[TheForge] Re: crackpottery

[Mike Spencer]

Frosty> Heck, how much trouble could a guy get into with a yard full
Frosty> of mirrors anyway?

     In Epitome ton Istorion, circa AD 12, John Zonaras wrote: "At
     last in an incredible manner he [Archimedes] burned up the whole
     Roman fleet. For by tilting a kind of mirror toward the sun he
     concentrated the sun's beam upon it; and owing to the thickness
     and smoothness of the mirror he ignited the air from this beam
     and kindled a great flame, the whole of which he directed upon
     the ships that lay at anchor in the path of the fire, until he
     consumed them all."  [1]

Small arithmetic error, vaporize the school bus as it goes by?  8-)

I saw a photo once -- Time mag. maybe? -- of a [large] yard full of
[large] mirrors -- heliostats -- focused on a tower.  Something to do
with aluminum smelting.

If we could make a solar forge though, we'd probably find that
critical elements had been patented already.  There were something
like 2300 patents for solar energy stuff issued just between 1974 and
1984. [2]


- Mike


[1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1599101,00.html

[2] http://faculty.maxwell.syr.edu/dcpopp/papers/patdata.PDF

-- 
Michael Spencer                  Nova Scotia, Canada       .~. 
                                                           /V\ 
mspencer at tallships.ca                                     /( )\
http://home.tallships.ca/mspencer/                        ^^-^^