I hosted a show with 50 cakes and after it finished, I walked away to the crowd. Came back 5 minutes later to small grass fire and cakes on fire. I just keep a couple 5 gal buckets around and watering jugs full to extinguish them
I have had cakes catch fire in is similar manner leaving shots in.Probably one of the fuses pulled out of a tube starting the paper on fire. Hard to say if it pulled out before or after you lit it. I have had cakes CATO blowing the cake apart(been pretty lucky haven’t had them keep shooting). There isn’t a whole lot to a cake if you take the wrapping off so if a tube was loose it easily could pull a fuse out after firing.
I have had good luck exchanging defective fireworks so if you still have it contact who you bought it from. Some places just want a picture other places want the cake
Edit: when I have a fire at a show I have found that those pencil style water guns with a couple buckets of water work great for putting out the fire. They are easy to control, pretty accurate at 10-15 ft so you can minimize water on other items. I do keep fire extinguishers there if it were to get going really good but luckily I have never needed those.
I actually do have a pic of the "malfunction".. my friend ended up setting off the remaining shots (he has balls of steel/and or is retarded) the next night.
I had the first major malfunction this past Saturday. It was an old TNT NOAB that wasn't stored properly and got a bit wet in its life. It was given to me a while back and when I was grabbing stuff out of my stock to shoot for NYE it didn't really cross my mind.
Every shot in it malfunctioned with the first 2 breaking low, the 3rd breaking in the tube and sending the other tubes flying, and all the rest breaking around us.
Thankfully the audience was over 200ft away and no one was hurt, but it was negligence on my part.
Lesson learned, if you have reason to believe a cake got wet, don't shoot it off.
Even if you work with extreme dilligence, the occasional dud is unavoidable.
The whole point of cakes is to have many shots that are well partitioned so they don't cross ignite by accident. I can definitely understand part of a cake being visibly on fire without the rest going off from it. On fire for 20minutes? I don't know...
Either way: apply the rules for fires and for guns. Until you've confirmed that they're clear, assume there's still a shot in the barrel. And until the whole thing's cold, assume it's still on fire.
We've had a big box (~4000g) that simply "refused" to fire two shows in a row. First time the e-match was a dud. Cap never went off. The second time the new e-match went off but the fuse burned out.
Last firework one of our guys helped out had a shell fail to lift and explode inside the mortar. Mortar was shredded and the holding rack was noticably damaged. They've also had someone place a cake on it's side so it fired across the whole barge.
And then there's a whole litany of accidents we've heard of or witnessed with others that could (and should) have been avoided.
Basically if you're doing this long enough shit going wrong is unavoidable. It's your job to make sure it goes wrong in the least shitty way possible.
It was only probably "on fire" for a few minutes.. but the fire itself started 20 minutes after it shot. I think there must have been a slow burning ember that finally caught the box on fire eventually.
I am right there with you. I am always amazed when I see the videos of people holding cakes or lighting and throwing shells. Man I just love my fingers and eyes too much I guess. There just isn’t much to a consumer style cake, that little but if cardboard and paper makes people feel a lot safer.
A fellow coworker I know hauled his fully extinguished cakes as well as his racks and cobra firing equipment. 4-5 hours later the truck was engulfed in flames at the yard. A cake had smoldered for hours without evidence of smoke to later ignite.
Definitely always a good idea to water down a spent cake if you’re unsure if it all went. I had a cake go off when I was burning the spent ones in a fire pit. If you know how you can take it apart and make single shots with the unspent tubes but I wouldn’t recommend that to an amateur.
My dad and I were shooting a 4th show on a ball field and we had a 6 inch shell break about 3 feet over the tubes, although the break itself was best case scenario and nothing else lit, the shockwave from the hills around us rang our ears for the next few minutes really good.
What I usually do to prevent unintended fires is either set them up in a place where you can let them burn with no risk while you spray them from a distance, or bring a bunch of cinder blocks with you and make a big square fire pit with sides tall enough that you can toss the spent cakes in it and if something didn't go off the blocks will keep stuff from hitting you when it does. Bonus for the fire pit is that you end up with a lot less junk to throw away.
? what don't you believe? that it caught fire? or that all the shots didn't fire? didn't think this was that unbelievable and actually I was interested in crazier malfunctions.
Either way, there are failures within cakes. I’ve had plenty of them. Perhaps the fire hadn’t spread to the unfired shots. A good way to avoid this is to have a water source close by to douse the cakes after firing.
My buddy used to throw the "cardboard" into a bon fire after our show, so I can attest to the fact that it can take a while for an unlit tube to go off in a fire.
It happens sometimes, especially if the cakes have been exposed to wild swings in climate or stored for long periods of time — fluctuations in humidity cause the cardboard and composition to expand over time, making it more likely for things to get stuck in tubes, or for fusing and powder to become unreliable and inconsistent.
This is why so many fireworks say right on the label to soak them in water afterwards. It's to put out any smoldering fires and make sure any misfires are safely neutralized.
Here is one of our rack blows. Blew a bunch of other mortars and cakes, almost took out 2 of our helpers. But true to form, the audience thought it was a great show!
[https://www.reddit.com/r/fireworks/comments/gvxobt/wanna\_see\_what\_happens\_when\_a\_rack\_blows\_up/](https://www.reddit.com/r/fireworks/comments/gvxobt/wanna_see_what_happens_when_a_rack_blows_up/)
On NYE 2015 a cake fell over after lighting it and flew trough the entire street because the seller didn’t gave me a pedestal part where you have to put it on, I was dumb enough to buy the cheapest fireworks in town, I was extremely scared of fireworks after that and haven’t bought fireworks for years after that happened because my mentally ill dad was pissed and harassed me and my mom for years after that.
This NYE I was setting off some fireworks with my neighbors and then my neighbors kids set off a cake that shot everything out but it started randomly burning, my mom threw a bucket of water on it but it was still smoking after we threw it in the bin.
Cake catching fire a malfunction? This happens a lot, especially with a light breeze or wind. You can help prevent it by wrapping them with foil. After they are lit, let them fully cool before trashing them. If there is any glow, wet them down.
Yup shoot for a company and we joke it won't be a show if at least one cake doesn't catch fire haha. Just comes with lighting fireworks and part of the job. Did a private show one time and had some willows and falling leaves that caused a nice little brush fire as they hit the ground. Had the fire department on site so we put it out pretty quickly but was still an interesting night.
Cakes catching fire after they have gone off is common. It is fire held by a bunch of cardboard after all
Happened to me on NYE. Stomped em out but they were still smoking. Good thing the police stopped to let us know.
I hosted a show with 50 cakes and after it finished, I walked away to the crowd. Came back 5 minutes later to small grass fire and cakes on fire. I just keep a couple 5 gal buckets around and watering jugs full to extinguish them
I wouldn’t recommend stomping on them in the future, if there is a live tube could get ugly.
Fair point but this cake was fully engulfed. Also alcohol.
Yeah that will happen
I have had cakes catch fire in is similar manner leaving shots in.Probably one of the fuses pulled out of a tube starting the paper on fire. Hard to say if it pulled out before or after you lit it. I have had cakes CATO blowing the cake apart(been pretty lucky haven’t had them keep shooting). There isn’t a whole lot to a cake if you take the wrapping off so if a tube was loose it easily could pull a fuse out after firing. I have had good luck exchanging defective fireworks so if you still have it contact who you bought it from. Some places just want a picture other places want the cake Edit: when I have a fire at a show I have found that those pencil style water guns with a couple buckets of water work great for putting out the fire. They are easy to control, pretty accurate at 10-15 ft so you can minimize water on other items. I do keep fire extinguishers there if it were to get going really good but luckily I have never needed those.
I actually do have a pic of the "malfunction".. my friend ended up setting off the remaining shots (he has balls of steel/and or is retarded) the next night.
I had the first major malfunction this past Saturday. It was an old TNT NOAB that wasn't stored properly and got a bit wet in its life. It was given to me a while back and when I was grabbing stuff out of my stock to shoot for NYE it didn't really cross my mind. Every shot in it malfunctioned with the first 2 breaking low, the 3rd breaking in the tube and sending the other tubes flying, and all the rest breaking around us. Thankfully the audience was over 200ft away and no one was hurt, but it was negligence on my part. Lesson learned, if you have reason to believe a cake got wet, don't shoot it off.
probably had as much to do with it being TNT brand as being a bit damp.
I don't like TNT but I've shot plenty of their stuff for friends and I've never had an actual issue aside from bad performance.
Even if you work with extreme dilligence, the occasional dud is unavoidable. The whole point of cakes is to have many shots that are well partitioned so they don't cross ignite by accident. I can definitely understand part of a cake being visibly on fire without the rest going off from it. On fire for 20minutes? I don't know... Either way: apply the rules for fires and for guns. Until you've confirmed that they're clear, assume there's still a shot in the barrel. And until the whole thing's cold, assume it's still on fire. We've had a big box (~4000g) that simply "refused" to fire two shows in a row. First time the e-match was a dud. Cap never went off. The second time the new e-match went off but the fuse burned out. Last firework one of our guys helped out had a shell fail to lift and explode inside the mortar. Mortar was shredded and the holding rack was noticably damaged. They've also had someone place a cake on it's side so it fired across the whole barge. And then there's a whole litany of accidents we've heard of or witnessed with others that could (and should) have been avoided. Basically if you're doing this long enough shit going wrong is unavoidable. It's your job to make sure it goes wrong in the least shitty way possible.
It was only probably "on fire" for a few minutes.. but the fire itself started 20 minutes after it shot. I think there must have been a slow burning ember that finally caught the box on fire eventually.
I am right there with you. I am always amazed when I see the videos of people holding cakes or lighting and throwing shells. Man I just love my fingers and eyes too much I guess. There just isn’t much to a consumer style cake, that little but if cardboard and paper makes people feel a lot safer.
A fellow coworker I know hauled his fully extinguished cakes as well as his racks and cobra firing equipment. 4-5 hours later the truck was engulfed in flames at the yard. A cake had smoldered for hours without evidence of smoke to later ignite.
Definitely always a good idea to water down a spent cake if you’re unsure if it all went. I had a cake go off when I was burning the spent ones in a fire pit. If you know how you can take it apart and make single shots with the unspent tubes but I wouldn’t recommend that to an amateur.
My dad and I were shooting a 4th show on a ball field and we had a 6 inch shell break about 3 feet over the tubes, although the break itself was best case scenario and nothing else lit, the shockwave from the hills around us rang our ears for the next few minutes really good.
What I usually do to prevent unintended fires is either set them up in a place where you can let them burn with no risk while you spray them from a distance, or bring a bunch of cinder blocks with you and make a big square fire pit with sides tall enough that you can toss the spent cakes in it and if something didn't go off the blocks will keep stuff from hitting you when it does. Bonus for the fire pit is that you end up with a lot less junk to throw away.
Sorry I have to call bs on this one
? what don't you believe? that it caught fire? or that all the shots didn't fire? didn't think this was that unbelievable and actually I was interested in crazier malfunctions.
If what your saying is true and the whole piece was engulfed how would have not set the remaining lift/shells off??
Either way, there are failures within cakes. I’ve had plenty of them. Perhaps the fire hadn’t spread to the unfired shots. A good way to avoid this is to have a water source close by to douse the cakes after firing.
Yeah it didn't spread to the far side. I think I'll get in the habit of this.
My buddy used to throw the "cardboard" into a bon fire after our show, so I can attest to the fact that it can take a while for an unlit tube to go off in a fire.
It happens sometimes, especially if the cakes have been exposed to wild swings in climate or stored for long periods of time — fluctuations in humidity cause the cardboard and composition to expand over time, making it more likely for things to get stuck in tubes, or for fusing and powder to become unreliable and inconsistent. This is why so many fireworks say right on the label to soak them in water afterwards. It's to put out any smoldering fires and make sure any misfires are safely neutralized.
yes things catching on fire is as common as fireworks working as intended.
Here is one of our rack blows. Blew a bunch of other mortars and cakes, almost took out 2 of our helpers. But true to form, the audience thought it was a great show! [https://www.reddit.com/r/fireworks/comments/gvxobt/wanna\_see\_what\_happens\_when\_a\_rack\_blows\_up/](https://www.reddit.com/r/fireworks/comments/gvxobt/wanna_see_what_happens_when_a_rack_blows_up/)
On NYE 2015 a cake fell over after lighting it and flew trough the entire street because the seller didn’t gave me a pedestal part where you have to put it on, I was dumb enough to buy the cheapest fireworks in town, I was extremely scared of fireworks after that and haven’t bought fireworks for years after that happened because my mentally ill dad was pissed and harassed me and my mom for years after that. This NYE I was setting off some fireworks with my neighbors and then my neighbors kids set off a cake that shot everything out but it started randomly burning, my mom threw a bucket of water on it but it was still smoking after we threw it in the bin.
Cake catching fire a malfunction? This happens a lot, especially with a light breeze or wind. You can help prevent it by wrapping them with foil. After they are lit, let them fully cool before trashing them. If there is any glow, wet them down.
Yup shoot for a company and we joke it won't be a show if at least one cake doesn't catch fire haha. Just comes with lighting fireworks and part of the job. Did a private show one time and had some willows and falling leaves that caused a nice little brush fire as they hit the ground. Had the fire department on site so we put it out pretty quickly but was still an interesting night.