SpudFiles

Hello fellow spudders!

a couple weeks back i was in a desperate need of a good and reliable igniter for my combustion. I didn`t have acces to a bbq-igniter, stun/tazer or anything like that. BUT! i found my electrical flyswatter!

it was a 3v rechargeable flyswatter. I modded it up to 9V and used it as a igniter! I was proud of this little project and I have never seen anyone use this sort of igniter. It is reliable, easy to make, CHEAP, legal, makes 3-5 huge sparks every second and allways fires!

I got to know it was in place to make a how-to.... so here it is





the flyswatter used was similiar to this:



Any feedback is appreciated
Hope you enjoy my a little bit alternative igniter

Very nice indeed, you will no doubt save many people tearing their hair out trying to get a camera flash working!
Great tutorial too, thanks. Now i gotta get me a flyswatter

Jokke Himself
Thanks

thats a pretty original idea and i've never herd of an electric fly swater and when i was reading it i was like wtf?

Nice how-to. Electric flyswatter? i agree with The Kid wtf?

people just love to agree with me

Thats a great idea I will try this and how important is it to "de-electrify" the wires before putting the fuel in because I was thinking of using this for an advanced combustion and would be annoying to take the cap off and touch it after every time I fire

dude, i was in ace the other day and was thinkin about that! nice instructable, now i gotta get a ride downtown...

edit: my bad, wrong website, my brain isn't working right now "nice how-to" not instructable

I always had the idea of using one of these but thought the circuites wouldn't last to long.I think I found the ignition source for my hybrid.

How long have you been using it for?I would like to know the life expectance of one of these with the increased volatge.

Novacastrian wrote: Very nice indeed, you will no doubt save many people tearing their hair out trying to get a camera flash working!

A camera flash is very simple to get working. Just dump it through an ignition coil or similar autotransformer, or use the ionization lead from the trigger transformer to reduce electrical resistance in the air of the spark gap to fire it off.

I though he was talking about a Bug Zapper at first, (those things you hang on the porch and wait for bugs to fly into them and get roasted by a few KV). Those would probably be great as well. I think they actually contain some sort of resonant, (tesla), coil to produce their voltage, so these would be lovely for a HV power source. I think I've actually got one too... Just let me check....

Nope, nevermind. I must have thrown it away. I do know plasma globes have resonant transformers in them, though.

Haha yea nice how-to jokke, I just got my camera ignition working the other day though

bigbob12345 wrote:Thats a great idea I will try this and how important is it to "de-electrify" the wires before putting the fuel in because I was thinking of using this for an advanced combustion and would be annoying to take the cap off and touch it after every time I fire

hey bibgbob

it`s depends


sometimes if you dont "de-electrify" it it will ignite as soon as something touch the ignition spot. I`ve experienced this myself and its god damned scary

there are other ways to do this, and it might not be important unless the propellant is wet and touch the ignition spot but for safety reasons i recommend to de-electrify it unless you want to toast your hands

This won`t be much of a problem with a propane mettered as long as you remember to be carefoul were you are pointing the barrel!

rna_duelers Posted: 12/14/2007 8:54 AM Post subject:

I always had the idea of using one of these but thought the circuites wouldn't last to long.I think I found the ignition source for my hybrid.

How long have you been using it for?I would like to know the life expectance of one of these with the increased volatge.

the flyswatter itself was used a couple months before i started modding it into a igniter. It`s been used almost daily a couple weeks and still works perfect

In the beginning there is a lot of modifications that need to be done to get the "perfect spark". The closer the "ignition-thingy" is the smaller and faster spark, The longer apart the bigger and slower. But once you`ve got what you want its an ideal igniter for spudders that want a cheap and good solution

Just remember to be carefoul with the little chip while modding it

Btw: I tried 18V but it only made one single spark and made a RRRR sound everytime i tried it... so 9V is the most im ever going to use on theese ones. Of course, this may differ from swatter to swatter.

Great Idea, I have an electric flyswatter and never thought of that.

thats a really cool idea... if i ever make another im definately gonna use one of those bad boys lol... now i just have to try and find one haha... but really original idea, good job

I'd thought about these little swatters, they put out 1.5-3kv normally but I'd never got round to fiddling with one.

Good stuff on the tutorial.

A small momentaty switch could be installed between the two contact wires to short it out without having to electrocute your fingers each time. Probably not a good idea to have a fixed position switch in case it's left on by accident while trying to fire the cannon. Could fry the circuit.