Disney Goes Boom!

BoomZilla writes "Reading Disney's alliteratively titled Practically Perfect Pyrotechnics introduces the latest in firework launch technology. Gone are the 'light blue touch paper and retire a safe distance' days. Shells are now launched using compressed air. No burning black powder means no smoke drifting over the residential neighborhoods, plus a safer show. Best of all the new system is more precise and can launch shells higher than black powder, enabling spectacular new effects. An additional article: The future of theme park fireworks covers some of the pros and cons of compressed air launch systems." We mentioned this earlier.

Full of hot air

...just like Disney.

Looks Great, Less Smogging

I'm not sure the launch charge contributes too much smoke, as I've found the charge which distributes the firework to create more -- usually evidenced by a series of greyish clouds carried away by higher winds. Grand Finales have had so much smoke at heights to obscure some of the fireworks themselves. Then there's the matter of where I live having a chronic fog/marine layer problem which has rendered the most fantastic displays only so many noisy, colorful blurs. Even they cute smiley ones, like the mouse pattern Disney is so fond of.

The air in the Los Angeles/San Bernardino area can be pretty awful, which probably has a lot more to do with their efforts to decrease smoke. I visited the Grand Canyon years ago and heard sometimes the visibility, in the summer is so poor you can't see across the canyon, thanks to smog from San Diego and Los Angeles/San Bernardino, hundreds of miles to the west. (Fortunately I was there in winter, which I highly recommend (South Rim open only), with 200+ miles of visibility.)

A word of advice: Try to avoid a down-wind position for fireworks as sulpherous ash may drift down into your eyes and it burns like H2S.

Re:INteresting fact

My understanding was that LA has had smog since before the invention of the automobile, due to the geography of the valley.

Supposedly it had smog from campfires when it was inhabited by native Americans.

Re:Looks Great, Less Smogging

So what? The worst environmental hazard connected to fireworks are elements like barium needed to make those colorful flames. This Disney technology won't change it.

New explosives for Disney

While the compressed gas systems won't change the toxics used in the shells, this will. [ornl.gov] (Look for the bit at the bottom on "Better Holidays through Chemistry.")

Some of the new high nitrogen explosives [lanl.gov] are well suited to this application.

It will be difficult to replace all of the colors produced by metals and other compounds used in fireworks- some of which are quite toxic (strontium, cadmium, arsenic, antimony, PVC plastic, etc.). It will also be much more expensive. But high nitrogen explosives and newer organic compounds have a lot to offer the field- including colors you can't get with the old standbys.

Some of the high nitrogen stuff I used to work with was pretty interesting. Lots of newer, potentially safer compounds are in the pipeline- mainly for military applications, but they can be bastardized to, er, recreational purposes.

Re:LIES, LIES, LIES

The Los Angeles basin isn't what the poster was referring to IMO, but east Los Angeles, and San Bernadino. Have you ever been out to Ontario or Riverside at 3pm on a stagnant July afternoon? I lived in Ontario for 2 years, and I'm not surprised in the least at the fact that San Bernadino county has the worst smog in the United States. Driving out there from Los Angeles in the summer, every single day you could see a thick blanket of black smog hovering above Pomona.

As long as the boom is still there...

I'm pretty excited about eventually seeing one of these shows in action. I don't think I'll miss the smoke of the rockets, as integral as that might be to a traditional show.

As long as the big boys still make that oh-so-satisfying "BOOM" when they go off, I'll be thrilled as ever.

Change is Bad! Very Bad!

No burning black powder means no smoke drifting over the residential neighborhoods, plus a safer show. Best of all the new system is more precise and can launch shells higher than black powder, enabling spectacular new effects.

But I like watching the billows of smoke drifting across the river! And if the fireworks go any higher, I won't be able to watch them from my computer desk! They'll be blocked by the balcony of the apartment above mine!

Re:Change is Bad! Very Bad!

Perhaps Disney would give you some of their leftover black powder pyrotechnics and you could take care of that upper balcony.

Re:Change is Bad! Very Bad!

Fireworks are launched by a classic blackpowder mortar system: there's a lofting charge in the launch tube (basically, a bag of gunpowder), and the shell (usually consisting of a bursting charge, a number of "stars", and filler to give it a spherical shape). Changing the lofting mechanism from gunpowder to compressed air won't make a bit of difference for the shell.

Re:Change is Bad! Very Bad!

A typical 8" shell weighs about 3 pounds, of which about 1 ounce is the lift charge. Most of the weight comes from the shell casing (pressed glued paper) that holds the burst charge and the stars and keeps them together long enough for the stars to ignite when the timing fuse burns through to the burst charge. Disney is probably using 4" shells for most of their stuff, so figure a pound of shell with a tablespoon of lift charge.

For reference, the largest shell ever fired (the 36" Fat Man) weighed 800 pounds and was lifted 1400 feet in the air by 1/2 pound of black powder.

Re:Change is Bad! Very Bad!

...people who've moved in since that time knew exactly what they were buying...a house/condo near a theme park renowned for its fireworks displays

There is a big difference between what's right, and the results of the US legal system.

Example: Small airports were built all over the country. Decades later, the land around them was made into housing developments. Then people sued to have the noisy airports restricted to the point they were no longer viable, or shut down altogether. They consistently win, because there are 100 irate homeowners vs. 30 people who want to preserve the pre-existing airport. Bye-bye airport. The ultimate irony is when the runway becomes the main street through the new subdivision that's built where the airport was, and all the subdivision streets have names like Blue Sky Place and Lindbergh Drive.

It's similar to developers leveling a beautiful stand of trees to pack as many little vinyl houses as possible into a congested suburban hell, and naming the subdivision Aspen Acres. I guess Fugly Houses Estates doesn't sound very good.

Maybe I'm getting even more cynical in my old age, but there seem to be fewer and fewer instances where Right and Reality coincide.

Too Easy...

So now when people say Disney sucks, I can say, "Well, I don't know about that..."

"But their fireworks sure blow."

Re:Too Easy...

And should we try the veal?

Skip the veal. Go for the fish.

Argh!

Disney Goes Boom!

You get my hopes up, then no chapter 11. :-(

Re:Argh!

They've been hemoraging cash on movies though

But now, they save money on the cost of matches!

Disney is losing.

They've been hemoraging cash on movies though

Darn right:

• Disney has shut down its cel animation studios and switched to a CG format (ever noticed how Mickey and Minnie tilt their heads down when facing the camera?), under a misguided belief about how the Pixar co-productions beat Disney's recent cel-animated productions at the box office. Disney will already be bleeding by the time its animation division realizes that Pixar's movies had a plot.
• Pixar has only two movies left with Disney, titled The Incredibles and Cars. Once these complete their theatrical and home-video runs, Disney will be bleeding even more.
• Disney relies on its back catalog for revenue. Watch Disney start bleeding again in 2023 when the Supreme Court invokes three strikes (hinted at in the Eldred opinion) against the Chastity Bono Act and a revamped Mickey Mouse joins the supporting cast in other animation studios' films. (Trademark law potentially bars other studios from casting Mickey in a leading role.)

Wait...

We still hate Disney, right?

Or do we like them now? Or do we like thier fireworks - but feel immediately compelled to qualify that statement with BUT DISNEY STILL SUCKS...

I'm so confused.

Re:Wait...

Considering that they have decided to donate the patents on this invention to a non-profit group I would say that we should all like/respect Disney at least a tad. That's a great move.

Slashdot is not a hive-mind

Obligatory response pointing out that Slashdot is comprised of many people, some of which like Disney, some of which don't.

One thing we all agree on, though, is that the "Do we hate ________ today?" joke is fucking tired.

Sincerely,

TU

Re:Slashdot is not a hive-mind

So do we hate "Do we hate X today" jokes today or not?

Re:Slashdot is not a hive-mind

Obligatory response pointing out that Slashdot is comprised of many people, some of which like "Do we hate _______ today?" jokes, some of which don't.

Obligatory response pointing out that Slashdot is comprised of many people, some of which like recursive jokes, some of which don't.

Well that ought to wrap that up. Move along.

Beer-can mortars anyone?

I know Im not the only kid who did this, the best ones were with a propane air mixture and a spark plug to ignite the gas electrically.

Re:Beer-can mortars anyone?

Oh yeah. The old-style beer cans were perfect tennis ball size. What's really cool is soaking the tennis ball with lighter fluid first. About 1/2 the time, it comes out on fire.

When it goes all the way down the street, and rolls under a neighbors car, still on fire...the decision to go get it or run is a tough one.
(don't ask how I know this)

Re:Beer-can mortars anyone?

My potato guns use a customized ignition like what you're describing. The guns themselves are PVC, and the ignition is a camera flash circuit wired through a car ignition coil, which goes into a spark plug. Hairspray shoots the potatoes a good 150 yards if you wedge them in there enough.

Slightly more on-topic though, a friend of mine has a real nice compressed air potato gun that has an electronically triggered poppet valve. Despite the fact that his gun cost much more and is so much more complex, mine shoots more rapidly, farther, and louder. They both get a nice cloud of smoke out the barrel after the shot though. His because of the rapid decompression, and mine because of the burning hairspray. Surprisingly, we have mutual respect for each other's designs and we don't really compete with each other so much as help with design and construction problems.

My next gun will be compressed air, and once I figure it out with PVC, I'm moving on to stainless steel to hopefully get a supersonic potato (or other projectile) gun :-)

What? They use Bluetooth?

Is it really true that they use Bluetooth for shell detonation? I thought the range was limited. And it seems rather expensive compared to fuses. But I guess it's Disney... :-)

odd timing on this...

I just find it amusing that Disney released all this news about their revolutionary, wonderful new launch system and then proceeded to roll out a new pyrotechnic show at Disneyland that, by all accounts, is disappointing at best compared to the one it replaced. Sure, it may be less polluting, but it's also a lot less fun.

Sure, there are other factors that caused the switch in shows, but the timing was unfortunate. They basically managed to associate environmentally friendly fireworks with totally boring fireworks, which, by an inspection of their description of the new launch technique, really isn't the case at all.

I imagine...

I imagine someone in a location where fireworks are legal could rig up a poor mans version using something similar to a Potato Cannon (the pneumatic type).

Re:I imagine...

I imagine someone in a location where fireworks are legal could rig up a poor mans version using something similar to a Potato Cannon (the pneumatic type).

Correct. These are the same people you read about in the Darwin Awards.

What if....

What if I'm allergic to the air that will spread to the residential area ??

Does Eisner know about this...???

From the article: The air-launch technology is such a revolutionary step forward that Disney has decided to share it with the pyrotechnics industry as a whole. The Walt Disney Company plans to donate the seven patents produced for the air-launch process to a non-profit group that will license the technology to the rest of the pyrotechnics industry. Cool article, shocking conclusion. Must now re-evaluate opinion of Disney...

Fireworks... let me think...

Fireworks shmireworks. I find this Disney merchandise [victoriassecret.com] much more worthy of my undivided attention. Oh well... Priorities, I guess.

aww....

No burning black powder


Is it just me or is it not lighting fireworks without the gunpowder smell and the soot all over your hands?

The Smallest Revolution

"Gone are the 'light blue touch paper and retire a safe distance' days.

You go ahead and stand next to the mortar if you want, but there are plenty of other ways for that round to cook off prematurally, not to mention what'll happen if a compressed air hose (enough to send a hefty shell 200+ feet into the air) bursts. Sure, the accident ratio will probably drop dramatically, but I'll keep my distance just the same.

Besides, normal ignition techniques will still be around for some time to come, if only because it's loads cheaper to fuse the bad boy than to lug around an expensive high performance compressor and the marginally more complex fusing in the shell itself.

old news twice over

When I read this article the first time [slashdot.org], I emailed it to a friend of mine who works in the Pyrotechnics division at Disney World, and he replied saying that he didn't know what prompted them to write that article when they did -- Disney has been using that technology for several years now. Oh well, I guess old news is still news. Maybe it was just a slow news day the first time /. had that article, and an even slower news day this time...

old news?

I could of swore a few years ago a friend told me about alternative rocket launching abilities. She lived in some hot desert place in America (Texas maybe..) and said they used compressed air or something similar to launch rockets because black power was too dangerous in the heat.

Why does it matter if Mickey mouse is now doing it? I was under the impression people at Slashdot were beyond Disney's target audience..

Saw it July 4th, first day they revealed it.

I took my wife and kids to Disneyland in Anaheim to check out the display. I have some video of it that isn't quite ready for web display (or should I say, I'm too busy :-), but suffice it to say it's a different show. They actually had two displays on July 4th, with slightly different timings and effects.

After seeing the same sort of fireworks for decades, I think it was more interesting than the old fire up and go boom. The most noticeable change is they can do much higher quality synchronized launches. One effect (a little overused) fired off a bunch of streamers in sequence at different angles, and because the flaming bits are not powered after launch, they have a nice regular parabolic trajectory. Nice effect.

However, they have a great Grand Finale either way. It's also nice to know my $150 worth of tickets went to something donated to the public (patents).

From matchlock, to airgun, to railgun?

Practically Perfect Pyrotechnics? In practice, it's probably even more imperfect than it looks on paper. >_> Now what they should really do is create railgun launchers for fireworks. Apparently the USA military is already in the process of developing missile launcher technology based on the electromagnetic railgun - an civilian applications would be both profitable and fun! >:) -fs

and they open-sourced it!

bottom of the article says they donated all the patents to an NPO for relicensing. that's.. unusually cool of them.

we've had these for years

it's called pneumatic potato guns, a hillbilly's delight if you will. www.xinventions.com

Hmm, compressed air plus explosives...

I'm thinking there's just something about that combination that sounds so wrong.

Like others...

...I found the title sadly misleading. No Chapter 11 bankruptcy for Disney. ;_;

However, that being said... even though Disney is still an evil corporation and amongst the most evil, this is a nice gesture on their part to make the compressed-air technology available to everyone.

What I'd like to know, however, is why they didn't release it into the public domain? Then again, this is Disney; they abhor the public domain, so it oprobably stands to reason that they wouldn't dare touch that prospect.

Yes my fellow Americans

It has been confirmed that the evil terrorist state known as Disneyland does have the means to produce weapons of mass combustion.

Black powder has its advantages

The one thing I did like about black powder is the ability for controlled burns, allowing a much slower ascent for fireworks which light up on the way up. I don't think that's possible with this technique.

Government funded?

I remember hearing something [eatthestate.org] about the Department of Energy giving Disney a big fat grant for brighter fireworks... I wonder if this is related?

Some Clarifications - And More Info

Here's some additional info that the articles don't mention.

The WDI spokeswoman says "Disney isn't sure when its Central Florida theme parks could install or start testing the new fireworks launch system."
Actually, the air-launched fireworks are not completely new, but Disneyland is the first time they're using air for the whole (or majority of the) show. The first use was at Epcot down at Walt Disney World for the Illuminations: Reflections of Earth show - where the first "comet" effect that screams over the lagoon is air-launched from on top of one of the pavilion buildings. If you're walking in that area around 15 minutes before the show starts, they rope off the main pathway that passes under the launch area. You do hear a big fwoosh when it goes off. The last time this bit made Slashdot, some comments were debating the gas used - in this case they're compressing plain air.

The new Wishes fireworks show which has been playing since last Fall at the Magic Kingdom at WDW also planned to use the air launch, but the cost of the installation was too much and traditional fireworks have been used. Unlike WDW where there's a sizable land buffer between residences and the parks, Disneyland has large neighborhoods of people surrounding it, and they exert pressure on the local government to make things more difficult (and expensive) for Disneyland. Wishes also introduces the concept of firing shells from within the park off buildings in Fantasyland, which makes for some spectacular effects if you're watching from back in that area.

Also related, Disney is working with a top national lab on fireworks that look just like normal pyro, but burn with much less smoke. While some shows use the smoke the fireworks produce for great effect, eliminating it could be nice for others. Another technology that has been slowly introduced is the use of shells that contain a sacrificial computer chip that syncs its timing upon launch and fires an electronic fuse when up in the air to obtain much more precise ignition timing than could be accomplished conventionally.

Overall, there's some very cool tech going on, but whether Disney chooses to use it all over the place is more of a question of practicality than simply because they have it, so it's good to hear they're donating some of the tech.

Damn, Title Misleading

I was hoping that Disney actually did go boom, and blowed the hell up. After RTFA, I find out its just some nonsense about fireworks and how to make them go higher.

paux on you, I curse thee, for raising our hopes then dashing them on trivial crap.
May the fleas from a 1000 camel infest your armpits.

adios tink

Now with improved accuracy Tinkerbell becomes a more formidable target.

Boom?

Wouldn't "Swooosh" be more appropriate?

There was supposed to be...

an earth shattering KABOOM!!

Forget the Fireworks

Who cares about the fireworks. Just think how far one of those compressors could launch a potatoe! This also presents an alternative to traditional guns. Forget plastic bullets, now you can kill/knockout your enemys with enviromentally friendly, biodegradable food staples. Where can I get one?

"Practically Perfect"

This refers, of course, to Mary Poppins, who was "Practically Perfect in Every Way", as anyone who has seen the movie will recall. Those of you with kids and a VCR, who have seen the damn movie at least 400 fricken times already and never want to see another dancing penguin for the rest of your fricken lives, will no doubt catch the reference right away.

And no, you can't watch "Hercules" either. Go read a book, for cryin' out loud.

Well

At least they're doing something. After firing 250 animators, literally and arrogantly destroying their entire (irreplaceable) animation department (after some 80 years) claiming "2D animation is dead," (despite the fact there are over 400 animation studios in Japan) canceling a multi-billion dollar deal with Pixar and then, with a straight face, claiming "we can't make money on Monday Night Football," I suppose replacing the fireworks show tubes is quite an accomplishment for a $46 billion company.

I, for one, am very, very bummed.

This beats my tennis-ball-cannon by a longshot. It doesn't use black powder either but I don't get that height. I guess I will have to switch from lighter fluid to compressed air and see what that does for the height.

Of course...

...it's going boom. There's a big ass hurricane with Disney in it's sights *AGAIN* Another week without power... *sigh*

Call me old fashioned

But this is kind of like going to a concert where everyone is waving glow sticks around. Without the anticipation of some long haired dudes hair catching on fire it's just not the same.

Shooting them up with compressed air just sort of takes away from the whole 'rockets red glare' that makes them fun.

Re:With high explosives?

Not when they're launched 200 feet up in the air =)

Re:So you know it's a dupe...

Because the extra links at the end inform better then the orignal.