Chinese Celestial Lanterns of Desire - In What Is Their Mystery?

Celestial flashlights of desires, or otherwise called Chinese balls of desires, have come to us from the East, where they are particularly in demand. In the Western countries, these paper soaring glowing designs are about to begin to gain popularity.

Chronicles will see that, in fact, the very, very first heavenly lanterns were used in 180-234, during the military campaigns of General Zhuge Liang, who used them to cause fear to the enemy.

They took an enormous paper bag and placed a lamp on the bottom from below, at high temperature the air from the heating lamp forced the structure to go up. The opposing forces imagined that this divine power was helping Zhuge Liang, in a word the opponents were greatly frightened of the light in the sky.

According to other sources, the balls of desires were used even earlier, around the 3rd century BC, as described by Joseph Needham. The first time used to alert Chinese troops, the desire balls eventually began to take on some significance in religious ordinances in the Eastern countries.

The frame of Chinese lanterns is usually made of the most lightweight type of wood - for example, a bamboo tree. In order for the ball to take off, the place of the burner uses cotton cloth, which is impregnated with a well-flammable wax. Such a piece of cloth is attached to the crosshairs of the frame. Also there is one more - this is the use in the production process of combustible polymers. The spherical dome attached to the frame is made technologically from non-combustible light rice paper with the addition of mulberry tree, in turn, which are impregnated with substances. The base and the dome of the sky lanterns can be of various shapes, from ordinary geometric figures (sphere, ellipse) to figures quite extraordinary.

The law by which a heavenly flashlight rises up very simple. A special cotton cloth impregnated with special combustible substances warms the air under the dome of the sky lantern to temperatures over one hundred degrees Celsius. There is an expansion of air, so its part is forced out, the density inside is less than outside, so we get a soaring Chinese flashlight.

The density of air inside the flashlight is calculated by a simple formula from school physics.

The Chinese flashlight usually weighs about 130 grams, and about a meter in height. The flight time of the flashlight is about 10-15 minutes, this is enough to climb to a height of thousands of meters.

This entertainment has its own precautions. Basically: it is forbidden to let them near to airports (closer than 5 kilometers), the next it simply should not be at a close distance of easily flammable objects or buildings. And it is desirable that the wind was weak.