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Okay...I actually did that as a kid, but I used match heads. I was a regular junior rocketeer.

I'd take a pencil, marker, any round tubular object - and would roll it over tinfoil to achieve about 3 layers. Then I'd twist one end to a point to form the 'nose cone'. Slide the writing instrument out and had a hollow tube of foil.

Then I would twist off a bunch of paper match heads and would fill the tube. Next was sliding a complete match up into the inserted match heads with the match head facing down as the fuse.

Then I would insert three of the paper match sticks I'd twisted the heads off of and would insert them each at 120 degrees from the other into the layers of foil and would then bend them 45 degrees to form landing legs.

I did this many times - but had always built small versions - and had always ignited them outside. For a 9 year old, the results were spectacular, and I just knew NASA would come looking for me.

Well, this one was bigger than I'd ever built and the weather sucked outside, so the dining room table became the launch site. I was set up just like the guy in the above video - but mine lit from the bottom.

The launch was spectacular - until everything went wrong. Flaming match heads flew everywhere, igniting the curtains and burning multiple patches in the carpet. I had developed the worlds first cluster bomb.

I spent the next few hours trimming carpet fiber from the edges of the carpet to glue over the burned patches on the rug. The curtains I cut patches from the bottom seam and glued over the burned hole marks.

Mom knew something was wrong when she got home, but couldn't put her finger on it. When she did notice a few weeks later, I was forced to admit my hand in almost burning the house down. She didn't beat me (which was unusual because she would typically put the smack down on me and my brothers). She made me promise, no more fire indoors. I never did pyrotechnics in the house again. I love you, Mom!

Now, outside was another story - but I'll tell that one another day.
 
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#Me Too :rolleyes:
Well, you know at 12 they wouldn't sell me black powder, but the local druggist would sell me potassium nitrate. Yup, that, sulfur and some crushed BB-Q brickets and I was in business. Things were going well, until I decided to test some product in my room one night. I forgot to put the lid on my store and as I was testing a teaspoon full, and a spark went into the can.:eek:
Prettiest fountain you ever saw. Lasted a full 30 seconds and burned pock marks in the ceiling and my drawing table.:D
A little paint fixed that in the morning. :p
I waited a long time for the boot to drop on that one, but it never did.:rolleyes:
 
LOL!

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Dumb FUKK. Even when i was doing that very same $h!t as a 12 year old, I knew enough to go outdoors and set it off on the concrete driveway, using a long stick with a match at the end.

Used to make smoke bombs with empty CO2 cartridges. Dumba$$ kid at school tried the same, stuffing strike-anywhere matches into one ... he blew off several fingers.
 

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