Fire & Ice

I was looking at PopTiki's volcano mug ant began thinking: What would happen if you put dry ice into 151 rum & lit it? I'm assuming the heat of the flame would disolve the dry ice quicker & possibly dissipate the CO2 "smoke," and that the bubbling of the CO2 escaping the dry ice could knock out the flame & possibly splatter flaming alcohol around the drink.

But is there an off chance that it'll look really cool? Blue flames flickering in the smoke, rising up as the smoke rolls down the side of the mug?

From my experience with putting dry ice in boiling water, it would be serious trouble.

But you could consider trying it in a controlled environment. Nothing flammable around, and light the 151 with a really long pole.

--SBiM

I have no idea, but please post pics of this when you do it, I'm dieing to see what happens!

In order to be scientifically valid, the results should be reproduceable, so I'm volunteering to also give it a try as well. :wink:

My hypothesis would be that the CO2(g) given off by the melting CO2(s) would suffocate the flame, as you said, but the interesting part would be how the dry ice would react to the alcohol in the first place.

But it's a great idea to experiment with nonetheless.

[ Edited by: HelzTiki 2006-01-15 08:00 ]

I'm going to have to try this outdoors in a very non flamable area using a shallow ceramic dish I don't care about. I can get dry ice at my local Albertson's, I might use rubbing alcohol instead of 151 to flame, and I can pick up a dish for under $.99 at a local thrift store. It'll take me a couple days to get everything together and find somewhere not near anything flamable yet sheltered from wind to experiment in.

My guess is it will not work, CO2 is what you use to put out flammable liquid fires. I would guess the dry ice will smother any flame you could ignite just like a gentle CO2 fire extinguisher.

What would look cool is one of those little red flashing LED buttons in the top of the volcano hidden in the smoke from warm water and dry ice.

Ya know, Cap't? That's an absolutely brilliant idea.

Brilliant.

Capt'n, I'd say you're right on both counts. How do you suggest waterproofing the LED button?

There are lots of waterproof glowy-light things for your drinks on the market, the most common of which are Litecubes. There are also glowing fruit wedges and slices. Probably more types of things, too, if you do a search for them. I can't find the link I had for one of the biggest companies, but a Froogle search should yield a bunch o' hits. Here's one to get started:

http://www.glowspace.com/products.htm

I'd be curious to hear about the results of placing one of these LEDs into dry-iced liquid.