The Cornstarch Flamethrower
Abstract
Igniting cornstarch powder is a classic physics demonstration that showcases the rapid conduction of heat for a material in which the surface area is greater than the volume of its constituent particles. Including such a demonstration in a physics "magic show" for the general public presents certain challenges such as reproducibility and consistent crowd appeal. A simple but effective design for widely scattering cornstarch dust over a flame breaches these challenges and always results in consistently large, crowd-pleasing fireballs; so much so that the resulting demonstration has been dubbed the "cornstarch flamethrower." A small-scale version may also be used effectively for classroom instruction.
Cite
@article{arxiv.1606.01866,
title = {The Cornstarch Flamethrower},
author = {Thomas Concannon},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1606.01866},
year = {2016}
}
Comments
4 pages, 4 figures; originally published in 2008 by The Physics Teacher