Hi everybody!

Its crazy how sometimes tricks that we think that they are simple or apprently simple become a nightmare.

I need your help here guys. Im really frustrated here.
I have developed a great and deceptive method (but risky) on the swallowing needles trick but the problem that I have is in the supposed easy part, I mean, the part I produce them tied.

I have Tarbell and Device & Illusion and I almost fliped how the tied needles preparation is overpassed in both books. Am I missing sometehing? Tarbell didn't specify how many needles would be necessary to perform the effect, only talks about a packet (How many needles contained a packet in 1930?) Steinmeyer talks about 20. So I took a LOT OF TIME to prepare those tied 20 needles and then prepare another 20 as my method require. Not to say that I spent much more time to do the knots that prepared my method. I played around with the swallowing and the method I developed is incredibly deceptive (since I saw Teller I wanted to do something clever) but the problem comes when everything is done!! The prepared packet get tangled into my mouth. I must be the first magician who his tied needles does not run smooth!!
I prepared the needles as said in Tarbell. I mean, Zig-Zag but it's the worst. Putting all the heads toguether or NO ZIG-ZAG method is better but still tangles!!

I don't know how to make them run! The first ten comes so-so but the remaining 10 becomes a nightmare of thread and needles that can't be produced. Two times I was so angry that I pincushioned my mouth with a needle trying to push them out. The last time near an inch of needle stabed me (I know I should taken off the sharps)!!

Im actually using strong cotton thread, and medium sized needles. Are the materials correct? I'm I missing something?

Any help?

Thanks a lot.

D

Trying doing the routine with just 10 needles. I don't think the extra 10 would add that much to the effect.

Jim

Thanks Jim,

I need a long thread full of needles as Im recreating part of the Houdini show and the photo of Houdini doing the trick will be behind me projected with a projector.

By comparison in the photo he will swallow much more than me.

Any way I have seen other performers swallow a big amount.

So I reapeat again.

More ideas?

D

This is totally speculative...but....what if you either used WAXED dental floss for your string, OR...rubbed beeswax on the string.

Then, if you squeeze the thread against the needle, it might grip it enough to not tangle.

Like I said, pure speculation. And I have no idea how you'll exactly "unstick" the needles, but you could give it a try.

Get Mahendra's Needle Routine by H. S. Mahendra. It goes into great detail as to how to wind the thread so it will reel out smoothly. Basically you wrap the thread around the first needle until the head of the second needle is next to the first. You then wrap these two needle together until the head of the third comes in contact with the first two. Continue wrapping the needles in this fashion until they are all wrapped together in a neat packet.

A packet of needles is generally between 16 and 24

Thanks everybody!

BRODY : Yes I have thought that but dental floss is quite wide and becomes a very large packet with 20 needles.

PAYNE: It worked!! I litte slow but works. I suppose that with practice I can make them run fast. I have been looking for the book but always with the same result "Out of stock". Im looking again fori it.

D

Mickey Hades appaears to have a copy at the moment

http://www.mickyhades.com/pbbauthm.htm

I did the needle thing back in the early 70's, and tried just about every way of folding the thread, but nothing worked. Finally I hit on the idea of winding the thread around the needles, as Payne mentioned, and it worked great. I don't have a clue if the Mahendra routine was around back then, but it would have saved me a lot of time if I'd seen it...

The other thing I did was to totally pantomime pulling the needles out of the packet, except for one I "accidentally" dropped. Then, when the needles came out threaded, there were only nineteen.

Ah, the good ol' days.

The Mahendra routine was published in the 1930's and according to "Ask Alexander" he was perfroming it a good quarter century before that.

I have been able to perform this trick using the setup described in Tarbell #4 without the needles tangling.

Photo-shop the image. Zoom in more on his face, so the thread isn't so long... or erase every couple of needles...

Might also be able to heighten the contrast, to make the visible needles "pop" more.

I can help you with this if you don't have the right tools... PM me if you'd like.

Most people will have never seen the Houdini picture, and even if they have, it will probably not occur to them that it was altered... They'll never know that other guys use more...

I have been stalled on this by the threading....I get tangled in prep. I can imagine the trouble with tangling in the mouth on display.

Ever see Otto Wesseley do the razor blades? He must pull out around 100 of 'em. Man, what a setup that must be. But it is one of the most amazing routines I've ever seen.

Otto was amazing. Karrell Fox did a spoof of it for his follies. He used tin foil and yarn. But he had Ott's wife load them up so they would not tangle.

Richard

Hi Pete, hi Richard!
I saw Otto a few months ago performing in Almusafes (Spain). He was terribly hilarious. He got a full standing ovation.

IMHO he does not use real razor blades. I was far from him but I had the impression of the razors been bent as paper.

He closed the act with the razors. Great show.

nathanallen: Thanks a lot for the idea, but Im still working on the hard way. I think that Teller got the prestige of regarding such an incredible method and I like the way he fools magicians with it. He is a master.

D

Here's an idea that struck me...What about thin black wire, the thickness of a thick cotton thread. That would work... Just fold the wire properly and pull it out, using your lips to keep it taught... It'll still look like thread. I've not tried this but it could work!

Hi Kyle,

thanks for the idea!!

I have tried it and looks weird, looks like the producing dlites wich I ever disliked the weird look of the wire. The word probably is not weird but messy or not very smooth... I don't know how to describe it.

Im working on a very clever method.

D

I used the method on Steve Spills DVD Confessions of a Needle Swallower. Recently reviewed it on http://www.themagicpodcast.com

Can you guys give some suggestions on Tangled thread on swallowing razorblades

Why not start a new topic, as your question will take this needles topic 'Off Topic', there are many razor blade topics on the Café.