Hello from Oklahoma

[Kamicollo]

I found this community while I was "putting the cart before the horse". I have always wanted to "shoot the big stuff" and while researching what it would take, learned I can't safely do it yet. I've always went pretty crazy on the 4th(at least I thought I did until I saw some of these posts). This was the first year that I really sat down and planned any kind of show and it really got me excited. I decided to go electronic next year and I am going to get a Cobra(1 18M to start). I want to get into the 1.4 Pro and eventually put together a pyromusical(MUCH shorter then 20 minutes lol)

So my only real question is, how do I keep my wife and get to buy the fireworks that I want?

[MtnViewPyro]

Welcome to the group. If you’re going to buy a cobra, make sure you check out Dave’s AP certification listed on this website. This will get you in the door with 3 advertisers from the site for 1.4pro purchases. As far as the wife, get her involved in planning a segment in your next show, maybe she will catch the Pyro bug. It doesn’t hurt to buy her a gift occasionally to make her not get as upset about the Pyro budget.

[Kamicollo]

I plan on signing up for Dave's AP course as soon as I can get the Cobra. I have to wait for a sale on it before I pull the trigger. My wife hates the 4th lol. From watching Dave's videos i'll be building a portable wall to help prevent anything from coming towards the crowd again. Id post my finale but too ashamed of it after the other videos =)

[Jay_]

Howdy Kamicollo, fellow Oklahoman here.

I jumped into the 1.4 pro game 2 years ago. It’s possible to stay married and put on a good show. Just takes a little understanding and some disposable income :)

Where are you located in Oklahoma?

[Kamicollo]

Elk City, pretty much 2 hours from anything.

[Jay_]

Elk City, pretty much 2 hours from anything.

We just got back from vacation and a rather long road trip a few hours ago. It’s funny my wife and I were talking this morning and I mentioned that I had never been to Elk City. It’s one of the few places in the state that I have never set foot in. Will pass through next year for sure on our way to California.

Wholesale joints will ship anywhere, so don’t worry about your location. Just order your pro items from them. Lots of good consumer fireworks in Oklahoma to be had too. If you aren’t satisfied with the ones I your area, just keep on driving east.

[Rick_In_Tampa]

So my only real question is, how do I keep my wife and get to buy the fireworks that I want?

There are only 2 possible answers to this question.

1. Sit your wife down and explain to her that if she doesn't ask you how much you spend on pyro, you won't have to lie to her. And you'd hate to lie to her!

2. Don't spend more than you can afford to spend!

The truth is you really don't need to spend thousands and thousands of dollars to have a great show. First of all, think wholesale. Find some people in your area who are willing to do a group buy. The more you spend together, the cheaper they are. Be ready to buy in January. That's when many of the wholesale places offer the best discounts. If your budget is modest (less than $1K) then look at the 200G cakes. You can get a ton of 200G cakes in a case for not too much money. Stringing a bunch of those together makes a great show. If you don't believe me, go watch Esgrillo's show finale! If you're only buying 1 Cobra firing module then you need to really maximize the use of those 18 cues. Shooting 3 or 4 cakes at a time in series is one way to do that. Or you can use each cue to light long runs of visco that launch your effects. Lots of possibilities. Get creative! As part of your pyro budget, factor in buying additional equipment like slats to expand your system for the next year.

Hope that helps.

[Rick_In_Tampa]

Id post my finale but too ashamed of it after the other videos =)

Dude... Please don't think like that. That's not what this place is about. We're here to help. That means offering feedback to help you make your show better. Not everyone in here has thousands to blow on fireworks. We get that. So please... Post your video. Tell us what you have going on (i.e. how many cakes/effects, how it's wired, what you were going for, etc.) so we can give you the feedback to make your show better! This isn't a contest of who can blow the most money.

[joewad]

Make sure you have the Hallmark Channel with your TV subscription service. And remember,making up is fun to do. Start small and work your way up dude, it's the safest and best path to harmony on the home front. Get her involved a bit like what do you like, etc.. For a few years after I started my getting into pyro I got a part-time second job to help scratch my pyro itch.

[Kamicollo]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJdP2XjYQmY&feature=youtu.be

1 fountain, 1 750 saturn, 4 500 gram cakes, 138 mortars. 1 fuse all linked with Visco or the fast Visco.

This was just my finale. We wired in the field as we were shooting so it took forever...

This was the first time I have ever fused cakes together and attempted any sort of timing. Basically what I was going for was just to get everything tied and not too much overrun. The first gap was intentional the second was because we were exhausted and just put too much fuse to the last rack. There was supposed to be another 15 mortars go off in about 2 seconds but the fuse failed to light. Burned half way through it for 6 inches, that was the point I said "I'm going electronic".

I plan on being very creative with my 18 queue's. I might be able to come up with 2 18M's when they go on sale depending on the sale. Seems like it's going to be the Black Friday sale.

I dont really understand the slats on the Cobra.

[Kamicollo]

I forgot to mention. I wanted the fountain ("the amazing") and the saturns ("750 shot saturn") to both end at the same time as my last cake was ending. I achieved that and was very proud of it.

[chriskrc]

Welcome to the forum and great to meet you. Oklahoma is a great place to be. Loved being there when I was in the army

[Rick_In_Tampa]

What are you talking about!? That finale was excellent. You sure made the most of what you had. I enjoyed it.

You're definitely going to want to pre-wire you effects before the 4th. Especially the mortars. With the Cobra you're going to be able to spread out the show. If you don't want to jump into slats just yet, you can run scab wire to (for example) your mortar racks. So you have 138 mortars. set up 69 on the right side, 69 on the left side. Wire 8 on each side with 5 sec per ft fuse. Wire the next 8 on each side with 2 sec per ft fuse. Then wire the remaining 53 on each side with 1/4 sec per ft fuse! Start slow and finish big! That will take up 3 cues on your Cobra.

Split the 4 500G cakes 2 left and two right. Do the same thing. wire one from each side in series into the Cobra. Then wire the next two in series. if each cake lasts 20 seconds have the last two cakes start 5 seconds before the first two burn out if you want to spread out the finale. If you're looking for sky puke, start all 4 at the same time! So there go 2 more cues. The fountain and saturn missile thing you can wire in to 1 cue, or add them to one of the other cues. So by my count, you still have 12 cues left for the body of your show. You can do a ton with 12 cues if you get creative with the wiring.

Just my humble opinion.... :cool:

[Kamicollo]

I am going to just shoot a show this year. No more taking 4 hours to light all my stuff.

Slats only allow you to wire more things to the same queue right? My understanding is 4 talon igniters(I dont think I'm going with them) or 8 MJG initiators can be wired to the same queue. I don't currently ever believe I will need to wire more than 8 things in 1 shot.

[Rick_In_Tampa]

As I just learned (again!) this week, the slat just extends your cues. Every time cue 1 fires on the 18M, cue 1 on every slat you have connected to that mod fires too. So if you have 3 slats connected to mod 1, your can fire a TOTAL of 8 initiators off cue 1. So you can have 2 in each slat and 2 in the mod. Or 3 in two separate slats and 2 in the 18M and none in the other two slats. Basically you can mix and match them any way you want, but you can't have more than the maximum in all the "cue 1 devices" combined.

I hope that makes sense.

What that does for me (my big epiphany this year!) is it extends the distance I can shoot between boards. Up till now, if I wanted to put at least 2 effects on one cue, I could only place the second item as far away from the 18M as the initiator is long, or, I'd have to use scab wire to extend it further. All that wiring needs to be done on the 4th on site When you multiply all those cues by 18 over 12 mods... That's an ass-ton of scab wire, or a very close proximity show front. By using slats I can wire everything into the slat right on the board then run a 100' DB25 cable back to the 18M. So now instead of maybe 7 feet between boards, I can get 100' between boards!! And the best part... I don't have to do any wiring on site the day off, other than connecting the DB25 cables to the 18M's!! That's going to save a ton of setup time! Factor in the quickplug connectors Cobra now has... Next year should be one smooth ass setup! I'm already looking forward to it.

[Jay_]

+1 on the slats, they are awesome! You can really put some distance between stations and pre-wire until your heart is content. As your shows get bigger and bigger, setup time is a factor that must be considered as it will push you to the brink of throwing all of your fireworks into a pile, lighting them on fire, and going straight to the pro shop to buy a set of golf clubs and try a new hobby.

If you are not shooting a pyromusical, id take a look at a big Chinese system. I have one with 120 cues that I paid just a shade over what 1 18m cost me. I think that they can be expanded to 99 modules (396 cues).

I really like the 4 cue mods with the Chinese system. They are super flexible and can be placed wherever you wish. You can also assign as many mods to a channel as you wish, so you can pull off some killer effects when used with the sequencer function.

If shooting script, the cobra will make you look like a hero.

[Rick_In_Tampa]

As your shows get bigger and bigger, setup time is a factor that must be considered as it will push you to the brink of throwing all of your fireworks into a pile, lighting them on fire, and going straight to the pro shop to buy a set of golf clubs and try a new hobby.

lol... I learned how to play golf when I was stationed in Hawaii back in 1984. I can honestly say I am a much MUCH better pyro enthusiast than I am a golfer!!

[Kamicollo]

I have played golf many a times. I am a WAY better Pyro than a Golfer lol. I will give the slats some thought. I had intended on just buying 500' of something like "Pyramid RSW18500 18 Gauge 500 Feet Spool of Speaker Zip Wire". 25 bucks on Amazon. I am dieing to do some kind of pyromusical, that is 100% my endgame.