Recent content by SirLollington

I've actually come across a video on YouTube recently that demonstrates this property of Gadolinium (Look at 5:00):

Like others said, it really depends on the specific system. There are many factors that influence the final velocity of the cap, such as the mass of the cap, the surface area of the cap, how large the pressure vessel is and the overall geometry around the cap. On top of that, if the pressure is...

Whoops. I missed that. Thanks for correcting my mistake for me.

Not very. I've basically made an estimate by shining it onto a sheet of paper with fine lines every 0.5 millimeters, and the diameter of the spot was significantly smaller than half of that. Unfortunately, I have no good way of measuring the size of things that small. I'll see if I can find a...

For some reason I interpreted the # as "number" and got confused about what it meant. Sorry about that. Firstly, it's more convenient for me to do this in metric units, I hope that's okay with you. I'll convert the units back at the end :smile: 160# = 72.6 kg 9# = 4 kg 10" = 25.4 cm According...

I should probably mention that the module outputs a line that's roughly 5 times as long as it is wide (makes sense because that's the shape of the actual laser diode). Without the lens in front of it, it makes a cone with an opening angle of around 20 degrees, and the line covers around half of...

I mounted the lens on a plate that's suspended on a threaded bar. I positioned it at roughly 24 mm from the laser and then used a nut to make fine adjustments.

Hey, Not sure if this is the correct sub-forum to post this question. I'm still kinda new here, so sorry if I got it wrong :smile: I have a laser module with a fixed focal point of 16 mm and I'm trying to collimate that light into a beam. The point of focused light is at most a quarter...

As for making your coilgun more efficient, there's a few things you could do. First, like Dr.D said, you need to switch your coils at just the right time. For my own coilguns, I've always used a setup like this: The idea is that the projectile itself acts as a switch for the coil. Once it...

Any rope you use is going to have some elasticity to it. How much it stretches and rebounds depends on the material you use. You need to consider that when the rope is fully extended and begins to stretch, this causes a massive spike in the force on that rope. A less elastic rope will mean that...

I might be able to help you here, but I'm not entirely sure what the machine you're trying to drive does, or how it works. From my understanding, it's just a weight on a rail, and you whack it with a hammer and make the weight slide a certain distance along that rail (Correct me if I'm wrong!)...

Hello! I thought I'd quickly introduce myself here. I'm a 22 year old college student in computer science, although my interests extend far beyond that. I've spent most of my life working on my own projects. I enjoy technical challenges, especially in the area of programming, electronics and...