Now, @Troy III, I got a little lost about your solution. You suggest to have a "strip" do you mean like having 5 images in one?I won't need a forward loop because I want the animation to stop when it comes back to the first image.
I start working on the code now.
thanks
Yes, a sprite; - [all anim.,images in one img file].
Here is one [randomly chosen article] about sprites.
http://sixrevisions.com/css/css-sprites-site-speed/
And here is a link that may probably help you construct your sprite image with ease.
http://csssprites.com/bare.html