How it's Made: Aluminum Foil

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Three weeks ago, I wrote a post that, much to my surprise, went viral, garnering more Facebook "Likes" than any before it, although it only came in maybe third in traffic after the all-time record-holding post from a couple of years ago. Maybe I shouldn't have been surprised.
Having followed the anti-vaccine movement continuously for nearly six years now, I had come to think that I had seen it all as far as deceptive strategies for frightening parents about vaccines.
The previous entry on cyclohexadiene reminded me of another important piece in some hydrogenations - Raney nickel.

Aww... I'll have to wait until Monday when I have fast net access again. You should see how items like hollow tubes, including those square section tubes, are made - you just have a piece of steel with the right size and shaped hole in it and you heat up the aluminum then ram it through the hole - and it magically comes out the other end with the correct shape (which is often pretty complex - but the simple square is easy to imagine).

Sheet metal being produced from huge rolls of steel is also pretty impressive - especially when something goes wrong - there's an instant mess of huge amounts of what looks like a very large ribbon. I wonder if there are any videos posted of such events.

By MadScientist (not verified) on 15 Jan 2010 #permalink

Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.
Why do they have to waste so much milk?
Remind me to never buy this crap again.

@WIll: were you listening to the thing? That's not milk; it's water with some small amount of vegetable oil added. It's a very common coolant in industry. Since everything costs money there's not much wasted either; >99% of the stuff you see spilling will be collected, filtered, and recycled.

By MadScientist (not verified) on 18 Jan 2010 #permalink