Chaff has always been a short term phenomenon - it settles, so how do you make it neutrally dense or even lighter than air so it will not settle. The key is rel

Chaff has always been a short term phenomenon - it settles, so how do you make it neutrally dense or even lighter than air so it will not settle. The key is related to the aluminum coated Mylar balloons - make them as light as air, Helium diffuses out quickly but if you use hydrogen you can create a chaff machine that uses two sheets of plastic, one coated with very thin aluminum. trap helium or hydrogen between them, then laminate and separate them into tiny tubes with neutral density so the residence time in air is quite a few hours with Hydrogen, lots less with helium. You can make it in advance, but popped popcorn fills a plane quickly, but unpopped corn allows you to mobilize more chaff in the plane. This would be a good method to fox radar guided missiles, or radar satellite surveys or launches. These short straws of Mylar would have the needed aerial residence time and could even be made to rise, loiter and then fall with the right choice of gasses (mixed hydrogen and helium allows a rise, followed by a fall as the helium diffuses out) - saves helium as well