Sciencemadness Discussion Board

Tejo (national sport of Colombia) legal in the UK or not??

DanW - 25-10-2017 at 09:37

Hi,

Some friends of mine and I were recently in Colombia and came across the fantastic game of Tejo! If you haven't heard of it, it involves throwing a metal puck towards a target.

The target however contains some little paper triangles that have some kind of "gunpowder" mix in them so that they "explode" on impact. In reality they just produce a bang, a little smoke and maybe a flash or the paper sets alight.

My friends and I thought this was a great game and thought it could be quite popular in the UK and trying to look into the possibility of creating a Tejo hall, open to the public as a business in London.

However whether this is at all feasible rests upon whether it would be legal to import the little triangle "explosives".

Now there doesn't seem to be a consensus on what the exploding material is which may or may not be imperative to the legality of the triangles - but it seems that it could be a mix of any of the following:

sulphur, gunpowder, phosphorus, ammonium nitrate, Potassium Perchlorate or maybe something like Tannerite?

I'm not expecting to get a firmly positive response of "sure, no legal issues whatsoever" as it would need to be looked into by legal experts. But hopefully someone will know enough to either say, that might be ok, or no way, you're talking about importing explosives and it doesn't matter how tiny they are.

We really have no idea and whilst it sounds like it wouldn't be possible, fireworks are perfectly legal so... hopefully someone can help give us a little guidance.

Thanks!


SWIM - 25-10-2017 at 10:34

Wikipedia says they sometimes use electronic sensors now which emit a sound like the mechas (gunpowder bags) when they're triggered (hit).

This sound might be made by a powerful solenoid hitting some hard object when the sensor sets it off, but I'm just guessing here.

Maybe it's an electric discharge like a short circuit making the sound.
Those can make a bit of a bang too with the right amount of voltage and amperage.



[Edited on 25-10-2017 by SWIM]

[Edited on 25-10-2017 by SWIM]

Sulaiman - 25-10-2017 at 11:24

http://www.pyrosociety.org.uk/media/er-2014-good-practise-gu...
http://www.pyrosociety.org.uk/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2...

LearnedAmateur - 25-10-2017 at 11:43

Snaps are perfectly legal and very cheap - couldn't you just empty a few of them and make the targets that way? Just my thoughts.

BJ68 - 1-11-2017 at 23:08

Quote: Originally posted by LearnedAmateur  
Snaps are perfectly legal and very cheap - couldn't you just empty a few of them and make the targets that way? Just my thoughts.



DonĀ“t know how it is in the UK...but in Germany you are not allowed to empty any kind of pyrotechnic article.
Reason for that: Every article was tested and approved through the BAM https://www.bam.de/Navigation/EN/BAM-Services/Licensing-and-...
If you empty and repack a snap you will generate a new device, with is not approved and may be illegal.

Other way would be to put a few of them in the Mecha, but I think they will be to sensitive for that purpose.

Amusingly I am on the same search to find a way to play Tjeo legal in Germany...

Fist Idea was to use Knallkorken https://www.feuerwerksvitrine.de/imagetypes/shop-md/910025.j...
but they are not produced anymore....

Searched further and found something:

Reactive Targets for air rifles from Firebird https://www.firebirdtargets.com/firebird-ar40/

Here are the measurements for the Tejos and the Bocin: http://www.boyacacultural.com/turmeque/tejoelementos.php


Will be tested in summer.....


Bj68