Making Back to the Future "Flame Trails"

[ghostryder]

We're going to be creating a Back to the Future Delorean cake for an upcoming Universal/BTTF event, and are looking into incorporating "flame trails" behind the rear tires. Does anyone have any idea on how to replicate something like this, or have suggestions? We'd love to use real fire if possible - not sure if there's some sort of long burning strip you can use or create - or perhaps we can create something out of EL Lightsheet... Any and all suggestions welcome... Thanks everyone!

 

[rollerboi]

You know those cans of gel fuel that they use under catered dishes to keep them warm? You could possibly lay down strips of that.
If I remember right, it's tinted pink. The name of it escapes me at the moment, perhaps another member will know what I'm talking about.

I suspect it's found under the keywords "alcohol based gel fuel".. and here's even an e-how on making your own.
http://www.ehow.com/how_6172804_make-alcohol-based-gel-fuel.html

Experiment well beforehand. I just remember as a kid sticking my finger into it, and lighting my hand on fire. It burns for a few seconds before you need to put it out. Childhood fantasy was to cover myself in a suit made of this stuff and run around being the human torch. I look back and sometimes wonder how I am still alive. :lol

 

[ghostryder]

Oh, that's a good one! Thanks rb...!

 

[nickytea]

Yeah, what about a long rectangular candle with bunch of separate wicks?
What, those don't exist?

 

[renaissance_man]

Maybe a narrow tray or gulley recessed into a piece of board on which the cake could sit, then fill the gulley with some alcohol like brandy and set it alight. Not sure how spectacular that would be, but if you want a long lasting flame maybe subsitute the alcohol with a slow burning oil?
Just an idea.

 

[ghostryder]

Thanks guys, I'll keep you posted on what we come up with... Forgot to add: the Delorean will be in flight, banking over the Hill Valley town square...

...all replicated in cake.

I'll post pics in a few weeks.

 

[vitacura]

Very interested to see how this turns out!

 

[Panaflex]

You might look for a product called Sterno. I think they still sell it.
B.

 

[Meta440]

I would love to see a pic of this when you are finished. Sounds like an awesome idea.

I like the rectangle candle idea, that way you arent really using a flammable gel on the cake itself. I think most craft stores sell candle kits so you could make a couple if you needed to.

I just youtube'ed it and there were a ton of videos.

Heres One

 

[SurferGeek]

Sterno and alcohol based products burn too blue... you need something with a petroleum base that will burn yellow/red. I've seen a type of FX gel used that produces that type of flame but have no idea where to go to find it.

Hopefully some industry insider will be able to shed some light on it for you.

 

[SurferGeek]

Here 'ya go...

Scroll down to almost the bottom of this page.
Pyrotechnic Supplies

Look for "Pyro Fluid" and "Pyro Gel"

You can also look up those two terms to find other vendors.

Looking forward to seeing the pictures!

 

[rollerboi]

Perhaps set the fluid/gel in a thin, rectangular trough that is separate from the cake base itself. I'm excited to see how you pull this off.

http://www.starlight.com/pyro.html

Oh, dear lord.. this website makes my inner pyromaniac very, very happy. It's about all I can do to not order a bunch of stuff from this page! If I had had this stuff when I was 14.. I would be in even MORE trouble (as if being expelled from school wasn't bad enough).. :lol

 

[SurferGeek]

I think most of us could get in trouble with that stuff at any age!

 

[berger]

apparently, once when i was a child, me and my little brother came running into the garage to ask our dad if we could borrow a cup of gasoline..... obviously he asked why his 2 kids, ages 6 and 4, would want a cup of gasoline, to set ourselves on fire and jump off the roof! duh?! i guess we had just watched a tv show on stuntmen... and wanted to try it ourselves.......

 

[Sidewinder]

There's sparkle flash paper (comes in diff paper colours), you can lay it in two strips behind the car with a cross-connecting strip at the back of the car so you can light both tire tracks at once. It should fast burn along with a sparkly effect when lit leaving no traces.

Here's a test i did with some, the flash is the flash cotton going up so ignore that.
YouTube - flash test.

If you put short candle stubs alongside the tracks with the wicks teased out over the flash paper, it might light them, leaving them burning as in the film - also giving the birthday person something to blow out.

SAS

 

[Wicked]

For my money I'd go with hot glue flames (since the fire trails are so short vertically), painted with translucent model paint, with an EL strip underneath. Real fire would be fantastic but ruining the cake would seem unprofessional to me. Also this way after the fact somebody can still take them home and keep them as a bonus to go with the Delorean.

Check out this tutorial and ignore the part about the little toy sword, what you're interested in is the bit with the hot glue. Since this was used for a one color energy blast it doesn't say so but you'd want to use a yellow paint and a red paint at least to get a fire effect, and if possible an orange but I think two colors would work.

Optic Blasts

 

[Wicked]

DP because it won't let me edit for some reason but if you absolutely HAVE to use real fire here's my thoughts.

The first thing to do would be to construct an "always on" butane system similar to what this guy used for his Pyro prop, but without the need to deactivate it on the fly (if you wanted to turn it off all you'd need to do is remove the butane canister).

YouTube - Pyro System 2.2 workings

After you've got that all ready you could hook it to a small (pressure rated) pipe and then drill small holes into the top of the pipe to allow the gas to rise upwards. Similar to this:

YouTube - Ruben's Tube

Once you had your flame system handled you'd need a way to make it into that rectangular shape. To do this I would mount the small pipe inside a metal trough as was suggested before (in a V shape with the pipe at the bottom) then run a couple small diameter screws through the top section of the V horizontally. Set a piece balsa wood on top of the screws and bada bing - instant flaming tread marks.

If you were to keep a decent supply of precut balsa wood and extra butane canisters around you could probably even keep this going all night. Provided of course you can cut a hole in the cake in the sections under and around the trough to keep it from melting the cake.

 

[ghostryder]

These are GREAT - thanks guys, really means a lot... Will definitely post pics as we get there... Turns out the Fire Marshall and Universal may not be down with REAL flames, so we're looking at simulated effects...

 

[Wicked]

One last thought actually! If they're paying you enough to afford it you could use LED strips rather than EL sheets for the lighting and then hook it up to (I forget what the proper name is) a sequencer so that the flames would flicker.

Here's the strips:
Flexible LED Strips

and I bet you could get away with using a sound activated controller for them.

Music & Flash Interface

 

[Ghadrack]

To blatantly steal from one of your competitors.... I was flipping channels and hit some other cooking (No offense intended), but there was a guy on there doing water and ice in pulled sugar. I don't know the name of the technique, but they were mixing up a thick sugary substance that had a taffy like consistncy and then dried hard that they could pull and shape, coloring it and then hitting it with a blowtorch to give it a glassy surface. I imagine that with a little experimentation you could mix up a red/orange/yellow fade that would look like fire trails.