Brent’s (CamClub) Low-budget Easy Electrical Detonator!
Okay, as promised long ago, here it finally is, a method to very cheaply produce your own detonators for your film-making explosion effects on a shoestring budget!
This system is reasonably safe, and you have good control over the way it works. The detonator can be mixed with loads of different things to form squibs, and can be made to go off twice! The detonators can be saved and re-primed for future use.
There’s other ideas like this one, but this one is tried and tested, and importantly, safe, over other methods! Some folks have used sewing needles in jump leads hooked up to car batteries. These methods can damage the battery plates, and are not always instantaneous enough to work on demand. Jump leads on wire-wool is similar, but not very localised, and a again, a bit unpredictable.
What U need:
Wire – 1.5mm Twin & Earth solid core
1.5mm stranded Flexible appliance cable
Battery - Car battery is ideal – Alternative needs to provide good amperage.
Wire cutters/strippers.
Electrical tape
Step 1 - Get some wire!
I use 2 types of wire – One for the signal cable, and the other as the actual detonation fuse wire. I don’t use shop-bought fuse wire, I make my own, it takes longer to burn out, so the result is better, plus it's a lot lot cheaper. I’m using the term fuse here because it’s effectively a wire that burns out and breaks the circuit, although acts as a detonator in the process.
Signal cable: You don’t want this wire to burn out, especially if you’ve concealed it somewhere for your film. I use 1.5mm solid twin & earth – You will see this used widely for household electrical circuits (Usually lighting and low-load), and you can buy it anywhere that sells household electrical cabling. Some places may sell it to you by the foot (Or metre), but I but it in 30M drums, because I use it for exploding balloon systems. It doesn’t cost a fortune either.
On one occasion I had to do 30m cable runs for a big ball-room, so I used 2.5mm Twin & Earth instead, just to make sure the current got all the way along with wire without finding any weak-spots, then connected 1.5mm Twin & Earth detonators (Like you're about to make) to the end, so they'd burn out in case of a short circuit.
Fuse Wire : For this I strip down stranded 3 core 1.5mm flexible cable. You would use this type of cable on electrical appliances. You don’t want the strands too thin (For instance headphone speaker wire), as it may burn out too quickly, and not spread the heat around enough to where it’s needed.
Again, you don’t want it too thick, because the signal cable will start burning out, and you can also wreck your battery. You can use this cable instead of the signal cable described above, but you may get unpredictable results from current not being carried properly across wires, especially if the wire you’re using is old or has started oxidising.
(Picture 1), you’ll see the signal cabling with the white insulation layer stripped back. My wire-strippers are in the picture as well.
Okay, now’s the time to start stripping! On the stranded wire, cut off a length, probably about 4â€
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