Fireworks Blog

In Italy and also in the majority of contries in Europe as well as in the USA , the most traditional fireworks shells are made in a cylindrical shape. There are ones that are "single-break", like the salutes, but the most interesting are the "milti-break", a shell made of multiple shells. You can see a picture below showing the both types from the Takeo Shimizu book: As you can see, usually the breaking charge (or burst charge) is in the center, and the stars or other effects like small reports are put around it. For these shells, the stars are also cylindrically shaped. These shells are also "top fused", I'm not fully sure why, but I think this is because of the pressure generated inside the mortar during the lift (so the fuse does not blow / damage), because the pressures generated inside the mortar are usually higher with cylindrical shells than with spherical ones. For the multi-break shells, a very common effect is what is called a "b...

Today i'm going to talk about the anatomy and function of a Fireworks Shell. As you may already now, there is a variety of fireworks like shells, rockets, mines, roman candles and many others, but today, let's see how a shell looks like and works. The principle is very simple, take a look at the below image: The shell consists of a hard casing, usually made of cardboard or plastic, in this case with a spherical shapping. Inside it, are the stars spread around the casing and in the middle, a bursting charge, made with a black powder like composition and a time fuse, which takes the fire from the outside into inside of the shell, making the burst charge to explode and disperse the starts all around in the air. In the shell bottom, there is a lifting charge, made of granulated black powder that explodes and expels the shell into a high altitude. All the package is put inside a mortar - a tube made with a hard material like steel, iron, cardboard or plastic (H...