Front panel material way OT)

[Jim Patchell]

Paul Perry wrote:

> At 10:01 PM 12/10/00 -0400, Terry Bowman wrote:
>
> >ever taken. The pros attach a candle to the end of a long stick.
> >
> As a child, I tried this & was singuarly unimpressed.
> So I filled a balloon with acetylene (home made from carbide lumps)
> and held a match under it.
> And ended up in hospital.
> Having learnt a little about the energy lurking in the carbon triple bond.
>

    Since we are on the subject of basement chemistry, I will add mine.  For a
really good boom, I used to go over to the neighbors house.  I would start up his
oxy-acetylene to torch, adjust the flame, put it in a water tank and swish it
around until it went out, and started filling baggies........I had a detonator
that would attatch to the bags....Those little bags would make quite a bang.

    I did the aluminum-NaOH thing in a coke bottle.  Got the mixture a little
pottent.  The contents foamed out of the bottle.....too bad it was sitting on my
Mothers car, on the hood (well Bonnet, it was an MG 1100).  It permanetly
discolored the paint......No way to cover that one up.

    I also found out that if you mixed NaOH in watet, put a couple of carbon rods
in, and a real high current power supply, it was amazing just how fast
electrolosis could go....It really made that water bubble.

    -Jim

>
> The only high point was a few weeks later when a doctor changing the dressing
> was pretty shocked because he thought my arm had turned black for some
> awful necrotic reason.. he was relieved when I said it was soot!
>
> paul 'toast' perry Melbourne Australlia