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Does that seem insurmountable? Large vacuum chambers are widely deployed in homes today, as thermoses and CRTs. As long as the structure punctures and leaks rat
by tlb 4y ago
Does that seem insurmountable? Large vacuum chambers are widely deployed in homes today, as thermoses and CRTs. As long as the structure punctures and leaks rather than fracturing suddenly, it doesn’t sound wildly unsafe.
Perhaps the toy would consist of bags of inch-diameter vacuum balls, the rupture of any one creating just a pop.
- bell-cot 4y agoBoth to look more like current helium birthday balloons, and for square/cube law reasons, I'm thinking the vacuum birthday balloons would need to be ~30cm diameter. The fragile vacuum part of a thermos has far fewer cc's of vaccuum (vs. a ~30cm "balloon"), is inside a pretty tough shell, and kids usually aren't allowed to play with 'em. CRT's hold more vacuum, but certainly aren't something that kids get to play around with. Vs. have you ever watched younger kids play with balloons? Consider the potential for ear injury, if Kid_1 breaks a 30cm vacuum balloon in close proximity to Kid_2's eardrum. Or how similar the broken pieces of a vacuum balloon might be to broken glass.
- jagged-chisel 4y agoKids play with current balloons because they’re elastic and bouncy. I think they would be bored of a perfect sphere that just hovers around the room. Further, given that the vacuum balloons are rigid, I think it’s far more likely to take on a leak that fills the balloon rather quickly but not instantly. For argument’s sake, suppose one does fail suddenly- do we even know what that sounds like? I don’t think it could possibly be worse than a (thick enough) mylar balloon pumped up to two atmospheres and exploding. It’s not like suddenly there’s vacuum in the room.
- moring 4y agoThis is a suggestion what might happen: https://what-if.xkcd.com/6/ https://what-if.xkcd.com/6/