Green visco

[FinnAmerican]

When did firecrackers start using visco..?

[countryboy7978]

I assume you mean individual 1.5” Chinese firecrackers and not American salutes like cherries and bulldogs.

Around 1992 the CPSC changed the requirements for labeling as well as requiring fuses that burned between 3-9 seconds and had to resist side ignition. You’ll notice that’s when you saw the lengthy warning that carried over to the UN designation that followed a year or two later. The warning says not to
Take the strings apart since the individual crackers would not pass the fuse burn or side ignition requirements. Before the 1990s there were not many individual 1.5” water crackers. The knockoff/legal M80s were all you had with visco.

[halk]

snippet from our publication in PGI Bulletin. Of course visco began being used on US fireworks way back before WWII, possibly in the '20's.


HISTORY OF THE WATER CRACKER
The original Water Crackers showed up at PGI Conventions, perhaps as early as 1985, under the banner of Flash. These devices were individually loose packed in a plain white cardboard box of 1,000 as a “brick” and were marked with a list price of around $19.95. They were also available by the case; 20 boxes of 1,000, a rare find indeed. These being the “ORIGINAL” Water Crackers, were 1” Crackers made from plain brown kraft type paper with approximately ?” of an excellent, green mini visco fuse. These were estimated to have between 50mg and 200mg of aluminum flash powder, however to my knowledge no powder measurements have ever made to date. Certainly they were far less powerful than a good 2 grain cracker of old, probably not too far from 50mg.
Upon extended conversations with Gary L., the “original” Water Crackers were imported by Air Capitol Fireworks, owned by Mr. Gerald Dunn., around 1983 or 1984, and probably manufactured somewhere in the Flower Basket Region of China. Time stamps inside the original unlabeled boxes indicates manufacture June, 1982. It seems that Air Capitol had a contract with disadvantaged kids to manufacture M-60’s from these original “Water Crackers” by using them as a insert (to put in red tubes with ends). This however, apparently did not work out too well for one reason or another. It was suggested that Air Capital couldn’t make a high quality product & be competitive. (make a profit)
Gary L. bought all the remaining original stock from Air Capitol, thus showing up at the PGI Conventions. Gary L. says he took them and put them in packages of 1,000 each w/ label, and a few years later in boxes of 100 each, and even later just imported them directly.
It is worthy to note, looking back further in time, say around 1976, that perhaps the original micro fuse was designed and developed by Gary Git. / Tom Scam., / and Gary Dust., and subsequently made in limited samples from China. Certainly it seems that these gentleman had some influence in the design of now so called “Chinese Micro Fuse”, perhaps even being the original inventors.
It seems that the development of the Visco Fuse idea resulted from the 1976 Hearings on banning all firecrackers. Mr. Tom Scam. obtained a waver to make M-70’s (a firecracker packaging waver) with the powder “pill capsule” insert design, employing visco fuse. Thus it is thought that the water cracker came into existence because of Tom Scam. & the M-70 waver. Perhaps this sparked the Air Capitol venture.
Gary L. further states that in the early 70’s, some crackers came loose in a box (Taiwan) , but still had the Chinese braided fuse. A comment from a Mr. Paul Aust. was noted “that we should not encourage people to buy loose firecrackers because they will shoot them one at a time and not shoot as many”. (Thus not BUYING as many).
As time rolled on, a number of American manufacturers made M-60’, M-70’s, M-90’s, & M-100’s. All can be characterized as made from “inserts” around a small cracker or “powder capsule” inside, with a good portion using the “Water Cracker” insert design.
It is interesting to note that M-60’s / M-70’s had a retail price of around $0.15 each & one could make a profit. Water Crackers retailed at around 2 cents each. It didn’t take to many years for kids to figure out which was a better buy for the same “bang”. Thus water crackers today (year 2000) are a good moving product at around a standard retail price of $1.25 per box of 100.

[displayfireworks1]

I assume you mean individual 1.5? Chinese firecrackers and not American salutes like cherries and bulldogs.

Around 1992 the CPSC changed the requirements for labeling as well as requiring fuses that burned between 3-9 seconds and had to resist side ignition. You?ll notice that?s when you saw the lengthy warning that carried over to the UN designation that followed a year or two later. The warning says not to
Take the strings apart since the individual crackers would not pass the fuse burn or side ignition requirements. Before the 1990s there were not many individual 1.5? water crackers. The knockoff/legal M80s were all you had with visco.

I know countryboy7978 knows some of the history on firecrackers. If I remember correctly from reading some of the history on firecrackers, how fast the string of firecrackers burn off was a regulatory requirement over the years. This is the part that still confuses me to this day. How does making the firecrackers and the individual fuse for each firecracker stay the same and somehow adding a long piece of slow burn Visco intertwined change the burn rate? What stops the fire from jumping past that Visco and speeding ahead of the Visco since all of the individual paper fuse firecrackers are intertwined so close together? I hope I said all of this correctly.

[halk]

Never heard of regulations on burn rates of strings. Have only heard of burn rate of the leaders that ignite them. Much safer when no crackers are lit for several seconds after igniting the leader.

[displayfireworks1]

Never heard of regulations on burn rates of strings. Have only heard of burn rate of the leaders that ignite them. Much safer when no crackers are lit for several seconds after igniting the leader.

I know some of the forums members know this firecracker history in United Sates very well. I am hoping someone can post information about this so we all can learn some of the history. I know in the past and actually in some of my older videos. I had a roll of firecrackers that burned so fast I could throw it in the air and before it hit the ground all the firecrackers were exploded off. You just do not see that burn off rate on Consumer Firecrackers anymore.

[halk]

Yes me too. In the old days many companies bragged about their 'fast lead' fuses. Been stung many times not following the advice to lay on ground and get away or retire quickly when hand-lighting and throwing firecrackers.
Would be interesting to time the fuses on the new sewn together packs to see if the burn rates have actually slowed down by changing the fuse composition. Dr. Lai mentioned that potassium dichromate was added to the comp at one time, but I don't know why. As you noted, I have not seen cracker explosions outrun the flame front of the visco either. If that were true one would expect a length of it lying on the ground still burning after the crackers had all exploded. So the conversion to the new sewn (by machines) system has not only benefitted the makers with reduced costs of hand labor (braiding), but satisfied the safety people as well. And now they can just have the machines chop off the packs at any length the buyers desire, leaving a length of visco with an inert support all wrapped and ready for use as a leader for the next pack to come down the line. Amazing machines!