[HN Gopher] Burning a NeXTCube (1993)
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Burning a NeXTCube (1993)
Author : _Microft
Score : 116 points
Date : 2023-01-30 20:17 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (simson.net)
(TXT) w3m dump (simson.net)
| aardvark179 wrote:
| We tried burning a small part of a Tadpole Sparcbook case (which
| was also a magnesium alloy) and it was hard work. I think we had
| to file the surface down to remove the surface oxide and then
| attack it with a blowtorch.
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| Year ago conversation with better link:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28326169
| dang wrote:
| Thanks! Macroexpanded:
|
| _Burning a Magnesium NextCube (1993)_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28326169 - Aug 2021 (23
| comments)
|
| _Burning a NeXT Cube_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=926992 - Nov 2009 (14
| comments)
|
| (link fixed now too)
| tpmx wrote:
| Besides missing the quality of writing in some of the better
| 80/early 90s computer mags (mostly familiar with US/UK), I also
| really miss the amount of money/skill/love they spent on getting
| high class photography and/or illustrations for the cover and key
| articles.
|
| This (1993) was on the tail end of that phenomenon.
| jjtheblunt wrote:
| i loved NeXTworld Magazine (not sure i got the lowercase and
| uppercase letters right)
| vondur wrote:
| Is this in reference to the post on the front page about not
| mining and harvesting Magnesium from the oceans?
| klyrs wrote:
| Yep, I think my comment there triggered this. Other folks are
| posting better links than the one I dug up from Slashdot then
| archive.org. I do hope that the poster or dang can update the
| link to one of the better ones.
|
| Edit: oh good dang did that while I was typing
| anyfoo wrote:
| I wondered the same! Not with NeXTCubes, but I used to have a
| Sony VAIO N505X at the end of the 90s. A beautiful, tiny laptop
| in a magnesium case.[1]
|
| I vividly remembered all these demonstrations of burning
| magnesium strips in school, and sometimes wondered whether the
| case of my laptop would react the same. Of course, I liked that
| thing, so it always remained a question.
|
| [1] Current pictures found on the Internet don't do justice to it
| at all, since the paint and materials seem to have degraded to
| something very ugly by now.
| tonylemesmer wrote:
| I still have my 505 Vaio. The rubber feet melted into sticky
| gel years ago. I put stickers on the lid so not sure what state
| the paint is in. Battery died a long while ago. Pretty sure the
| alloy these things are made from is not easily ignitable due to
| being close to electronics. And to make the product less
| expensive by alloying with cheaper metals.
| bertrandom wrote:
| This may be a better link:
| https://simson.net/ref/1993/cubefire.html as it has links to the
| actual photos on Flickr:
| https://www.flickr.com/photos/nitroba/albums/721575944354804...
| dang wrote:
| Changed now (see
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34586795). Thanks!
| dang wrote:
| Url changed from
| http://web.archive.org/web/20000817013818/http://simson.net/...,
| which points to this.
|
| Submitters: " _Please submit the original source. If a post
| reports on something found on another site, submit the latter._ "
| - https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
|
| It's fine to post archive links in the comments, but please don't
| do it at the top level, unless you've searched and there's really
| no alternative.
| Gordonjcp wrote:
| Given that magnesium alloy car wheels often survive car fires
| with barely more than the surface spalling off, I don't know what
| they expected.
| [deleted]
| low_tech_love wrote:
| Living in Europe, I'm deeply amazed at how much help and support
| he got for free from a bunch of people from one of the most
| important (and expensive) laboratories in the world. All of that
| just to basically have some fun and take some pictures. I'm
| absolutely sure that here he would _never_ have any support to do
| this. We unfortunately have forgotten how to have fun and be
| creative here in the old world.
| csdvrx wrote:
| This connects to a comment I made earlier today about pleasure
| or fun not being things that are valued much in Europe:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34581385
| anyfoo wrote:
| As someone who's been living in the US for a while, but who
| grew up, lived, and worked in Germany all my life before, I'm
| not sure what you mean.
|
| Me and engineers I knew were humans who liked fun (and
| especially had curiosity), too. As long as proper safety
| precautions are taken, why not? Seems like it wasn't very
| different here, either:
|
| > "I need to have an MDS --- a Material Date Safety Shet --- on
| the paint before I can let you burn it," he said.
| cjbgkagh wrote:
| The US is surprisingly Germanic so it could be a common
| cultural thread.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _I'm deeply amazed at how much help and support he got for free
| from a bunch of people from one of the most important (and
| expensive) laboratories in the world_
|
| As a former journalist, it truly is amazing the amount of free
| information that comes out of America's government, and the
| vast number of truly helpful people who work there.
|
| I can't count the number of times I didn't understand something
| I read in a federal document, and was able to pick up the phone
| and within 15 minutes or so be in touch either with the person
| who wrote it, or someone who knew the topic intimately. Very
| often, they would follow-up with stacks of documentation by
| mail.
|
| And I'm not talking about conversing with public relations
| people or media people or others who are paid to talk to the
| media. But regular federal staffers who really just wanted to
| make sure I understood things.
|
| The Congressional Budget Office, and the General Services
| Administration stick in my memory as being especially helpful.
|
| Sadly, it's the bad bureaucrats who get all the notoriety, and
| state/local offices have become markedly worse over recent
| years, as budgets have been cut and the Freedom of Information
| Act backfired, turning everything into a firewalled process.
| But there are still plenty of people out there who remember
| that every... single... thing... the federal government
| produces is the property of the people, which is why it's
| _illegal_ for a federal agency to assert copyright over
| anything it created with tax dollars.
|
| Again, state and local governments routinely put (c) notices on
| everything, as if they weren't paid for with public money for
| the good of the public.
| zabzonk wrote:
| i once blew up the monitor of a next. it had been sent back to
| the us from the uk for repair, but when we recieved it back in
| the uk i didn't notice that the power selector was set to 120
| rather than 240 volts. and ... bang.
|
| the cube itself seemed a bit more resilient.
|
| there were reports of the mag alloy airframes of lancaster
| bombers burning in the raf offensive on germany in ww2, but i
| can't find any confirmation of this.
| rodgerd wrote:
| Honda made an all-magnesium Formula 1 car at one point.
|
| The result was horrific.
| zabzonk wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honda_RA302
|
| for those interested. the article seems to say it was mg
| skinned, which would make it even more combustible, as the
| skin would be thin
|
| magnesium is far from being easily machinable, so a
| chassis/airframe/cube made out of the pure metal is unlikely
| [deleted]
| jll29 wrote:
| Thanks for this report, despite my initial reluctance upon
| reading the headline it was educational and a pleasure to read up
| to the last full stop.
|
| I particularly chuckled at the line "We have problems like this
| all of the time".
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