Caporegime
- Joined
- 13 May 2003
- Posts
- 34,560
- Location
- Warwickshire
So my parents brought round a little bubble stick this weekend for my kids and they loved it, but I wanted MORE.
So I started Googling ways to make larger bubbles at home.
I found a million different ways to make large DIY bubbles, most of which involved three key ingredients in terms of the bubble mixture:
1. Water (some called for distilled!)
2. Soap of some kind
3. Glycerine (or other strengthener / binder)
I made a litre of mixture and used 5% Fairy Platinum and 95% water, with two tablespoons of glycerine-based cough medicine added to strengthen the bubble and make it last longer.
Some people recommended corn flour and baking powder as well as / instead of glycerine. Pure glycerine from a pharmacy would be better than cough mixture, which obviously has various other stuff in it as well as glycerine. Other ratios and recipes were mentioned, there are loads of combinations to try.
To make larger bubbles, we also needed a larger 'wand', so I used bamboo sticks threaded with string, with the lower section weighed down by a washer (makes it easier to dip the wand into the mix).
Wand and mixture:
Bubble!
Another bubble!
You can make some epic, huge bubbles for pennies and if you have any children or nephews and nieces you need to keep amused, they will go absolutely nuts for this.
Sometimes the bubbles get caught by an updraft and go very high, sometimes they go into the street and attract some amusing comments, sometimes they hover around the garden for ages. They look like alien blobs when the wind makes them contort and deform, it's pretty cool.
The kids chased them around and made their own bubbles until they were pooped.
Great fun and actually quite addictive, even as an adult. It's quite a challenge to know when to 'close the bubble' before it becomes too big for the wand and just pops. Almost like a lesson in bubble greed!
I made some vast bubbles that popped as soon as I closed the wand...I reckon with the right mixture I could complete them, but I wasn't being that scientific and was mainly just experimenting. It's very important for it not to be windy when trying to make big bubbles.
Anyone else a giant man child?
So I started Googling ways to make larger bubbles at home.
I found a million different ways to make large DIY bubbles, most of which involved three key ingredients in terms of the bubble mixture:
1. Water (some called for distilled!)
2. Soap of some kind
3. Glycerine (or other strengthener / binder)
I made a litre of mixture and used 5% Fairy Platinum and 95% water, with two tablespoons of glycerine-based cough medicine added to strengthen the bubble and make it last longer.
Some people recommended corn flour and baking powder as well as / instead of glycerine. Pure glycerine from a pharmacy would be better than cough mixture, which obviously has various other stuff in it as well as glycerine. Other ratios and recipes were mentioned, there are loads of combinations to try.
To make larger bubbles, we also needed a larger 'wand', so I used bamboo sticks threaded with string, with the lower section weighed down by a washer (makes it easier to dip the wand into the mix).
Wand and mixture:
Bubble!
Another bubble!
You can make some epic, huge bubbles for pennies and if you have any children or nephews and nieces you need to keep amused, they will go absolutely nuts for this.
Sometimes the bubbles get caught by an updraft and go very high, sometimes they go into the street and attract some amusing comments, sometimes they hover around the garden for ages. They look like alien blobs when the wind makes them contort and deform, it's pretty cool.
The kids chased them around and made their own bubbles until they were pooped.
Great fun and actually quite addictive, even as an adult. It's quite a challenge to know when to 'close the bubble' before it becomes too big for the wand and just pops. Almost like a lesson in bubble greed!
I made some vast bubbles that popped as soon as I closed the wand...I reckon with the right mixture I could complete them, but I wasn't being that scientific and was mainly just experimenting. It's very important for it not to be windy when trying to make big bubbles.
Anyone else a giant man child?
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