fuchikoma Posted June 26, 2012 Report Share Posted June 26, 2012 I disagree. It matters very much what the thickness of any thermal insulator is - even thermal paste. It stands to reason that it's still less optimal to have a gap than to have a continuous conductive medium, but it is possible to get it down to a point where the detriments no longer outweigh the benefits, depending on the dissipation of the cooling fin surface. They were saying that one of the main problems they were working against was the insulating effect of stagnant air on fin surfaces - perhaps the dynamic nature of the air bearing effectively prevents the insulating effect that static air between surfaces could lead to - slowly heating up, but not going anywhere or effectively exchanging its heat? So whatever conducts to the air is whisked off, and radiative heat transfer is easily facilitated? I can't say for sure, I'm no engineer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheFlyingGerbil Posted June 26, 2012 Report Share Posted June 26, 2012 Apparently it is actually to be built. It just looks SO futuristic, I can hardly believe it. Sci Fi Sets Sail Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fuchikoma Posted June 26, 2012 Report Share Posted June 26, 2012 Apparently it is actually to be built. It just looks SO futuristic, I can hardly believe it. Sci Fi Sets Sail That's the new sea lab? Awesome! I wonder what the acceleration will be like in the top floors when massive waves are tossing it about... At first I thought "hey, that looks like a floating Burj al Arab..." derp. Of course it does - it was designed to look like a sail after all... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted June 27, 2012 Report Share Posted June 27, 2012 (edited) I disagree. It matters very much what the thickness of any thermal insulator is - even thermal paste. It stands to reason that it's still less optimal to have a gap than to have a continuous conductive medium, but it is possible to get it down to a point where the detriments no longer outweigh the benefits, depending on the dissipation of the cooling fin surface. They were saying that one of the main problems they were working against was the insulating effect of stagnant air on fin surfaces - perhaps the dynamic nature of the air bearing effectively prevents the insulating effect that static air between surfaces could lead to - slowly heating up, but not going anywhere or effectively exchanging its heat? So whatever conducts to the air is whisked off, and radiative heat transfer is easily facilitated? I can't say for sure, I'm no engineer. I, however, do have an engineering degree (not practicing though). Yes, it matters how thick an insulator is. What I'm saying is that air between the chip and the fan/heat sink in any thickness is too thick to transfer the heat off the chip to the fan/heat sink quickly enough. They may have increased the efficiency with which the sink dissipates heat to the surrounding air but that doesn't do them any good if the chip can't get the heat to sink quickly enough. A fire hose doesn't do you any good if you've only got a kitchen faucet feeding it. *Edit* - I'd also like to add that my degree is in Mechanical Engineering, and in my studies I focused on thermodynamics and heat transfer systems. Edited June 27, 2012 by TheMightyEthan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mercurial Posted June 27, 2012 Report Share Posted June 27, 2012 That boat looks really nice, but it reminds me too much of Brink. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTF Posted June 27, 2012 Report Share Posted June 27, 2012 *Edit* - I'd also like to add that my degree is in Mechanical Engineering, and in my studies I focused on thermodynamics and heat transfer systems. OT Note: Funny how most engineers today end up in law, media, finance or investment banking. I'm one of them after all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fuchikoma Posted June 27, 2012 Report Share Posted June 27, 2012 That's impressive, but I'm looking at it more from the standpoint of Sandia's credibility. They have some incredible minds working for them, so do you think they're distorting the usefulness of this device? That it will dissipate heat very poorly? That they've overlooked this and maybe not tested it yet? You have me dead to rights on the theoretical capabilities of it, but I'd find it really strange that they'd put out this video if it turned out it doesn't work very well compared to existing active cooling systems. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted June 27, 2012 Report Share Posted June 27, 2012 No, I totally believe they got it working, I just want to know how, and I don't think any of the explanations you suggested work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fuchikoma Posted June 28, 2012 Report Share Posted June 28, 2012 A high performance oxygen delivery solution has been made, that could be injected into people unable to breathe, allowing them to survive for additional minutes. No video clip, but... c'mon! This is awesome! 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mal Posted June 28, 2012 Report Share Posted June 28, 2012 That is pretty cool. I wonder how packed is that solution to keep something as large as humans alive for long. It'll be insane if we could get something like 15 extra minutes from those injections. Also I don't think an action video is needed. By the sound of it, they made a lipid membrane that can hold oxygen molecules but readily gives it up to red blood cells. Pretty much it. Magic of chemistry, more specifically... organic chemistry (I'M SCARED MOMMY!). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mal Posted July 4, 2012 Report Share Posted July 4, 2012 (edited) The Large Hadron Collider seems to have served it purpose: find the Higgs Boson or something really much like it. At the very least, they found something. Edit: Actually, at 5 sigma... thinking back to Stats... they are REALLY damn certain they found it as predicted. FYI, Peter Higgs first proposed the boson back in 1964, 48 years ago. He's alive and kicking at the announcement. He must feel like a billion bucks. Edited July 4, 2012 by MaliciousH Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted July 4, 2012 Author Report Share Posted July 4, 2012 They're 99.99999% certain they found something that's "Higgs-like". It's going to be many arduous years until they can be certain they found the standard model higgs boson. There's always the fun part where they've found the Higgs Boson, but it doesn't act how it should. Their method of finding the higgs is to look at the aftermath of the collision and work backwards. It's like trying to find a Jaguar by going through shredded car parts. Some expected them to just be at 3-4 Sigma, so this is certainly something (of course them flying in Peter Higgs to the announcement did kinda give away they had something good). But yes, all big news all the same. And this was before they ramped the LHC up to full capacity, so results like this make it oh so much more promising. Must suck to be working on Tevatron right now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted July 31, 2012 Report Share Posted July 31, 2012 Supposedly what appears to be fire is actually due to heat generated from air friction. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fuchikoma Posted July 31, 2012 Report Share Posted July 31, 2012 Woah! That railgun is looking seriously svelte these days. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted July 31, 2012 Author Report Share Posted July 31, 2012 That actually looks to be the early version given it seems to be firing the "hypersonic bricks" rather than the newer (though kinda old now) missile shape projectiles. Which I can't still get over the fact they started with bricks instead of missile shapes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted July 31, 2012 Report Share Posted July 31, 2012 My understanding is that this is demonstrating a turret that could potentially actually be mounted on a ship, whereas previous ones have been too large. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted July 31, 2012 Author Report Share Posted July 31, 2012 It's not the size that has been the issue, ships are fucking huge, you can put ships on ships, it's that the power needs have been too great for what a ships powerplant can deliver. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted July 31, 2012 Report Share Posted July 31, 2012 (edited) Ships are huge, but you still need the gun to be small enough that it can be turreted so it's aimable. It doesn't do you any good to be able to put a rail gun on a ship if it's fixed in one direction. Unless you want to go back to the "close to point-blank range and broadside" method of ship combat. Edited July 31, 2012 by TheMightyEthan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted July 31, 2012 Author Report Share Posted July 31, 2012 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fuchikoma Posted August 1, 2012 Report Share Posted August 1, 2012 Well, the date in the video puts it at several months ago. Before that, I'd mainly seen this one from 2010, though I don't really keep up on them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted August 1, 2012 Author Report Share Posted August 1, 2012 When video is uploaded and when video is produced can be two different times. Especially given that video had to become unclassified. In some cases, like for Boston FBI, the video might be uploaded before it's produced. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted August 1, 2012 Report Share Posted August 1, 2012 That looks like a battleship, which if that's the case we don't use those anymore. The ships we'd be mounting these guns on are much smaller. More like this: The turret on that is much more comparable to the one in the video (though still larger). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fuchikoma Posted August 1, 2012 Report Share Posted August 1, 2012 I'm not talking about the upload or production date though. I mean the part where it says "Office of Naval Research Electromagnetic Railgun Program Commissioning Test of BAE built railgun at NSWC Dahlgren February 2012." I take that to mean that for all we know, they could have built it in the 70s (kinda doubtful though...) but the test firing was in Feb. 2012. So seeing that the other "recent" naval railgun test I'd seen was from 2010, I'd still stand by my statement that the railguns are looking much more compact now (assuming it's not an entirely different project... the older one seemed to be going for a kinetic energy output target, though it seemed to fire the same projectiles and I still haven't seen one in that range that small until now.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted August 24, 2012 Report Share Posted August 24, 2012 This is 3 years old, but I can't for the life of me figure out why it didn't make big news when it happened: Robot programmed to love goes horribly wrong. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted August 24, 2012 Author Report Share Posted August 24, 2012 Same reason the Abortion factory thing never hit national news. You have read the side bar of "recent entries" right? Man swallows three controllers, Palin challenges Obama to sandwich eating contest, etc. It's an Onion wannabe site. The robot itself exists, but it's not a "loving robot", just one built to be able to carry old folks around http://www.engadget.com/2006/02/28/ri-man-the-soft-and-cuddly-robot/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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