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New Metal That's Full of Holes

Posted by timothy on from the yeah-right dept.

anoopsinha writes "Wired reports: 'Caltech researchers have made a metallic glass-based foam that is stronger than traditional metal alloys, providing industry with a revolutionary lightweight material.' Currently the applications envisioned for metallic foams are in automobile and aircraft crumple zones, which absorb the impact of collisions, and in artificial bone. Some imagine using the foam to create structures in space."

11 of 75 comments (clear)

  1. Ouch... by EABird · · Score: 4, Funny

    Aircraft crumple zones....

    That can't be good

  2. foam steel by dpilot · · Score: 5, Interesting

    In my high school years, (early 70s) my dream was to set up an orbiting factory making foam steel, flat (radial gradient density glass) lenses, and hollow ball bearings. Of course bubbloy apparently doesn't need to be manufactured in zero G, and my (or anyone else's) factory isn't up there.

    IIWIC, (If I Were In Charge) I'd declare a tax holiday on 50+ mile content in order to promote greater space access. I might exclude satellite communications relays, since that industry is already well developed and I'm trying to foster new development. OTOH maybe not, since more development opportunities might arise.

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  3. Not as cool as Aerogel by Tom7 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Aerogel is 99.8% holes. Check out the photos of a thin sheet insulating crayons from a blowtorch!

    1. Re:Not as cool as Aerogel by snake_dad · · Score: 4, Informative
      For those that only looked at the pretty pictures: Aerogel is used in the Stardust spacecraft, that is at this very moment collecting spacedust. On january 2nd 2004 it will fly past the comet Wild-2, and collect particles from the comet. And in 2006 the spacecraft will return to earth to bring back the samples.

      And this is only one of the spectacular things that NASA is doing next year. There is also the Mars rovers mission, Cassini-Huyghens will arive at Saturn, and (hopefully) the Shuttle will fly again..

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  4. Metal that's full of holes? by vasqzr · · Score: 5, Funny


    Nobody told me Microsoft opened a steel mill?

  5. Re:One Step . . . by KDan · · Score: 4, Funny

    Just keep on going in this direction, increase the bubble/metal ratio and soon we'll have transparent aluminium which looks like air, feels like air, and has the structural strength of air! Think of all the applications!!!

    Daniel

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    Carpe Diem
  6. Re:One Step . . . by zangdesign · · Score: 4, Funny

    I spent the whole morning talking into my mouse, trying to convince my computer to display the formula, but alas ...

    I'm stuck with this quaint keyboard thing.

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  7. Re:bubbloy? by Theresa+Bean · · Score: 5, Funny

    I thought the name was cute.:-p

    But they'll have to come up with a really catchy "space-agey" name to market it to the general public. The idea of a commercial VO saying "The new BMW 7-series, now with BUBBLOY!" makes me giggle a little bit.

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    There are 10 kinds of people: those who understand binary, and those who don't.
  8. Name for the metal by MobyDisk · · Score: 5, Funny

    Researchers are debating over the name for this new metal. Currently, the top two contenders are "Mithril" and "Adamantium" :-)

  9. He had a mind... by cybermace5 · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...like a steel sponge.

    (source: the hilarious "Use Bizarre Metaphors" idea at the Halfbakery)

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  10. Reason #984 not to trust a Slashdot editor's blurb by The_Laughing_God · · Score: 5, Informative

    The blurb Timothy posted (or approved and passed on) said: "Currently the applications envisioned for metallic foams are in automobile and aircraft crumple zones, which absorb the impact of collisions..."

    This sentence is taken from the article, but refers to the old-style metal foams, which have been tested for decades, NOT the 'glassy' metal foam discussed in the article. Most of the article explains why the new glassy foam is different from the old ones, and lists properties, like rigidity and high elastic energy return, which make it specifically unsuited for use in crumple zones. The article itself says:

    "Given the bounce bubbloy would have off a wall or tree, Veazey said it might not be suitable by itself as a crumple zone."

    Hitting a wall and bouncing creates up to twice the change in momentum, and potential for damage to humans, as a 'hit and stick impact' (e.g. wrapping your car around a tree or hitting the concrete after a 100 story fall). The impact would admittedly be mitigated by being spread out over several milliseconds vs. nearly instanteous, but "high elastic energy RETURN" is the opposite of an "energy ABSORBING crumple zone".

    Similarly, a high rigidity, high energy return, bone replacement would place an extreme stress on its anchors and surrounding real bone. You want a material that absorbs energy as it flexes, rather than returning is as a one-two punch (initial impact and then sharp recoil in the opposite direction) The energy absorbed by the flexing of a good bone substitute should be released as heat (it takes a lot of kinetic energy to make rather little heat) instead of crumpling [mechanical deformation] like a Mercedes front end.

    This glassy metallic foam has many potentially interesting applications. It's a shame that the blurb picked up on two applications where the old foams look more promising than the topic of the article