Hi everyone, welcome back to Cody's lab
So today I have some samples of metal
And we're gonna test to see how these act under low temperatures
To see what it's going to take for me to
Build a gun that shoots bullets that are frozen
down to liquid nitrogen temperatures
Now in the movies they show that steel gets brittle when it gets cold
So, it'd be a problem if the gun fired and exploded
because the metal was brittle and fractures easily.
So I'm gonna test several different types of material
and see which one holds up the best.
The first test we're gonna do is whack em' with a hammer
on the anvil, warm, so we can prove that they don't shatter.
So here is a piece of hard facing rod, this high-carbon steel.
This is Bronze
Here's some aluminum
Nothin'
And some 7018, or mild steel.
There it goes, no problem.
Let's stick em' in the liquid nitrogen and see how they react then
Into the nitrogen.
I got em' cooled down to liquid nitrogen temperatures
Let's see what happens when I hit this with a hammer
This is the hard facing rod
It's still bends and deforms pretty well actually.
Let's put that back in the nitrogen, cool it off
Alright the 7018
It seems to bend OK
And the deform didn't shatter anything
Put that away
Let's try the Bronze
Nothin'
And the aluminum
Oh wow, the aluminum just shattered, look at that
There's nothing left of it.
Not at all
So this was a piece of aluminum welding rod
The alloy might be different than what you got in your pop cans.
The aluminum sure didn't hold up well did it?
Oh it shattered look at that
So it doesn't bend very well
Look at the end of that it's all broken like it was a piece of glass.
Lets try the 7018
That broke to, look at that.
Lets try the bronze
The bronze seemed to do okay, it was able to bend okay.
Didn't shatter
Bronze is lookin' good
I think the bronze is gonna do the best then.
Because even at the cold temperatures it didn't break
Nevermind.
(laughs)
Alright
So thats interesting.
So it didn't bent very well.
It was able to take the impact.
here's a stainless steel spoon. Let's see if that can handle the liquid nitrogen.
Here's the spoon. Cold.
Look at that. It shattered too.
See?
So not even stainless can handle it.
I'm sure this isn't very good stainless.
Since the bronce did so well. Let's try a piece of brass.
It's ok.
Let's see if it will bend.
Yeah brass seems to be doing pretty good.
Yeah it's even better than bronce I think.
Like I can bend that.
Let's try a piece of lead.
See?
Lead seems to smash and bend fairly ok.
Let's cool that back off.
Alright.
Let's see how it'll do in here.
Yes it bends.
Yes lead seems to do pretty ok.
Look at that.
Let's cool it off again.
Yeah. It's definely harder but I think ...
Right. So here is a piece of copper pipe.
Let's stick this into the nitrogen.
Haha look at that, shooting the nitrogen out of it.
Alright. Let's whack it and see if it will shatter.
Copper did pretty good actually. See how it is bend?
Yeah. I'd say that copper alloys are propably going to do the best.
Let's try this piece of pipe. And see if it will break.
Oh yeah. That shattered like glass.
Look at that.
I know you guys are all waiting for it. Let's see if we can break the chain by getting it cold.
Alright. Here is the chain cooled down in liquid nitrogen.
Let's see if it will break.
Look at that it actually worked.
It actually broke that link.
It seems that from my experiments the cold makes it so that it can't bend almost at all.
So it basicaly makes it harder *brittle*.
But one thing I know for sure is that I'm not going to be able to cool off a regular gun and then fire it that way.
It's gonna have to be made out of some sort of copper based alloy.
The brass and bronze seem to do pretty well.
A lot better than the steels.
Pure copper looks like it does best out of anything but pure copper is kinda hard to cast and work with.
So I might have to put a little bit of zink in it.
So. There you go. Hope you guys enjoyed! And I'll see you next time.
(Music plays)
Subs by Lucas Fanchiotti