blike Posted December 4, 2002 Share Posted December 4, 2002 Awhile back my friend showed me something I could do in my microwave to produce artificial "ball lightning". I'm not sure thats what this is, but its pretty neat. Anyhow, I captured the thing on video. I modified the original experiment by putting a jar over the toothpick in order to capture the ball lightning so its lifespan is longer (and because i was afraid of what it was doing to the microwave). Without the jar, the ball is instantly sucked into the vent and disappears with a crackling sound. I only let it run for maybe 2 or 3 seconds because it heats the jar extremely quickly. I don't want to have to deal with shattered glass in the microwave. Anyhow, heres a theory behind it: "Before the plasma ball forms there is a bright flash at the flame. Probably the electromagnetic field induce arc-light at the carbonized wick producing large number of electrons and ions. These particles together with the ionized particles of the flame forms a cloud that conducts electricity. The microwave can create eddy current (?) in this cloud. This current could prevent the recombination of the ions and electrons. The size of the balls is cca. 3cm that is in good agreement with the theory of P. Kapitza." Plasmoid in my microwave (WMV Format, 1.9MB) Plasmoid (MPEG-1 format, 6.9MB) I recommend you right click and "Save Target As" ...as opposed to watching in your browser. That way it will run smoother and won't eat bandwidth. If anyone has a deathly slow modem and would rather see images, I can try and capture some images from the video, just let me know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fafalone Posted December 4, 2002 Share Posted December 4, 2002 sweet Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blike Posted December 4, 2002 Author Share Posted December 4, 2002 foolish mpeg lover. now its going to kill bandwidth 6 times the size of the WMV. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fafalone Posted December 4, 2002 Share Posted December 4, 2002 someone doesn't know how to compress things right Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sayonara Posted December 5, 2002 Share Posted December 5, 2002 Mmmm, chewy microwave plasma. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest GTRON3030 Posted December 5, 2002 Share Posted December 5, 2002 I would not suggest that you conduct this experimentular without proper instruction. I failed to read the "2-3 seconds" and needless to say, there is a sufficient amount of glass shards in everything that goes through my microwave now. good day. [edited... play nice graham, <3 fafalone] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aman Posted December 5, 2002 Share Posted December 5, 2002 Thomas Edison would have loved to play with one of these. Thanks for sharing that. Just aman. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dragoon Posted December 7, 2002 Share Posted December 7, 2002 some explain to me how this thing is workin in more details please? i'm not exactly grasping the whole concept of it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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