Picolo Petes Explode

If you live in california, there is a facist theme going called "no explosive fireworks allowed!". So we have to improvise. A very popular trick is to take picolo petes (a firework about a half inch around, and 5 inches high, that stands on it's end and shoots fire out the top and whistles). The usual way to make it explode is to tap it with a hammer or put it in a vice, wrap it tightly in duct tape and light it. But that dosn't really work. What you have to do, is take the fuse out, then with a nail or flat end screwdriver, losen the powder, and dump it out, till it's all in a little heap. It helps if you use a pie tin or something for putting the powder heap in. Then you pour the powder back in the tube that you made when you took the powder out. (the tube looks kind of like a big firecracker). Make sure you don't tap the powder down, it's gotta be fluffy and soft. You'll have some left over. Make sure the top is heaped full. Then you take the fuse (which should have some paper stuck in it. keep the paper stuck in it, it needs to have a good 'lid') and push it into the end of the tube with powder, until it's kind of stuffed to the point that it's hard to push. The end of the fuse that you arnt holding onto shoudl be about one CM in the tube. THEN you wrap it nice and tight in a lot of duct tape, being careful not to tap the tube, so you don't make thepowder inside settle. Then you light it. If you have a picolo pete on hand, so you can follow the instructions piece by piece, it's easyer. And I like to have the honor of having figured all this out by myself:)

Don't you love that hollow "wump" they make?

Josh