kz08+@andrew.cmu.edu (Ken Zuroski) (03/05/90)
As a kid I too ran through the gambit of burning out resistors, exploding capacitors, etc. One time I encased a transistor in Lucite or some other type of clear plastic, leaving the leads sticking out, then applied voltage--mini bomb. I am horrified at some at the things I used to do, now that I look back on them. I never had an accident, but it sure wasn't from trying, or giving bad luck the opportunity to visit. One "experiment" that I performed in particular reminds me (1) how kids like to "hack"; (2) how dangerous some of things are that kids can get into, and (3), especially, how stupid I was as a twelve-year-old. Let me briefly relate this story, although it doesn't have much to do with electronics. I was raised in a very rural town in which the prevalent attitude toward safety was cavalier at best. My father had built our house maybe fifteen years before I was born. In order to do so, he had to cut down trees and blast away a lot of glacial erratics (boulders) which were prevalent in the countryside in which we lived. In order to the latter, he used some type of dynamite. As far back as I can remember, I recall asking my mother what was in that "shiny box" above our head in the rafters of our garage. She would say: "don't you dare go near there; those are dynamite caps which your father used to clear the area" etc. etc. Of course, that only stoked my interest. Nowadays it seems it was rather irresponsible of my parents to leave that lying around, of course. But again, it was nothing that all my neighbours didn't also do, and really didn't strike me as being at all unusual at the time. Well, both my parents worked and so in the summers I was alone a lot. I had one friend in the area who would walk over to play. One day we were bored. And so, yep, we climbed up to the rafters and took down that box. I was about twelve years old at the time. Once we got it open (it was all encrusted and rusted; by now it was twenty or twenty-five years old); we looked inside and gasped. Contrary to what my mother told me, it wasn't dynamite caps at all. It was bona-fide sticks of dynamite. Four pieces. Like roman candles. So old that I remember that there was some kind of oil oozing out of them. Now, I didn't really know anything about dynamite and still don't, but if I found a box like that today you can bet that I would be very, very far away from it in a second's time. Who knows how unstable it would be after all those years? I haven't a clue; but it would seem like a good plan just to leave it alone, wouldn't you agree? Well, can you guess what we did, geniuses that we were (Darwinism in action, here, folks)? Yep, that's right: we tore the paper off each stick to get at the explosive inside. It was white and sorta like clay and so we shaped it into little figurines. I made a dinosaur and Paul Hamby (my friend), I remember, spent a lot of time making an enviable likeness of the Starship Enterprise, mumbling away and talking to himself as he worked. Then we took them into the woods and--get this--struck matches and *lit them on fire.* I remember watching gleefully as they flared up with an intense white light. Whenever I am feeling depressed and thinking that life has done me a bad turn, I remember this incident and how lucky I was. And I immediately am happy again, knowing that I am living when I don't deserve to be. Anyone out there know how likely it was for this stuff to explode? We did a lot of stupid things--made gunpowder and pipe bombs, etc., but this one lives in my memory as being the worst. --ken z.
ken@cs.rochester.edu (Ken Yap) (03/05/90)
Ah yes, I remember getting a batch of transistors removed from faulty equipment as a gift from my brother-in-law, who worked for the phone company. Most of them were shorted, but a few were usable. These were the ones encased in glass and made good photodetectors if you scraped off the black paint. Anyway I decided to send the shorted ones off in style and discovered that if I applied 6.3 volts from a filament heater it would make the transistor explode, case and all. The first one to explode sent a sliver of glass flying that hit my upper eyelid causing a surface wound. A little bit lower and I might not be typing this in today. Didn't discourage me, I detonated the others from a safe distance thereafter. We were holy terrors in those days, wonder how EEs every survive...
forbes@aries.scs.uiuc.edu (Jeff Forbes) (03/05/90)
In article <IZwNThu00VQc0GOWF1@andrew.cmu.edu> kz08+@andrew.cmu.edu (Ken Zuroski) writes: >Four pieces. Like roman candles. So >old that I remember that there was some kind of oil oozing out of >them. Old dynamite sweats nitroglycerine. > >Whenever I am feeling depressed and thinking that life has done me a >bad turn, I remember this incident and how lucky I was. And I >immediately am happy again, knowing that I am living when I don't >deserve to be. Anyone out there know how likely it was for this stuff >to explode? > Alfred Nobel made all of his money from his invention of dynamite, which is a tame version of nitroglycerine. Neat nitroglycerine is extremely unstable, and it takes very little shock or heat to detonate it. By adsorbing it into dry clay Nobel made an explosive that was relatively safe to transport. While not recommended, I have heard that it can be thrown around, stepped on, and beat on with usually little result. Dynamite typically needs a blasting cap to set it off. I suspect that if one end of the stick had been lit, rather than an open mass it might have exploded. >We did a lot of stupid things--made gunpowder and pipe bombs, etc., but this >one lives in my memory as being the worst. > >--ken z. Jeff
ken@cs.rochester.edu (Ken Yap) (03/05/90)
|Alfred Nobel made all of his money from his invention of dynamite, which |is a tame version of nitroglycerine. Neat nitroglycerine is extremely |unstable, and it takes very little shock or heat to detonate it. By It is (was?) very quirky stuff too. I was reading about the construction of the Union Pacific railroad. While the Central Pacific stuck to raw manpower, the Union Pacific was innovative and tried nitroglycerine (which was more effective than blasting powder) but not without terrible accidents. One nitro explosion demolished an entire powder shed but some other crates of nitro near the blast didn't even go off. Oops, this is straying from electronics...
phil@ingr.com (Phil Johnson) (03/06/90)
In article <IZwNThu00VQc0GOWF1@andrew.cmu.edu> kz08+@andrew.cmu.edu (Ken Zuroski) writes: >Once we got it open (it was all encrusted and rusted; by now it was >twenty or twenty-five years old); we looked inside and gasped. >Contrary to what my mother told me, it wasn't dynamite caps at all. It >was bona-fide sticks of dynamite. Four pieces. Like roman candles. So >old that I remember that there was some kind of oil oozing out of >them. The oozing oil is referred to as "sweating". It is NOT oil but is infact semi- hydrolyzed Nitroglycerine. >Now, I didn't really know anything about dynamite and still don't, but >if I found a box like that today you can bet that I would be very, >very far away from it in a second's time. Who knows how unstable it >would be after all those years? I haven't a clue; but it would seem The better part of valor is PF Flyers. >Whenever I am feeling depressed and thinking that life has done me a >bad turn, I remember this incident and how lucky I was. And I >immediately am happy again, knowing that I am living when I don't >deserve to be. Anyone out there know how likely it was for this stuff >to explode? You should look back on this experience as an "UNLIFTING" experience and count your lucky stars and say thank you to your guardian angle. How dangerous was? The "sweat" can be caught on you finger and flicked at a solid object. When it hits there will be a small explosion, like a Craker Ball that kids step on. *** this is a small drop of the nitro. Typically a sweating stick of 60/40 dynamite (general construction mix) will ecavuate a crater about three feet across and two feet deep. Most of the Navy EOD (Explosive Ordance Disposal) guys I knew would gingerly move this box to a detonation crater an blow it IMMEDIATELY! You are definitely two lucky souls. -- Philip E. Johnson UUCP: usenet!ingr!phil MY words, VOICE: (205) 730-8112 MY opinion!
pahsnsr@nmtsun.nmt.edu (Paul A. Houle) (03/19/90)
Prehaps the most dramatic mini-bomb that I've made out of parts you can buy at radio shack was a light-emitting-diode that I dipped under liquid nitrogen. Under liquid nitrogen, you can operate yellow and green LED's continuously at up to about 9 volts. When you do that, there are several distinct voltage levels where power consumption increases by three orders of magnitude or so and the colors change. Trying it with a red LED the first time, I blew it apart, cracking the case and vaporizing/fragmenting the actual semiconductor inside. The burst sprayed liquid nitrogen over the table which sizzled for quite a while.