colored smoke

Colored smoke is a kind of smoke created by an aerosol of small particles of a suitable pigment or dye.

Red Arrows air display team

Colored smoke can be used for smoke signal, often in military. It can be produced by smoke grenades, or by various other pyrotechnical devices. The mixture used for producing colored smoke is usually a cooler-burning formula based on potassium chlorate oxidizer, lactose or dextrin as a fuel, and one or more dyes, with about 40-50% content of the dye. 2% of sodium bicarbonate may be added as a coolant, to lower the burning temperature.

Smoke released from aircraft can be based on a mixture of 10-15% of dye, 60-65% of trichloroethylene or tetrachloroethylene, and 25% of diesel oil, injected into the exhaust gases of the aircraft engines.

Some mixtures used for production of colored smokes contain these dyes:

• Red:
  • Disperse Red 9 (older, used eg. in the M19 grenade)
  • Solvent Red 1 with Disperse Red 11
  • Solvent Red 27 (C.I. 26125)
  • Solvent Red 24
• Orange:
  • Solvent Yellow 14 (C.I. 12055)
• Yellow:
  • Vat Yellow 4 with benzanthrone (older)
  • Solvent Yellow 33
  • Solvent Yellow 16 (C.I. 12700)
  • Solvent Yellow 56
  • Oil Yellow R
• Green:
  • Vat Yellow 4 with benzanthrone and Solvent Green 3 (older)
  • Solvent Yellow 33 and Solvent Green 3
  • Solvent Green 3
  • Oil Green BG
• Blue:
  • Solvent Blue 35 (C.I. 26125)
  • Solvent Blue 36
  • Solvent Blue 5
• Violet:
  • Disperse Red 9 with 1,4-diamino-2,3-dihydroanthraquinone
  • Solvent Violet 13

External links

• Smoke and masking agents

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