2020 Show - First time using Cobra

[BeerGuyEd]

Backstory from 2019 - One of the biggest things I took away from the comments last year was that I could use multiple positions. Now I am limited since I put on the show for our Swim and Tennis and I am limited to using a couple of tennis courts mostly surrounded by pine trees for a shoot site. I did manage to find an area that could safely shoot closer to the edges without having to worry about the trees and give myself 3 positions with 25 feet in between each position.

I planned out my show and then realized I was going to have issues with my firing system. I have a 36 cue (3 12 cue mods) Chinese firing system (its a nicer one with step fire and 12v external power) but with the 3 positions I was going have to run around 800 feet of scab wire to make it work. I was running out of setup time so I ordered a Cobra 18R2, 36M slat model, and a couple of 36S mini slats to help ease the setup. I ordered on 7/1 and got it 7/2, man those guys at Cobra are amazing. I'm in Georgia and setting up on a tennis court can be brutal as it is. I was looking at 8-9 hours of setup time before the Cobra order. It took 2.5 hours with the Cobra and should of been faster than that.

As far as the show everything went really well. I had a about 6-7 seconds of black sky in the middle of the show (edited out of the video). A cake ended earlier than excepted but I was ready for that and stepped to the next event. The problem was the next event was a rack of shells and it took time for the fuse to burn. Is there a good way to prevent this sort of thing from happening? If my next event was a cake its not a huge problem. That happened a couple of times and created a 2-3 second black sky gap. I also had a purposeful couple of second gap after the fake finale. You can also see the huge variance in cake timing between the same item. Almost everything fired from the left and right stations are the same thing going off at the same time. Way different timings on them though. I also have some setup pictures but not as much as I would of liked, it was hot and I was drenched in sweat and just needed to drink water and sit once I was done setting up.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ky1LSb6IeDo

Next year I am going to switch to quick plugs to have even more setup pre-wired. Since I got my Cobra, I think an audiobox will be on the menu for when cobra has a sale. Please let me know what you think and what I can do better.

[Mattp]

Great show man!!! i really like some of the effects.. those color changing shells (possibly ghost shells).. were really cool.. and the rings with crackle middle were too... about the question you asked.. you could always pair a cake with your racks.. even if its a small 200g just to fill the space until the fuse burns... and BTW.. how great is the cobra... was my first year using it too!!!.. also thought it was really cool everyone was watching it from the pool!!

[krayg]

To avoid fuse delays you can poke cakes/shells and insert the MJG initiator or you could replace the original fuse with quick fuse (white one). I would do the quick fuse method for shells or get the training cert and start buying 62mm Dominator shells. For dark sky, you should take advantage of the "Alternate Firing" cues that cobra offers.

FYI. There's a new cobra dealer in Marietta @ 731 Whitlock Avenue.

[BeerGuyEd]

Great show man!!! i really like some of the effects.. those color changing shells (possibly ghost shells).. were really cool..

That was a NOAB called Ghost Revolution. I loved it!!


and the rings with crackle middle were too...

That was a couple of Saturn Ring by Dominator

about the question you asked.. you could always pair a cake with your racks.. even if its a small 200g just to fill the space until the fuse burns...

That is a great idea. I know some tiny 200g 8 shot cakes that would be great for that.


how great is the cobra... was my first year using it too!!!.. also thought it was really cool everyone was watching it from the pool!!

Cobra is tremendous. It saved me a ton of time this year and will make a huge impact on all my shows going forward. It was super easy to use. CSC made the script for me and worked really well. I can not wait to get into more of the advanced features of the system. I only had a couple of days to play with the Cobra before show time and I still had boards to work on, so I really did not get to do anything extra with it. Hell the first time it actually fired anything off was the start of the show. Glad it work. lol

[BeerGuyEd]

To avoid fuse delays you can poke cakes/shells and insert the MJG initiator or you could replace the original fuse with quick fuse (white one). I would do the quick fuse method for shells or get the training cert and start buying 62mm Dominator shells. For dark sky, you should take advantage of the "Alternate Firing" cues that cobra offers.

FYI. There's a new cobra dealer in Marietta @ 731 Whitlock Avenue.

I know that dealer very well. Super nice people. I went there a lot this season. Quick fusing the shells is the first thing that popped into my head while I sat there waiting for the fuse to burn. Every year I try to add to my toolbox of knowledge.

[Jay_]

Great job Ed! That was a great show, and it looks like you found your way around the cobra system very quickly!

Finale was awesome! Looked great in the sky.

[BeerGuyEd]

Great job Ed! That was a great show, and it looks like you found your way around the cobra system very quickly!

Finale was awesome! Looked great in the sky.

Thank you very much. Cobra was pretty easy to learn the basics of it and their website has a lot of great checklists and guides on it. So I had cheat sheets with me to remind me how to do things. At show time I just made sure arm the system and hit autofire. Cobra did the rest. I think I hit step about 5-6 times to keep the timing right. 1 was my fault hit without needing 2. The 4 of the others were because the mortar rack timing was not correct (which I knew going in). A tip I learned too late to fix is that you need to time your fuse both covered in tape and uncovered. I had already fused all my racks before timing out my fuse while covered in tape. The perfect fuse I was using burned at ~2 secs per foot faster than uncovered!! I had no idea it would be that big of a difference.

[hatsgoods]

is that fire restaint plastic on the ground ? if not only 1 burning a
hot amber with torch everything.

[BeerGuyEd]

is that fire restaint plastic on the ground ? if not only 1 burning a
hot amber with torch everything.

It is there to help with clean up. I know of a lot of people that use plastic sheeting like that to help with clean up. That may just mean a lot of people are doing the wrong thing. I did notice one of my racks caught on fire during the show for a little but before burning itself out. Burn marks all over the stabilizing legs. Glad the plastic just melted.

[N.E. Pyrotechnics]

That was a really nice shoot. Very nice job of layering multiple items. Fireworks from the swimming pool is pretty damn cool....

[BeerGuyEd]

That was a really nice shoot. Very nice job of layering multiple items. Fireworks from the swimming pool is pretty damn cool....

Thank you very much. As soon as Cobra has a waterproof cover for a 18R2 I’m going to shoot while in the pool.