Old Shiny Small Thin Metal Case -- WHAT IS IT??

Old-N-Feeble · Oct 6, 2014

I received this in a package deal with something else. Any idea what it is?

dmb · Oct 6, 2014

Is a magnesium ribbon holder. The ribbon is stored inside and goes up the tube. Light the ribbon to give lots of light and white smoke. The length of ribbon burnt relates to amount of light and hence exposure.

http://www.earlyphotography.co.uk/site/entry_M42.html

Old-N-Feeble · Oct 6, 2014

Thank you!!

TheToadMen · Oct 6, 2014

snapguy · Oct 6, 2014

Yes

I am gobsmacked.

David A. Goldfarb · Oct 6, 2014

Cool!

Old-N-Feeble · Oct 6, 2014

Why is this so special? Is it worth a million bucks? No? Darn...

Dr Croubie · Oct 6, 2014

Ah, Magnesium Ribbon, takes me back to my highschool chemistry classes.
We were told by the teacher, "now everyone come up and get a 1" long bit for your experiment". 2 Minutes later the jar (which probably had about 10m in it to begin with) was completely empty and the last kid up to the front missed out.
All the rest of us stuffed our pockets with it, grabbed some jars of Potassium Permanganate, and made some nice extremely bright fires on the weekends.

After a few classes of people missing out, the teacher twigged and cut it up herself and handed us each just what we needed for the lab, no more...

ciniframe · Oct 6, 2014

Dr Croubie said:
Ah, Magnesium Ribbon, takes me back to my highschool chemistry classes.
We were told by the teacher, "now everyone come up and get a 1" long bit for your experiment". 2 Minutes later the jar (which probably had about 10m in it to begin with) was completely empty and the last kid up to the front missed out.
All the rest of us stuffed our pockets with it, grabbed some jars of Potassium Permanganate, and made some nice extremely bright fires on the weekends.

After a few classes of people missing out, the teacher twigged and cut it up herself and handed us each just what we needed for the lab, no more...

That's what the chem teacher used as a fuse to set off the thermite ignition mixture and start the reaction. Nice glowing glob of melted iron in the sand dish was the result. Didn't you just love high school chemistry class. Lots of stinky pyrotechnics, a teenagers dream class.

Newt_on_Swings · Oct 6, 2014

Ah the stuff to light thermite. Was one of the coolest experiments I saw in science class. That stuff makes an awesome addition to any tinder kit for emergency fire lighting when camping. You can buy small blocks of it for shaving oof slivers to light wet tinder.

Pioneer · Oct 6, 2014

Yeah, works great as fire starter when you have a lighter. Not so easy if you're trying to light a fire with flint. Could never get those silly little sparks to go the direction I wanted. You will never know how many long, cold nights I wished for a small bottle of petrol.

JRoosa · Oct 19, 2014

I saw a story years ago about a titanium bike manufacturer.

At their annual party they would pile up a bunch of titanium scrap and kindle it with magnesium.

The photos of the titanium burning at noon look like nighttime because the fire was brighter than the sunlight by several stops.

Had to be very healthy for everybody around too.

-J.

Dr Croubie · Oct 19, 2014

JRoosa said:
I saw a story years ago about a titanium bike manufacturer.

At their annual party they would pile up a bunch of titanium scrap and kindle it with magnesium.

The photos of the titanium burning at noon look like nighttime because the fire was brighter than the sunlight by several stops.

Had to be very healthy for everybody around too.

-J.

Yeah, I've been to one of them, except the other way around. Giant bonfire at a Scout Camp (actually, the kind of scout camp for 18-26 year olds where you drive home-made rally cars around all weekend), and someone threw a magnesium gearbox on the fire, that made night look like day. Titanium just sounds fun though, but a bit expensive...

Old Shiny Small Thin Metal Case -- WHAT IS IT??

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