burnin' stuff

[The Ninjas Doom]

what is the coolest Mixture of colors if you could make fire any Mixture of colors?(zoringe is a micture between orange, blue and red

[Triumph]

Blue and Green are pretty nifty flame colors. I remember seeing a chemistry demonstration that showed how burning certain substances could achieve unusual flame color. Neat stuff.

[Tyranicus]

Green is awesome. Cupric oxide (the green tarnish on copper) burns green.

[inni]

would zoringe be a mix of all of the colors or the colors close together?

 

i pick green, blue, and black,

the topic is burning stuff so are all of these colors achievable with the right chemicals?

[Swimmin' Salmon]

I didn't see it on your list, but I would have to pick happiness.

[A less presumptuous name.]

Originally Posted By: I need no introduction

the topic is burning stuff so are all of these colors achievable with the right chemicals?

Theoretically, yes. Well, each element has it's own set of light frequencies given off when heated. There are plenty of these colors, so you can get enough colors to satisfy most people.

[Celtic Minstrel]

I'm pretty sure black isn't a possible flame colour, but anything else is fair game.

[A less presumptuous name.]

Oh, I missed the black. Yes, since black is, in terms of light, the absence of light, it's rather difficult to get truly black light.

[Celtic Minstrel]

Though UV is sometimes called black light...

[Øther]

I once burned a textbook. Green fire. Awsome.

[A less presumptuous name.]

Originally Posted By: Celtic Minstrel

Though UV is sometimes called black light...

Hence why I said truly black light.

[Callie]

I object to the lack of orange. Red orange is awesome, and throw in some neon red and it's even better.

[Alorael at Large]

Black light is a lot like white light moving in the opposite direction.

 

—Alorael, who is a fan of the pale blue of ethanol fires. Especially on his clothes.

[Rowen]

"Que le vaya burn" is what I use to say to jerks when I lived in Chile.

[Enraged Slith]

Magnesium burns with something like the intensity of the sun. It's pretty cool to see, as long as you don't stare directly into the light.

 

On a related note, that useless Introduction to Physics and Chemistry was the greatest class I've ever taken.

[Xaiya]

omg light purple is teh shiz, yo.

 

I'm not sure what would burn as it, though, since I don't know that much about scientific stuff.

[Swimmin' Salmon]

phosphorus is a delightful burn too

[Student of Trinity]

I was once giving a Powerpoint physics talk in the middle of which I showed a single overhead projector slide. So I had one Powerpoint slide that was just all black, to leave the screen empty for when I turned on the OHP.

 

At the time I was badly jetlagged, and for a moment I actually thought, Wait, this isn't going to work, I'll have to turn off the digital projector, or the black light from my Powerpoint is going to cover up the overhead image.

 

I explained this thought to my audience, and since they were all physicists, it went over well as a joke.

[Dantius]

I demand an explanation why Octarine is not a choice. It is the coolest color!

[Alorael at Large]

No, it is not. If you could see it you'd know that!

 

—Alorael, who demands to know whether fireballs are octarine and, therefore, invisible to benighted non-magicals.

[Sudanna]

My candle in The World is grey. I love that candle.

[The Ninjas Doom]

Quote:

I object to the lack of orange.

sorry, i thought i put orange.

[Dikiyoba]

Regular fire is mostly orange already, though. People wanting orange fire should check the none option.

 

Dikiyoba will take white and/or blue doom, please.

[Monroe]

Ah, and here I was worried I'd be the only one who'd pick white. Good choice, Dikiyoba.

 

I also picked black, though. Few things would be more interesting to see than a dark fire.

[The Mystic]

I choose the wavelengths just barely outside both ends of the visible light spectrum. A fire in colors only I can see...

[Monroe]

Wouldn't fire outside of the visible light spectrum be more like radiation?

[The Mystic]

Yes. And so, to an extent, is fire inside the visible light spectrum, since visible light can be classified as radiation.

[The Ratt]

I have actually seen purple fire before. It was in a heat-treat plant in my area. I think they said it was nitrogen burning, but I don't remember.

[The Mystic]

Originally Posted By: The Ratt

I have actually seen purple fire before.

Not surprising. When I was a boy scout, I saw and/or made fires that were just about every color of the rainbow.

[Dantius]

Originally Posted By: The Ratt

I think they said it was nitrogen burning, but I don't remember.

I'm pretty sure that nitrogen is very, very inert and won't burn. Maybe it was potassium?

[Student of Trinity]

Radiation could be pretty much anything that tends to travel outwards in straight lines. So in some contexts one speaks of sound as radiation, or even of water waves.

 

Fast-moving material particles that are ejected from atomic nuclei undergoing nuclear decay are also referred to as radiation; materials whose nuclei decay in this way are called radioactive. The ejected particles can include ordinary electrons (created when a neutron transforms into a proton), though in this context they are often referred to as 'beta rays' for historical reasons. More common as a radioactive product is a little mini-nucleus of two protons and two neutrons. If it had two electrons orbiting it, we'd call it a helium atom, but when it's ejected in decay it's normally called an alpha particle (again, this name was given before people knew what it actually was).

 

In some cases radioactive decay can also eject neutrons. Neutrons that aren't surrounded by other protons and neutrons tend to break up into protons and electrons, which is why we don't find loose neutrons floating around; but if they encounter another nucleus before this happens, they may get absorbed into it. Unfortunately this usually destabilizes the absorbing nucleus, making it radioactive if it wasn't before. In this sense radioactivity can be contagious.

 

What 'radiation' usually means, though, is electromagnetic waves. These can have literally any wavelength, from light years to far less than the diameter of a nucleus. An electric charge shaking around at a certain temporal frequency excites an electromagnetic wave of corresponding wavelength (speed of light divided by the frequency). A narrow range of wavelengths just under one micrometer happen to trigger certain photochemical reactions in human visual cells, and we call electromagnetic waves in this range 'visible light'.

 

Much longer wavelengths are normally only created artificially, as microwave or radio signals. Much shorter wavelengths, down to the ranges called 'X rays', are emitted naturally by highly excited atoms, and can be generated artificially by accelerating electrons very sharply. EM waves with any wavelengths shorter than the arbitrarily decreed limit of X-rays are all called gamma rays, and are produced by nuclear reactions, as well (it seems) as by poorly understood astrophysical processes that probably involve black holes.

 

Flames are hot gas, which means that the molecules that compose the gas are moving fast, which means that they often hit each other hard. This jolts their electrons around sharply, and the acceleration of these electrical charges generates electromagnetic waves. The hotter the gas, the more violently the molecular electrons get shaken up in collisions, and the higher frequency light (so, with shorter wavelength) is emitted. In the visible range, higher frequency means toward the blue end of the spectrum, lower frequency means toward the red. But atoms and molecules also all have certain specific frequencies at which their electrons tend to shake around, like a bell that makes a certain tone when struck. So some molecules glow in distinct colors that don't change much with temperature.

 

I guess by 'flame' one means not just any hot gas, but specifically gas that has been heated by ongoing chemical reaction. The sun is a big ball of hot gas, which is why we have sunlight, but it is heated by nuclear reactions rather than chemical. So the sun is not technically a ball of fire, though the distinction is a bit of a quibble, since only the core of the sun is really undergoing nuclear fusion, and the outer layers that we see are not really so different from any very hot flame.

[Avarakadavra]

Oh my god... That post s really big...

[Celtic Minstrel]

Originally Posted By: Dantius

I'm pretty sure that nitrogen is very, very inert and won't burn. Maybe it was potassium?

Um, what? Nitrogen is reactive enough that it bonds in pairs like oxygen. I'm sure it would burn fairly readily.

[Student of Trinity]

I think that's just it: nitrogen atoms are reactive enough, but nitrogen molecules are pretty tightly locked together, and so are pretty inert. A good thing, too, or the atmosphere would have burned up a long time ago.

[Celtic Minstrel]

Ah, okay, that makes sense. Still, nitrogen would burn in the right circumstance, then.

[Lilith]

Yeah, there are several different oxides of nitrogen that can be formed at high temperatures. For example, car engines produce small amounts of nitrogen oxides; these are a significant contributor to smog.

[Xelgion]

Originally Posted By: Dantius

Originally Posted By: The Ratt

I think they said it was nitrogen burning, but I don't remember.

I'm pretty sure that nitrogen is very, very inert and won't burn. Maybe it was potassium?

Nitrogen has 6 valence electrons (I think), so it would burn as easily if the molecules were not locked so tight.

And potassium has 1 valence electron, and is volatile with the air (not sure which it reacts to, Nitrogen or Oxygen), and is impossible to find uncombined in nature.

[Kelandon]

Originally Posted By: Xelgion

Nitrogen has 6 valence electrons (I think), so it would burn as easily if the molecules were not locked so tight.

5, no?

I've sometimes thought of the alpha/beta/gamma radiation vs. electromagnetic radiation distinction as being confusing before. When astronomers talk about a "radiation-dominated universe," they mean the latter, but when physicists talk about radiation from a fission reaction or something, they mean the former. (And so on.) The terminology is ambiguous, and we don't seem to care, I suppose because context usually makes it clear anyway, more or less.

We have similar problems with electric potential energy and electric potential, though; they're both called "potential" sometimes, and context is the only differentiating factor. For some reason, textbooks always lament the "electric potential" name but never the "radiation" name.

[Lilith]

Originally Posted By: Xelgion

And potassium has 1 valence electron, and is volatile with the air (not sure which it reacts to, Nitrogen or Oxygen), and is impossible to find uncombined in nature.

Potassium can react with both oxygen and water vapour in the air. It's reactive enough that it will break down water into hydrogen and oxygen, forming potassium oxide and hydrogen gas. The buildup of hydrogen and the heat produced by the reaction can cause an explosion.

[The Mystic]

You know, the more I read this thread, the more I realize it's a good thing I never wanted a chemistry set when I was younger.

[The Ninjas Doom]

Quote:

I never wanted a chemistry set when I was younger.

why? you can blow stuff up with it

[Dantius]

Originally Posted By: The Mystic

I never wanted a chemistry set when I was younger.

 

Don't worry, it should have little influence. After all, I played with Legos when I was younger, it had no influence on my career whatsoever!

 

 

 

...wait a second...

[A less presumptuous name.]

Originally Posted By: Student of Trinity

Radiation...stuff...flame.

Let's avoid giving our resident physicist(s) any fodder.

[Alorael at Large]

Originally Posted By: Student of Trinity

nitrogen atoms are reactive enough, but nitrogen molecules are pretty tightly locked together, and so are pretty inert.

That's true of a lot of atoms. Hydrogen and oxygen are also very reactive, but somehow water rarely seems to burn.

—Alorael, who is quite sure that nitrogen is inert. It's often used in much the same way as noble gases when you just need something not to react with air, with "air" usually meaning the oxygen and not the other stuff.

[Niemand]

Quote:

I've sometimes thought of the alpha/beta/gamma radiation vs. electromagnetic radiation distinction as being confusing before.

My favorite is delta radiation or delta rays. Aside from specifically referring to secondary particles it's charmingly redundant.

[The Mystic]

Originally Posted By: fiery doom

Quote:

I never wanted a chemistry set when I was younger.

why? you can blow stuff up with it

True, but looking back on when I was a pyromaniac (read "boy scout"), the odds were too great that I'd find a combination of chemicals that would've made my sister an only child.

[keira]

Originally Posted By: fiery doom

Quote:

I never wanted a chemistry set when I was younger.

why? you can blow stuff up with it

You haven't seen chemisty sets nowadays, have you? The lawyers ruined the fun of 'em...although there are a coupla niche companies that sell unlawyered sets.

[Student of Trinity]

Miniature hadron colliders would be pretty cool. Man. But maybe there wouldn't actually be much to see for the kids; the data would have to all be represented on a screen, anyway. So why not just give the kid a simulator program? That might actually be a great idea. In fact, it might even exist. CERN does have a gift shop. I wonder if they sell something like that?

[waterplant]

The first circular particle accelerator was small enough to fit in a human hand. I'm not sure anyone would want to be holding a device colliding accelerated particles though....

[Student of Trinity]

Really? It can't have achieved dangerous energies, then.