I'm certainly not the first person to think of making a Class C shell into a salute, but I'd never heard of anyone actually trying it, so I decided to give it a shot. The construction is very simple, just get a normal Class C shell (preferably one with a boring effect so you don't take apart a good one), make a small hole to empty the contents, put in some flash powder, and seal it up again.

Step one is to cut a hole in the shell with a knife. The hole should be as small as possible, while being large enough to shake out all the stars, powder, etc in the shell. The cut should be made on the top so you don't make it any larger in diameter sealing it up because it might not fit properly in the tube.

Shell cut and emptied:

Once empty, pour in your flash powder. I used 15g in this shell, you could probably fit at least 20g if you tried.

Flash to be poured in hole:

Once the flash has been added, I stuffed in some tissue paper to hold it in and glued it in place.

Paper glued over hole:

I didn't do a very good job in this one, but next tape over the hole to make it a bit stronger. Again, try to keep the shell the same diameter so it will fit in the tube.

Shell taped:

The shell can be launched just like any other, just take extra care in where the tube is pointing, these can be much more dangerous than ordinary shells. Also, be sure to label any modified shells so they donÔø‡t get mixed up with normal ones.

Shell launch and report:

Click here for video ( 432KB, .mov)