[penguicon-general] Thermite versus Liquid Nitrogen

[Rob Landley]

On Friday 04 August 2006 2:09 pm, Daniel Nance wrote:
> The heat potential for both substances are way different and that's the real
> factor that needs to be considered here. Just because one thing is way
> colder than another doesn't mean that it couldn't absorb a massive amount of
> energy.
> 
> Based on what I could find on the web, molten thermite probably has a heat
> potential of between 750 to 930 calories per gram (depending on where you
> look) while it takes about 50 calories per gram to evaporate liquid
> nitrogen. Therefore, you should need about 15 to 18.6 times more mass of
> liquid nitrogen than thermite in order to have enough to absorb all of that
> energy and lessen the risk of melting the container.

Sounds about right. :)

> Daniel Nance

Rob
-- 
Never bet against the cheap plastic solution.