Author Topic: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)  (Read 37394 times)

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Offline EEVblogTopic starter

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High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« on: January 30, 2015, 12:06:54 pm »
This is the coolest thing I've seen in a long time, not the actual footage etc, but the fact that a science Youtuber (albeit a well respected research scientist) can change our understanding of a field. And it all started with playing around with sodium for a youtube video.
Well done Thunderf00t  :-+  :clap:
I'm one of those contributors too.
Oh, and it's on-topic, to the tune of 5 billion amps!

 

Offline electronics man

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #1 on: January 30, 2015, 06:35:35 pm »
that is pretty dam cool. i have handled metallic sodium myself, its interesting stuff
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Offline nctnico

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #2 on: January 30, 2015, 06:45:17 pm »
Dave, IMHO you didn't waste your money on this!
There are small lies, big lies and then there is what is on the screen of your oscilloscope.
 

Online tom66

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #3 on: January 30, 2015, 07:55:07 pm »
I wonder if this sort of sodium explosion could be used in high-discharge applications. Currently in fusion power prototypes they use banks of capacitors to discharge into lasers to produce peak gigawatts of power. Don't know how you'd harness the discharge current though.
 

Offline Yago

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #4 on: January 30, 2015, 10:04:34 pm »
Wow, amazing stuff!

It's guys like this, and you Dave, that add so much value to the internet.
 O0 :-+

Who knows where this will lead to, including the transparent metal vid.

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The rain fell into the sand mould for a huge stator plate, on Monday it was cast.
Soon could be a thing of the past thanks to this work.
« Last Edit: January 30, 2015, 10:07:58 pm by Yago »
 

Offline mikeselectricstuff

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #5 on: January 30, 2015, 10:34:56 pm »
They mentioned crowdfunding - any details?
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Offline elgonzo

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #6 on: January 30, 2015, 10:48:33 pm »
That's some fantastic stuff. Interesting and well explained.  :clap:
 

Offline mikeselectricstuff

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #7 on: January 30, 2015, 10:59:16 pm »
I wonder if you wound a coil round the reaction you could measure a magnetic field resulting from the electron flow
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Offline rx8pilot

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #8 on: January 31, 2015, 01:23:04 am »
I wonder if this sort of sodium explosion could be used in high-discharge applications. Currently in fusion power prototypes they use banks of capacitors to discharge into lasers to produce peak gigawatts of power. Don't know how you'd harness the discharge current though.


....that could get the Flux Capacitor.....fluxing.
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Offline EEVblogTopic starter

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #9 on: January 31, 2015, 01:55:42 am »
They mentioned crowdfunding - any details?

He's talking about Patreon, not Kickstarter et.al
So not a funded project, just generic per-video funding from his Patrons.
« Last Edit: January 31, 2015, 02:03:13 am by EEVblog »
 

Offline EEVblogTopic starter

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #10 on: January 31, 2015, 02:02:20 am »
I wonder if you wound a coil round the reaction you could measure a magnetic field resulting from the electron flow

I thought the same thing, worth trying.
 

Online Marco

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #11 on: January 31, 2015, 02:05:00 am »
Oh, and it's on-topic, to the tune of 5 billion amps!

What's the voltage? Can you put some NAK on an electrode with the other electrode in the water and try to get some of that current through something else?
 

Offline aargee

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #12 on: January 31, 2015, 03:18:32 am »
Thanks for the post, Dave. Very engrossing.
Hmm, a small toroidal coil, with some Na in the centre wired to test gear and dropped into some water? What sort of field would 5x109A on a micro scale generate?
Not easy, not hard, just need to be incentivised.
 

Online Dave

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #13 on: January 31, 2015, 03:34:48 am »
So if I understood the video right, the current (electric, not electron!) flows inwards from the water to the metal. But considering that it does so on all sides of the metal droplet simultaneously, wouldn't the fields just cancel each other out (or at least most of it)?
It would be interesting to see an experiment with a coil, though, but I wouldn't expect it to produce anything usable. What if only one half of a chunk of metal was submerged? :-/O
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Offline pickle9000

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #14 on: January 31, 2015, 04:34:32 am »
Super cool on all counts.
 

Offline AlfBaz

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #15 on: January 31, 2015, 04:40:26 am »
I wonder if you wound a coil round the reaction you could measure a magnetic field resulting from the electron flow

I thought the same thing, worth trying.
Another good use for those EM probes of yours >:D
 

Offline justanothercanuck

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #16 on: January 31, 2015, 05:43:08 am »
Thunderf00t?  Seriously?  90% of this guy's videos are anti-feminist drivel, mostly surrounding Anita Sarkessian.  I hate what the woman has/is doing to the video game industry as much as the next person, but I think he takes his videos a little too far.  :-//
« Last Edit: January 31, 2015, 05:49:34 am by justanothercanuck »
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Offline c4757p

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #17 on: January 31, 2015, 06:04:22 am »
Thunderf00t?  Seriously?  90% of this guy's videos are anti-feminist drivel, mostly surrounding Anita Sarkessian.  I hate what the woman has/is doing to the video game industry as much as the next person, but I think he takes his videos a little too far.  :-//

Yes, his channel looks positively loony.
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Offline devanno

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #18 on: January 31, 2015, 06:32:34 am »
Enjoyed this very much, thanks, Dave!   :-+
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Offline AG6QR

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #19 on: January 31, 2015, 06:47:06 am »
The current is obviously traveling only a very short distance, and it's not very coherently directed, so the vector sum of all the currents is going to be small.  It would be hard to measure, and much harder to harness.

But I'm curious.  Does any of it radiate?  I wonder if it at least makes a "pop" on a radio receiver nearby?  My first guess would be that five billion amps, even very disorganized, would be audible on a radio at a reasonable distance, but...
 

Offline mtdoc

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #20 on: January 31, 2015, 07:43:10 am »
That is awesome!  Thanks for the link Dave.

Makes me want to order up some sodium and blow stuff up.
 

Offline SeanB

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #21 on: January 31, 2015, 08:55:57 am »
May be an incredibly high current, but the antenna is so small that it likely only emits in microwave region, absorbed by the water.  Field likely will be zero outside the metal, and likely the only way to examine it will be to have a probe embedded partially in the liquid alloy and then freeze it to keep it in place. Place a sacrificial amplifier right by the metal to provide a low impedance cable drive and do a nuclear industry test regime of blowing up your probes with the experiment. You record the tiny amount of data before the destruction to get the info that you want.
 

Offline EEVblogTopic starter

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #22 on: January 31, 2015, 09:01:32 am »
Thunderf00t?  Seriously?

Yes, seriously. You cannot deny that his science and debunking videos are absolutely first class.

Quote
90% of this guy's videos are anti-feminist drivel, mostly surrounding Anita Sarkessian. 

So don't watch then.
And it's not even close to 90% as you claim. He has almost 500 videos, a very large percentage of which are science and bunking etc.
 

Offline justanothercanuck

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #23 on: January 31, 2015, 01:04:22 pm »
So don't watch then.

I never said I did watch it.

Is it so wrong to have an opinion about someone?  :wtf:
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Offline EEVblogTopic starter

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Re: High speed camera reveals why sodium explodes! (5 billion amps)
« Reply #24 on: January 31, 2015, 01:19:26 pm »
I never said I did watch it.

You must watch his feminist videos to have an opinion about the videos enough to call them "dribble" and have the opinion that he "takes it too far".

Quote
Is it so wrong to have an opinion about someone?  :wtf:

No, but what you have done here is effectively question my posting of a top notch science video because you don't like some of the guys videos that are completely unrelated. You are effectively dismissing all of the guys work because you don't like some of it, that to me is just asinine.

I note that you didn't refute my statement that his science and debunking videos are first class.
« Last Edit: January 31, 2015, 01:21:39 pm by EEVblog »
 


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