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Wasnt sure where to put this, but Ive recently been trying some firebreathing, but only the basics. Liquid parafin, spraying it out onto a flaming torch, but to be honest, I dont know any of the rules, or guidelines to go with it. Does anybody know any tricks? Safety issues? How to not get burned?

crozboz wrote:Wasnt sure where to put this, but Ive recently been trying some firebreathing, but only the basics. Liquid parafin, spraying it out onto a flaming torch, but to be honest, I dont know any of the rules, or guidelines to go with it. Does anybody know any tricks? Safety issues? How to not get burned?

This stunt, should only be learned from a professional teacher. No book, dvd or forum can truely cover it correctly.

My advice is to not play around with this.

You will get burned. There is no way not too. You play with fire, you will get burned.

What your doing really isnt that bright.

IF you really want to learn this, seek out a professional to teach you in person.

I do a fire-eating cabaret act, but I don't do the breathing - there is too much to go wrong and almost everyone I know has had accidents (one of them even made page 5 of a national paper at the Tattoo Expo in Dunstable several years ago!!)

As David said - don't try to learn from a book, they can't teach you the right breathing techniques and experimentation is not advised.

I had some friends who did fire breathing. They used kerosene, which was more popular in Oz than parafin. In order to make it more spectacular one of them would hold the kerosene in his mouth for a few minutes while doing fire twirling, before blowing on the flame.
The obvious problem with this, apart form the risk of swallowing is breathing through your nose. The nose and the mouth are connected, and so the fumes were going straight into his lungs.

Even from a proffesional view, there is no safe way to do fire breathing. Some people think the effect is worth it. Regardeless of whether you try it or not, do not experiment with different aclohols. In Oz we use kerosene, some alcohols burn a little hotter and are dangerous.

Fire breathing is INCREDIBLY dangerous. Having been in the circus world for some years you would not believe the amount of horror stories I've heard, people inhaling instead of exhaling and the like. Really get professional advice before attempting it, not exactly sure if they'll help but you could talk to one of the uk's circus academies, Greentop (Sheffield), Circus Space (London) or Cirque Media (Bristol).

One thing that amazed me at the recent Blackpool convention was the booklet that was given to gold and vip ticket holders. It contained loads of information about fire work which was not only inaccurate but also highly dangerous and irresponsible. I gave it to one of my associates (a man with twenty years experience as a fire performer) and he spent the next three days criticising it and condemning it's author's lack of knowledge.

Well, after seeking professional help (which was long overdue) I tried with water for a few days and got it as near perfect as I could.

I then tried it for real.

All went well I am pleased to say. No burns at all. My clothes stink of the stuff, but otherwise no problems.

We have a low garden wall one way, and I terrified the kid next door

So overall, pretty pleased with how it went.

I can only reiterate the warnings above. This is a very, very dangerous stunt to learn.

If you haven't already, I'd look at www.homeofpoi.com, it has a section on fire breathing, why you shouldn't do it, and if you insist on doing it, ways to stay safe.

Good luck...

I did see that. I found it useful, but more towards pushing people away from doing it. Very biased. But a couple of good safety tips.

Thanks for caring.

http://www.instructables.com/id/EY7BF08 ... /?ALLSTEPS

Heres a really good instructables article on the matter, covers lots of aspects of fire breathing as well as making a torch.

As far as I'm aware its sound information, great pictures too.
(the picture of a cut has nothing to do with it, he just added to shock people into realizing the risks)

ominoustom wrote:http://www.instructables.com/id/EY7BF08K5VEPA8KTN9/?ALLSTEPS

Heres a really good instructables article on the matter, covers lots of aspects of fire breathing as well as making a torch.

As far as I'm aware its sound information, great pictures too.
(the picture of a cut has nothing to do with it, he just added to shock people into realizing the risks)

Never try to leanr this kind of stunt from a article on the internet, and that also goes for most books. They just cant cover everything like it needs to be coverd, and the fact that many contain incorrect information.