Xavier Onassiss Posted April 16, 2010 Report Share Posted April 16, 2010 Do lava lamps work on Jupiter? With the help of a 3-G centrifuge and digital camera, now we know! Don't look at me, Xavier Onassiss Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tkdguy Posted April 16, 2010 Report Share Posted April 16, 2010 Re: Valuable info for your Star Hero Campaign! But how would they work in low-g conditions, like Jupiter's moons? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Man Posted April 17, 2010 Report Share Posted April 17, 2010 Re: Valuable info for your Star Hero Campaign! I was so impressed by the centrifuge that I didn't even care about the lamp any more. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lawnmower Boy Posted April 17, 2010 Report Share Posted April 17, 2010 Re: Valuable info for your Star Hero Campaign! They still have Meccano? Answer: yes, barely. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Mackinder Posted April 19, 2010 Report Share Posted April 19, 2010 Re: Valuable info for your Star Hero Campaign! I also noticed the preponderance of old-style Mechano parts. Nice room. Impressive device. I'm guessing the test runs were made elsewhere. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted April 21, 2010 Report Share Posted April 21, 2010 Re: Valuable info for your Star Hero Campaign! But he had the lamp axis wrong to mimic high gravity! The centripetal acceleration vector (the "artificial gravity" made by the centrifuge) is at right angles to the long axis of the lamp. He needs to repeat the experiment, with the lamp lying on its side (or on a pivot so that when "spun up" it will lay more or less sideways) so that the centrifuge's outward acceleration is in the same direction as the "usual" gravity axis on the lamp. His experiment is interesting, but it's not the experiment I thought it was going to be. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xavier Onassiss Posted April 21, 2010 Author Report Share Posted April 21, 2010 Re: Valuable info for your Star Hero Campaign! But he had the lamp axis wrong to mimic high gravity! The centripetal acceleration vector (the "artificial gravity" made by the centrifuge) is at right angles to the long axis of the lamp. He needs to repeat the experiment, with the lamp lying on its side (or on a pivot so that when "spun up" it will lay more or less sideways) so that the centrifuge's outward acceleration is in the same direction as the "usual" gravity axis on the lamp. His experiment is interesting, but it's not the experiment I thought it was going to be. Caption quoted directly from the webpage: The payload container pivots freely so that it is always facing 'down'. Having the lamp lying on its side wouldn't work at all, because 'down' is actually the vector sum of the artificial gravity from the centrifuge plus the earth's gravity. The pivot allows both to be taken into account. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted April 21, 2010 Report Share Posted April 21, 2010 Re: Valuable info for your Star Hero Campaign! Hmm, OK. And looking more carefully at the camera footage late in the video, that is the flooring bast the lamp and its cradle. And at 59 seconds in, you can see the lamp cradle tilted in the paused frame. I wonder why anyone said the lava lamp wouldn't work at higher gravity? Buoyancy forces scale directly with gravity, and it's buoyancy forces that drive the rise/fall of the convective elements in the fluid; to first order, at least, changing the gravity doesn't alter what's going on. Convection and turbulence are well known to operate in Jupiter.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zeropoint Posted April 22, 2010 Report Share Posted April 22, 2010 Re: Valuable info for your Star Hero Campaign! Well, that's just it: if the balance is delicate enough, the increased buoyancy at a higher gravity might be enough to disrupt or alter the flow of the fluids. I wouldn't have thought that a lava lamp would be that delicate, though. In any case, you're missing the important part: Up until now, it was all theory. Good theory, maybe, but still theory. Now we KNOW! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Man Posted April 22, 2010 Report Share Posted April 22, 2010 Re: Valuable info for your Star Hero Campaign! And knowing is half the battle! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tkdguy Posted April 24, 2010 Report Share Posted April 24, 2010 Re: Valuable info for your Star Hero Campaign! And knowing is half the battle! G- I- Jooooooe! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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