74 replies to this topic

[blinkin]

2,500,000 kelvin is the minimum temperature required to fuse common hydrogen (1 proton and 1 electron).

diamonds melt at approximately 3,800 kelvin. so this material starts out in a highly energetic state.
http://en.wikipedia..../Nuclear_fusion :
It takes considerable energy to force nuclei to fuse, even those of the lightest element, hydrogen. This is because all nuclei have a positive charge due to their protons, and as like charges repel, nuclei strongly resist being put close together. Accelerated to high speeds, they can overcome this electrostatic repulsion and be forced close enough for the attractive nuclear force to be sufficiently strong to achieve fusion. The fusion of lighter nuclei, which creates a heavier nucleus and often a free neutron or proton, generally releases more energy than it takes to force the nuclei together; this is an exothermic process that can produce self-sustaining reactions.

and for fusion to work the material must be kept at extremely high pressures:
https://en.wikipedia.../wiki/Star#Mass :
the theoretical minimum mass the star can have, and still undergo fusion at the core, is estimated to be about 75 times the mass of Jupiter.^[110][111] When the metallicity is very low, however, a recent study of the faintest stars found that the minimum star size seems to be about 8.3% of the solar mass, or about 87 times the mass of Jupiter.^[111][112]

guess what happens when the pressure is released? ever see a boiler explode? imagine that except with several million times the pressure and heat.

for hydrogen to fuse it must be in a plasma state which means the electron shell (about 99% of what makes up the size of these atoms IS GONE) at these pressures the material acts like a solid because the nuclei are forced that close together. if you could touch it your finger would not be stopped by magnetic repulsion like 100.00% of everything else we interact with, it would in fact be truly solid.

BUT

the hydrogen is still a plasma so if pressure were ever released the expansion alone would create an incredibly massive explosion with even a small amount. this would not be a nuclear explosion this would just be purely from the rapid expansion of this material.

combine with that the fact that hot materials like to expand even more, and this is far hotter than even what is produced by our hydrogen bombs (because they use deuterium which is a breed of hydrogen that fuses at much lower temperatures and pressures.)



this material is compressed at pressures equivalent to the center of an object at least 75 times the mass of jupiter and at temperatures more than 500x what it takes to melt diamond. and you expect me to believe this will NEVER explode?

energy can neither be created nor destroyed. <-at some point that heat and pressure has to go somewhere.

[Pht]

blinkin, on 12 April 2013 - 05:16 PM, said:

energy can neither be created nor destroyed. <-at some point that heat and pressure has to go somewhere.

First, you're making the false conclusion that the BTU fusion reactors behave that way; there's no reason to conclude this, and second, ask a quantum physicist about the idea that energy can't be destroyed or created. You should get a surprising answer.

[blinkin]

Pht, on 12 April 2013 - 05:37 PM, said:

First, you're making the false conclusion that the BTU fusion reactors behave that way; there's no reason to conclude this, and second, ask a quantum physicist about the idea that energy can't be destroyed or created. You should get a surprising answer.

the only other answer is it can be converted into matter and i seriously doubt that is the case here. the universe is a zero sum game. even black holes lose mass because of these rules.

BTU reactors either follow the known rules of thermonuclear reaction or we are going with the generic scifi answer "because of technology". if these reactors work just cuz then there is no point in anyone arguing either side and any effort at explanation will always without error end up talking in circles. i have seen efforts to explain the functionality of these systems in terms of known science, so i am going to assume that we are allowed to apply scientific reason.

[Blue Footed Booby]

blinkin, on 12 April 2013 - 05:16 PM, said:

2,500,000 kelvin is the minimum temperature required to fuse common hydrogen (1 proton and 1 electron).

....

Remind me why we're fusing hydrogen and not helium-3, which doesn't produce neutrons thereby drastically reducing the need for heavy shielding and frequent containment vessel replacement?

Oh right, it's a computer game centered on giant robots set in a fictional universe that lifts heavily from the fall of the western Roman Empire* and exists entirely to provide setting for and drum up interest in a commercial game.

Rebas Kradd, on 07 April 2013 - 06:05 PM, said:

Who cares what BT canon says. If it'll look cool and/or improves gameplay, I say do it.

Fixed.

Engines going critical is first and foremost a game mechanic to provide a disincentive for forming tightly packed blobs. Just like 90% of the Mechwarrior universe, the science and technology is justification for gameplay mechanics and scenario first, fluff to establish tone for the setting second, and a genuine attempt at realism a distant, distant third. There is science fiction that attempts to speculate at what the future could look like, but Mechwarrior isn't it. Mechwarrior is science fantasy, like Star Wars, rather than "hard" science fiction like Arthur C Clark or Larry Niven.

* Are there any clan leaders named Belisarius? There really should be.

[blinkin]

Blue Footed Booby, on 13 April 2013 - 07:58 AM, said:

Remind me why we're fusing hydrogen and not helium-3, which doesn't produce neutrons thereby drastically reducing the need for heavy shielding and frequent containment vessel replacement?

because that is what sarna told me is in the lore.

i agree with you even if it wasn't justifiable in the lore, mechwarrior living legends proved that it makes for fun gameplay. i was merely trying to debunk all of the false science that has been going around.

[Pht]

blinkin, on 13 April 2013 - 12:13 AM, said:

the only other answer is it can be converted into matter and i seriously doubt that is the case here. the universe is a zero sum game. even black holes lose mass because of these rules.

I gather that quantum physicists are saying that this is not true. Rather would be a copernican shift for the sceintific world.

Quote

BTU reactors either follow the known rules of thermonuclear reaction or we are going with the generic scifi answer "because of technology". if these reactors work just cuz then there is no point in anyone arguing either side and any effort at explanation will always without error end up talking in circles. i have seen efforts to explain the functionality of these systems in terms of known science, so i am going to assume that we are allowed to apply scientific reason.

If you'd have followed the link I have ... and it's also in my signature line... you'd know why the BTU fusion reactors can't blow up as nuclear explosions.

The source referenced at the link is the current defining source on the in-fiction tech.

[blinkin]

Pht, on 16 April 2013 - 01:35 PM, said:

If you'd have followed the link I have ... and it's also in my signature line... you'd know why the BTU fusion reactors can't blow up as nuclear explosions.

The source referenced at the link is the current defining source on the in-fiction tech.

and i have said countless times before that they are not nuclear explosions, otherwise the match would end when one happened. nothing i have mentioned is in reference to any sort of fission or fusion explosion BUT there is a S---load of energy being contained at pressures far exceeding anything we can produce on earth.

2.5 million kelven at pressures AT LEAST equivalent to the center of a celestial body 75x the mass of jupiter. SOMETHING is bound to happen if that pressure is released improperly.

this isn't a nuclear explosion, IT IS gas expansion on scales never before seen on earth. hydrogen is a gas at room temperature and gasses expand as they become heated so if you increase the heat by approximately 5000x it will want to expand A LOT (talk to anyone who has any experience with a boiler).

these are pressures where PLASMA is compressed so hard it imitates a SOLID. the electron shell is stripped but the nuclei are jammed so close together that any interaction is with the protons and neutrons themselves, on earth ALL particle interactions are done via electron shells which make up 98% (probably severely lowballed this number, but you get the idea) of the volume of ANY atom. any standard solid you interact with on earth is going to be at least one fiftieth (1/50) of the density of this stuff (again that is relying on my likely severely lowballed percentage that i listed). THESE HYDROGEN ATOMS ARE F---ING TIGHTLY PACKED.

Edited by blinkin, 17 April 2013 - 12:29 AM.

[Pht]

blinkin, on 17 April 2013 - 12:15 AM, said:

BUT there is a S---load of energy being contained at pressures far exceeding anything we can produce on earth. 2.5 million kelven at pressures AT LEAST equivalent to the center of a celestial body 75x the mass of jupiter.

You're miscalculating the amount of energy in the plasma ball because you're not factoring in the fact that in a plasma ball in a BT fusion reactor, the only energy on hand is from active fusion reactions; and these reactions don't carry enough energy to even make the fusion reactor walls hot if the plasma ball touches the reactor walls... why?

Simple: as soon as the plasma touches the obscenely cold (relative to the temps in the plasma) reactor walls, the fusion reactions stop, for all intents and purposes, instantly. The reactor can't maintain active fusion reactions with the plasma in contact with the reactor walls.

The same thing happens if the fusion reactor is breached and lets cold air into the eqaution to touch the plasma... but this is a bit more spectucular, as it touches off an oxygen flash fire.

The most scary thing the plasma ball can do is if the mechwarrior runs the reactor way, WAY beond it's normal paramaters, making the active plasma so hot that it doesn't matter that it "blinks off" when it touches the reactor walls ... in this case, once the reactor has been over-run to the point of insanity, the MW lobotomizes the reactor's computers, allowing the magnetic fields containing the plasma to simply drop, and the plasma burns off the inner layer of the reactor walls, overpressurizing the reactor, which makes for a decent explosion.

One has to calculate for the fact that the pressures go away with the heat, and the heat goes away virtually instantly when the plasma ball touches the reactor walls or when air hits it.

Edited by Pht, 18 April 2013 - 06:15 PM.

[blinkin]

Pht, on 18 April 2013 - 06:13 PM, said:

You're miscalculating the amount of energy in the plasma ball because you're not factoring in the fact that in a plasma ball in a BT fusion reactor, the only energy on hand is from active fusion reactions; and these reactions don't carry enough energy to even make the fusion reactor walls hot if the plasma ball touches the reactor walls... why?

Simple: as soon as the plasma touches the obscenely cold (relative to the temps in the plasma) reactor walls, the fusion reactions stop, for all intents and purposes, instantly. The reactor can't maintain active fusion reactions with the plasma in contact with the reactor walls.

The same thing happens if the fusion reactor is breached and lets cold air into the eqaution to touch the plasma... but this is a bit more spectucular, as it touches off an oxygen flash fire.

The most scary thing the plasma ball can do is if the mechwarrior runs the reactor way, WAY beond it's normal paramaters, making the active plasma so hot that it doesn't matter that it "blinks off" when it touches the reactor walls ... in this case, once the reactor has been over-run to the point of insanity, the MW lobotomizes the reactor's computers, allowing the magnetic fields containing the plasma to simply drop, and the plasma burns off the inner layer of the reactor walls, overpressurizing the reactor, which makes for a decent explosion.

One has to calculate for the fact that the pressures go away with the heat, and the heat goes away virtually instantly when the plasma ball touches the reactor walls or when air hits it.

yes i have read the sarna article on fusion engines several times too. EXCEPT i read all of it.

http://www.sarna.net...i/Fusion_Engine
The Thermal Expansion damages anything within 90 meters of the destroyed 'Mech.

and as i have said thousands of times before this is not a fusion explosion.

as far as i have seen there is no mention of anything related to cold fusion which means: for standard hydrogen atoms to fuse, temperatures of 2.5 million kelvin MUST be sustained at pressures AT LEAST equivalent to 75 jupiter masses. it doesn't matter if they have managed to chill the case down to absolute zero. at those temperatures and pressures the gas expansion will create an incredibly massive explosion.

if you can find a credible reference to any form of cold fusion being used in these reactors then i am wrong, otherwise physics says that it is very possible for these reactors to suffer massive explosions. (sarna is a good source but it can be altered since it is a wiki so by "credible source" i mean some sort of rule book or i will even allow official fiction that has been published)

and if there weren't risk of a critical failure we wouldn't need this:
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.

[Pht]

blinkin, on 18 April 2013 - 06:44 PM, said:

yes i have read the sarna article on fusion engines several times too. EXCEPT i read all of it.

... and I have read all of it.

and more.

And even discussed the article in Techmanual on, amongst other things, fusion engine explosions, with the guy that wrote it.

... and put an article on the sarna wiki that discussed fusion engine explosions, amongst other things - and the author that wrote the source material looked over it and said "you got it right."

http://www.sarna.net...gine_explosions

Quote

The Thermal Expansion damages anything within 90 meters of the destroyed 'Mech.

I would like to find the source on this. I've never seen this anywhere.

I think I'll ask the page's author.

Quote

...and as i have said thousands of times before this is not a fusion explosion.

Yep. You did.

Quote

as far as i have seen there is no mention of anything related to cold fusion which means:

I didn't say that they used cold fusion.

Edited by Pht, 18 April 2013 - 06:59 PM.

[blinkin]

Pht, on 18 April 2013 - 06:58 PM, said:

... and I have read all of it.

and more.

And even discussed the article in Techmanual on, amongst other things, fusion engine explosions, with the guy that wrote it.

... and put an article on the sarna wiki that discussed fusion engine explosions, amongst other things - and the author that wrote the source material looked over it and said "you got it right."

http://www.sarna.net...gine_explosions
--^^
--you don't need to work to convince me how full of yourself you are. i am already convinced.

--according to PHYSICS you are wrong. these engines won't create a fusion explosion, but it is outright stupid to believe that you can contain that much power with absolutely no risk of explosion. you just get to be wrong together.


I would like to find the source on this. I've never seen this anywhere.

I think I'll ask the page's author.
--^^
--again, don't care.


Yep. You did.
--^^
--find it, quote it. i never would have advocated a full fusion explosion because that would completely end any match on even the largest of our levels


I didn't say that they used cold fusion.
--^^
--which makes me right because cold fusion is THE ONLY WAY you could be right.

i noticed you seem to have over looked the scientific explanation of why there is risk of a catostrophic explosion. here you go
vv

blinkin, on 18 April 2013 - 06:44 PM, said:

as far as i have seen there is no mention of anything related to cold fusion which means: for standard hydrogen atoms to fuse, temperatures of 2.5 million kelvin MUST be sustained at pressures AT LEAST equivalent to 75 jupiter masses. it doesn't matter if they have managed to chill the case down to absolute zero. at those temperatures and pressures the gas expansion will create an incredibly massive explosion.

^^just in case you were confused what i described there is standard fusion. i did not describe cold fusion because as of currently it is entirely fictional, but as the name implies it was a theory that described how fusion could be attained at reasonable temperatures and conditions that can be replicated on earth.

[Pht]

blinkin, on 18 April 2013 - 07:15 PM, said:

--^^
--you don't need to work to convince me how full of yourself you are. i am already convinced.

Because obviously, nobody should never answer an accusation directed at at them about how little they supposedly know.

Even worse, answering it and showing that you might actually know what you're discussing... now that's just pure arrogance!

Quote

--according to PHYSICS you are wrong. these engines won't create a fusion explosion, but it is outright stupid to believe that you can contain that much power with absolutely no risk of explosion. you just get to be wrong together.

Yes, I've really posted that there's "absolutely no risk of explosion" (of any type).

Even when I posted a link directly to me posting how the things can explode.

What's next ... I say up, you say I said down?

You seem to have a terminal case of "I have unhappy feelings towards this poster. Therefore, I will not actually attempt to comprehend what he posts - rather, I'll just look for any excuse to try and go one-up on him. After all, I'm justified to do so... look, he disagreed with me!"

[blinkin]

Pht, on 18 April 2013 - 08:04 PM, said:

Yes, I've really posted that there's "absolutely no risk of explosion" (of any type).

Even when I posted a link directly to me posting how the things can explode.

What's next ... I say up, you say I said down?

You seem to have a terminal case of "I have unhappy feelings towards this poster. Therefore, I will not actually attempt to comprehend what he posts - rather, I'll just look for any excuse to try and go one-up on him. After all, I'm justified to do so... look, he disagreed with me!"

then what on earth are you arguing?

the explosions i have described have always been about gas expansion. i have NEVER even suggested anything about these reactors going nuclear. ALL of the explosions i have described on this thread or any other on this topic have been in reference to conventional explosions. i have been using concepts that directly relate to gas expansion. pressure and heat have been my weapons of choice and you keep arguing "NO FUSION EXPLOSIONS!!!1!!11" <-and i have been agreeing that we shouldn't have fusion explosions BUT a conventional explosion caused by massive gas/plasma expansion is almost inevitable should the safety systems fail (and things tend to fail when you shoot them full of holes).

i could easily make a case for a full fusion explosion since a hydrogen bomb stops fusing immediately after it starts (the whole fusion process there is done in a matter of milliseconds, after it has started expanding you are done the explosion has happened) BUT that would destroy any of the current maps and ruin gameplay.

still waiting on that quote where i claimed these should be full nuclear explosions.

Edited by blinkin, 18 April 2013 - 08:47 PM.

[MasterErrant]

this kind of fusion plant is basically a donut probably a pair of counter-rotating ones)of hot plasma spinning inside of an magnetic coil generating electricityit's not likely to go critia\cal and if it did it would be more like a big ball of napalm than an explosion...whoose rasther than wham. but if would scrag the mech and anything close would get werry werry hot.

[blinkin]

MasterErrant, on 18 April 2013 - 09:10 PM, said:

this kind of fusion plant is basically a donut probably a pair of counter-rotating ones)of hot plasma spinning inside of an magnetic coil generating electricityit's not likely to go critia\cal and if it did it would be more like a big ball of napalm than an explosion...whoose rasther than wham. but if would scrag the mech and anything close would get werry werry hot.

a super collider style? that would be horribly inefficient, and the descriptions i have seen so far tend to suggest a single ball of material trapped inside a magnetic containment field.

super colliders are used to smash very small numbers of particles into each other. in effect it is a rail gun that fires extremely tiny bullets. it would take far more energy to collide the particles that way than what you would get out of the collision.