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Ways to Light Fireworks

Over the years I have tried many different ways to light fireworks. I have tried matches, butane lighters for grills, regular lighters, road flares, and propane torches. I am going to discuss the advantages and disadvantages that I found with each way that I tried to light my firework display.

Matches

I have found that matches only have use for lighting one or two items at a time. I would not recommend using matches to set off your show, unless if you have everything fused together on a piece of plywood.

Advantages

Disadvantages
  • Can light single items easily.

 
  • Hard to light.
  • Easily blown out after lit.
  • If the show is large you will have to carry lots of them with you.
  • Hard to light in the dark.
  • Burn your fingers trying to light the match

Recommended Usage: Matches are great for lighting items like novelty, smoke balls, and other single items.


Regular Lighters

With regular Butane lighters they are better to use than matches, the lighter is easier to light.  With the lighter however, when you are lighting your show and it is windy it is hard to get the lighter lit. When you use a lighter  to light your display, I would always have to toasted thumb the day after the 4th. The one problem

Advantages

Disadvantages
  • Can light multiple firework with one lighter.
  • Good for lighting small items
  • Wind can make lighting the fireworks a problem by blowing the flame out.
  • Hard to light in cool weather.
  • Burn your fingers.

Recommended Usage: When using this type of lighter for your firework display, I would recommend that you have spares handy during your show just in case the lighter stops working. Regular lighters have a broader range of items that they can light than matches.


Butane Lighter For Grills

The lighters that you use for lighting grills is a  better way than using the regular butane lighter to light fireworks. It keeps your finger farther away from the flame so you don't burn your fingers as much. It is easier to light since it uses a trigger. If it is a windy day you still have a hard time lighting items because your flame keeps on getting blown out. Also after a while of using one of these there always seem to break somehow.

Advantages

Disadvantages
  • Easier to Light Butane Lighters for Grills.
  • You don't burn your fingers.
  • Good for lighting small items
  • Wind is a big problem with making it hard to light.
  • These things seem to always break in the middle of a show.
  • Hard to light in cold weather

Recommended Usage: As with lighters make sure to have a spare, ready. If you are setting a display off during colder months of the year, make sure that you keep the spares someplace where it is warm so that they are easy to light. Cold weather really bothers this type of lighter.


Road Flares

I really don't like using road flares to light items. You have to be careful not to get any particles that are coming off of the flare on your clothes or skin. You constantly have to hold the flare. So if you have to set stuff up you can't extinguish it easily. If you have everything setup like the professionals do in their shows it is easy to use a road flare.

Advantages

Disadvantages
  • Wind is not a factor.
  • Quick to light items.
  • You must always hold it.
  • If you are not careful you could get burnt really bad.
  • It creates a lot of light.
  • Can start fires if the ground is dry.

Recommended Usage: Road flares I would only use as a last resort and only if your show is fully setup and you don't have to reload any shells. If you have to reload shells I would recommend having someone else be in charge with reloading to make sure that you don't accidentally prematurely ignite anything. Also with the flares any particles that might come off of the flare could possible ignite exposed fuses, if you are using black match or quick match this is fairly easy to do.

Punks

There are multiple different types of punks that you can find on the market. The better of the three that I have seen are made by World Class and they are their 2hr and 1hr versions of punks. Once you get these punks lit lighting fireworks is a breeze. The 2hr version works the best of the two.

Advantages

Disadvantages
  • Easy to light all types of items.
  • Last for a while.
  • Keeps bugs away.
  • Have to be careful not to knock the end of the punk off, or put the punk out.

Recommended Usage: With using pucks make sure that you have a bunch of them all ready lit before your show that way if one goes out you still have others you can use and not create dead time while you try to relight the punk.

Handheld Propane Torches

This I think is the best way to light consumer fireworks for your firework display. You can find electrical ignition handheld propane torches at your local hardware store for around $30.00. You use a push button ignition that always lights regardless how windy it is. The only downfall to this technique is it is hard to light small items like firecrackers, bottle rockers, etc. A visitor to this site emailed me and told me that at the latest shooters certification class they are no longer recommending using propane torches to light professional shells due to safety concern and recommend flares now.

Advantages

Disadvantages
  • Easy to light.
  • Low risk of burning yourself.
  • Can turn on and off the flame
  • A little bit pricier than other methods
  • Not good to light small items.

Recommended Usage: While using propane torches I don't recommend keeping the torch constantly lit during your show if you have one with the electronic ignition on it. The tip of the nozzle can get extremely hot. The time that it takes for you to turn on the propane and hit the trigger is almost nothing. Also you don't have to worry about where the nozzle of the propane torch is while you are watch what you just lit. Another recommendation that I have when using this type of ignition is to make sure to have extra tanks readily available if you have previously used the tank on the torch. This way you are sure to not run out of propane.

Electronic Ignition

If you have the extra time and money to setup the electrical firing equipment (EFE) and the e-matches, this is the way to go. Either you can find plans on the internet to build your own, or buy an inexpensive system from a company like ODA Enterprises. Check out our links for electrical firing equipment for some companies that specialize it this.

Advantages

Disadvantages
  • Light multiple items at once
  • No risk of burning yourself.

 
  • Pricier than other methods
  • Not good to light small items.
  • Setup time increase.

Recommended Usage: Unless you have a very large budget and access to e-matches or time to make your own chances are you are only going to fire a few items electronically. If you are going to only electrically fire a few items make sure that they are the items that you cannot fire by hand. For example, if you want to fire three angle racks at the same exact time that are spaced 15 feet apart you could do it by fusing with quick match or electrically fire them all with e-matches. If you were to fire this setup with fuse it might not light all of the items at the same exact time, which would happen if done electronically.

 

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