21 replies to this topic

[blinkin]

blinkin, on 01 July 2013 - 01:38 PM, said:

ok a little physics lesson for those who say an explosion is impossible:

according to sarna, fusion in mech reactors is done with common hydrogen (1 proton, 1 electron). i have seen no mention of any form of "cold fusion" being used in battlemech engines (if "cold fusion" is confirmed to be used in mech engines it WILL render this entire post irrelevant and allow for safe engines)

temperatures-- this **** is ******* hot
http://en.wikipedia....onuclear_fusion :
Temperature is a measure of the average kinetic energy of particles, so by heating the material it will gain energy. After reaching sufficient temperature, given by the Lawson criterion, the energy of accidental collisions within the plasma is high enough to overcome the Coulomb barrier and the particles may fuse together.
In a deuterium–tritium fusion reaction, for example, the energy necessary to overcome the Coulomb barrier is 0.1 MeV. Converting between energy and temperature shows that the 0.1 MeV barrier would be overcome at a temperature in excess of 120 million Kelvins. <-diamonds melt at just a little shy of 5,000 kelvin according to wikipedia.

^^also note this is the type of fusion used in modern H-bombs. even using nuclear fission we CANNOT produce high enough temperatures to fuse common hydrogen.

http://en.wikipedia..../Nuclear_fusion :




The only man-made fusion device to achieve ignition to date is the hydrogen bomb. The detonation of the first device, codenamed Ivy Mike, is shown here.

unfortunately i could not find exact minimum fusion temperatures as it varies with pressure. last i heard the minimum temperature that the core of a star needed to reach was 2.5 million kelvin to fuse common hydrogen (because of the electrostatic repulsion from the naked protons) and at those pressures around 750,000 kelvin were required to fuse deuterium (²H). on earth we currently can only fuse deuterium and tritium (³H) because they require much less temperature and pressure.

i think you get the point by now, this is incredibly high energy. things that get hot like to expand. imagine it like a steam explosion to end all steam explosions.

PRESSURE-- more dense than any material you have ever experienced
i can say that definitively because a material MUST be plasma to fuze. (plasma means it has reached an energy state high enough that none of the electrons stick to it anymore and it is just a raw nucleus.) for these nuclei to fuse these raw protons MUST be forced within 1 fermi (0.000000000001 millimeters for reference) https://en.wikipedia...i/Atomic_radius : the radius of an atom is more than 10,000 times the radius of its nucleus (1–10 fm),^[2]





so children what happens when you have something held at heat and pressure levels completely unseen on the surface of this or an other planet and then suddenly the thing holding it fails?

even if the reaction stops completely as soon as the containment fails there is still an insane amount of energy there. when you claim there would be no explosion because the reaction stops it is like claiming that a skillet stops being hot as soon as you turn off the burner underneath it.




as for my opinions on the subject: in reality such a reactor would have a massive explosion almost every time it fails, BUT i like gameplay balance so something like a 5% chance or have it set off by causing a certain number of engine critical hits within a certain time frame before the mech is destroyed. 90m radius with an AC20 hit to EVERYTHING within that radius is what i would like to see along with a delay that includes an obvious glowing build up. <-none of this is based on reality because reality would blow up most of the battlefield on a regular basis.

[PanzerMagier]

Well it is commonly mentioned in battletech novels that there are mentionings of fail safe countermeasures to prevent a reactor breach in the event a mech is destroyed. Enough failsafe countermeasures that you'll have to manually re-engineer a mech in order to allow an override and let the reactor explode. One could postulate the mechs have cold fusion reactors then. Otherwise they have some other "unknown to man method" of preventing these explosions... A good post nonetheless. ^.^

[Renaissance]

Magic. Got it.

[blinkin]

PanzerMagier, on 23 July 2013 - 05:49 PM, said:

Well it is commonly mentioned in battletech novels that there are mentionings of fail safe countermeasures to prevent a reactor breach in the event a mech is destroyed. Enough failsafe countermeasures that you'll have to manually re-engineer a mech in order to allow an override and let the reactor explode. One could postulate the mechs have cold fusion reactors then. Otherwise they have some other "unknown to man method" of preventing these explosions... A good post nonetheless. ^.^

it is partly educational, partly so i don't have to retype the lecture from scratch every time someone claims "fusion engines don't explode". i can just go here and copy the quote.

if you don't like it as a game mechanic then fine but don't mutilate laws of physics just so you can have your way. /end rant

[PanzerMagier]

That's a laugh. "Oh don't worry sweetie, fusion reactors don't blow up! Your grandpa said so..."

The thing is though, you have to take battletech science with a grain of salt, it was initialized in the 19somethings back when the tv was magical. Mainstream science has rocketed in progress since then. So if you think they're butchering the laws of physics, it's because they didn't know any better back then. my 2c on that.

[blinkin]

PanzerMagier, on 24 July 2013 - 12:23 PM, said:

That's a laugh. "Oh don't worry sweetie, fusion reactors don't blow up! Your grandpa said so..."

The thing is though, you have to take battletech science with a grain of salt, it was initialized in the 19somethings back when the tv was magical. Mainstream science has rocketed in progress since then. So if you think they're butchering the laws of physics, it's because they didn't know any better back then. my 2c on that.

and i have no problem with that. they fix it with sci fi stuff. i get angry when people on the forums try to twist real world science to justify their views.

[PanzerMagier]

blinkin, on 24 July 2013 - 01:51 PM, said:

and i have no problem with that. they fix it with sci fi stuff. i get angry when people on the forums try to twist real world science to justify their views.

That tends to happen, I usually start buttering my popcorn then ^.^

[Steve Varayis]

I want fusion explosians.

Then AC/40 JagerMechs get a face full of explodey fun!

[PanzerMagier]

Steve Varayis, on 25 July 2013 - 01:58 AM, said:

I want fusion explosions*.

Then AC/40 JagerMechs get a face full of explodey fun!

Yes reactor meltdowns would be fun.

Jesus Vader Kerensky:"See that awesome packed with lrms and xl engine? The one between all those mediums&heavies?"
Me: "Yes master. Order received, proceeding with team wipe chain reaction, stand by..."

[dal10]

fusion reactors can't go supercritical like that. to use an analogy. it is like heating a particle to a million degrees then throwing it into the ocean and expecting it to evaporate. the walls are very thick, and much colder. so basically if it touches the reactor walls, the reaction cools down to sub-fusion temperatures basically instantly. the only real explosions you would see would be more akin to a boiler explosion to a nuclear bomb.

[PanzerMagier]

Like I said, there are enough countermeasures to ensure you won't have a complete apocalyptic explosion, you'll have to somehow manually engineer the reactor to continue the reaction while you somehow get rid of the reactor walls off while only the magnetic shielding remains...

Even if you just get a boiler type explosion, it would still be pretty major. There's A LOT of broken bits of a mech left hanging after it's CT is cored. Perfect material for giant sized shrapnel. As in the type that could easily just fly through another mech's leg/arm/cockpit/ct...

Edited by PanzerMagier, 27 July 2013 - 09:16 PM.

[dal10]

countermeasures don't matter. it can't go supercritical.. the countermeasures are to stop radiation from leaking and to make sure the reaction (which is done in a vacuum inside a large tungsten casing suspended by a powerful magnetic field) keeps going.

quoting directly from sarna

Fusion engines usually will only shut down if damaged, and they are absolutely no risk of being a fusion bomb. [2] There have been a number of cases of fusion engines being "over revved" and exploding with devestating force, but this is more akin to a boiler explosion than a true nuclear explosion. More often a destroyed engine will be punctured by weapons fire. Because the plasma is held in a vacuum chamber (to isolate the superheated plasma from the cold walls of the reactor; contact with the walls would super-chill the plasma below fusion temperatures), a punctured reactor can suck in air where the air is superheated. Normal thermal expansion of the air causes the air to burst out in a brilliant lightshow often mistaken for a "nuclear explosion". The Thermal Expansion damages anything within 90 meters of the destroyed 'Mech.

Such dramatic failures are rare, though. It is difficult to sustain the fusion reaction and very easy to shutdown. Safety systems or damage to containment coils will almost always shut down the engine before such an explosion occurs. The massive shielding of the engine (in the case of standard fusion engines, this is a tungsten carbide shell that accounts for over 2/3 of the weight of the engine) usually buys the safety systems the milliseconds needed to shutdown the engine when severe damaged is inflicted.

[blinkin]

dal10, on 26 July 2013 - 08:47 PM, said:

fusion reactors can't go supercritical like that. to use an analogy. it is like heating a particle to a million degrees then throwing it into the ocean and expecting it to evaporate. the walls are very thick, and much colder. so basically if it touches the reactor walls, the reaction cools down to sub-fusion temperatures basically instantly. the only real explosions you would see would be more akin to a boiler explosion to a nuclear bomb.

dal10, on 27 July 2013 - 09:58 PM, said:

countermeasures don't matter. it can't go supercritical.. the countermeasures are to stop radiation from leaking and to make sure the reaction (which is done in a vacuum inside a large tungsten casing suspended by a powerful magnetic field) keeps going.

quoting directly from sarna

Fusion engines usually will only shut down if damaged, and they are absolutely no risk of being a fusion bomb. [2] There have been a number of cases of fusion engines being "over revved" and exploding with devestating force, but this is more akin to a boiler explosion than a true nuclear explosion. More often a destroyed engine will be punctured by weapons fire. Because the plasma is held in a vacuum chamber (to isolate the superheated plasma from the cold walls of the reactor; contact with the walls would super-chill the plasma below fusion temperatures), a punctured reactor can suck in air where the air is superheated. Normal thermal expansion of the air causes the air to burst out in a brilliant lightshow often mistaken for a "nuclear explosion". The Thermal Expansion damages anything within 90 meters of the destroyed 'Mech.

Such dramatic failures are rare, though. It is difficult to sustain the fusion reaction and very easy to shutdown. Safety systems or damage to containment coils will almost always shut down the engine before such an explosion occurs. The massive shielding of the engine (in the case of standard fusion engines, this is a tungsten carbide shell that accounts for over 2/3 of the weight of the engine) usually buys the safety systems the milliseconds needed to shutdown the engine when severe damaged is inflicted.

i have read that article several times too and it doesn't mention anything that negates the physics concerns.

also i already referenced the reactor walls defense: even if the reaction stops completely as soon as the containment fails there is still an insane amount of energy there. when you claim there would be no explosion because the reaction stops it is like claiming that a skillet stops being hot as soon as you turn off the burner underneath it.

i will humor you though. imagine we have a refrigerator that has been cooled down to absolute zero. now imagine we detonated a fusion bombs inside this fridge. what do you think would happen no matter how tight those cold fridge walls are? the fridge would vaporize just like anything else within the immediate vicinity. now what you fail to consider is the extreme pressures required to fuse anything. the atomic nuclei need to be almost touching. in standard matter that makes up everything that you and i know 99.999% empty space AT LEAST. atoms like to spread out and when they are really close together they want to spread out even more. if you don't believe me then go air up a bike tire with a basic hand pump. it gets harder to pump the more air there is in the tire. the pressures required for fusion are to put it mildly, far worse.

[PanzerMagier]

blinkin, on 18 August 2013 - 08:42 PM, said:

i have read that article several times too and it doesn't mention anything that negates the physics concerns.

also i already referenced the reactor walls defense: even if the reaction stops completely as soon as the containment fails there is still an insane amount of energy there. when you claim there would be no explosion because the reaction stops it is like claiming that a skillet stops being hot as soon as you turn off the burner underneath it.

i will humor you though. imagine we have a refrigerator that has been cooled down to absolute zero. now imagine we detonated a fusion bombs inside this fridge. what do you think would happen no matter how tight those cold fridge walls are? the fridge would vaporize just like anything else within the immediate vicinity. now what you fail to consider is the extreme pressures required to fuse anything. the atomic nuclei need to be almost touching. in standard matter that makes up everything that you and i know 99.999% empty space AT LEAST. atoms like to spread out and when they are really close together they want to spread out even more. if you don't believe me then go air up a bike tire with a basic hand pump. it gets harder to pump the more air there is in the tire. the pressures required for fusion are to put it mildly, far worse.

I'd like to casually throw the "what he said" line here and would like to mention I am only doing so because he summarized it perfectly and not because some would think I didn't understand a word he said.

[dal10]

sorry for any incoherence, i am tired...

what happens when you drop something really hot onto something relatively cool. it melts. it doesn't freaking explode, besides maybe steam. you are talking about melting 20 tons of tungsten, even given its relatively low specific heat compared to water, that is A LOT OF METAL that has to be heated to well over a thousand degrees. at best you would get something similar to thermite.

your concern is basically the same as people worrying that fission reactors would turn into fission bombs, it is not only improbable, it is IMPOSSIBLE.

There are 2 ways to heat things to fusion temperatures. one is to add INSANE amounts of heat to something, the other one is through incredible levels of pressure. As far as i can tell, battletech uses the latter via magnetic fields.

so if pressure decreases and volume increases (think canned air, as you spray it, the temp decreases as the gas expands), what happens? temperature decreases.

for fuel concerns, i would guess that the fusion process is held in an area much much smaller than the containment chamber. lets say 100th as large. you then proceed to let it go free, it would expand almost instantly to the size of the chamber, this

your temperature just got decreased by a lot right there. to top it off you have a little bit of matter, and you are trying to heat up a large amount of matter in it.

and now to point to real world science, and no i do not have a better source than wikipedia.

There is no possibility of a catastrophic accident in a fusion reactor resulting in major release of radioactivity to the environment or injury to non-staff, unlike modern fission reactors. The primary reason is that nuclear fusion requires precisely controlled temperature, pressure, and magnetic field parameters to generate net energy. If the reactor were damaged, these parameters would be disrupted and the heat generation in the reactor would rapidly cease.[42]
Fusion reactors are extremely safe in this sense, and it makes them favorable over fission reactors, which, in contrast, continue to generate heat through beta-decay for several months after reactor shut-down, meaning that melting of fuel rods is possible even after the reactor has been stopped due to continued accumulation of heat.[43]
There is also no risk of a runaway reaction in a fusion reactor, since the plasma is normally burnt at optimal conditions, and any significant change will render it unable to produce excess heat. In fusion reactors the reaction process is so delicate that this level of safety is inherent; no elaborate failsafe mechanism is required. Although the plasma in a fusion power plant will have a volume of 1000 cubic meters or more, the density of the plasma is extremely low, and the total amount of fusion fuel in the vessel is very small, typically a few grams.[43] If the fuel supply is closed, the reaction stops within seconds. In comparison, a fission reactor is typically loaded with enough fuel for several years, and no additional fuel is necessary to keep the reaction going.[44]
In the magnetic approach, strong fields are developed in coils that are held in place mechanically by the reactor structure. Failure of this structure could release this tension and allow the magnet to "explode" outward. The severity of this event would be similar to any other industrial accident or an MRI machine quench/explosion, and could be effectively stopped with a containment building similar to those used in existing (fission) nuclear generators. The laser-driven inertial approach is generally lower-stress. Although failure of the reaction chamber is possible, simply stopping fuel delivery would prevent any sort of catastrophic failure.
Most reactor designs rely on the use of liquid lithium as both a coolant and a method for converting stray neutrons from the reaction into tritium, which is fed back into the reactor as fuel. Lithium is highly flammable, and in the case of a fire it is possible that the lithium stored on-site could be burned up and escape. In this case the tritium contents of the lithium would be released into the atmosphere, posing a radiation risk. However, calculations suggest that at about 1 kg the total amount of tritium and other radioactive gases in a typical power plant would be so small that they would have diluted to legally acceptable limits by the time they blew as far as the plant's perimeter fence.[45]
The likelihood of small industrial accidents including the local release of radioactivity and injury to staff cannot be estimated yet. These would include accidental releases of lithium, tritium, or mis-handling of decommissioned radioactive components of the reactor itself.

Edited by dal10, 19 August 2013 - 08:04 PM.

[blinkin]

dal10, on 19 August 2013 - 08:03 PM, said:

sorry for any incoherence, i am tired...

what happens when you drop something really hot onto something relatively cool. it melts. it doesn't freaking explode, besides maybe steam. you are talking about melting 20 tons of tungsten, even given its relatively low specific heat compared to water, that is A LOT OF METAL that has to be heated to well over a thousand degrees. at best you would get something similar to thermite.

your concern is basically the same as people worrying that fission reactors would turn into fission bombs, it is not only improbable, it is IMPOSSIBLE.

There are 2 ways to heat things to fusion temperatures. one is to add INSANE amounts of heat to something, the other one is through incredible levels of pressure. As far as i can tell, battletech uses the latter via magnetic fields.

so if pressure decreases and volume increases (think canned air, as you spray it, the temp decreases as the gas expands), what happens? temperature decreases.

for fuel concerns, i would guess that the fusion process is held in an area much much smaller than the containment chamber. lets say 100th as large. you then proceed to let it go free, it would expand almost instantly to the size of the chamber, this

your temperature just got decreased by a lot right there. to top it off you have a little bit of matter, and you are trying to heat up a large amount of matter in it.

and now to point to real world science, and no i do not have a better source than wikipedia.

There is no possibility of a catastrophic accident in a fusion reactor resulting in major release of radioactivity to the environment or injury to non-staff, unlike modern fission reactors. The primary reason is that nuclear fusion requires precisely controlled temperature, pressure, and magnetic field parameters to generate net energy. If the reactor were damaged, these parameters would be disrupted and the heat generation in the reactor would rapidly cease.[42]
Fusion reactors are extremely safe in this sense, and it makes them favorable over fission reactors, which, in contrast, continue to generate heat through beta-decay for several months after reactor shut-down, meaning that melting of fuel rods is possible even after the reactor has been stopped due to continued accumulation of heat.[43]
There is also no risk of a runaway reaction in a fusion reactor, since the plasma is normally burnt at optimal conditions, and any significant change will render it unable to produce excess heat. In fusion reactors the reaction process is so delicate that this level of safety is inherent; no elaborate failsafe mechanism is required. Although the plasma in a fusion power plant will have a volume of 1000 cubic meters or more, the density of the plasma is extremely low, and the total amount of fusion fuel in the vessel is very small, typically a few grams.[43] If the fuel supply is closed, the reaction stops within seconds. In comparison, a fission reactor is typically loaded with enough fuel for several years, and no additional fuel is necessary to keep the reaction going.[44]
In the magnetic approach, strong fields are developed in coils that are held in place mechanically by the reactor structure. Failure of this structure could release this tension and allow the magnet to "explode" outward. The severity of this event would be similar to any other industrial accident or an MRI machine quench/explosion, and could be effectively stopped with a containment building similar to those used in existing (fission) nuclear generators. The laser-driven inertial approach is generally lower-stress. Although failure of the reaction chamber is possible, simply stopping fuel delivery would prevent any sort of catastrophic failure.
Most reactor designs rely on the use of liquid lithium as both a coolant and a method for converting stray neutrons from the reaction into tritium, which is fed back into the reactor as fuel. Lithium is highly flammable, and in the case of a fire it is possible that the lithium stored on-site could be burned up and escape. In this case the tritium contents of the lithium would be released into the atmosphere, posing a radiation risk. However, calculations suggest that at about 1 kg the total amount of tritium and other radioactive gases in a typical power plant would be so small that they would have diluted to legally acceptable limits by the time they blew as far as the plant's perimeter fence.[45]
The likelihood of small industrial accidents including the local release of radioactivity and injury to staff cannot be estimated yet. These would include accidental releases of lithium, tritium, or mis-handling of decommissioned radioactive components of the reactor itself.

i am actually talking about the fact that if there is any space between the fusion mass and the reactor walls the mass is very likely to begin the explosion process BEFORE the walls are contacted and the insanely high pressures alone would be enough to support a conventional explosion. a thimble full of this stuff would weigh several thousand tons (actually it is more likely several million but i am being very lenient since i don't have the exact numbers). hydrogen boils at 20 kelvin or -252 degrees Celsius. to put it simply hydrogen does not like being tightly packed. now when you heat it to a few million degrees and and compress it to the point where the protons themselves are almost touching it really, really, really, REALLY wants to expand. the compression required for fusion makes the material far more dense than any material any of us has ever experienced on earth. the "few kilograms" (for reference a kilogram is a little over 2 pounds within standard earth gravity) would need to be compressed so tightly that you would likely need a microscope to observe it.

i will also turn to wikipedia for a response to your real world example:



The only man-made fusion device to achieve ignition to date is the hydrogen bomb. The detonation of the first device, codenamed Ivy Mike, is shown here.

fusion reactions do not rely on unstable materials and radiation was never mentioned in my OP. the problem is that first your example uses tritium: tritium and deuterium are much easier than standard hydrogen that mech reactors use http://www.sarna.net...i/Fusion_Engine (common hydrogen requires MUCH more heat and pressure to fuse) second: the processes described require far more internal space than any mech possesses by nature ( http://www.sarna.net...i/Fusion_Engine : The massive shielding of the engine (in the case of standard fusion engines, this is a tungsten carbide shell that accounts for over 2/3 of the weight of the engine)).

with current human technology we CANNOT fuse protium (A.K.A. common hydrogen). our hydrogen bombs require deuterium and tritium to function and use fission based nuclear devices (atom bombs) to create the temperatures and pressures required for fusion in this case.

[dal10]

your telling me we can make a thermonuclear bomb out of a couple of grams of hyrdrogen.

to quote my own damn post.

There is also no risk of a runaway reaction in a fusion reactor, since the plasma is normally burnt at optimal conditions, and any significant change will render it unable to produce excess heat. In fusion reactors the reaction process is so delicate that this level of safety is inherent; no elaborate failsafe mechanism is required. Although the plasma in a fusion power plant will have a volume of 1000 cubic meters or more, the density of the plasma is extremely low, and the total amount of fusion fuel in the vessel is very small, typically a few grams.[43] If the fuel supply is closed, the reaction stops within seconds. In comparison, a fission reactor is typically loaded with enough fuel for several years, and no additional fuel is necessary to keep the reaction going.[44]
In the magnetic approach, strong fields are developed in coils that are held in place mechanically by the reactor structure. Failure of this structure could release this tension and allow the magnet to "explode" outward. The severity of this event would be similar to any other industrial accident or an MRI machine quench/explosion, and could be effectively stopped with a containment building similar to those used in existing (fission) nuclear generators. The laser-driven inertial approach is generally lower-stress. Although failure of the reaction chamber is possible, simply stopping fuel delivery would prevent any sort of catastrophic failure.

a runaway reaction would be required for it to turn into a thermonuclear bomb.

note, even if EVERYTHING failed, you would get something similar to an industrial accident. at best you might destroy the building. (except in the case of fire, but that is a whole different story)

the thing CAN NOT and WILL NOT turn into a thermonuclear bomb.

[blinkin]

dal10, on 21 August 2013 - 09:30 AM, said:

your telling me we can make a thermonuclear bomb out of a couple of grams of hyrdrogen.

to quote my own damn post.

There is also no risk of a runaway reaction in a fusion reactor, since the plasma is normally burnt at optimal conditions, and any significant change will render it unable to produce excess heat. In fusion reactors the reaction process is so delicate that this level of safety is inherent; no elaborate failsafe mechanism is required. Although the plasma in a fusion power plant will have a volume of 1000 cubic meters or more, the density of the plasma is extremely low, and the total amount of fusion fuel in the vessel is very small, typically a few grams.[43] If the fuel supply is closed, the reaction stops within seconds. In comparison, a fission reactor is typically loaded with enough fuel for several years, and no additional fuel is necessary to keep the reaction going.[44]
In the magnetic approach, strong fields are developed in coils that are held in place mechanically by the reactor structure. Failure of this structure could release this tension and allow the magnet to "explode" outward. The severity of this event would be similar to any other industrial accident or an MRI machine quench/explosion, and could be effectively stopped with a containment building similar to those used in existing (fission) nuclear generators. The laser-driven inertial approach is generally lower-stress. Although failure of the reaction chamber is possible, simply stopping fuel delivery would prevent any sort of catastrophic failure.

a runaway reaction would be required for it to turn into a thermonuclear bomb.

note, even if EVERYTHING failed, you would get something similar to an industrial accident. at best you might destroy the building. (except in the case of fire, but that is a whole different story)

the thing CAN NOT and WILL NOT turn into a thermonuclear bomb.

it is already reacting it STARTS out reacting and producing energy. if that energy were ever suddenly released then it would be a full on fusion explosion because the fusion process is actively happening.

it would also provide a very substantial conventional explosion because to effectively produce energy the "several kilograms" of material would need to be compressed to smaller than the size of the head of a sewing needle and held at several million degrees in order for hydrogen fusion to operate. also how many kilos of reactive material do you think it takes to make a fission (not fusion) bomb? fusion is a much higher energy process and that is why we USE FISSION bombs as a COMPONENT of FUSION bombs.

the fusion processes that you are using as an example are most likely for the purposes of small scale scientific testing. the human race does not currently possess the technology required to maintain a stable fusion reaction and draw power from it. to put it simply you would be making a star on a very small scale (actually it would be the core of a star since stars only actively fuse material near the core).

[dal10]

it is worse than trying to argue with fundamentalist religion people. i repeatedly point out why something won't happen, then you are like, yeah it could because bombs.

a fusion reaction IS NOT self sustaining (not talking about stars either, because they still require fuel to be drawn to the center, aka gravity.). you have to constantly feed it fuel. you shut off said fuel supply, or allow it to cool significantly, it INSTANTLY stops. Fusion is FREAKING HARD. It takes basically high precision, and by high precision i mean INCREDIBLY PRECISE conditions to happen on the scale of an reactor. the lose of a few HUNDRED degrees would be more than enough to shut it down. allowing the plasma to expand BY ANY SIGNIFICANT AMOUNT shuts down the reaction. to turn it into a fusion bomb, you would literally have to FLOOD it with fuel while simultaneously doing EVERYTHING PHYSICALLY POSSIBLE to increase the field strength to turn it extremely hot. then once you basically have a run away star in the reactor, then you could possibly have a thermonuclear bomb. you would literally have to TRY to make it into a bomb. IT CAN NOT AND WILL NOT DO IT ACCIDENTALLY.

[blinkin]

dal10, on 30 August 2013 - 06:09 AM, said:

it is worse than trying to argue with fundamentalist religion people. i repeatedly point out why something won't happen, then you are like, yeah it could because bombs.

a fusion reaction IS NOT self sustaining (not talking about stars either, because they still require fuel to be drawn to the center, aka gravity.). you have to constantly feed it fuel. you shut off said fuel supply, or allow it to cool significantly, it INSTANTLY stops. Fusion is FREAKING HARD. It takes basically high precision, and by high precision i mean INCREDIBLY PRECISE conditions to happen on the scale of an reactor. the lose of a few HUNDRED degrees would be more than enough to shut it down. allowing the plasma to expand BY ANY SIGNIFICANT AMOUNT shuts down the reaction. to turn it into a fusion bomb, you would literally have to FLOOD it with fuel while simultaneously doing EVERYTHING PHYSICALLY POSSIBLE to increase the field strength to turn it extremely hot. then once you basically have a run away star in the reactor, then you could possibly have a thermonuclear bomb. you would literally have to TRY to make it into a bomb. IT CAN NOT AND WILL NOT DO IT ACCIDENTALLY.

i never said anything about self sustaining.

how much time do you think a hydrogen bomb spends fusing? to put it mildly the fusion process stops well before a second has passed when it started. i am arguing that it is very likely because of bombs, stars, and BECAUSE PHYSICS SAYS SO. even WITHOUT the fusion explosion aspect there is enough energy compressed into that microscopic point to level everything for several miles. it states on sarna that the mechs use a few kilograms (i take this to mean more than one) each kilogram is roughly 2.2 pounds. how much energy does 2.2 pounds of C4 have? how about 2.2 pounds of reactive material in a fission bomb? and now we come to the biggest one 2.2 pounds of hydrogen heated to several MILLION degrees and compressed to a microscopic point? i don't care what the lore says without some form of cold fusion PHYSICS says this **** is incredibly volatile.

arguing with you is like arguing with a fundamentalist religious people because you refuse to acknowledge any form of scientific evidence.

Edited by blinkin, 11 September 2013 - 10:27 AM.