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A material can be "hard" but also be brittle. Diamond is one of these substances. You don't need a large hammer to crack or destroy one. Ask any jeweler.
by joezydeco 10y ago
A material can be "hard" but also be brittle. Diamond is one of these substances. You don't need a large hammer to crack or destroy one. Ask any jeweler.
- logfromblammo 10y agoDiamond has perfect cleavage in four directions. If you want a mineral that you can really pound on without it breaking, you want nephrite. The Maori made war clubs out of it. Bring a diamond to a nephrite fight, and you're going to end up in the stewpot. If you need hardness and toughness, corundum is what you want.
- randall 10y agoThis is what makes me think it's probably going to be used in pacemakers / satellites, rather than phones. Imagine the Galaxy Note 7 fiasco with radioactive isotopes. Tesla has this problem too. They shield the underside of the car now, but imagine if you accidentally punctured the diamond. It'd likely shatter and spread radioactive material everywhere. It could be awesome in non-touchable contexts though.