Idiot tries nuclear fission in the kitchen

[sjastro]

It's only "a hobby".



Regards

Steven

[kitsuna]

I really hope that's a work of fiction.

cuz if it's not, it's both hilarious and horrifying.

Hilarious for obvious reasons, and horrifying because I'd really REALLY like to believe it isn't easy for some putz off the street to get a hold of that kind of nuclear material.

Heavens forbid it got into the hands of people more malicious and marginally cleverer....

[xelasnave]

I find that funny and scarey at the same time.
alex

[M_Lewis]

hahaha - priceless.

Well closer to home, yahoo serious did split the beer atom to give us bubbles! :D

[renormalised]

"It's only a hobby!!!......".....next minute, there's a mushroom cloud rising above the remains of 10 city blocks around where his house existed:):P

[AstralTraveller]

For those who find stamp collecting a little tame.......

[bojan]

Guys,
do you realise that in Europe now it's so called "The Sour Cucumber Season"?
Meaning: it is Summer, it is hot and there are no news... so, media must invent something to write about...

[TrevorW]

I remember as a kid being able to buy from Selby's all the stuff I needed to make an assortment of bombs including Nitro the formula's and combinations where researchable and after a few attempts getting the right combination my nerdy friend and I managed to make some quite volatile explosives

the fun has now been taken out of life

[sally1jack]

Not for this guy apparently,BECAUSE HE IS MAKING A NUCLEAR REACTOR IN HIS KITHCEN :eyepop: or am i just boring:question:
phil

[TrevorW]

Curiosity makes good science, says Professor Barnhardt in The Day the Earth Stood Still. (Paraphrased.) But foolishness, ignorance and/or a lack of wisdom precede injury, illness and death from experimental boldness.

Knowledge comes with possibilities, and action based on this brings the burden of consequences. Read and learn, but cultivate wisdom along with an understanding of the natural world. Just because you can do something, you do not necessarily have a license to actually do that thing. History is replete with example upon example of this lesson.

[multiweb]

:lol: Yeah I have no problem believing that. Also Sweden is ridden with mozzies this time of the year. Big ones too! Enought to drive anybody nuts. Nuk'em all :P

[jenchris]

Imagine if he'd succeeded to make an inexpensive power source -'build them a megawatt and they will come'.
http://www.dyesol.com/index.php?page=NewsArticle&archiveitemid=67&archiveitemdatetime=2011-06-21%2012:46:16&archiveitemstart=1&archiveitemtotal=46&archiveitemlimit=2
This is the company that's making the 3rd gen Solar Cells

[Zaps]

The Radioactive Boy Scout. (http://www.harpers.org/archive/1998/11/0059750)

[tlgerdes]

These are usually documented on tombstones.
:lol:

[blindman]

Lucky neighborhood,


they almost got FREE POWER.

[astrocookie]

lol:rofl::rofl::rofl:

[Waxing_Gibbous]

Oh come off it you lot.
You need a critical mass as you well know!
Anyway. Here's a pictodaguerrowhatsits of Rutherfords laboratory:

http://http://www.ssplprints.com/image/87247/unattributed-sir-ernest-rutherfords-laboratory-early-20th-century

Just about any kitchen is better tecked than this!
I think my LG fridge might do the job if I dismantled it. :D

[Steffen]

It's obviously a hoax. I don't know what they think he was splitting but there is no way he could have obtained real atoms! ;)

Cheers
Steffen.

[Ric]

How exactly do you buy radioactive elements?

I mean it's not like you can nip down to Bunnings and buy a can of domestic strength Uranium.

[TrevorW]

You can't, obviously this must be a hoax,

Uranium is a metallic chemical element which is classified among the actinides on the periodic table of elements. It is perhaps most famous as the source of fuel for nuclear weapons and power plants, but it has a range of uses as well. Deposits of uranium have been found in several regions of the world, and the element is fairly abundant in nature, keeping prices relatively low under normal conditions.



Because this element is toxic and radoactive and because it has potentially very dangerous uses, access to the world's supply of uranium is tightly restricted and only avaibale through licensed dealers.


When uranium is isolated from the metal ores it occurs in, it is a silvery white, very heavy metal which is extremely reactive and a little bit softer than steel. Because uranium is so reactive, it quickly forms a thick gray to black tarnish when exposed to air. There are 14 known isotopes (http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-an-isotope.htm) of uranium, and the element also appears in a number of chemical compounds, some of which have industrial uses. You can find uranium on the periodic table of elements by looking for the “U” symbol, or atomic number 92.


This element's reactivity makes it ideally suited to making fuel for nuclear power plants, reactors which power submarines, and of course nuclear weapons.



Several militaries also use a form of uranium in high density penetrating rounds; this usage has been subject to controversy, as such rounds can potentially present a health risk if they are not properly disposed of.


Because uranium is toxic, it needs to be handled very carefully. It can cause severe organ damage, and uranium dust can irritate mucus membranes such as those found in the lungs. The radioactivity of the metal is also a health risk, as is the explosiveness of uranium dust. Most people who work around uranium are trained to use basic safety precautions to keep their work safe.

Americium is a highly radioactive element.

Radium is over one million times more radioactive than the same mass of uranium.

[Terry B]

Others have tried before.
See
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hahn

[Ric]

That's pretty amazing stuff Terry

Thanks for the link

[sjastro]

It seems that the BBC news thought the story was legitimate.

The mental giant was interviewed by the BBC and claimed he purchased the materials on Ebay.:lol:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-14406766

The sale of radioactive material on Ebay is prohibited.



Regards

Steven

[bojan]

Hmm..
Uranium's chemical reactivity has nothing to do with it's use as a nuclear fuel.
Also it must be noted that only isotope suitable as fission material is U235.
U238 (most abundant isotope) is used in rounds, because it is heavy (so penetrates well into other materials), and because it is chemically reactive (basically it burns (oxidises) violently (especially at higher temperatures and when in aerosol mode after bursting through shield) so it serves as a kind of explosive charge.

[rally]

The book "The Radioactive Boy Scout" tells how David Hahn constructed his own breeder reactor as a teenager in his mother's garden shed !

Its fascinating reading if you can still find in a library.

The amazing thing is he was not only able to find out how to source his raw materials from ordinary places - Americium from old smoke detectors, Thorium from stock damaged gas lantern mantels which he ingeniously refined, but that the regulatory authorities and universities actually provided him with a lot of the information on how to do it !
He sent many letters to various people under various false names and guises, these letters were full of typos and poor grammar but were still replied to.

A very quick outline

The Americium produced alpha rays which when bombarded into Aluminium produced neutrons which in turn when bombarded the Thorium produced Uranium - but his Neutron gun wasn't powerful enough.

So he then used Radium from the paint used to illuminate old clock dials and refined it for his Alpha Ray source and used a piece of more efficient Beryllium as the target and now directed his fully functioning neutron gun at some Pitchblende ore (contains small amounts of Uranium) he had managed to get.

This was now becoming more radioactive by the day.

He then decided to make a Breeder Reactor and combined all of this Radium, Americium, Beryllium and Aluminum into an aluminium foil wrapped reactor core and surrounded this core with the Thorium and Uranium wrapped up in little foil packages and held together with duct tape and a blanket !

His Breeder Reactor worked.

By this stage his Gieger counter was detecting radiation half a suburban block away so he thought he better break it down into smaller pieces and take it away and got caught by the police only because there was report of a teenager stealing car tyres and he was driving around in the early hours of the morning.

The guys in moon suits came as part of a Radiation Response emergency and dismantled his now highly contaminated 'nuclear laboratory' which consisted of nothing much more than few old pots and pans and a milk crate in a small potting shed - total value probably $2.00 !

He was not charged and went to the Navy on a Sub, where he apparently wasnt allowed near the reactors.

Its worth reading.

Rally

Oops I now see Terry already posted a Wikipedia link for David Hahn - sorry

[TrevorW]

all you ever wanted to know about how to make a reactor at home

http://reactor1967.fortunecity.com/

[bojan]

Guys.. please get serious.
If it was so simple, we would have been obliterated couple of times already and world would have been a very different place..

All those are nothing but urban legends... just like UFO's.. or cold fission... or... whatever else.

[TrevorW]

Thats just the point so why take it seriously :D

[bojan]

:thumbsup:

[sjastro]

If this numbskull was somehow able to moderate the energy of the colliding neutrons so that nuclei would be able to capture them and undergo fission, then he and any unfortunate individual nearby would quickly succumb not to radiation, but the neutrons formed in the chain reaction.

Any talk of meltdowns in the kitchen or other individuals making their own mini reactors is the stuff of mythology.

Regards

Steven

[Terry B]

I don't think David Hahn is an urban myth. He idn't make a reactor but her certainly made a seriously hot house. (pun intended)

[bojan]

I don't believe a single word of this story (apart from perhaps the fact that he managed to obtain some quantities of radioactive material.. but how much, this is also questionable).
If he really did what they said he did, he should have ended in hospital with acute symptoms of radiation sickness, together with all of his neighbours.

However, the story can be read as good SF :-)

[TrevorW]

As an example of the improbablity of this

Americium

the isotope 242m1Am (half-life 141 years) has the largest cross sections for absorption of thermal neutrons (5,700 barns (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barn_%28unit%29)),that results in a small critical mass (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_mass) for a sustained nuclear chain reaction (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_chain_reaction).

The critical mass for a bare 242m1Am sphere is about 9–14 kg.

It can be lowered to 3–5 kg with a metal reflector and should become even smaller with a water reflector.

Such small critical mass is favourable for portable nuclear weapons (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapon), but those based on 242m1Am are not known yet, probably because of its scarcity and high price.

The critical masses of two other readily available isotopes, 241Am and 243Am, are relatively high – 57.6 to 75.6 kg for 241Am and 209 kg for 243Am.[86] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americium#cite_note-irsn-86) Scarcity and high price yet hinder application of americium as a nuclear fuel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_fuel) in nuclear reactors (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_reactor).

Americium is the only synthetic element to have found its way into the household, where one common type of smoke detector (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoke_detector) uses 241Am in the form of americium dioxide as its source of ionizing radiation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ionizing_radiation).

This isotope is preferred against 226Ra (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radium) because it emits 5 times more alpha particles and relatively little of harmful γ-radiation.

The amount of Americium in a typical new smoke detector is 1 microcurie (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curie) (37 kBq (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bequerel)) or 0.28 microgram (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microgram).

So to obtain sufficient 241 Am for a critical mass you would require at least 30,000,000,000 smoke detectors at a rough guess.

[Steffen]

Otto Hahn certainly isn't and neither is Lise Meitner. The stuff was still legal back then ;)

Cheers
Steffen.

[rally]

Why not read a little about what he actually did first before discounting it.

He used Tritium as a moderator.

He didnt build a nuclear bomb and he didnt build a fully functioning nuclear reactor, but he did make a nuclear device that was producing a radioactive output as a result of nuclear reactions/transformations.

Random House (largest English book publisher in the world) still has it listed for sale and continues to list it as a True Story.
http://www.randomhouse.com/book/167319/the-radioactive-boy-scout-by-ken-silverstein

If it were not true I would have thought that it would have been uncovered as a fabrication over all these years, the book is chock full of otherwise very easily disputable facts and the names of all parties and occupations involved.

[Terry B]

Quite a good review is here
http://pubs.acs.org/cen/books/8232/8232books.html