Realistic Muzzle Flash Feature

[Gerard Philipp]

Dear Armortek community,

I am looking into building a device to create a realistic Muzzle Flash.

To stay within the regulation of Armortek and other authorities, I am not looking into building a Blanc Firing device or ammunition device with some kind of Black powder propellant!

I would like to present my idea to this forum hoping to get some feedback, your thoughts, or experience gained on similar devices, before investing time and money into building a prototype.

The objective is to create a realistic muzzle flash by combing the features of Armortek recoil and sound option packs. All details in the following pictures and descriptions are only for illustration purposes and do not take account of accurate size or measurements etc. (Picture 1)
The muzzle flash will be created by mixing burnable gas, in my demo I propose an oxygen with acetylene mixture, but any gas combination better suited could or should be used.

The advantages of a Gas Muzzle Flash feature:
1) Should be Safe when correctly build and used.
2) No burning residue or soot will damage the interior or exterior of the tank.
3) Resources for many gun shots (no reloading with shells required).
4) Compatible with the recoil function.
5) Allows 360o turret rotation. (as the feature will fit completely into the turret)
6) Customized muzzle flash possible (short, long, bright, reddish etc.)

Description of operation
Both of the gas cylinders, the oxygen and acetylene are opened to provide the correct gas pressure for the “Gas mixer – Muzzle Flash adjuster”
The “Gas mixer – Muzzle Flash adjuster” is used to regulate the desired gas mixture for a customized muzzle flash. (bright, reddish etc.)
The Flash Back Valve is a standard required safety equipment.
The electronic Shutoff Valve is used to meter the required amount of mixed gas in into the combustion chamber. (short, long, large etc. flash flame). The opening time is depending on the size of the combustion chamber and is expected to stay open between 1 and 5 seconds.
The ignition is done with an electronic ignition device.


Timing sequence
I looking into an automatic pre-programmed timing and sequencing, upon pushing the firing button on the RC transmitter;
1) The Shutoff valve opens
2) The Shutoff valve closes (after the programmed time interval)
3) At the same time following events will take place:
- The Ignitor is activated
- The Armortek Recoil
- The Armortek canon sound
4) As per your tank, a waiting time before next firing is possible

Picture 2 shows the expected Muzzle Flush with not enough Oxygen to speed up the combustion, resulting in a reddish bowl.
Picture 3 shows the flash with a properly adjusted mixture of Oxygen / Acetylene with the correct amount of gas in the combustion chamber.
As such, numerous adjustment combinations are possible to obtain your desired Muzzle Flash result.

[Dave Nadin]

Hi Gerard, I read with interest your proposal for a realistic mussel flash/smoke unit. I did some research and experiments' aiming to archive this effect. Some years back. Unfortunately I could not clear the stumbling blocks, Manly due to time & facility's. I was using full size acetylene burning eqpt, my neighbor's cat, didn't appreciate the bangs. I did do some work with a company called Military Muckabouts, They manufacture full size weapon replicas which use the gas firing simulations. They were very helpful. But the main difficulty was reducing in size the combustion chamber but keeping the flame effect, the control valves, plus the gas bottles which they could not source small enough to fit inside the turret. At the time this was intended for the Centurion. Alas it came to nothing. Have a chat with Military Muckabouts there web site is handy .
Developments have moved on in the last 5 years, so my I wish you luck & success with your research.
If you are successful with developing a system, I for one would be interested, Please be wary of Mr Health & safety.
Best of luck Dave n. p.s. Me & the cat are best friends again..

[Dave Nadin]

Hi Gerard, I read with interest your proposal for a realistic mussel flash/smoke unit. I did some research and experiments' aiming to archive this effect. Some years back. Unfortunately I could not clear the stumbling blocks, Manly due to time & facility's. I was using full size acetylene burning eqpt, my neighbor's cat, didn't appreciate the bangs. I did do some work with a company called Military Muckabouts, They manufacture full size weapon replicas which use the gas firing simulations. They were very helpful. But the main difficulty was reducing in size the combustion chamber but keeping the flame effect, the control valves, plus the gas bottles which they could not source small enough to fit inside the turret. At the time this was intended for the Centurion. Alas it came to nothing. Have a chat with Military Muckabouts there web site is handy .
Developments have moved on in the last 5 years, so my I wish you luck & success with your research.
If you are successful with developing a system, I for one would be interested, Please be wary of Mr Health & safety.
Best of luck Dave n. p.s. Me & the cat are best friends again..

[mark lawson]

Reenactors use a pro-pain gas system for machine guns as its cheap and effective, some people have used this in RC tanks, if the system had a small leak which in a combined space such as a tank turret could be disastrous, the use of oxygen and acetylene potentially could be far worse should there be a leak in the turret. Firstly I would get as much advise from companies who have installed similar systems for reenactors.

[yves mouton]

Hi Mark,

Then i prefer the Armortek blankfire system ( for the older tank models )
it is a lot safer if you know what your doing.

The gas system is a great setup but i dont trust gas ( leaking )

Best regards Yves

[Gerard Philipp]

Hello,
Thank you for your replies and kind advices.
I will get in touch with https://military-muckabouts.webs.com/ and let you know about the outcome.
Regards
Gérard

[Mark Heaps]

You cannot know what is realistic muzzle flash for any weapon unless you have observed it firing.
Small arms are fitted with flash eliminators. You do not want to reveal your position to the enemy.
Larger calibre weapons have muzzle brakes, they help to reduce the flash but their prime purpose is to buffer the recoil. Once the projectile has reached that point in the barrel, it will not get significantly faster so the remaining expanding gases get put to better use.
Mark

[Gerard Philipp]

Hello Mark,
I fully agree with your comment and do not want to question your expertise. What I meant to achieve is a more realistic muzzle flash than a light bulb in the canon.
Although I did not find original picture or video of a King Tiger firing, I derived my assumption based on a Sherman super slow-motion firing and a restored Flak 36 88 mm firing. I assume the real KT muzzle flash should be somewhere between those extremes.

Sherman firing

[Flak 8.8 firing

Gerard

[Gerhard Michel]

My M48 firing at dusk. At the left side you can see the tracer:

[Christoffer Ahlfors]

I am also scared of combustible gasses. Not even sure if we are allowed to store them in our homes any more here. To me, the smoke effect is more important.

[Stephen White]

We've seen the effect of a catastrophic failure in a home-made pyrotechnic solution at a public show, so, as you say, the first consideration is safety. Could you assure yourself that this system could be operated without risk to yourself, the public and the model? Although it would make for a very realistic model, the risk probably outweighs the gain.

As Christopher says, a smoke effect is more important and we have solutions already developed, in my Centurion system for example based on a vape box, which is very effective.

The bigger remaining challenge is to simulate the percussive sound, recoil and platform rock associated with firing the main armament. Some solutions have come close but the explosive effect of firing is hard to replicate. A compressed but inert gas solution may well be the answer.

[Mark Heaps]

Whilst platform rock would definitely make it more realistic, would it be noticeable when scaled down to 1/6th ?
The rock might be detectable physically but scaled down you have way less than half a second to notice it.
Mark

[Robert Reid]

This goes back away to some fun 'educational' experiences in a galaxy far far away...

But dust explosions are quite scalable. And once upon a time, we had an instructor who demonstrated small-scale dust explosions with powered Coffee Mate Coffee Creamer. It's a colloidal mixture of sugar and powered milk and probably methylisocyanate... But because of the sugar in it, it packs a lot of energy. Not sure what else is in it... but it does ruin a perfectly good cup of black coffee. Cafe-American to my beloved British friends!

Anyhoo... a very small amount of Coffee Creamer, ignited by a spark, lighter or other ignition source makes for a rather spectacularly large flash, but with little overpressure or risk from gasses or other 'bigger' kabooms. It won't go off in a confined space because the stoichiometric ratio will be off. And as a 'solid' it can be packed or metered very accurately. Much better control than a liquid or a gas.

Safety concerns, etc. being what they are, I offer this merely as an experience. But after our initial instruction in how to level a reasonably-sized building with a pound of coffee creamer and some detonators, we were blowing off Bic (Biro) Pen-lids of the stuff all over the place for entertainment and amusement and most didn't even lose any arm hair.

I would think that someone could come up with a solids-based-flash that was both safe and spectacular.

Cheers,

RPR

[Christoffer Ahlfors]

...how to level a reasonably-sized building with a pound of coffee creamer and some detonators...