassium nitrate and twenty four
grams of white table sugar with hot
water and a little bit of mixing the
powder should dissolve completely
next we can mix in a few drops of food
coloring and I chose to use seven drops
of red at this point we’re ready to add
around 12 feet of 100% cotton yarn and
this will need a couple of minutes to
soak up the liquid when the yarn is
supersaturated let’s transfer it to a
cookie sheet in a zig-zag pattern so
it’s all evenly spaced now this goes in
an oven set to 150 degrees Celsius for
about 20 minutes at the ten minute mark
it’s a good idea to slide a spatula
under the yarn to lift it up and help
prevent it from baking to the cookie
sheet remember that this is extremely
flammable very dangerous so make sure
you use extreme caution and have a fire
extinguisher closeby alright our time is
up so we can remove the tray from the
oven and leave it to cool for another
five to ten minutes you can see that
when the yarn is cooled it’s fairly
stiff and holds its shape to finish
these up all we need to do is snip the
ends with a pair of scissors and these
sparklers are ready to use I went ahead
and made a couple more batches in
festive colors just for fun let’s test
this one out by placing it in the end of
a clothespin just like this when you
light your sparkler you’ll see it smoke
quite a bit and throw off a beautifully
dangerous array of sparks the sparks are
pretty hot and they can burn you so make
sure this is done with adult supervision
you can use one Sparkle stick to light
another very quickly and of course your
clothes penholders can be used over and
over again in my experience this is a
cheap and gratifying way to share a
little excitement and wonder on these
special occasions the best part is you
can make hundreds of them for just a few
dollars
well there’s how to make some improvised
handheld fireworks for your next
celebration if you like this project
perhaps you’ll like some of my others
check them out at the king of random
calm
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