Programatically-controlled Propane-based Flame Effects

The goal of this project is to increase the number of flame effects in the festival circuit. We'd like to make flame effects as easy to work with as LEDs, both for personal decoration and large scale art.

This repository documents the process as well as the results of my exploration, thus is contains plenty of work product produced along the way. Things like hand-sketched circuit diagrams, code snippets, and experiments.

This repository contains experimental, lightly-tested, research-level designs to build things that make giant fireballs. These are dangerous prototypes. You can hurt people, damage property, and break the law. Please be careful, work under the guidance of professionals, and find a venue that supports this work (Burning Man, The Crucible, etc.). And as always, you're responsible for anything you get up to!

This project documents my experiments with building Burning Man-style flame effects. It contains designs for several fire poofers (devices that shoot fireballs) and the FireControl2000. The latter is an arduino shield and enclosure for controlling solenoids on fire poofers.

I've categorized things into three areas:

• mechanics contains the fire poofer propane plumbing designs
• electronics contains the FirePoofer2000 arduino shield design and ancillary user interaction hardware.
• code contains the source code for the FirePoofer2000.

If you want to learn about working with propane, check out mechanics

If you want to get into the hardware and software, check out electronics and code

Do your research before getting into flame effects. Start here!

Safety and Building Codes

• Burning Man FAST Regulations and Flame Effect Guidelines
• NFPA 58 "Liquified Petroleum Gas Code" and NFPA 16 "Standards for the Use of Flame Effects Before an Audience" (Why do you have to register to get these?! and you're not allowed to download them?!!)

Suppliers

• http://www.poofersupply.com/
• https://www.mcmaster.com/

Inspiring People and Projects

• FoxFur's Fire Toys
• Steve Hardy's Propane and Electrons
• LeMaitre's alcohol-based flame effects
• Site 3 Fire Arts (Toronto)
• Ardent Heavy Industries and Interpretive Arson
• Arsonic Creations
• FlameThrower Gallery
• Thor Productions

Snippets

• High-Power Control: Arduino + N-Channel MOSFET Monday, March 5 th , 2012