Fireworks - which ones are best

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#2806044 2-Nov-2021 11:34

We’ve had no problems with the Bad boy ones in the past, and used ton purchase the quiter ones that the warehouse use to sell.
This year we will probably get bad boy ones as I see theres a store being setup here to sell them.
We lock our pets up, and let the neighbours all know so that they can do the same for their animals.
We do this also if we have fireworks on the weekend instead so the kids dont have too late a night.
We enjoy them and do it responsibly.

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Lias

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#2806853 3-Nov-2021 18:16

Anything you can buy from a store in the nanny state we live in is pretty tame sadly, bring back double happies and skyrockets.

Luckily I live next to some rich people who put on a very good private show last year :-)

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#2806856 3-Nov-2021 18:24

Lias: Anything you can buy from a store in the nanny state we live in is pretty tame sadly, bring back double happies and skyrockets.

Lol. Opened the topic just now to ask if anyone has seen a noiseless box available ; ).

networkn

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#2806863 3-Nov-2021 18:47

freitasm:

Folks, the OP asked for an opinion on a certain type of product, not for your condescending preaching.

Thank you! I was going to post a similar thread but thought of all the lectures and decided to flag it.

driller2000

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#2806867 3-Nov-2021 18:52

+1 for Bad Boy

Also Thumping Thunder used to be good - they might have been replaced by Kiwi Thunder?

Worth noting sellers often drop their prices after 5pm on the 5th as they try to offload their stock.

MarkM536

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#2806882 3-Nov-2021 19:10

Bad Boy fireworks have been great when I last used them about 4 years ago. I don't have experience recently.

What I have been using in recent years is a cheap pack of Roman Candles from The Warehouse.

They used to be $12, but went up at to $30 in 2019.

Still cheaper than a package and these are the fireworks that make the nice bang of sparkles in the sky.

I see Bad Boy fireworks has packs of these on their website.

*** Kit's mostly have fizzing things inside, I recommend buying a pack of things you want individually. ***

SirHumphreyAppleby

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#2806998 3-Nov-2021 19:54

JeremyNzl:

Bad Boy seem to have the best grade of fireworks, I have used.

I understand fireworks are tested by MIBE or other agency to determine they contain no more powder than there class denotes.

A compliance certifier tests fireworks.

To address the safety/noise concerns raised in earlier posts, for a batch or consignment a minimum of ten randomly selected samples must be tested against a list of regulatory requirements, including labeling, chemical composition, noise (90dB at 15m maximum) and fuse length/delay etc. If any single firework fails to comply with one or more requirement, a further ten must be randomly selected and all must fully comply. If that level of compliance cannot be met, the batch cannot be certified. Overall compliance rate for the sample set would exceed 99.5%, assuming the failing firework failed on only one of the criteria.

Lias:

Anything you can buy from a store in the nanny state we live in is pretty tame sadly, bring back double happies and skyrockets.

This is actually a good idea. We now have a much better framework in place for certifying products than at the time they were banned. The regulations which sought to reduce the risks, however, are the main driver for the increased noise (by far the most common complaint). Bringing back skyrockets and applying the stringent tests we now have in place, would bring down the noise levels significantly. It's simple physics. Limit powder quantities as ridiculously low as we do (a twelfth of the limit in the US for retail fireworks), and the only way to get the effects people want to see is to use more energetic compositions. The very operation of a skyrocket necessitates slower burning compositions.

As for best, that's a tough one. I'm a big fan of the girandola (not my image)...

grizzz

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#2807014 3-Nov-2021 20:32

geekbhaji:

Linux:

@geekbhaji Tell that to my mum when her prize horse ran thru and fence and broke its leg!!

BAN THE THINGS!!

Thats really sad mate. I am also not in favor of punishing animals for fun.

BUT

There are fireworks without loud noises and lighting them up in the backyard doesn't cause any animal in the barn to go haywire. They don't even go above our fence, neighbors don't even notice that there have been fireworks although we advise them well in advance so their kids can come and watch too

and what if some easily distracted driver , crash's into you while looking at the petty lights

geekbhaji

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#2807030 3-Nov-2021 21:33

For that I think the driver will need to stop driving on the road.
An easily distracted driver does not fit the criteria for being roadworthy. He will sooner or later get distracted with one or another thing and cause accident.

Humor makes us humans !

insane

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#2807067 4-Nov-2021 00:11

geekbhaji:
There are quite a few companies like bad boy fireworks and pyro company selling fireworks this year.

Bad boy have good variety and are cheaper than pyro. which ones do you like?

My vote would be for Boom Brothers.

I haven't bought any in maybe 7 years, not since I bought a dozen or more very large Roman Candles :)

I let one or two off a year when my neighbour is on holiday... They do produce embers and I have caught my palm tree on fire 🔥 once :D.

Should really ban them from urban environments and only allow them at the beach again. You'd think there's plenty of sand and water around to mount them and prevent fires.

neb

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#2807072 4-Nov-2021 02:19

dt:
they're much the same really since what we are allowed in NZ for private use is pretty limited

And that's the weird thing, in many European countries you can buy fireworks up to and including ones that are just short of a stick of dynamite (great for blowing up your cousin's snow forts), things getting up to the size of a toilet paper roll filled with gunpowder of which a box of them weighed several kilos, ones that burned and exploded underwater so you could drop them into ponds and see the glow sinking down until they detonated and the water welled up, ones wrapped in sisal that threw masses of burning sparks in every direction, strings of double happy's you'd wear like machine-gun belts... and yet it doesn't lead to the end of civilisation as we know it. People go out and have fun, a small number of idiots are idiots just as they'd be without fireworks, and then life goes on.

Oooh, and they still sell the Tsar Bomba, nearly a kilo of gunpowder in a single pack but since no-one can afford it it may not actually exist.

insane

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#2807146 4-Nov-2021 07:24

@neb, yeah I remember those 'strikers' as they were called.

Came on all sorts of sizes and only required you to strike them like a match to light. Blew up many coke/beer cans and oddly fruit with them. And yes they floated on water :)

I used to launch marbles and ball bearings out of pipes like a primative canon. Ahh the days .. Have never seen them in NZ for perhaps good reason!

SirHumphreyAppleby

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#2807150 4-Nov-2021 07:56

neb:

Oooh, and they still sell the Tsar Bomba, nearly a kilo of gunpowder in a single pack but since no-one can afford it it may not actually exist.

Almost every multi shot I've seen comes in pretty retail packaging. Tsar Bomba looks small compared to some of those. I can't see why they'd have fancy labels if they weren't going to be on shelves somewhere to look at.

neb

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#2807628 4-Nov-2021 17:35

insane: @neb, yeah I remember those 'strikers' as they were called.

Came on all sorts of sizes and only required you to strike them like a match to light. Blew up many coke/beer cans and oddly fruit with them. And yes they floated on water :)

They were great, with the striker heads they looked like brightly-coloured kids' crayons... that exploded! Absolute genius design.

neb

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#2807635 4-Nov-2021 17:53

SirHumphreyAppleby:
neb:

Oooh, and they still sell the Tsar Bomba, nearly a kilo of gunpowder in a single pack but since no-one can afford it it may not actually exist.

Almost every multi shot I've seen comes in pretty retail packaging. Tsar Bomba looks small compared to some of those. I can't see why they'd have fancy labels if they weren't going to be on shelves somewhere to look at.

I was more commenting on the fact that when you got some older cousin to buy fireworks for you (they were age-restricted) you could either buy a crate full of assorted explody things or a single Tsar Bomba, and since blowing up snow forts and collapsing snowdrifts (throwing them up on the roof to see how large a load of snow you could bring down was frowned upon) was a lot more fun than firing off a single set of mortars, no-one had ever seen a Tsar Bomba in action. They could have just been empty boxes as far as we knew.

It was also a comment on the fireworks culture across different countries, a bit like the alcohol culture where in most of Europe alcohol means an apéro with the neighbours while in Australia and NZ alcohol means getting as s---faced as possible as quickly as possible. Some of those things could easily take your hand off but you rarely hear about any serious injuries from them, and when they do occur (not people losing hands but more burns and the like) it's just accepted as a risk you're taking when you use fireworks. In contrast here, where no-one bats an eyelid at the fortune we spend treating self-inflicted sporting injuries, the country goes into an uproar when a single person gets singed by a Roman Candle.

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