I’m going to buy some dry ice for a halloween party in a couple days. I’ve found a place in town that sells it for a $1/lb. How much do I need?
I’ve played around with dry ice before, but just in small little chunks.
Some questions:
Let’s say I buy a 10lb. block of it. How long would that sucker last in my freezer?
Let’s say I take half that block (a 5lb. chunk) and drop it into a bucket of water. How long will it produce the fog for? How long until I have to chuck in another block to keep it going?
I know there are a lot of factors here, but I’d appreciate at least an approximate answer. I really don’t know if we’re talking minutes or hours.
Any other advice for my endeavor would be appreciated too.
The most important things to remember about dry ice:
Never touch it;
You need warm water to make fog; since dry ice is very cold, you need a way to heat the water or add warm water frequently/continuously.
Dry ice produces a ground-hugging water fog, which will then make the ground (or floor) wet and slippery. Plan accordingly, and remember you are thoroughly exposed to liability for hazards that you create.
As for your questions, it won’t last as long as you think, but I don’t have a figure for a 10 lb. block. It’s better to use the dry ice in small chunks, as it will produce more furious bubbling and fog, and last longer.
Mr. Moto: Do you have a cite for these warnings? I doubt whether a block of dry ice could sublimate enough CO2 to create a health hazard in the volume of an ordinary sized house. Especially if kept in a freezer. And if it is true, then all that the OP is planning (and that I’m recommending below) is a serious suffocation risk.
Anyway, as to the OP, you haven’t said what effect you want to create. If you want to fill a room with a low-lying fog, everything Nametag has said is correct. If not kept constantly “on the boil,” your fog will disperse relatively quickly, especially if people are walking around.
Many years ago, on a stage show I worked on, we chopped about five pounds into small chunks, dropped them into a trash can a quarter-filled with hot water, and put on the lid, which had a hole to which we taped a length of four-inch flexible duct. We were able to fill a stage about 100x50 feet for about ten minutes. Use work gloves to handle the dry ice and chop it up. Once the water cools off, you get less fog. But there may still be some solid dry ice in there that will produce more fog if you add more hot water.
At only $1 a pound, why not conduct an experiment to test your equipment and techniques and see how long the fog will last in your exact circumstances?
Another (simpler and less expensive) option is to place small chunks of dry ice in the bowl of punch or cider to create a spooky bubbling concoction. Of course, be VERY careful not to consume the dry ice!!! (Interesting side note: the dry ice will tend to carbonate the drink after a while.)
You may want to look into renting or buying a fog or smoke making machine from a party or theatrical supply store. They burn a non-toxic oil and will probably produce the effect you want for a longer time with less trouble than the dry ice method. (If you can get one at this late date.)
Thanks for the replies, all. Any other advice is, of course, appreciated.
I don’t really know what effect I’m looking for. I just thought it’d be cool to play around* with some dry ice. And at a dollar a pound, it seems even better.
I kind of like the idea of putting a lot of little chunks into different bowls around the house for a bubbly cauldron effect.
Unanswered OP question: How long will this stuff keep (store) in my refridgerator or ice chest (no water). The party is on Friday night, but I want to know if I buy it on my lunch break at noon whether or not it’ll still be there at around 8pm.
*no, I’m not really going to play with it. I’m an adult and I always handle dangerous materials responsibly.
We used dry ice at my madrigal dinner to make the wassail bucket look like it was steaming. It was a ten pound block (I think), and we just chopped off what we needed for that night. It was stored in a regular cooler, and the first batch bought on Monday lasted the entire week (I believe, although they may have purchased more around Wednesday or so…).
If you have a decent cooler, it should last way longer than 8 hours.
Buy a styrofoam ice box to store it in. Wrap it in newspapers. It should last 8 hours no problem. At one dollar a pound, just buy enough to fill the ice box. Once you get to playing with it it seems you never have enough.
DO NOT store it in a plastic ice box that seals. As the dry ice melts it releases the Co2 in gas state. If you place it in something that seals, it will pop. (if you put dry ice in a plastic bottle screw the cap on, it will explode -don’t try this at home kids)
I wouldn’t worry too much about C02. Granted, you don’t want to lock yourself up in the bathroom all night with pounds of this stuff. But for a party where doors are opened, people moving around, etc… there shouldn’t be a problem. If there was really a serious danger, far more people would die at halloween parties.
We had a party a few months back where we played with dry ice. Great fun. Here’s a few things I learned.
Don’t put it in blender drinks. It turns your nice ice slush back into solid form making it quite hard to drink.
It carbonates everything. I rather liked the taste of carbonated bloody mary’s.
If you drop it in cold water it stops bubbling rather quick because the cold water forms a little ice cocoon around the dry ice. Warm or hot water melts the forming ice.
Place a small piece on a dry metal spoon. It makes a cool sound.
Drop some stuff in the ice box with the dry ice for a few hours and super freeze them… then smash them.
Buy a mylar balloon. Slip a few pieces of dry ice into the balloon and seal it. It will slowly fill up with Co2 until it pops.
Buy a styrofoam ice box to store it in. Wrap it in newspapers. It should last 8 hours no problem. At one dollar a pound, just buy enough to fill the ice box. Once you get to playing with it it seems you never have enough.
DO NOT store it in a plastic ice box that seals. As the dry ice melts it releases the Co2 in gas state. If you place it in something that seals, it will pop. (if you put dry ice in a plastic bottle screw the cap on, it will explode -don’t try this at home kids)
I wouldn’t worry too much about C02. Granted, you don’t want to lock yourself up in the bathroom all night with pounds of this stuff. But for a party where doors are opened, people moving around, etc… there shouldn’t be a problem. If there was really a serious danger, far more people would die at halloween parties.
We had a party a few months back where we played with dry ice. Great fun. Here’s a few things I learned.
Don’t put it in blender drinks. It turns your nice ice slush back into solid form making it quite hard to drink.
It carbonates everything. I rather liked the taste of carbonated bloody mary’s.
If you drop it in cold water it stops bubbling rather quick because the cold water forms a little ice cocoon around the dry ice. Warm or hot water melts the forming ice.
Place a small piece on a dry metal spoon. It makes a cool sound.
Drop some stuff in the ice box with the dry ice for a few hours and super freeze them… then smash them.
Buy a mylar balloon. Slip a few pieces of dry ice into the balloon and seal it. It will slowly fill up with Co2 until it pops.
Buy a styrofoam ice box to store it in. Wrap it in newspapers. It should last 8 hours no problem. At one dollar a pound, just buy enough to fill the ice box. Once you get to playing with it it seems you never have enough.
DO NOT store it in a plastic ice box that seals. As the dry ice melts it releases the Co2 in gas state. If you place it in something that seals, it will pop. (if you put dry ice in a plastic bottle screw the cap on, it will explode -don’t try this at home kids)
I wouldn’t worry too much about C02. Granted, you don’t want to lock yourself up in the bathroom all night with pounds of this stuff. But for a party where doors are opened, people moving around, etc… there shouldn’t be a problem. If there was really a serious danger, far more people would die at halloween parties.
We had a party a few months back where we played with dry ice. Great fun. Here’s a few things I learned.
Don’t put it in blender drinks. It turns your nice ice slush back into solid form making it quite hard to drink.
It carbonates everything. I rather liked the taste of carbonated bloody mary’s.
If you drop it in cold water it stops bubbling rather quick because the cold water forms a little ice cocoon around the dry ice. Warm or hot water melts the forming ice.
Place a small piece on a dry metal spoon. It makes a cool sound.
Drop some stuff in the ice box with the dry ice for a few hours and super freeze them… then smash them.
Buy a mylar balloon. Slip a few pieces of dry ice into the balloon and seal it. It will slowly fill up with Co2 until it pops.
There was a case a few years back of someone suffocating, but IIRC, he was working in an extremely confined area within a haunted house and producing tons of fog.
Everything said above is the way to go. Insulate it, don’t refrigerate it.
The first time we used it, we found out the hard way you need a supply of warm water. The ice produced some great fog, but quickly cooled the water and then just bubbled a bit. Dry ice looks way better than a chemical fog machine, although a machine is easier to deal with, and they’ve come way down in price.
The ice is also pretty dense, so a 10lb block isn’t that huge.
Oh, another thing about dry ice: large chunks, when submerged, tend to develop a coating of water ice, which will kill the fog effect. This is another reason to keep the chunks small (they’ll disappear before this can happen), and to keep the water warm.
Theater friend of mine built a tub for dry ice fogging. The previous post is right that the ice will form a layer of frozen water around it, insulating it from the water and cutting off your fog.
He used the heating element for a water heater fastened to the side of a metal washtub to keep the water warm and the CO[sub]2[/sub] fogging.
We had a couple of blocks of dry ice for a film once years ago. Put a block in the freezer to use a few days later. It melted and refroze as regular H20 ice.
Ummm… I suspect that, as others have mentioned, a coating of water condensed and froze on top of the dry ice still inside. It couldn’t have “melted,” since CO2 can’t exist as a liquid at normal temps and pressures (hence “dry” ice). At room temps, including the relatively warm conditions (compared to its boiling point of -78C) of a household freezer, CO2 sublimates: it changes straight from solid to gas.
So what happens to the dry ice once regular ice forms around it? I don’t think the strength of the regular ice is enough to prevent expansion of the dry ice, right?
You need to be careful, if you’re using this to make “spooky” punch, that nobody puts any in their glass and then immediately chugs the whole serving. Aside from the obvious concerns about getting flash-frozen skin in one’s mouth or esophagus, it is possible to swallow small chunks sheathed in ice (or simply surrounded by liquid) which, upon hitting one’s warm stomach, create a rapidly expanding pocket of gas. Internal discomfort and possible injury may result.
