For this video, I’m going to show you how to make a handful of remote controlled, electric
ignitors from things you already have around the house. That will ignite fireworks safely,
and from a distance. Or launch your homemade rockets, with the simple press of a button.
To start this project, you’ll just need a book of paper matches, some tape, and an
old cell phone charger. Chances are you have a spare charger somewhere in the house, but
if not, you can easily find them at thrift stores for about a dollar.
Now get to work with a pair of scissors, and carefully chop the head and charge controller
off of the cable, then cut it up into smaller pieces around 2” long.
If we remove the outer jacket, you can see there are two insulated wires inside, made
of very thin, stranded copper wires. And for this project, the thinner the wires are, the
better the ignitors will work.
Now we don’t need the outer sheathing at all, so go ahead and pull the wires out and
strip the other ends down about half an inch.
Carefully single out one copper strand, from the bundle of wire, and pull it to off the
side. And now the other frayed wires, are all garbage, so just twist them together,
and use a pair of scissors to snip them off at the base.
Now let’s take a close look at the other wire. If it has nylon cording mixed in with the
copper strands you need to get rid of it. And the most effective way to eliminate it,
is to lick it with a flame from a candle, or a BBQ ignitor.
Now hold the two cables side by side about 1/4” apart, then twist the bridge wire from
the first cable, so it binds together tightly, and meshes in with the other strands. This
will ensure the bridge wire has great electrical contact, and should prevent it from unravelling.
To hold the wires in place, simply lay a small piece of tape on the table, so it’s facing
sticky side up, and press the wires down into the center.
Now make sure the bridge wire is poking out around 1/4” from the top, then bend the
excess wire back, and press it down beside the wires on the inside.
Alright the ignitor leads are completed, so let’s take a quick break from all that,
and spend some time modifying the match heads.
Take the matches, one at a time, and carefully slide them down the edge of a sharp pair of
scissors. You can see it scores a very small grove, right down the center of the tip.
Now bring back the ignitor leads, and line the bridge wire up with the groove in the
match-head, and secure it firmly in place by wrapping one side of the tape tightly over
the base of the match, then reinforce it again, by firmly wrapping the other half of the tape
the other direction.
For one finishing touch, it’s good practice to burn the nylon strands on the ignitor leads
as well, then twist them together tightly so they’ll make better contact.
At this point, your electric match is finished, and ready to go to work.
To test them out, I tried connecting alligator clips to the leads of the ignitor, then running
the wires to two 9 volt batteries, in parallel.
Now all it takes for ignition, is the press of a button to complete the circuit. Or in
this case, a touch of the wires to the battery terminals.
The matches light off because when the circuit is completed, over 6 amps of electrical current
surge through the tiny bridge wire on top, and the electricity gets the wire so hot it
ignites the chemicals in the match head, causing it to burst into flames. And you can see that
all happens very quickly.
Now just for fun, I got an old N64 controller and converted it, into a rocket launch controller.
So now I can launch homemade sugar rockets with the the press of a button. Look for how
I made this in another project video.
Well now you know how to mass produce electric ignitors, with junk you probably have lying
around the house.
By the way, if you try using different colored tape, you can give your ignitors your own
custom touch. And if you can’t find paper matches, wooden matches will work just as well.
Well that’s it for now. If you like this video, perhaps you’ll like some of my others.
Check them out at www.thekingofrandom.com