"No-fire current" for flash bulbs?

Hi all,

Does anyone out there have no-fire/all-fire characterization data for flash
bulbs, specifically AG1/AG1b?

I am trying to improve my launch controller design to be "flash bulb safe"
but solid data on the above is proving elusive.

I found one mention on the web that "5 mA" is flash bulb safe, but when I
did my own test it took around 220 mA to fire, so I suspect the 5 mA is way
too conservative. OTOH, I don't know what the manufacturing variabilities
are. I'd rather not burn up my stock of bulbs to find out if the data is
already available somewhere.

TIA

And now, 16 years later, we still have no data ?

Dave F.

I have never felt enough of an urge to do the testing to round up the 80 or so flashbulbs testing would require.

I suspect that the no fire current would be fairly low based on the likelihood that the variance in firing currents would be high.

I did some testing decades ago and the steady state no fire current is higher than one would think; well over 200mA. The caveat is that it takes a small amount of system capacitance to cause a current surge to fire them. How do I know this? When I was testing the no fire current, I was using a variable voltage and current source. I started in a current limited state and slowly increased the current to the limit of the power supply. I disabled the output, then enabled it and the bulb fired.

Another interesting fact is that the IR emission of a flashbulb firing will set off another flashbulb if it's closer than ~1/4"

Johnly said:

Another interesting fact is that the IR emission of a flashbulb firing will set off another flashbulb if it's closer than ~1/4"

Click to expand...

Very interesting . . . I never knew that !

Dave F.

Ez2cDave said:

And now, 16 years later, we still have no data ?

Dave F.

Click to expand...

Not surprising really, as not many people use flash bulbs for deployment or staging anymore with the advent of Quest Q2G2's and or cheaper and readily available ematches.

rharshberger said:

Not surprising really, as not many people use flash bulbs for deployment or staging anymore with the advent of Quest Q2G2's and or cheaper and readily available ematches.

Click to expand...

Quest Q2G2's have been OOP for several years.

Dave F.