4 ms·
No, they don’t. The force a man can apply does not require "high strength" materials to withstand. They don’t need high temperature performance, either. Serious
by kergonath 2y ago
No, they don’t. The force a man can apply does not require "high strength" materials to withstand. They don’t need high temperature performance, either. Seriously, we don’t need superalloy spoons.
When we’re talking about advanced materials, "high strength" means hundreds of MPa and "high temperature" is beyond 500°C (and more depending on the application).
- kragen 2y agoAny material can withstand the force a man (or a woman) can apply if you make it thick enough. Contrapositively, if you make it too thin, it can't. So sign me the fuck up for the superalloy spoons, but hold the nickel, please. (It would be excellent to be able to clean my silverware by firing it in a kiln, though with a copper alloy I'd probably have to scrub off the verdigris.)
- kube-system 2y ago304 stainless is already strong enough that you could make a durable spoon thin enough that it would be painful to use. And it is cheap.
- kragen 2y ago8–11% nickel, not antibacterial, and five times weaker than this CuLiTa alloy in the annealed state. Thin out the middle and leave thick edges to avoid pain. None of this is an option with this new alloy unless someone finds a cheaper way to make it and probably some kind of beryllium-copper-like precipitation hardening process so you can form it.
- fc417fc802 2y ago> Thin out the middle and leave thick edges to avoid pain. Ok but if you do that then what is the point of the exercise? I thought fancy flatware was thin because of the appearance. If the edges are thick doesn't that defeat the purpose? The equivalent thickness being something like 5x stronger is of course the benefit here. I don't think price is an issue for high end home use items. Rich people buy far weirder and more expensive things.
- kragen 2y agoI was thinking the edge could have a radius of about 350μm (like 21-gauge wire) while the main body might be 200μm thick. Price is always an issue. Maybe you're willing to pay €100 a spoon, or €1000, or even €10000, but nobody is going to pay €1000000000 per spoon. If there's a good chance the price will drop by a factor of 10 in the next year, many rich people might be unwilling to pay even €100. The process described sounds like it would currently be able to produce a spoon for a cost on the order of €100k: four PhDs working for a month is maybe €50k, but they're also tying up a lot of rather expensive lab space, and I think they're using analytical-grade fine chemicals rather than metallurgical-grade copper and tantalum. And in this study they made roughly enough for half a spoon. The second spoon would probably cost closer to €1000.
- fc417fc802 2y agoI'm just not clear what the aesthetic advantage of making the body thinner than the edge is. At least not once you're already down under a millimeter. In an adjacent exchange it seemed we both expected the price to be far lower. 10x or even 50x the material cost of a piece of stainless steel flatware seems well within budget for a rich customer.
- kragen 2y agoSure, silver silverware already costs that much (and is antibacterial, and requires scrubbing tarnish off, though only for aesthetic reasons). It'll be interesting to see what shakes out.
- amluto 2y agoNickel-free (e.g. 18/0) flatware is just fine from an engineering perspective, and it’s cheap, and it sticks to magnets, which is fun. It’s even available as fairly nice, decorative name-brand products. And I found some studies suggesting that 304 and 316 stainless steel leach very little nickel when in contact with food. It’s the cheaper nickel-containing stainless steel that’s a problem.
- kragen 2y agoYeah, it's fine in my experience.