“Bubble Guy” brings good clean fun
David Matthews, ‘That Hartsville Bubble Guy’, works on one of his bubble creations. Photo by Samantha Lyles
By Samantha Lyles, Staff Writer, slyles@newsandpress.net
If you swing by the courtyard lawn at the SC Governor’s School for Science and Math on a windless afternoon, you’re liable to find a grown man happily focused on making bubbles. Watch for a bit and you’ll see him dip a series of hand-made bubble wands into buckets of solution, check the breeze, and whirl around in slow circles, producing dozens of little soapy spheres or smaller quantities of gigantic, Prius-sized bubbles.
This fellow, known online as “the Bubble Guy,” has an alter ego: David Matthews, IT Director at the Governor’s School, and he takes his avocation quite seriously. Matthews says “the whole bubble thing” started about four years ago when he was asked to come up with something different for fall festival entertainment at his church.
“I hit the Internet looking for innovative things, and I saw a very simple solution for bubbles that involved glycerine, water, and dish detergent. I got some kite string and a couple of wands and it worked out reasonably well. The kids really seemed to enjoy it,” Matthews says.
But, being the tech-minded tinkerer that he is, Matthews immediately began to explore ways to improve that basic solution and make bubbles that were far bigger, and much more durable.
“I really dove into it. It started out as an interest, then became a hobby, then a passion. Now, I probably need an intervention,” he says, laughing.
Though it might sound like child’s play, there’s a fair amount of science at work here – most of which has to do with weather. Wind and heat are the prime enemies of good bubbles, and unfortunately those conditions are pretty common in South Carolina summers. Matthews says that bubble making is very popular in Australia and New Zealand, where the cool and humid climate is more friendly to fragile, water-based membranes.
“I’ve had to do a fair amount of tweaking to get a solution to work here in the hot southeast. It’s very challenging,” Matthews says.
He notes that on hot days, it helps to keep the bubble solution hotter than the air temperature. This way, when the bubble forms, it actually cools down a smidge and evaporates less quickly. Mixing the solution a day in advance and letting it cure also helps improve results.
“Now, I can make it work reasonably well in the summer, but at the end of the day, we’re talking about a membrane that’s only a few hundred nanometers thick,” he says.
To give you some perspective, a sheet of paper is about 100,000 nanometers thick, while a strand of DNA is 2.5 nanometers in diameter. So…bubbles are pretty fragile, right? Yup. And yet, Matthews has managed to create bubbles as long as 53 feet, and some have been strong enough to survive the half-mile flight from the Governor’s School to the Hartsville Post Office.
Still, he considers his bubble making a work in progress, and continues to chart his failures and successes in pursuit of ideal solutions for every season. Matthews has also experimented with numerous options for wands (broom handles, wires, painter’s poles, etc.) and bubble shaping materials like kite string and pipe cleaners. He says that in the near future, he plans to work with some colleagues at the Governor’s School to 3-D print some custom bubble wands and loops.
“Some of the chemists here have given me great ideas for things I can try with my polymers, and some of the engineers have great ideas for ways to improve the wands to get bigger bubbles,” says Matthews.
Matthews has taken his bubble show on the road, and regularly makes appearances at local Downtown Markets, festivals, church events, and even the occasional birthday party. He says that kids are often fascinated by the process of making exceptional bubbles and it can turn into a fun learning opportunity where they investigate the behavior of membranes, the composition of solutions, and the effects of weather.
He says that anyone interested in learning how to make bubbles can find the information readily online, and he encourages the curious to tweak these basic bubble solutions and track their results to craft a formula that provides the type of bubbles they’re looking for.
Most of the online recipes yield two distinct types of bubbles: the high-rising bubbles, which are lighter and float readily away into the air, and the more durable bubbles, which are heavier and hang around close to the ground.
For high-risers, mix 2 cups of warm water with 1/3 cup of dish soap and ¼ cup of corn syrup. For durable bubbles, mix 2 cups of hot water with ¼ cup of dish soap, a .25 ounce pack of gelatin, and 2 tablespoons of glycerin.
Matthews says that he’s had quite a bit of fun learning how to craft the best possible versions of these lovely – and very temporary – floating gems, and he hopes others who try bubble making will find some of that same Zen-like satisfaction.
“That’s one of the things I’ve had to come to grips with that, even with everything I do, most of the bubbles I create have a lifespan of just a few seconds,” says Matthews. “It’s all temporary.”
If you’d like to learn more about Hartsville’s “Bubble Guy” David Matthews, look him up on Facebook. There, you’ll also find booking information, just in case you’d like to add some good clean fun to your next party or event.
