youtube

[Mark]

Joe, I used that same clip in my "dissertation" on wanting to crack methanol in my snorkeler, bottom of page 74 in Odds and Ends. If you could get even as little as 5% hydrogen to form I was thinking it would be the "equivalent" of increasing the oxygen in the air a few percentage points. It certainly is an energetic demo. I wonder what diameter pinhole the copper vessel uses and how long the hole is too? It's almost like a high frequency tiny jam jar the way it buzzes before the big bang. Or do you remember on some jam jars how they don't light but form that little dome of fire over the hole and hum softly because the fuel/air ratio is shot inside the jar? I once made a little 3/4 inch diameter reeded pulsejet about 13 inches long where after lighting the tip of the tail, the flame wouldn't advance down the 1/4 inch tail pipe but formed a dome of fire and there was this tone like buzzing bee. After 10 seconds or even 20 seconds or so the reed, after opening and closing in some ultra-micro mode, would cause the pre-primed jet to reach an acceptable fuel/air ratio and the flame front would suddenly advance down the exhaust tube and the jet screamed to life. I used a single .003ths blue tempered spring steel homemade petal valve over a mirror polished washer for a reed. This is an impressive sound effect too, for anyone who has built a Sibley-sized craft jet, you know just how loud they can be. Even when they backfire, they are very hard on your ears.
Hydrogen is not very fussy in fuel/air ratios. That's why I hoping there was some way to increase the forgiveness of my snorkeler in starting and sustaining sometimes, making methanol even more idiot proof. I recall my brother using a long piece of very small diameter copper tubing with propane. He preheated the flowing propane in the copper tubing in the fire produced from the tip of the copper tubing. It was about 3 feet long from the ramjet like can where the combustion took place but the pinhole sized "nozzle" was far ahead of the engine. He crimped a pin in the tubing and then pulled it out and I think he used a drill press chuck to pre-crimped the tubing so as to get the hole centered. He had to tweak it several times to get the right nozzle effect. Now when he fired this thing up, sort of like a linear Gluhareff, the pinhole sized hole firing super-heated propane into the throat of the open ended can was deafening. I told him the other day I wanted to video it. It was horribly loud, I have to wonder if the propane was getting cracked somewhat in the regenerator coils or just so hot that it explodes when it mixes with the air by the time it reaches the can. I'm a fairly brave guy, but the noise was such that I felt something was going to explode. I don't think anybody could imagine that much noise from a pinhole nozzle and small propane canister with the flow regulator drilled out. No exaggeration, it was deafening. I was impressed to say the least.

[Mark]

Levitating Water Droplets
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0Wqw1rIs6A
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70QlzUNmCuI

[Mark]

Maybe I could mount a steel golf ball somewhere below the intake inside the tank of my snorkeler. ha
Creating a science of turbulence through theory, experiment, and simulation
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zn6dN3P7 ... re=channel

[Mark]

They should make a pulsejet "flute". I like that multi-exhaust look at the end. ha
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwHgszH0aqI
http://www.engadget.com/2010/12/29/3d-p ... und-video/#

[Mark]

I was looking for some small diameter aluminum flex tubing and came across this. I don't know why, but I liked this simple video.
Aluminum flexible tube former
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzkEiIo1tuI

[Mark]

Old news in review.
Around the 20 second mark it's kind of nice to see the snorkeler flame motif. With a little more methanol in the bottom and/or a slight extension on the neck, it could really rev up. Or it could suffer catastrophic failure in the form of a bang. ha
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0aqH1JgmZ_4
I've done this with a plastic milk jug with a hole in the cap and a paper mache ostrich egg with a half inch hole drilled in the pointy end. Thinking the egg would jam jar, I held it in my hand, and it stung my fingers when it went bang. In this video I liked the little girl asking, "What happened to that one?" ha
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BnHL_UlbUaI
Interesting animation of a methanol mistake.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYgJcnzr_2k

[Mark]

Weekend Project: Styrofoam Plate Speaker
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIbzQ_8-aaM
Tune in again next week for a styrofoam plate microphone. ha

[Mark]

These guys are good, and I envy them for having a fun job making/designing these rockets. They really put some effort into it. I think you will be surprised at the tricks they come up with. I love the creativity and sense of humor. Give it a chance, and you will see. It's annoying that some other video automatically starts after the first one, not related to the series.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2WpIdOU ... 9C&index=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_G3hMrqJ ... C&index=21
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wMU7sG9 ... re=related

[Mark]

Supercritical fluids
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBRdBrnIlTQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6S7bZbx ... h_response

Lots of fun facts about supercritical fluids here.
"In 1822, Baron Charles Cagniard de la Tour discovered the critical point of a substance in his famous cannon barrel experiments. Listening to discontinuities in the sound of a rolling flint ball in a sealed cannon filled with fluids at various temperatures, he observed the critical temperature. Above this temperature, the densities of the liquid and gas phases become equal and the distinction between them disappears, resulting in a single supercritical fluid phase."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supercritical_fluid

[Mark]

"Happy Birthday or Get Well Soon" (Mike) ha
Viewer comment
"You can increase power efficiency by buying a 5-dollar mylar emergency heat blanket from walmart or any camping store - less wrinkles, or none if you are determined. good job."
Solar furnace with Doritos bags
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gb_EhbMXTHM

[Mark]

PARABOLIC DISH MIRROR PARABOLOID HOMEMADE DIY REFLECTOR RENEWABLE ENERGY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nGheClD-lY

I noticed my chromed metal ear syringe had a tiny parabolic shape to it so I tried it out and it melted a tiny spot on my TV remote control and got some paper to start smoking just from the tiny splash guard.
http://www.amazon.com/Syringes-Ear-%60E ... B000LX0A1A

[Mark]

If I was big into slingshots, I might have ended up like this guy. But instead, I have a lot of tubing and jars. ha
Jörg Sprave's best slingshots
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZypZVxpyMM#t=2m24s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTQUYT7y ... re=related

[Mark]

Large Iris windowshade mechanism
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TuEqHp64UvQ

[Mark]

Kind of a study in sound. At around 4:45 it shows an interesting representation of the cooling process.
Cooling with sound waves.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwV4Gkni ... re=related

[Mark]

A funny effect.
Alternative Energy from Sound Waves can be achieved!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6KRxWEYCxo
And another spinner.
The Feynman Water Sprinkler Experiment
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQrkiH0U1Yg