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Transparent Concrete
rakerman writes: "The Economist reports in How to see through walls that development is underway on translucent concrete, with hopes of eventually developing transparent concrete. Can transparent aluminium be far behind?"
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Won't translucent structures lead to an increase rate of smack death amongst bird populations?
According to Dr. Price, of course.
I guess as long as the price is right, we can go for it.
cue the drummer, please
"You know why you do not see me styling wit my homies? Because I have no homies!!" -Mojo Jojo
They should work on making it so that Scotty wont confuse the mouse for a microphone.
Who run Barter Town?
Well, it's nice to see innovation within the construction sector isn't dead. Even for something that seems so off the wall as transparent (or currently, translucent) concreat can give birth to innovative new designs and possibilities from architechs.
I mean, I can just see a wall done with a bubble effect (with slighly differnt opacities in the aggitates and clear binding coumpound).
Only thing is, once transparent concreate is perfected... how are the mobsers going to get rid of bodies if they can't throw them in the foundation of a new building anymore...
The article mentions the problem that it really needs a transparent reinforcing material to work well. So obviously transparent aluminum is what you want for rebar....
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
...after all, Scotty already gave us transparent alumnium to replace plexiglas in Star Trek IV...
They're called windows, and they're usually made of a neat transparent material called glass... ;-)
Seriously, though, any slurry-based material like concrete is most likely to be opaque because microscopic structures tend to scatter light. You only need to pour a glass of milk to see this in action.
"It take 9 months to bear a child, no matter how many women you assign to the job."
I seriously doubt we will ever see transparent aluminum. In order for it to succceed, the atoms would have to be aligned in a crystaline matrix. Such a matrix would likely create a hard, yet weak substance.
It would have much strength, yet it would fracture easily. Its called "Modulus of elasticity"; something certain steels(H11 namely) holds in spades. I doubt even if it could be produced, people would find it of much use.
You can't legislate goodness. Let each to his own destiny, by will of his freely made choices.
Can transparent aluminium be far behind?
It's already here, although in the form of an oxide rather than the pure metal.
Dirk
Aluminium isn't transparent and it's quite hard to change a metal's transparency property (I think it involved some time space continua). so forget about that.
--- Sigmentation Fault - Comments Dumped
A little off topic, but germane to the item noted in the summary for this topic.
He refers to transparent aluminum from the Star Trek IV movie. In that film, they risk rewriting history by giving the technology for transparent aluminum to a 20th century factory.
They never answer the basic question of why did the aluminum have to be transparent? Why not regular aluminum or any other such material? Do the whales need a view of the Klingon starship? Do they have no cameras or sensors to let them see the whales?
It made no sense at all but it was a major plot point for the whole film. Sigh. Ok, mod me off topic now.
Has it been over a year since you last donated to the Electronic Frontier Foundation
How's that going to help my weed plantation?
"Can transparent aluminium be far behind?"
Yes, transparent aluminum can be far behind. Metals like aluminum have free electrons which prevent transmission of light.
Bush's education improvements were
Apparently neither The Economist nor Slashdot knows the difference between translucent and transparent. Ugh.
Anyway, this is old news. Metropolis magazine reported on the development of translucent concrete back in April 2001.
would be to legislate that all new residential and commercial dwellings be built from transparent concrete.
Anyone refusing to demolish their existing house would be added to a database of 'potential conspirators'.
This would be quite consistent with recent 'anti-terrorist' surveillance legislation.
Also, the boom in building would boost the flagging economy.
Imagine whole neighbourhoods of people living in complete exposure, proving they're real honest patriotic Americans.
-- In the beginning was the WORD, and the WORD was UNSIGNED, and the main(){} was without form and void...
I wouldn't want to live in a transparent house. Think of the lack of privacy. People'd be able to see when I was in the bedroom, when I was in the bathroom... They'd be able to see all my movements.
although right now it sounds more like Plexi glass or a liquid epoxy of some sort. kudos to the marketing rep who associated it with concrete.
on the other hand, at my old middle school, the school had outgrown it's original gym, and elected to build a second gym away from the main building, made entirely from concrete. I never understood how that thing stood; it was full-sized, housed a cafeteria in one end, and above that was the wrestling mat. to get to the point, it was abysmally dark in there. they had xeon HID lamps or the likes in there, and things were still pretty dim. emergency lights would no doubt have poorly lit it also. making the east and west walls semi-translucent would have significgantly improved lighting conditions.
i wonder if you could put an element in this "concrete" that would block IR light, otherwise I can't see this being implimented in the south or very far north, as it would cause massive heat-loss/absorbsion.
moox. for a new generation.
There is a very big difference between "transparent" and "translucent". The former means that light passes through the material almost completely unchanged (a certain amount of distortion is okay, but the point is that you can make out what's behind it). Translucent means that light is transmitted, but it's diffuse and you can't make out what's behind the material. This concrete is translucent. It's not transparent (read the article).
oooahheeehheheeeehheoooaheooeao
Just make a Counter-Strike map out of this transparent concrete and people wouldn't need to Wall-hack anymore!
Syrinx is exactly right! I can't count the number of times I've had to correct would-be nitpickers about this.
The real problem with transparent building materials is that people inside want to control the transparency, just look at your own home, you got curtains and shades on all(most) windows.
:)
:)
A classic problem with new hightech buildings (Glass 'n metal) is climate control, its nice to be able to look outside, but if the sun is starring you right back its not that fun. So you tint the windows
The next problem is that in those buildings the light that gets through is not white light (sunlight) anymore, and working in that kind of buildings can cause depressions very similary to winter depressions.
Remember: Architects are just building nerds
can someone explain to me what the writer of this story meant when they said "can transparent aluminium be far behind?" (i think he meant translucent) What does alumunium have to do with concrete ? Did i miss a joke ?
Contain my voice. Place my user into your foe list.
Can material described in the article really be called "concrete"?
As it is written there its only resemblance to concrete is that it consists of coarse aggregate, fine aggregate and binding agent. But this is not a recipe for concrete only - also for other materials. Also, Dr. Price's secret material can't be poured or produced on site - one the main reasons of traditional concrete popularity. It would probably find its use in form of blocks of translucent material, that could be used to enhance possibilities for architects but what Dr. Price is trying to do is another building material, which is very interesting indeed but can hardly be called "concrete".
Plasteel was a concept I first read about in Count Zero. What other sci fi authors have invented a "stronger than steel and as visible as glass" idea?
Buildings glowing from within? This is terrible for astronomers... the added light pollution would further ruin the viewing conditions for many great observatories.
"I would say that 99 per cent of what my father has written about his own life is false." - L. Ron Hubbard Jr.
From the article - "That is not as crazy as it sounds. Technically, concrete is simply a mixture of three ingredients: big lumps of material called the coarse aggregate (such as gravel), smaller lumps called the fine aggregate (such as sand) and a binding agent, or cement, to glue it all together into a solid. So translucent concrete, in theory, should be fairly easy to make using bits of plastic or glass of various sizes, with some kind of transparent glue to act as a binding agent."
So basically he wants to make concrete using glass and plastic. What the hell does making see through aluminum have to do with anything? Do slashdot editors read the articles before posting them?
Timed popup? Sheesh, that's worse than most porn sites.
Won't be going there again.
People in concrete houses should not throw stones?
After all, most of us are reading this through a good chunk of transparent mixture of lead and sand! Yes, good quality glass used for CRT displays...
In Murphy We Turst
I can't believe we've made it this far without a debate on the spelling of Aluminium.
--jquirke
What I find most amazing is he models the molecules on like a Mac Plus, if I remember right (haven't seen it since it came out)...
Imagine what he coulda done w/a g4. You say "Hello, Computer" and it actually listens!
W
-------------------
This is my SIG. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
What next? Transparent curtains?
If you lived in a transparent concrete house would you still have to refrain from stone throwing?
If voting were effective, it would be illegal by now.
parent contains goatse link:
The amount of light that gets through goatse^-cx where a is a constant and x is the thickness of the metal
First we had clear Pespi.
Then we had clear deodorant.
Saturday Night introduced us to clear gravvy.
Like clear concrete was that far behind?
almunium! (you jerk!)
You are not buttfucked. You can ask to be buttfucked by michael now using the convenient form below, or Create a Bumfuck Account for regular assreaming by /. janitors. Without proper registration you're just another Anonymous Fuck.
Architect "...are the stairs, and this is where the wi..."
Programmer "NO! NO! I will not have windows installed!"
A pizza of radius z and thickness a has a volume of pi z z a
I have to agree here -- I don't think that crystalline structure alone will confer transparency on a material, especially metal. It has firstly to do with the properties of the atoms and molecules themselves, and maybe second the crystalline nature.
Why, then, would glass be transparent? Glass has a most uncrystalline structure!
Selfridges in oxford street apparently has a "key worker" living behind plate glass this week. I haven't found the time to have a peek yet though :-(
this sure is an 'interesting' post. its total bs. the author doesnt have the first clue what hes talking about.
* common aluminum _is_ crystalline
* common glass (arguably the prototype of a transparent material) _is_not_ crystalline
* in fact, transparancy has little to do with crystallinity (think diamond or quartz)
* strength _is_not_ the same as stiffness (which in turn is the youngs modulus)
* H11 steel?
it made me laugh though; maybe it was meant to be funny?
..the mafia will have to find other places to bury people like Jimmy Hoffa!
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
This is terrible news! Do you realize how hard it is to dispose of a body using transparent concrete?
The ladies showers. The peep hole is dead.
Thank you.
and buildings whose windows need not be flat, rectangular panes, but can be arbitrary regions of transparency within flowing, curving walls.
Sorry, but that is already possible.
A researcher at the university of Delft has developed a way to create twisted glass allowing for twisted buildings.
A dutch article can be found here. Take a look at the images if you don't understand the text
"We live in our minds, and existance is the attempt to bring that life into physical reality" Ayn Rand
Love,
Jon
On the upside, if anyone tries it, my curiosity as to what such a corpse looks like after a few years will no doubt be satisfied.
His name is Anal Cocks, not Alan Cocks!
If the world switches over to a new plastic+epoxy-based concrete, the beautiful smell of rain on concrete in the city will give way to the smell of water on heavy plastic or some other nonporous surface (i.e. the smell of a wet bathtub).
Don't people think before they go off trying to revolutionize everything?
Wow, glass bricks. What will they think
of next, Scotty?
maybe mimes actually make lots of sound , but maybe they are just trapped in big trabsparent concrete cubes ?
Hmm, maybe we could all live like smurfs in giant mushroom houses.. i mean.. what the hell is he thinking? how do you expect to make non rectangular windows....? maybe this can be used in one of those 'art houses', you know, those ones with the 20' steel doors, and the giant gargoiles and the 'modern art' paintings consisting of black and only black ("I call it, city.. at night!").
MABASPLOOM!
I just wish they'll be able to achieve this great feat of engineering: Transparent female bathrooms.
Go, scientist, go.
-
Roses are #FF0000, Violets are #0000FF, find / -name '*base*' |xargs chown -R us && mv zig greatjustice
People who live in transparent houses shouldn't take showers unless they're sexy. ;)
Hope they have this ready for the next series of big brother....
Cruise TT
The explanation on how to achieve this reads a bit funny.
It seems to assume that if one mixes two transparent
components (e.g. glass grid, and some transparant matrix), the result is also transparent.
This is not true, as every high school boy that studied optics can tell you. Refraction index, surface properties etc.
It will probably be pretty hard to make a transparant material from two components, let alone keep the other properties of concrete.
Would be really if they could have completely transparent concrete.
Here is a question that seems to have gone unasked, what are the insulation properties of this new material likley to be?
It seems to me that concrete is a pretty good heat conductor and that this new material being made of a mix of glass and plastic and 'glue' might be okay (glass is a good heat conductor, but plastics tend to be a pretty good heat insulators). Also controlled air bubbles could add to this insulation, and reduce weight where strength is not required.
This could save alot of money and help build more energy efficient buildings (not to mention the cheap light source, ie sunlight)
Now here is another thought, how about 1 way translucent concrete, let the light in, but not out?!? (Well just a thought)
The article mentions that the doctor wants the material to be able to recycle. The author comments that this might be a "tall order".
This tells me they must be using some VERY uncommon bonding agent. They do mention the use of glass, which is a sand product anyway, being used.
It's hard to imagine why they couldn't recycle this stuff like they recycle concrete now. It makes me even more curious as to what their formula is.
. Quit playing Monopoly with Bill. Switch to one of many non-Microsoft products today.
coarse aggregate - dried fruit
fine aggregate - flour
binding agent - eggs.
It proved so popular, it's got its own name - cake!
Let's face it, Marie Antoinette would've looked a bit of a dork saying "let them eat edible concrete."
Ok, I'm just a dumb radio/computer geek and gearhead. Pardon my stupidity here but:
How would development of translucent or transparent concrete be related to the development of a transparent aluminium?
I've read everything in the discussion so far and still fail to understand. From what I've read so far the making of concrete is a very different process from making aluminium, which is just what I would have imagined.
So why would reading the article in the Economist cause someone to wonder about the creation of transparent aluminium?
. Quit playing Monopoly with Bill. Switch to one of many non-Microsoft products today.
Edible concrete has been with us for years:
coarse aggregate - dried fruit
fine aggregate - flour
binding agent - eggs.
It proved so popular, it's got its own name - cake!
Let's face it, Marie Antoinette would've looked a bit of a dork saying "let them eat edible concrete."
I haven't any real mod points, but this AC post deserves notice in the context.
-- MarkusQ
Can't happen.
Metals are a "sea of electrons" right ? Basic stuff. When a photon hits it these electrons are responsible for reflecting the particle. And you get basic "skin effect" penetration inverse exponential. It aint possible except in very thin layers. Like gold that can be beaten so thin as to be transparent.
If you get transparent aluminium it'll just be a dielectric not a metal.
Bitter and proud of it.
this april 2001 edition of Metropolis has a pretty informative article on the man and his background.
interesting that i live in houston (concrete captial next to LA) and never have read an article on this guy.
/* Half alive and half dead too, work is for suckers and the sucker is you. - "Half-life" by Local H*/
Paul.
You are lost in a twisty maze of little standards, all different.
Error Diagnostic Information ...
Request canceled or ignored by serverServer busy or unable to fulfill request. The server is unable to fulfill your request due to extremely high traffic or
cost about 5 times more than concrete, is made offsite in pre-fabricated blocks, has exceptionally vivid transparency, and is available today.
Granted, its probably a lot more than 5 times more expensive, but if cost is a concern, and you will settle for the bear minimum of translucency, use plastic.
I've lived in a house with too many windows, and its hell. You would not want every outside wall in your building transparent. If only because furniture is designed to have its back hidden.
The i only got lost on your side of the Atlantic chum. On this side we have aluminium. It goes with Sodium Ammonium and lots more.
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
A little paranoid aren't we, Michael?
"from the mandated-by-anti-terrorism-act-of-2004 dept."
What does a new architectural material have to do with your petty liberty concerns?
Oooohhh. So that is why transparent materials are often also good insulators of electricity. Transparent materials do not have many free electrons, while metals do.
I think by either Marvin or Pella. I've seen promotional materials, and IIRC it was a kind of transparent LCD panel that could be opaqued or made mostly transparent. The downside is that I believe it took power to keep the window transparent, and it was really expensive.
Either way, modern windows, according to my wife who used to work with Andersen Windows, have a higher R factor than a lot of walls -- triple glazing, low emissivity coatings, and krpton/argon filled voids go a long way.
I once heard a comedian describe a house as something like "to distance ourselves from the world, we build houses to live in; to get closer to the world and know what's going on outside, we cut holes in the walls; to separate ourselves again, we put glass in the holes; to feel closer to outside, we make the glass slide up so it's out of the way again; to separate ourselves, we hang curtains to block the holes in the wall; to be closer to the world; we slide the curtains out of the way -- let's just make up our mixed up minds already!"
Transparent or translucent aluminum might save us a step or two.
is Transparent Spandex!!!!
Ohhh yeah baby!!
Just because you have see through concrete doesn't mean you will have see through walls. Those concrete walls,bridge etc don't standup by themselves, they are filled with re-enforcing steel. However if they get the fiber glass strengthed concrete stronger then maybe.
Yes but every time I try to see it your way, I get a headache.
Why tell me now? How much closer are they than they were 50 years ago??? When you develop something, call me.
No, really!
If high quality displays can be made inexpensively, of flexible material, and incorporate light sensors (presumably not overwhelmed with photons emanating from the display), would it not be possible to use them as wall paper on the inside and out and thereby achieve the illusion of transparency?
"Provided by the management for your protection."
Yes! very good idea! It would also be harder for would-be terrorists to aim and crash a plane into an invisible building!
You'll be rich beyond the dreams of Avarice!
Just imagine what Steve Jobs would do with his iMac cases...
Don't quote me on this.
The quest for transparent buildings is eternal among deigners, eternally rejected by building occupants (for the most part). After all, who *really* wants transparent waste lines? Not to mention walls are not uninterupted monolithic entities-there are all sorts of utilities in walls. As a *real* architect ("brick and mortar"), I've seen this sort of fad before, but it is hideously expensive to achieve and can only be done in specialized buildings, not general use. Not to mention, these types of buildings often do not weather well.
If they achieve transparent concrete (not likely IMNSHO), then people that live in transparent (glass) houses WOULD be able to throw stones!
Oh great... NOW I have to worry about driving over TRANSPARENT BRIDGES? :)))
From what I remember, transparent aluminum was supposed to be invented sometime in the '70s.
I've calculated a possible material to use for the binding agent, that's a no brainer: Silicone (as it can be formulated for varying degrees of clarity and density)or fiberglas epoxy resins (the added bonus of this is fairly rapid curing...
However, the ecological impact is a far better thing to consider... For example, recycled bottle glass can be ground down to make both aggregate and filler (you can seperate the colored glass and use that to add a touch of color to the finished product), and ground further down, it can act as filler as well...
Considering that the majority of states in the US only have voluntary glass recycling, it might provide incentive for deposit glass bottles, not to mention finally provide a real incentive to recycle old CRT's...
Or if you're feeling daring, you can use the same optical quality sand they use for reflective road striping to give the concrete an almost luminescent quality... For added strength, use polycarbonate rods or strips in a woven lattice...
The article stated that transparent/translucent concrete can only be prepared offsite, but in theory it can be done the same way as existing concrete, just bring a lot of drums of resin or silicone to the site...
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
People in translucent concrete homes shouldn't throw rocks
That's going to be the next headline. They'll design something like the Jacob Javits Center, and then we'll see transparent floors, and next thing you know, all the execs get sued for sexual harrasment because their secretaries all had offices on the floor above them, not next to them. And for some reason they had to wear skirts...go figure.
"Time is long and life is short, so begin to live while you still can." -EV
Haven't these guys see Star Trek 4? It's supposed to be transparent aluminum, not concrete!
The reason you will never see transparent aluminum is not because of a lack of crystalline structure...
The real reason you will never see transparent aluminum is because it is, well, transparent.
I thought it was Micro$oft who invented the ultimate device to see through walls. didn't Bill Gates call them Windows?
Much easier to find your car in the parking garage.
I would be willing to stretch the definition to include this new material... IF it is also structural.
Hm, tastes like concrete.
Hm, feels like concrete.
Hm, The way this bridge is wobbling makes me think maybe it's not real concrete.
I'm sure the moderator just slipped, and meant +1, funny instead of -1 offtopic. How come I never see these guys in meta-mod?
We need some kind of catchphrase for moderation like this. Humorless Nazi Moderator or something. Then we can reply to posts like this with "HMN Alert" or "Dude, ignore the HMN, I thought it was funny."
Liberty uber alles.
Get a dictionary. There's only one 'I' in aluminum :P
Maybe you didn't catch the in-joke - "transparent aluminum" was an invention and plot device of STAR TREK IV: THE VOYAGE HOME, the most comedically-pleasing flick in the series.
http://www.netl.doe.gov/publications/factsheets/pr oject/Proj070.pdf
Hope their server supports alpha-channels. :-)
This gives a whole new meaning to bump-mapped walls...!
Haven't you heard? "Nothing gets though a General Products hull."
Taken to the logical extreme (where everyone has transparent houses) then we'd have the world of Yvegeny Zamyatin's We. I for one don't want this, and fail to see how more transparency will change the world. Perhaps we'll get an interesting new concert hall out of this (a nice change from halls clad in titanium, such as the Guggenheim museum in Bilbao, Spain) but what else?
Don't see it mentioned anywhere in the comments yet, but after reading the article, the first thing that concerned me is that the nice thing about a concrete building is that it will hold together when it catches fire, not melt, puddle, and add to the blaze with choking poisonous smoke.
Hopefully the designer is taking into account other properties besides strength.
-- perl -e'print pack"H*","6e656d6f406d38792e6f7267"'
http://www.metropolismag.com/html/content_0401/shu lman/
It actually is a potential reality, though:
http://www.netl.doe.gov/publications/factsheets/p
He calls his "glass" Zappi and you can find some more details here
Here is an abstract:
Abstract
Glass is not generally used for loadbearing building components. The primary reason for this is that once the failure process starts in a glass component, the cracks run throughout the entire component. As a consequence the component fails completely in its loadbearing function. This is generally resolved by using metal components in the design that serve as a backup.
For architectural reasons the use of metal components is not desirable while the presence of metal components designed to carry all the loads if the glass fails, obviates the need for a loadbearing function in the glass.
To resolve these problems a hybrid glass/polymer composite system has been developed. Special tempering treatments have been developed to increase the toughness of the glass. In addition a method of combining the specially tempered glass with polymers has been developed. In combination these processes give the following properties :
- structural engineering properties
comparable with aluminium.
- reduced chance of crack initiation and
crack propagation in the tempered glass.
- high residual strength of the component
after accidental damage.
- slow progressive collapse of components if
damage exceeds a certain criterion allowing
for sufficient time to evacuate the building.
- very large components are possible
The resulting system has the advantage of allowing complete transparency, while having adequate strength, stiffness and safety to compete with metals while the increased architectural possibilities outweigh the cost of the components.Rigolo
It might be possible the take a bunch of really thin threads of aluminum and weave them into a mat, which you then embed into a matrix of pale sapphire. Perhaps the metalic threads would enhance the flexibility of the sapphire, while still being thin enough to allow for transparency. The problem that occurs to me is that I believe that sapphire usually solidifies at a higher temperature than aluminum. So keeping the mat intact might be a real challenge.
.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Transparent aluminum is used in rocket weapons
that use forward looking sensors. Rockets go
so fast that this durable substance is used
instead of glass because glass would not stand
up to mere rain at the speeds the rocket reaches.
Thank you AC. When I read the article, it was very clear (pun not intended!) from the beginning that they were aware of the difference. This is The Economist: they might simplify technical subjects, but they rarely make such obvious mistakes. And just to quote one part of the article:
"Dr Price is also the first to admit that translucency is a far cry from transparency. His aim is to champion the idea in the hope that fully transparent concrete will eventually become possible.
"I have as much authority as the pope, I just
don't have as many people who believe it" - George Carlin
I don't want to even think about mausoleums.
"I have as much authority as the pope, I just
don't have as many people who believe it" - George Carlin
Then everybody might know what really happened there!
Is anyone else afraid of something like this? using plastic instead of steel to reinforce a building made of some new kind of concrete. I for one will not set foot in such a building... I have visions of galloping gerdie... (the bridge in Washinton state that wasn't tested enough)
"We" by Yvegeny Zamyatin, written in 1927, is a precursor of Orwell's 1984. It's a classic dystopic novel, which features, among other things, transparent dwellings for exactly the purpose you suggest.
The REAL jabber has the user id: 13196
What you do today will cost you a day of your life
Glass houses that are golf-ball resistant.
And tornado resistant.
Heck, even crowbar resistant. That's right Milo, keep whacking on that window, we'll get in eventually!
-Restil
Play with my webcams and lights here
You know, I don't think that's the intended affect. I think the idea is to actually have transparent concrete.
There are some subtle differences, like, transparent concrete will still display what's on the other side after shelfving is screwed to it and the water cooler falls against it. Oh, and stuff like, it wouldn't need to use any power.
"Stratigraphically the origin of agriculture and thermonuclear destruction will appear essentially simultaneous" -- Lee
i just thought of a neat idea for translucent "concrete".... a big long line of white (superbright, maybe?) LED's, spaced about 18" apart, much like lane dividers of old. add in some refraction properties (the aggrigate substance), and you have an illuminated lane marker....oh wait, you could do that with clear epoxy resin. isn' t that just what "transparent concrete" is going to be? maybe apple should hire his marketing rep.
moox. for a new generation.
Practice random senselessness and act kind of beautiful.
It's aluminum, not aluminium or alumiteenytinyum.
--joshua
NOTE TO MODS (and to those who don't think it's funny): this was not intended as flamebait or trolling!!
I know this is a little off-topic, but here's an unsolved trivia question I've had for a few years that nobody has been able to answer...
If you have ever been to Disneyland (Calif, USA) and been to the Star Tours attraction, when you get about half-way through the line inside the building, as you go around this right-turn, there is this special glass on the right that has parts of it that change rapidly from clear to translucent. I think C3PO is working behind it. This is one of the details they added to the attraction in the past few years.
Anyway, I always wondered how they did that. The entire piece of glass doesn't change at once, only a few squares of it at a time. The piece of glass appears to be one single solid piece (maybe 8 feet tall by 6 feet wide or so if I remember correctly) with no wire leads going to the squares visable (some of the squares are in the middle). The squares don't change to black, but to white translucent, looking much like frosted glass.
I have asked several imagineers about it, but as usual the answer was simply 'it's just magic' followed by 'I can't disclose any of our secrets'.
Has anyone else noticed this piece of glass, and better yet does anyone know how they did it?!
--SONET
Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do. --Benjamin Franklin
There's already a transparent observation floor at the top of the CN Tower in Toronto.
I think you mean an array of void *.
--
There are 10 kinds of people in the world, those who think in binary, and those who don't.
Yeah.
And as the article says, concrete is normally re-inforced when it is used for any type of load-bearing structure. So technically it's sort of a composite material. A bit like fiberglass-epoxy composite. And, despite the fact that both glass and epoxy are transparent, any reasonably thick layer of fiberglass/epoxy is merely translucent. (Unless you paint it or put dye in the epoxy, of course, in which case it is opaque.) I think this proves your point rather well.
If they want transparency they will have to find some way to adjust the index of refraction of the cement (or glue, as they call it), aggregate, and rebar to all match closely, and they will need a reasonably smooth surface finish as well.
Frankly, I think using glass (or clear plastic) aggregate, epoxy and steel rebar would make for a pretty cool-looking structure even if it weren't remotely transparent. The building cost would be out of control, however, and UV radiation is not good for epoxy. Epoxy exposed to sunlight turns yellow pretty quick, and is significantly weakened, at least near the surface.
MM
--
By including this sig, the copyright holders of this work or collection unreservedly place it in the public domain.
I see this being used in stadium domes as a cheap way to light the dome without paying the electricity. Depending on it's insulation, location and gametime it may or may not save money on heating/cooling too over normal domed stadiums.
Superchurches (the 7000+ seating variety) could also use this, which might make for requests for stained glass varieties of Dr. Price's new material (whatever it is).
________________________________________ History Must Not Fall Into The Wrong Hands ___________________________________
For fire resistant concrete, (Polymers)
check out http://www.geopolymer.org/techno2.html
http://www.geopolymer.org/techno6.html
Wander the site, there's more good stuff. I'd love to see an interview with the guy behind this work!
Can transparent aluminium be far behind?
Can an integral version of pi be far behind? 'fraid so.
It's a conspiracy I tell you!!!
Microsoft have been developing transparent concrete for a while now..
fine aggregate = Windows CE
course aggregate = Windows ME
binding agent = Windows NT
Mix them all together and you get
Microsoft CE-ME-NT
He is also keen for transparent concrete to be an environmentally friendly material that can be recycled--though that, too, seems a tall order.
Even though it is a tall order, it should be the most important order...!
I'd rather have sustainability than transparent buildings!
Before I get started, I stress that this is NOT OFFTOPIC, as it addresses a ST:IV nit that's been posted many times to this discussion.
Okay, here it is: Scotty presumably chose to use transparent aluminium rather than steel or some other substance because he had no way to obtain any other substance. He had to give away something significant, which he had access to in either his knowlege or the Bounty (the B'rel in the movie), in order to gain access to to a material. Rather than give away the secret for, say, Duranium, which would have enabled humans to build things so strong that they would change humanity's future drastically (e.g. allowing inpenetrable (by the weapons of the day) armour, or disaster (think terrorism) -proof buildings, etc.), he chose to do the least possible timeline damage as possible by giving away a trivial secret, only useful for aesthetics. Thus, transparent aluminium was the correct choice.
After all, how do you know *insert arbitrary name here* didn't invent the bloody thing?
*while holding mouse to mouth*
Computer? Hello, computer?
Magius_AR
I remember on Mr. Wizards World a long time ago, he said glass actually isn't a solid but a VERY viscous liquid. He even showed this old pane of glass from a cathedral, and the bottom had a noticable buldge. He said it was because over the 300 years that this glass was standing up, the glass slowly flowed down....
I can see it now...
Burgler1: Oh man this place has barred doors.
Burgler2: Just brek a window man.
Burgler1: *SMAACK* *SMACK* *SMACK*.. Hey! what the...I bent my crow bar!
Burglur2: Here let me try...moron. *SMAACK* *SMACK* *SMACK*.. Hey! what the...I beusted my fist
Burgler1: HA HA HA HA, Whos the mon now?
Burgler2: It aint worth it lets go next door.
Could be a fire problem thou.
Builder: Um... emergency exits?
make Linux, not Microsoft. sin(beast) = -0.809016994374947424102293417182819
Have you ever looked at concrete? Its filled with lots of air pockets. It's like the fractal sphere packing problem.
The problem is agravated by the material itself. As concrete cures it generates gas. most of it never reaches the surface to disapate. Therefore; causing voids to apear in the final material. Vibrating the concrete before it's fully cured helps but is never perfect.
Even if you used rosin as the glue and glas beads as the aggregate, you would still have bubbles. As any POVRAY user would tell you you can never get a perfect merge like that in real life.
make Linux, not Microsoft. sin(beast) = -0.809016994374947424102293417182819
I don't think "Why was the tank transparent??" is on the same level as "How can a Macintosh computer talk to an alien computer, give it a virus, and disrupt the defensive shields on every single alien ship attacking?"
The truth is, I don't think "why does this need to be transparent?" was much of a plot point. They needed materials to build a tank, and plexi-glass suited their needs. It really doesn't need to be more complex than that. I don't think anybody was on the edge of their seats going "Why do they need plexi-glass!?!?!? Yeesh, what a crappy movie.".
This type of detail sounds more like you were fishing for an inconsistency in the movie so you could make yourself look more observant. It seems like everybody nowadays is looking for flaws in movies so they can appear smarter to everybody else. The problem with doing this is that you ruin the movie for youself. What's embarrasing is that both Star Trek and Star Wars fans do this alot.
One of my favorite examples of these ludicrous debates is "Turbo Lasers aren't lasers! They don't act like lasers, they can't be lasers!" I actually watched a forum grow out of control over this topic about Star Wars. People got upset! There was name calling and everything. This type of behaviour makes people say "Damn dudes, get a life!!". This makes me afraid to admit I like any of these shows/movies for fear that I might get grouped along with these people.
It's fun to have discussions about it, but to get heated about it is absurd.
Anyway, it's not my intention to flame you, btempleton. I just thought it'd be right of me to bring to your attention the way I interpreted your post.
"Derp de derp."
The tanks, as I said, are not the plot point. In fact they have no real need for them.
The plot point is the time they spend hunting around for money and other means to get the tanks. Kirk sells his glasses and Scott hands over a major new piece of chemistry.
That's the part that was bogus. They didn't need transparent tanks. And frankly, I'm amazed the Klingons didn't have a waterproof hold anyway, or one that could be made waterproof enough for the trip. But if they didn't, they would have affected the past far less by just transporting plates from a yard, stealing though it would be. They just wanted to have a cute scene where Scott tries to talk to a mouse.
(And yet somehow is able to then handle a molecular modelling package like a master.)
Has it been over a year since you last donated to the Electronic Frontier Foundation
All you need is clear large aggregate, clear small aggregate, and adhesive, all with the same index *(&#*&$^*00==0== NO CARRIER
Glückwünsche, haben Sie Slashdot ermordet, indem Sie zum korporativen Druck beugten und Subskriptionen einlei
If it saves just one life, it's worth it!
Only an idiot would argue against such a common sense safety measure.
Do it for the children.
The Ludwig von Mises Institute. The reasoning individuals economics
This is so awesome, you are my hero. I can't figure out how to do it though!
I hate to chime in here to state the obvious. But umm... it really is just a movie. None of it is real. In fact, most of the key techs on there cannot be produced by todays theoretical science. (let alone the real stuff) Soooo... who cares why they needed a clear tank? They just did. You know why you shouldn't worry about it?????
:-)
Because it is just a movie
I promise... Klingons don't really exist.
Indeed. But one of the reasons people read science fiction, and go to SF movies, is because they like seeing an interesting and coherent imagined world presented. And sure, Star Trek could do a far better job at it, but back in 1967, it was actually way ahead of most of the other media SF, so it got its fans.
This is not just SF. With a mystery, the clues and resolution need to be consistent or the viewers will be annoyed. You can't tell them it's just a story.
So it is just a movie, but viewers want it to be a better movie, so when it does something stupid, something not just outside of the rules of its own imagined world but outside the rules of reason, expect people to be annoyed, even if it's just a movie.
Has it been over a year since you last donated to the Electronic Frontier Foundation
'tis'nt long 'til we'll be beamin' up whales into our starships!
i live in a place that where part of the year we need to put up boards or shutters for hurricanes.. if all the windows were concrete like the rest of the structure it sure would save alot on things like insurance(i.e. no windows to break for the 150 mph+ winds) and would be awful cool to accually see outside during a storm..since i've been through 6 in the past 5 years spending 20+ hrs in a very dark room is not the funnest thing i've ever done ..but hey i can go to the beach any day of the year....
Just Limin' Mon
Site is short on information, but it appears this is a mineral/polymer composite, and unfortunately, one that isn't transparent.
Don't know what minerals they are using. Wonder if they could use silicates...
For that matter, the transparent columns, any reason the aggregates couldn't be glass? I think glass would even be cheaper to produce in mass quantities.
-- perl -e'print pack"H*","6e656d6f406d38792e6f7267"'
This stuff would need to expand/contract with temperature at a similar rate to the steel, otherwise you run into problems. You could pre- or post-tension the structure with steel cables run through sleeves in the concrete, but the sleeves also need the same thermal expansion/contraction ratio.
Here in the U.S. concrete is most often used as a structural material anyway, not as a cladding system (though these exist). People don't usually make walls out of it; for these purposes, if you want translucency or transparency, it seems far easier to use any of the myriad varieties of glass block, assuming you don't need a whole lot of structural strength.
Disclaimer: I studied architecture for 4 years and my wife is an architect, but I've been out of the loop for 10 years or so. Civil engineers or architects, please correct me if I'm wrong about any of this.
Read my keyboard review.
Aw come on mods! noone else posted that!
Transparent aluminum was actually already created. Lookin past issues of Scientific American. It been around for about 6 years. They are using it in faceshields for police riot gear etc. but it is expensive and they can't find many applicable uses for it.
Skirt sales will surely plummet.