Loons that pop the quietest or at least quiet in comparison to a lot of others

[Boom&Bust]

Re: Loons that pop the quietest or at least quiet in comparison to a lot of others

The other day while I was driving down the street with my window fully wound down, I spotted a balloon on the road, and then it just popped for whatever reason.

It was very quiet, more of a snap than a bang. I guess maybe it was underinflated and/or oxidised.

[Kaballcz]

Re: Loons that pop the quietest or at least quiet in comparison to a lot of others

I completely forgot about these. They seem very soft and seem to pop quietly.

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The only information that I have about them is that people have said they're Russian balloons.

I would love to find some.

I thing it is possible, i remember balloons like this from 1. may celebrations if i was child, they are not so big, but nice soft...Never see them in Czech Republic in the 90s, and never try order them from Russia.

[tebe2hu]

Re: Loons that pop the quietest or at least quiet in comparison to a lot of others

I completely forgot about these. They seem very soft and seem to pop quietly.
The only information that I have about them is that people have said they're Russian balloons.
I would love to find some.

These are the famous Russian Bakovka balloons, I used them and popped a lot when I was a student. They could grow incredibly big with repeated inflations and, since they got stretched and soft this way, popped with a muffled sound.
Things were completely different with 'virgin' inflations, especially when they weren't stretched before the inflation. Then they were rather loud.

There is a cute story with such a balloon. It happened in Kyiv, on NYE 1981 to 1982 if I'm not mistaken. Me and my girlfriend, Milla - soon we got married and we still are together - celebrated the upcoming year with a students' company. Early morning we left the party and waited for the first bus at the bus stop to get back to the hostel. The third person at the stop was a cute girl of our age coming from the same party. We had already met, we knew each other. It was freezing cold, around -25C/-13F so we moved, jumped, sang and danced to stay warm. We chatted, joked a lot, the girls giggled. Then Valya (Valentina - it was her name) got an idea. She took out a big (24") dark green Bakovka balloon from her purse. Warmed a bit between her palms and proceeded to blow. "Just to take home some souvenir from the party" she explained to Milla. Until the bus arrived, the balloon was huge and incredibly tight. She knotted quickly and we entered the bus. Valya had some difficulties not to pop her balloon in the doorway but finally succeeded.

The driver took care that the passengers didn't catch a cold, turned up the heating. It was nice warm inside, around 20C/68F. The majority of the passengers were coming from parties: tired, sleepy, some half drunk so the bus was more or less silent inside. Then an inevitable process started. From the warmth of the heating, the air in the balloon started to expand. Actually Valya had pushed the balloon to its limits quite well, so the size didn't change only the pressure inside got higher and higher... until.... BANGGG!!! The balloon popped with a tremendous bang. The passengers jumped, some of them didn't understand what the hell happened, from where the bang came. Milla's and Valya' eyes met and they couldn't but laugh, hardly could stop until we arrived.

Epilogue: This "incident" took us close, we became good friends. In 1982 we married and Valya waited us with a huge colorful bunch of the biggest Bakovka balloons when we came out of the town hall after pronouncing the 'Yes' forever. She wrote some messages onto the balloons like 'Just married', 'Happiness forever', 'Good luck!' and so on. But on the green balloon she wrote 'Happy New Year!' The wedding guests didn't understand why we burst out in laugh when Valya came to us with her balloons and innocent puppy eyes Some years later she got married with a lucky South-American guy and now she lives in Argentina. We are far from each other but still in touch. Sometimes we have long chats on Face Time and the girls giggle every time we recall that night.

[tebe2hu]

Re: Loons that pop the quietest or at least quiet in comparison to a lot of others

PS. By far the most of my experiences are with blowing to pop. I have only rather limited experiences with popping balloons in other ways. I do suppose that popping underinflated balloons won't be as loud though.

Susie, your empirical observations are completely right The slower the balloon is inflated, the further it can be pushed and the bigger and tighter gets.
The tighter the balloon, the louder the bang is. So to amend your opinion, let me add, if we pop balloons from the same party different ways, the loudest bang we get with slow overinflation till popping. This is my 2 cents.

[UrielDUnicorn]

Re: Loons that pop the quietest or at least quiet in comparison to a lot of others

Using your teeth and tearing into it at the tie of the neck slightly to release the air.

[Guest]

Re: Loons that pop the quietest or at least quiet in comparison to a lot of others

I bought one 36" belbal with a text "Just Married" on it and it was just super squishy all the way even after being blown far bigger than it is supposed to. I popped it with a pin and it was so quiet compared to some 19" balloons I popped before it.

[Slow DeFlaite]

Re: Loons that pop the quietest or at least quiet in comparison to a lot of others

I have over inflated tuf tex 36" Balloons up to 52" after several rides and adding more air before each Ride. At 52" You would think it would Make a Bang but it's a tiny little "Poof" when You prick it with a Needle.

[Ladyloonerlover]

Re: Loons that pop the quietest or at least quiet in comparison to a lot of others

All these posts about pushing balloons far beyond their limits is giving me chills but good chills.