Videos r taking time
Added 2025-11-10 12:44:48 +0000 UTCI’ve been working on the silicon carbide video and I’m still working on it! Been a bit of a drawn-out process, but I’ve been able to get a water chiller to run the cooling on the induction furnace, so I’m really excited to go push it to its limit in the next week or two, chasing a 1800 C temperature that will let us fuse silicon dioxide and carbon into silicon carbide. I hope so!
thanks as always for your support here, I’ve bought a lot of equipment and crucibles and gadgets for this project, and that’s only possible thanks to you generous Patreon people.
New baby birds in the video too… saw the eggs and wondered if they would hatch during the video—- they have well and truely grown and flown the nest before the video project has been completed!
I’m thinking about the cubane project again too, it’s unfair that I’ve dropped the ball on that. Recrystallisations are boring and unsuccessful. I think I’ll need to Do a Column, so I’m looking into that.
Thanks!
Tom
Comments
Just a thought, but you could dismantle the induction furnace and make your own smaller diameter coil, wound from copper microbore pipe or vehicle brake pipe. Then you can have the coil remote from the control box as well, it might help stop spills and also for your small sample size.
Richard Pruen
2025-12-01 13:53:28 +0000 UTCOn the induction heater front, the extra hot water seems to be from the induction coil cooling water. That means a lot of your heat is going into the wire coil, not into the graphite. The issue you had to start with is that you are trying to heat too small an amount of graphite. It also wants to be pressed into as solid a block as possible to improve conductivity. Ideally, as it off-gases and 'puffs up' like bread, you want the puck centred in the coil and as large in diameter as insulation allows. A zirconia disk is placed on top, then a thick-walled ceramic tube allows a weight to be placed on top to keep the puck consolidated (and keep oxygen out). What frequency is your induction heater using? For graphite, you want to be in the range 3-5KHz to get good heating. You might need to check the settings of the induction heater and start at the lower end. Your thermocouple will work in the induction furnace; you might need to shut the induction off to get an accurate reading, but rough readings should be fine. The coil will induce voltages in the two parallel wires, but they cancel out as the two legs to the thermocouple are the same length. The EMF can cause reading errors, but switching off the heating for 20-30 seconds will give an accurate reading. The wires are too fine for much induction heating and won't melt. I am an electrical and electronic engineer. Feel free to reach out if you would like any help. I also worked in waste-to-energy plants, so I can help with refractory info. The coating you want for your ceramic fibre is this sort of thing https://shop.vitcas.com/vitcas-zircon-paint-coating.html. That allows a graphite crucible at 1750°C to be placed inside a coated ceramic fibre insulation, which will cut heat loss a lot.
Richard Pruen
2025-12-01 13:43:42 +0000 UTCin jan 2027 i will begin my master thesis on enantioselective chromatography, if the cubane project is still in the works by the time i have valuable knowledge hit me up
Korrasami
2025-11-27 12:50:00 +0000 UTC
