Old flash cubes

What are the chances they fire? What are the chances they START a fire?

For now, this is curiosity, but a family member cleaning out old stuff dug up an old 110 camera and a box of flash cubes, and I have a masochistic impulse to try using it. I’m sure I’ll come to my senses soon, but the idea of taking a picture by the light if burning metal has a certain appeal.

I really can't remember if an 'indicator dot' was used with flashcubes, but proper flashbulbs used to have a dot of colour-changing paint on the inside of the glass bulb.

If the dot was blue it meant the bulb was good. If pink, the bulb was leaky and risky to use. (If the bulb was brown or black, it meant it was already used!)

Cubes were meant to make flashbulb use safer by enclosing the bulb in a tough plastic case that would stop bits of glass flying around if the bulb exploded, and to prevent the risk of people touching a hot bulb after firing. This was really 'belt-and-braces', since flash bulbs were already coated with a tough plastic varnish to prevent them flying apart.

Anyhow. I suspect the fire risk from those titchy bulbs is very minimal - as is the amount of light they produce.

Unless you have a cube adapter, using those cubes will probably limit you to using a crappy Instamatic camera as well.

Get an Agfalux C.

Well, you probably want more than a few of them for this case.

The whole idea is to burn the insides very fast, so they can't really get much worse.

They have 100% oxygen inside, as well as I know. If that leaks out, then they won't

work well or at all.

I have some #22 flashbulbs:

#22 Flash Bulb by Westinghouse Package of 6

which are the size of, and the same socket as, household light bulbs.

I even have a camera that my grandfather adapted to use bulbs like this,

as it has two ordinary 120V electrical outlets attached to it.

(Otherwise, an ordinary 116 box camera.)

I had an Agfalux C when I was younger, inherited from my grandfather.

After I got my Vivitar 283, I took it off the camera strap, and lost it somewhere

(maybe in my parent's house). But then I got another one on eBay.

I have some other sizes of flashbulbs, too, but haven't gotten around to using them.

Just in case anyone was curious, I’ve been defeated in my attempt to use these old flash cubes.

I picked up some old 110 film and a sealed “size K” battery from Ebay, loaded it all up in the camera, and...nothing. The battery seems weak on a multimeter, and I’m not paying for another one! Since the cubes (magicubes) are probably bad in any caseI think I’m done here.

These new fangled gadgets are too complicated. I say, bring back the old flash powder.

Eyebrows are overrated...

I've got some bulbs and a nifty little folding Zeiss Ikon reflector, never got around to trying then though.

Just in case anyone was curious, I’ve been defeated in my attempt to use these old flash cubes.

 

I picked up some old 110 film and a sealed “size K” battery from Ebay, loaded it all up in the camera, and...nothing. The battery seems weak on a multimeter, and I’m not paying for another one! Since the cubes (magicubes) are probably bad in any caseI think I’m done here.

If they are indeed Magicubes, then no battery is required. While the original type were fired electrically, these later ones were set off mechanically. If they have any electrical contacts on the base they're flash cubes (which do need a working battery).

If they are indeed Magicubes, then no battery is required. While the original type were fired electrically, these later ones were set off mechanically. If they have any electrical contacts on the base they're flash cubes (which do need a working battery).

This is the camera: Kodak Pocket Instamatic 30 - Camera-wiki.org - The free camera encyclopedia

It takes a K battery (which was seriously hard to find and cost more than I'm willing to admit). The cubes are magicubes, so I suppose that the failure to flash is unrelated to the battery.