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I'm working on a spiritualist routine based on a seance conducted by Daniel Home described in Experiences in Spiritualism by Lord Dunraven. One thing he used to do that has always fascinated me is to place his hand into a hot fire remove a hot coal, glowing red and handle it (at least this is how it was described over 100 years ago by witnesses in the dark rooms). Handling hot coals is something that people appear to have been doing for 100's of years.
Anyone know how this is done? To what extent is this trickery and what extent some natural property that makes this possible. Is there any literature out there on doing this? I have an idea in mind of heating a piece of coal held in tongs with a blowtorch and then holding it in my hand. Only problem is I have no clue as to how this could be done or even if it would be possible. Any help would be much appreciated.

There's some background on past generation feats like this in Houdini's "On Deception" which has been re-released with a foreword by Derren Brown.
Stuff like pouring molten lead or wax on the tongue, handling hot rocks and coals, other such feats of endurance. Without going into too much detail, the trickery is in preventing permanent damage blistering, you have to learn to take the pain purely by force of will.

There are similar feats such as fire walking, glass walking, beds of nails, bending a steel bar against the throat, fire eating, and others which have some kind of scientific principle saving your bacon, but (at least in the methods used at the time) this isn't one of them.

Maybe modern magicians have some other way of doing this, but the methods of the age were downright dangerous.

-Stacy

Holding a glowing red coal in a dark room sounds like a D'lite-full effect.

Firstly always remember any magical effect you hear or read about second hand is often far from what actually happened.

The difference between a magic show and a psychic or spiritual demonstration is that, in a psychic of spiritual demonstration, your performance isn't put under as much scrutiny. When you perform straight magic, you're letting your crowd know right from the start that you're going to deceive them, and so you have allow them to check for trickery to their (actually your) satisfaction.

Whereas with a psychic or spiritual demonstration you're telling your audience the truth, and so you don't need to spend time proving that everything is fair, you just spend your time doing what you claim you can do. That's why faith healers and T.V psychics don't throw balls out into the crowd to get random volunteers, show that they don't have earpieces or ask audience members if they've ever met before.

So if you're doing that kind of show, all you need is a bowl of hot coals, perhaps using them to burn paper with questions written on it, and then palm a cold coal you have in your pocket. Just don't make a big deal out of holding the coal, treat it as a method to get information or test you're in a trance state rather than an effect in and of itself.

This isn't an effect you amaze your audience with, it's a bizarre little presentation they talk about afterward.

Actually just thinking about it as I type, you could palm a cold coal on top of the hot ones and let it sit for a minuet, then one half will be glowing red and the other half will be cold, just be careful with your fingers and don't drop it on your lap.

Our old friend The Masked Magician showed how to hold a coiled wire, a bit like the element in an electric fire, in your hands and gradually make it glow red hot then cool down again. All courtesy of a stripe of Red/Orange Dayglo paint on one side of the coil and a slow rotation to make this 'glowing' side appear and disappear. Very realistic coals are found on those coal fire effect gas fires (we have one here in Mandrake Mansions) and a few dabs of Dayglo paint would make them look quite realistic indeed. Palm one of those or steal it as you reach towards the fire and after you've finished the display of handling a glowing hot coal, just chuck the thing onto the fire where it will sit happily and blend into the background. Just remember to locate and remove it afterwards for re-use (not difficult, they're very light and weigh almost nothing) !

Just a thought on this:

You know those coal-effect gas fires? Well you can buy replacement ceramic 'coals' for them.



My memory of these when I was a kid at least, was they would glow red when a flame was applied but be cool to the touch the instant the flame was removed.

However, this is a hazy memory from childhood, please check it before you grab one!

Anyway, I don't know if this phenomenon could help at all?

Yes they are made of firebrick which resists heat. It is usually used to line the inside walls of kilns so that the kiln doesn't start to melt during firings.

MatCult wrote:You know those coal-effect gas fires? Well you can buy replacement ceramic 'coals' for them.

See my post immediately above yours - great minds think alike!

V.E. Day wrote:Yes they are made of firebrick which resists heat. It is usually used to line the inside walls of kilns so that the kiln doesn't start to melt during firings.

Actually the ones' I'm advocating aren't made of firebrick, the material used is a very lightweight, almost expanded polystyrene type of material - next door's cat often wanders into Mandrake Mansions and if the fire isn't on will happily flick the coals off the fire just for the sheer hell of it!

Mandrake wrote:See my post immediately above yours - great minds think alike!

But fools seldom differ!

Note to self, read threads properly

Wow, some awesome advice here. I was thinking that this idea would probably never work out but the concept of these firebricks definately gives me something to work with. I'll let you know how it goes.
Now I'm off to drink a pint of molten lead, that should be a piece of cake, right?

read this;

http://www.globusz.com/ebooks/Miracle/00000015.htm

daleshrimpton wrote:read this;

http://www.globusz.com/ebooks/Miracle/00000015.htm

Amazing!

Having ordered three fagots of wood, which is the quantity generally used by bakers, to be thrown into the oven, and they being set on fire, twelve more fagots of the same size were subsequently added to them, which being all consumed by three o'clock, M. Chabert entered the oven with a dish of raw meat, and when it was sufficiently done he handed it out, took in another, and remained therein until the second quantity was also well cooked; he then came out of the oven, and sat down, continues the report, to partake, with a respectable assembly of friends, of those viands he had so closely attended during the culinary process.