How not to dry wet sand...

[btrueblood]

Electric charcoal lighter plunged into a metal bucket containing wet sand...a colleague learned why you don't walk away from something like this. Luckily nobody was hurt (well maybe one person's ego), nothing burned down. A tech I work with heard the wiring rattling in the conduit just before the breaker let go.

Attached file is a photo of the heater after the event...the lucky thing is that these things are designed to fail "open". Yes, that chunk in the foreground is some sand that was heated to/above the glass transition temperature.

 

[msquared48]

Well, the lighter looks a little lighter now...

Mike McCann
MMC Engineering

 

[Compositepro]

That's a typical failure for an electric heater when the heat is not removed as quickly as it is generated. There is no limit to the temperature of the heater except its melting point. And molten metal and molten sand both still conduct electricity.

 

[TheBlacksmith]

Old thermodynamics rule of thumb, everything that is heating something is also being cooled by that something. Change the rate of heat transfer and you won't like the results, this charcoal starter or superheater tubes in a ship's steam boiler.

 

[dgallup]

Had a dangling 440 V power line arching to earth in my front yard for 12 hours following an ice storm. Made quite a few new rocks. The police and firemen just stood and watched it for awhile then left.

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The Help for this program was created in Windows Help format, which depends on a feature that isn't included in this version of Windows.

 

[ivymike]

hehe... reminds me of my neighbor the fire&rescue guy. when responding to a bomb threat, their practice was to wait several blocks back. his comment: "we do fires, not bombs, call us back when you have a fire."

 

[IRstuff]

""we do fires, not bombs, call us back when you have a fire.""

Without those cute little robots, that's quite wise.

TTFN
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[jraef]

That piece of molten metal / sand is now called a "fulgurite" by the way. The natural form is created when lightning hits sand or soil. It's also the name given to the residue that forms in a sand filled fuse that has interrupted a fault.



"Will work for (the memory of) salami"