Fire lighting idea using disposable vape batteries

[LadyG]

I find the Co op sell the best firelighters £3.65.

[ditchcrawler]

Just now, LadyG said:

I find the Co op sell the best firelighters £3.65.

Towpath Telegraph is free

[magnetman]

11 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

If I remember correctly hair lacquer was good for that, made great flame throwers

Yes hairspray from Woolworths was cheap. We used this in the trains when not tagging. Swan Vestas. 

 

 

I was almost down with the CWE posse CrimeWavE. A nuff carn writer .

 

My tag was ROC might still be around somewhere. 

 

 

Sadly Swan Vestas seem to now be safety matches. I have the aluminium matchbox holders for these from when they were The Smokers Match. 

 

Edited November 23, 2023 by magnetman

[Chris Lowe]

Bear Grylls did this with a phone battery, he just stabbed it with his knife, as soon as the air hit it thebattery ignited.

[Hudds Lad]

16 hours ago, robtheplod said:

When i was a lad i wasn't closely supervised which was great for experimenting. I made a fire lighter with a match with thin wire wrapped around going to mains (yes it was mains!) controlled with what i think was a 12v switch. worked a treat. I then found you could use lighter fluid to make a run of fire across the garden and it didn't even burn the grass!  its quite amazing im still alive!  ah the fun of being a kid in the 70s!

Fun times indeed: airfix glue that ate through polystyrene, a couple of matches coupled with an elastic band the spring from a peg and mums hairspray gave a good flamethrower, the foolish relative that bought me a chemistry set one Xmas (homemade stinkbombs), discovering blutack burns, discovering Hai Karate was an alternative fuel source too, roadworks lamps that contained lovely parrafin burners, homemade bows & crossbows, playing frisbee with a circular saw blade we found, liberating rope from a nearby haulage yard and making ridiculously dangerous swings, raiding the defect skip at Ben Shaws/Sun Charm and finding beer! Not to mention discovering the sports shop in Holmfirth didn't check age when you tried to buy a Black Widow or Gat Gun. (a gat gun "duel" was a wonderful thing, as likely to hit a spectator as your opponent). Amazed we survived.

Oh, and the absent minded science teacher who allowed us to make thermite  

[IanD]

20 minutes ago, Hudds Lad said:

Fun times indeed: airfix glue that ate through polystyrene, a couple of matches coupled with an elastic band the spring from a peg and mums hairspray gave a good flamethrower, the foolish relative that bought me a chemistry set one Xmas (homemade stinkbombs), discovering blutack burns, discovering Hai Karate was an alternative fuel source too, roadworks lamps that contained lovely parrafin burners, homemade bows & crossbows, playing frisbee with a circular saw blade we found, liberating rope from a nearby haulage yard and making ridiculously dangerous swings, raiding the defect skip at Ben Shaws/Sun Charm and finding beer! Not to mention discovering the sports shop in Holmfirth didn't check age when you tried to buy a Black Widow or Gat Gun. (a gat gun "duel" was a wonderful thing, as likely to hit a spectator as your opponent). Amazed we survived.

Oh, and the absent minded science teacher who allowed us to make thermite  

 

Don't ask what happens when you drop a brick of sodium -- meaning, a couple of pounds of it -- into a tin bath full of water... 😉

[magnetman]

Black widows and Diablos were cool. We used to get scrap lead from the scrapyard in Teddington then melt it down in my shed and pour it into a 3/8 socket fitted to an extension bar and let it cool. Push through from other side and you have a nice projectile. 

 

One day we had one each I had the Black widow and James had the Diablo. Pigeon flew over we both fired and one of us hit it! It crashed into the neighbours conservatory. I'll always remember that as it is so unlikely. 

 

Good fun with those solid lead projectiles they'd travel for miles. 

 

 

The reason for using a socket is I had discovered quite a long time before this that M8 or the imperial equivalent sized plain nuts are brilliant for catapults. Lead is a bit heavy so needs and smaller size. 

 

 

[robtheplod]

I can also remember asking my Dad about lead and he heated up an andrews liversalts tin in a pan and melted a teaspoon to it using a lead fishing weight - mum was not happy!

[Hudds Lad]

1 hour ago, IanD said:

 

Don't ask what happens when you drop a brick of sodium -- meaning, a couple of pounds of it -- into a tin bath full of water... 😉

The same teacher did almost that, and blew all the glass out of the fume cupboard  

He was the science teacher equivalent of that Kenny Everett DIY character

[Ronaldo47]

Swan Vestas are certainly not what they were. As a schoolboy in the 1960's, we used to make miniature rockets from a Swan Vesta march and a piece of the heavy plasicised aluminium foil that Polo mints used to be wrapped in. You rolled the foil into   a tube around the end of the match, slighly overlapping the head, and carefully formed a nozzle in rhe open end. You then balanced the match on the end of something, lit another match, and held it under the foil. After a few seconds there would be a sharp crack, and the match would fly across the room at speed, leaving a smoke trail behind it. It worked in the 1970's, but when I tried it in the 1980's, it just fizzed. 

[Hudds Lad]

1 hour ago, magnetman said:

Black widows and Diablos were cool. We used to get scrap lead from the scrapyard in Teddington then melt it down in my shed and pour it into a 3/8 socket fitted to an extension bar and let it cool. Push through from other side and you have a nice projectile. 

 

One day we had one each I had the Black widow and James had the Diablo. Pigeon flew over we both fired and one of us hit it! It crashed into the neighbours conservatory. I'll always remember that as it is so unlikely. 

 

Good fun with those solid lead projectiles they'd travel for miles. 

 

 

The reason for using a socket is I had discovered quite a long time before this that M8 or the imperial equivalent sized plain nuts are brilliant for catapults. Lead is a bit heavy so needs and smaller size. 

 

 

We were too poor to afford a Diablo, especially with all those fancy balance weights you could get for them.

 

I do fondly remember my Barnett Imp pistol crossbow that i acquired by trading a couple of grumble mags to a kid at high school  

[magnetman]

Yes that was a favourite party trick in our house too. Sometimes the bang was impressive. 

 

I just looked up Swan Vestas and apparently in 2018 one of the constituent chemicals was banned si they went to safety matches. 

 

Very Sad. 

[Hudds Lad]

1 minute ago, Ronaldo47 said:

Swan Vestas are certainly not what they were. As a schoolboy in the 1960's, we used to make miniature rockets from a Swan Vesta march and a piece of the heavy plasicised aluminium foil that Polo mints used to be wrapped in. You rolled the foil into   a tube around the end of the match, slighly overlapping the head, and carefully formed a nozzle in rhe open end. You then balanced the match on the end of something, lit another match, and held it under the foil. After a few seconds there would be a sharp crack, and the match would fly across the room at speed, leaving a smoke trail behind it. It worked in the 1970's, but when I tried it in the 1980's, it just fizzed. 

Scraping matchheads into a bit of tin foil then folding it tightly and slipping it into the end of a cig and giving it to an unsuspecting victim who cadged a smoke off you  

[magnetman]

6 minutes ago, Hudds Lad said:

We were too poor to afford a Diablo, especially with all those fancy balance weights you could get for them.

 

I do fondly remember my Barnett Imp pistol crossbow that i acquired by trading a couple of grumble mags to a kid at high school  

I did have the balance weights. Full kit but the Black widow was a better catapult. 

 

Also had the obligatory Gat gun, a BSA meteor which I still have and got lots of pigeons and we also had longbows and full archery kit including hay bales for the targets. 

Another good trick was a can of lighter refill gas take cap off fill the ridge around the top with petrol, light it, walk away then shoot it with the air rifle. 

 

As long as you hit it right and pierce the can it all gets fun. 

Edited November 24, 2023 by magnetman

[Hudds Lad]

11 minutes ago, magnetman said:

Another good trick was a can of lighter refill gas take cap off fill the ridge around the top with petrol, light it, walk away then shoot it with the air rifle. 

 

As long as you hit it right and pierce the can it all gets fun. 

Throw an old aerosol on an open fire and see who dare stand there longest, i remember someone chucking their dad's shaving foam can on once which was particularly impressively messy.

[cuthound]

On 23/11/2023 at 17:46, robtheplod said:

When i was a lad i wasn't closely supervised which was great for experimenting. I made a fire lighter with a match with thin wire wrapped around going to mains (yes it was mains!) controlled with what i think was a 12v switch. worked a treat. I then found you could use lighter fluid to make a run of fire across the garden and it didn't even burn the grass!  its quite amazing im still alive!  ah the fun of being a kid in the 70s!

 

When I first started work, the workshop foreman used to light his roll ups by dousing the workbench in Bluebell metal polish, putting two wires into a convenient socket and touching them together, which created a spark which lit the metal polish!

Edited November 24, 2023 by cuthound
phat phingers

[TheBiscuits]

9 hours ago, Hudds Lad said:

We were too poor to afford a Diablo, especially with all those fancy balance weights you could get for them.

 

I do fondly remember my Barnett Imp pistol crossbow that i acquired by trading a couple of grumble mags to a kid at high school  

 

I'd recommend a trip to the Royal Armouries Museum in Leeds, particularly the top floor display of illegal offensive weapons.

 

MrsBiscuit was quite impressed as I was walking along a display case of items saying "Yeah, and one of those, and one of those and two of them, but mine was the smaller version..."

 

At the end of the row there's a large sign pointing out that simple possession of anything in the display is worth 5 to 10 years in prison.

 

I'm fairly sure that wasn't true in the 1980s, or the 1990s would have been quite different for me!

[wakey_wake]

On 09/11/2023 at 17:52, magnetman said:

Yes I remember licking the PP3 batteries. I have declined to attempt this with lithium batteries as they have a high C rating.

On battery licking, it's the voltage that matters. Electroboom is a wonderful clown with this stuff -

https://www.youtube.com/@ElectroBOOM/search?query=tongue

(may cause cringing in horror!)

 

On 09/11/2023 at 20:21, Ewan123 said:

Someone on Reddit once told me about setting up their fire to light automatically on a timer [...]

Electric fire lighters are a thing.

ebay, "fireplace tube igniter"

 

Once it's electric and the fire is laid ready, then remote control is just a relay contact away.

Maybe also a sign "machinery may start without warning". 😀

 

On 09/11/2023 at 20:53, magnetman said:

[...] I was thinking that these little dangerous NMC lithium batteries with the cobalt in them could be used as extra accelerant making it more likely the fire would get going properly.

 

I have been told that due to oxidation the ash product may be intolerably toxic.

I don't know much about cobalt chemistry, but with NMC it's the electrolyte / solvent which is flammable (why not use vaseline/cotton wool? ah the NMC is free) and yes I would expect the ash to be toxic in some way. Not that anyone on youtube demonstrating battery fires seems to know or care.

[magnetman]

My idea was to deliberately start a thermal runaway as a way to introduce accelerants into the initial ignition process. 

 

Despite never failing to light a fire in real life I still worry a lot about how difficult it is. 

 

 

 

I have experienced a proper thermal runaway and although I was glad to have become socially distant from the battery at the time of flameout I still secretly yearn for such an outcome but in a small, controlled and useful way. 

 

I'm not talking about using the battery on an already lit fire. It was an idea for getting it going. 

 

 

 

I think the wires would probably melt. 

 

 

[rusty69]

Why not just light the damn fire in October and wait for it to go out in April. Thats what normal people do.

[magnetman]

Just now, rusty69 said:

Why not just light the damn fire in October and wait for it to go out in April. Thats what normal people dooo. 

 I have the London Boat and the country estate Boat so there are no fires going all the time. 

 

The country estate Boat only has wood as a fuel source. Terrible hardship but cold mornings can be very rewarding when they get warmer. 

 

 

 

And please refrain from damning my fire. Thank you. 

 

 

[rusty69]

Can't you just pay the butlers to tend to them in your absence?

[Ronaldo47]

I use the red wax from Babybel cheeses, smeared on pieces of corrugated cardboad rolled into tubes, as the foundation layer for firewood.  The local industrial estate always has some non-returnable pallets that they are happy to let you take away for firewood 

Edited November 30, 2023 by Ronaldo47
typos

[wakey_wake]

On 30/11/2023 at 15:59, magnetman said:

My idea was to deliberately start a thermal runaway as a way to introduce accelerants into the initial ignition process.

Fire is a thermal runaway. (All fire always? Maybe there are exceptions.)

The reagents are sitting there. You provide a little shove and the subsequent reaction shoves the rest, until it's all going.

 

Some can't be prevented, even by cooling to -180°C first. If you're interested in that kind of thing I recommend reading some of Derek Lowe's "Things I Wont Work With"

• This one I picked at random and hadn't seen before is a lovely example of his way with words. Things I Won't Work With: Hexanitrohexaazaisowurtzitane. Hexa-nitro = it has six NO2 groups stuck on it somewhere, like tri-nitro-toluene (TNT) has three = bad news already. Hexa-aza... I'll let him explain that. Isowurzitane, um yeah.
  "... There's a recent report of a method to make a more stable form of it, by mixing it with TNT..."
• Another graphic description of a chemical which is at once extremely toxic, borderline pyrophoric (auto-igniting in air) and tends to form explosive compounds: TIWWW: dimethylcadmium
• but if you want to start a thermal runaway reaction with almost anything, this is your kiddie: FOOF . Just please, not within a mile of anything anyone cares about. On the bright side it's not something you can make by accident.

I digress - this might be a specialised taste for those who got at least an A-level in chemistry.

 

 

But you're talking NMC thermal runaway in particular? The cell overheats electrically, and then... especially if it has been abused electrically by charging over the safe voltage... it will tend to overheat chemically as well. After that it vents the flammable electrolyte which catches fire. Other than the availability, what's special?

 

You can do this with much greater safety and minimal cost with some bike brake cable (stainless steel stranded wire). Get a loop and put it in your ceramic chocolate block, then put the cotton/vaseline fire lighter in contact. Stainless steel's resistance is quite significant so a few volts at a couple of amps should bring a few inches of this up to red heat pretty quickly. After that you run away. 😁

 

The only difference between this and flaming petrol around the neck of a WD40 tin is that it's electrically triggered, and there are plenty of ways to do that. This chap is also good,

but you might not want that in your stove, door open or shut.

 

 

On 30/11/2023 at 16:27, magnetman said:

And please refrain from damning my fire. Thank you. 

Sure. I won't dam your river either. 😉

 

On 30/11/2023 at 16:39, rusty69 said:

Can't you just pay the butlers to tend to them in your absence?

Cheaper to run a propane pilot light and have a contract with the fuel boat?

 

On 30/11/2023 at 18:44, Ronaldo47 said:

I use the red wax from Babybel cheeses, smeared on pieces of corrugated cardboad rolled into tubes, as the foundation layer for firewood.  The local industrial estate always has some non-returnable pallets that they are happy to let you take away for firewood 

It's weird how "reduce, re-use, recycle" makes no mention of "just burn the stuff, it save us hauling it to the incinerator". Anyone would think it's a bit of theatre for psychological purposes, rather than a serious effort to reduce our impact on the environment. 😐

It is a good source of kindling but I guess some people can't tell what will produce toxic fumes? (Don't burn polystyrene or PVC)

Oh and don't burn anything that's not defra approved. 🤦‍♂️

[Jerra]

9 minutes ago, wakey_wake said:

It's weird how "reduce, re-use, recycle" makes no mention of "just burn the stuff, it save us hauling it to the incinerator".

I suspect it is because commercial incinerators make attempts at cleaning the flue gasses, but domestic burning does not.

 

As I understand it much of what is currently burned could be reused, recycled, or composted rather than being sent as general waste.