*SWAT MAGAZINE ISSUE ELEVEN: NOVEMBER 1998*
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|		 .Getting the good stuff from fireworks.	     |
|                       By -=The Firestarter=-	    		     |
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Yes we can all cut a firework into pieces and extract the gunpowder,
but there is more that you can do with the contents. This article will
deal with more than just extraction of explosive and useful stuff, it
will also detail what the stuff is, how to make it more powerful and
what else you can do with it.

1) Rockets.

First off there is the whistling air bomb style, the cheapest that you
can buy, you can cause some real terror with these. Anyway stuff you
can get:
Black powder (or some white cast stuff, still burns)
VERY fine gunpowder
Fuse
Cardboard/plastic tube
Stick

Ok, the design of these rockets is pretty simple, the card/plastic tube
is full of the white shit (or solid black powder). Use the stick to
scrape it out, then crush it up into a fine powder.
Stuck on top of this is a small cardboard tube with clay on top of it
and a very small and fast burning fuse (if you light this you won't
have as many fingers as you did before). If you scrape the clay away
you will have a small ammout of fine gunpowder, when I say fine I mean
as fine as flour. Just save the little card tubes in one piece for now.

2) Air bombs.

By far my favorite firework, you light the blue touch paper and it
flares up with a purple flame which dies down and shoots an explosive
device into the air. Ok first of all strip the paper from around the
tube, you will have a piece of blue touch paper that you can use as a
fuse. Then tip/scrape out the purple shit, this is what burns, it is
mixed with black powder, just crush this up and save for a later date.
Now you should see a funny white fuse, this is just a piece of white
paper with two lines of black powder encased in it, burns fairly
fast and is handy for booby traps (but i'll come to that). Pop out the
small cardboard tube that's in there, this should have a plastic cap,
you can pop this off and see a load of fine black powder. The bottom
of these tubes has a solid piece of black powder sealing it (it may not
be black powder but it's used as a fuse). Below that you should see a
small tisse bag, juse pop this out as it's full of black powder.
(Note: to make the cardboard tubes more powerful pop off the cap and
 seal it with epoxy resin)

3) Large rockets.

Similar to the small rockets only the nose cone has a load of little
"balls" in it, these are the bits you see when it explodes. You may
have loads of them of just a few, either way save them, they are good
for incendrie bombs.

4) Sparklers.

Yes there cheap, little kiddies play with them adn they don't explode.
But you can crush up all of the shit round them and use it as a low
grade explosive or use it as part of an incendrie bomb, after all it
can burn upto 2000 degrees (you can light thermite with it), and if you
mix it with an oxidiser, well i'll let you figure it out.

5) Roman candles.

Like the air bombs only they don't explode, they have the same little
"balls" in them as the large rockets.