Rod Speed wrote:
The Natural Philosopher wrote
Rod Speed wrote
The Natural Philosopher wrote
Rod Speed wrote
The Natural Philosopher wrote
MM wrote
Andy Dingley wrote
Adam Funk wrote

On a related note, is there a good & easy way to destroy data CDs? CDs or CD-ROMs?

If they're CD-ROMs, you can microwave them. You need to space
them apart if you're doing a batch (plastic toastrack, or else a $500
silicon wafer processing boat). You also need to do them for just long enough to nuke the data layer, but
without cooking the
plastic or there's a fume problem. For regular industrial use I
was able to use a cheap domestic microwave from Currys, but had
to mod it with a fixed timer and a single big push button.

CDs can't be nuked to reliably kill the data without getting
them hot enough to cause a fume problem. Shredding is easier,
although you do need a hefty shredder.

I do not understand this penchant for microwaving CDs! Toxic, extremely obnoxious fumes will be released.

Absolute bull****.

Yes.

You simply dont understand: you are rapidly heating the conductive
metallisation which arcs and splits apart without even getting the plastic hot.

It uses the properties of the microwave to put heat into conductors,

No, in fact they just bounce off those. Thats why alfoil on the
ends of say chicken chicken drumsticks stops the ends burning.

Microwaves (to heat) need to get absorbed by something.

Yes, but the destruction of CDs when done right isnt done by heat.

They 'bounce off' thick metal film because they do get absorbed,

They bounce off thick metal film even when there is nothing to
absorb them, like when microwave is empty and you only have the
thick metal walls etc there.

and that sets up currents that effectively cancel the EMF at that point this reflecting them back with if you like a
counteracting EMF generated by the foil.

That utterly mangles what actually happens.

No, its a valid mathematical way of looking at it actually - and the
way that explains WHY a conductor 'reflects' incident radiation.

Nope.

In terms of a classical EMF model anyway. the same properties
undergo a transform into different equations in the quantum theory of photon reflection.

You'll go blind if you dont watch out.

But then you didn't do honours in electrical sciences,

You have no idea what I have done.


No, but I have a very good idea from what you say what you have NOT done.

so you woudln't probably have come across teh maths or that particular explanation.

Wrong again.

OK so you accept my explanation now?

Otherwise your actual words say that you HAVE come across my explanation
and its common knowledge, which again contradicts what you said earlier.

You must learn to post properly Rod. You really are not going to win
trolling arguments if you fall into every single elephant trap set for you.

It just makes you look stupid and clumsy.

Microwaves bounce around inside the microwave oven.

yes, and the reason why they do is because the walls are made of metal that is thick enough not to smoke.

They dont even get heated.

Well actually they do, just not very much ;-)

They dont get absorbed by the ends of the chicken drumsticks
that you have covered in foil just because they cant get thru the foil and so whats under the foil doesnt get heated,
and so doesnt burn.

correct, but the waves DO get absorbed by the *foil* SURFACE ...
and that's what MAKES the foil SURFACE a microwave reflector.

But there is no HEATING involved.

There is, again, some. Just not very much as nearly all the energy does
get reflected

It has circulating currents induced in it that set up an opposing EMF that becomes the 'reflected wave'

That is why (in e classical model) reflection happens and not
absorption as it were, nevertheless nothing is a perfect reflector.
The energy that is lost - if its large enough, will heat the
'reflector' and destroy it.

Wrong, that foil does not get destroyed or even affected.

It would if you stuck it in front of a real he-magnetron on a military
radar set.

As it is it just gets a bit warm.


You still get conduction of the heat thru the bone from the part of the drumstick that isnt covered in foil and so is
heated by the microwaves.

BUT that current itself does heat the foil a bit

Nope.

Yes. Put a mirror in the sun. It still gets hot.

And the walls of the microwave oven dont.

They do, but its only a piddling 800W magnetron and the surface is a
relatively good conductor, and quite thick.

If you think there is no loss of energy and no heating and can prove
that the oven wall reflect 100% of the waves there's another Nobel prize
waiting for you.

But my oven walls and perfectly smooth superconductors.


Not as hot as a black plate, but it gets hot.

Because of the IR falling on it.

Exactly. IR ios very short waelength microwaves isn't it?

Same for any reflector .

Nope, not with the walls of the microwave oven.


You are a card Rod! I love watching you making an asshole of yourself.

and if the foil is thin enough...

The reason you get a spectacular light show is the very thin foil
getting vaporised by the currents that flow in the foil because its
an antenna.

if it absorbs no power than it wont - cant- get hot.

I never said it gets hot.

You are actually contradicting yourself Rod.

Nope.

Yes, because you said it absorbed power without getting hot and thats
why it vapourises!

Anyone who can make a metal vapour and strike arcs in it without it
getting hot is in for a second Noble prize after the superconducting
microwave walls.


Nothing to do with heat.

so how do you vaporise metal without heat, Rod?

With the current flowing in it.


And what does current flowing through a metal do Rod? What is Ohms law,
and what does it say? and where does the power lost in a resistor end up?


Theres a Nobel prize waitng for you

Nope.

Its a bit like saying you want see a voltage drop across a straight
piece of metal - well you wont until you have a larger enough
current and a small enough piece of metal and then you have a fuse.

Cut thats current, not heat.

I squared R, Rod.

It doent get hot.

It doe get hot, child


Do you have any basic knowledge of physics at all?

Yep.

Liar :-)


CD metallization is thin enough to not withstand the currents
needed to reflect the microwaves without fusing - that's all.

Yes, and its not heat, its currents.

Oh Rod...purlease.

Down on your knees, boy.


what for? I just farted in your general direction. Its all you are worth.



--
To people who know nothing, anything is possible.
To people who know too much, it is a sad fact
that they know how little is really possible -
and how hard it is to achieve it.