Test for alien metal?

[Cinorjer]

This question is about the bogus piece of "alien metal" talked about in the commentary. I got to thinking, if something was presented, what possible properties could the metal have that could prove it's off-world origin? After all, atoms are atoms, and as far as I know have the same properties in any part of our universe. Our own technology is good enough to combine the various elements into whatever metal has the best properties for our use. All metalic elements that might be used are present on earth.

So, why should a piece of metal from outer space look or test any different from something that we could make here? What could we possibly look for? If an element is stable enough and has the right properties to use in construction, then our own engineers are already aware of and using it.

Jerry

 

[Atlas]

If the alloy has not been invented yet on this planet, and if it's properties make it stronger than transparent aluminum or if Superman cannot bend it - I'd say it would pass the preliminary test and make the final round.

 

[MRC_Hans]

An alloy alone, that is, just a combinations of metals wouldn't cut it. As you say, we already know all metals, and surely any concievable alloy has been tested. Even if some alloy was presented, of which no previous record existed, it would still be possible to make on Earth, so where would the proof of extraterristrial orogin be?

It would require something extraordinalry about the molecule structure, or something.

Hans

 

[Virgil]

I agree will MRC.

it might have an unusual isotope pattern as well



Virgil

 

[Beanbag]

The thing to do is to look at the composition of the alloy -- what different elements are in the mix. For the most part, metals in everyday use are not a single, pure metal. They have other metals and elements added to give specific properties, which is why you have such things as silicon bronze, free-machining brass (with a small amount of lead added to give it the free-machining quality), and so on. Straight aluminum tends to be very soft, so (if I remember correctly) most alloys have some copper and some zinc thrown in.

Now, once you know what's in the metal, you take a look to see if it matches any known Earthly-use alloys exactly. If there was a close match, I'd be suspicious. However, if the proportions were off considerably, and there were other elements thrown in, then at least you could reasonably entertain the suggestion that the item in question wasn't cut from an old Wear-Ever aluminum cooking pot.

That by itself doesn't prove an other-worldly origin. I've got a small foundry in the back yard, and could whip up some witches' brew allow out of the scrap in the shop waste can, cast a part, machine it to some interesting shape, and present it as a lug nut from a space cruiser. I might have a problem if I used a standard 4-40 thread in a screw hole, however.

Machine parts wouldn't be conclusive, because they are too easy for anyone with a minimal machine shop to counterfeit. Doesn't it strike anyone as peculiar that the only "parts" found from a spaceship are like gears, sheet metal scraps, and relatively primitive simple shapes? There are no examples of fasteners, screws, rivets, bonding agents such as adhesives, sealants, or glues. These are the items which would show something of the technology which produced the supposed craft. The supposed alien parts are always so damned simple, like flat or round shapes. No one has produced something that, while simple, requires a better-than-high-school-shop level of skill to produce, like a length of metal tubing, or some kind of pressure fitting or coupling.

A dedicated forger would have to develop their hoax piece entirely from the ground up, starting with the materials, to the geometries of the part (I'd immediately reject any gear with a standard pitch and tooth form), the dimensions (funny how the aliens use parts machined to the English measurement system, working in quarter or eighth inch increments, or are surprisingly Metric), down to what tools were used to make the part (they ALL leave distinctive, identifiable marks), cutting fluid residues, and lastly, just what the part is supposed to do.

Regards;
Beanbag

 

[Cinorjer]

That's pretty much what I thought. I suppose there might be some sort of crystaline structure that indicates the metal was formed in a gravity-free environment, but even then you'd have to prove it couldn't have been reproduced by some other method on Earth.

Jerry

 

[Beanbag]

That's pretty much what I thought. I suppose there might be some sort of crystaline structure that indicates the metal was formed in a gravity-free environment, but even then you'd have to prove it couldn't have been reproduced by some other method on Earth.

Jerry

Why assume it has to be manufactured in zero gravity? Zero G would be great for assembling parts, but I would want a little G while manufacturing them. It's kinda nice to have things stay put where you place them, and handling large quantities of molten metal or hot parts in zero g would be incredibly hazardous. Consider the difficulties the astronauts have when servicing the Hubble telescope. That's "just" swapping modules. Now consider having to make the parts.

Regards;
Beanbag

 

[Beanbag]

Forget machine parts or alloys -- I want to see something electronic or high-tech, like a quantum transtator or an Eludium Q-32 explosive space modulator. You'd at least think they'd have some type of electronics devices -- diodes, at the very least -- if they have the technology of space travel. Forget these tinkertoy metal scraps -- let's see something that at least approaches the 60's level of technology. All the stuff presented so far could have been made in the 14th century by a decent clockmaker.

edited to add -- except for the aluminum alloys, of course.

Regards;
Beanbag

 

[Virgil]

(I'd immediately reject any gear with a standard pitch and tooth form),

Regards;
Beanbag

don't we use these because they are the best for what they do. the space men could have come to the same conclusion.

I always thought it would be cool to have a forge/ foundry in my garage what do you use it for?


thanks

Virgil

 

[Beanbag]

Depends on what you're trying to do. Involute gearforms work well for transmitting power. They're a good compromise for tooth strength versus friction between the meshing teeth. Watch gears, or wheels as they are called in the biz, use an epicycloidal form, which isn't as strong as as the involute, but has very little friction as the teeth surfaces roll against each other, rather than slide.

If you're transmitting a lot of force in just one direction of revolution, then the tooth form can take a slanted, lopsided shape called a wolf-tooth form in watchmaking. It resembles a badly worn circular saw blade.

A lot of shapes are standard simply because manufacturers want their parts to interchange with others. Ask anyone who works on classic British motorcycles or cars about trying to find replacement nuts and bolts to match the original Whitworth threads. Technically, the Whitworth profile is superior to the Unified thread, since it is rounded, has no sharp edges, and can take a lot more stress before breaking. They're just a lot harder to manufacture, and Unified works almost as well and can be cut with a straight 60 degree bit.

I would be very suspicious if an alien gear had a standard 20 degree pressure angle, given the way the standards here have evolved. Some things are universal, like the value of pi and the charge on an electron, but most mechanical things are optimized for a particular set of circumstances at the expense of others. There would have to be too many things happening exactly the same between the two cultures for them to arrive at the same designs.

Regards;
Beanbag

 

[Beanbag]

Oh, yeah -- the foundry. I use it for occaisionally making specialized fixtures and some replicas of medieval scientific instruments. Haven't used it in a while, but that's because I've been busy with other things. I've slowly been developing the tooling and skills to make a watch completely from scratch, just because it conveys the ultimate bragging rights between watchmakers.

Regards;
Beanbag

 

[epepke]

The instability of trans-uranic elements is generally thought to be a temporary thing. They should get stable again somewhere around atomic number 150 to 200. The presence of such an element would be easy to test for, but we don't know how to make them.

 

[sackett]

Alien artefacts

Way back in the 1950s (sackett, you fool! now they can guess your true age!), a UFO promoter had a piece of magnesium he claimed was "purer than anything Terran science can produce!" (They loved that word Terra back then.) It was in fact an unusually pure sample of magnesium, but nothing a decent foundry couldn't duplicate.

But oh how the ufoologists loved that strip of metal! Not that -they- needed proof, but now they had Something Alien that the skeptics couldn't deny. I believe that promoter cleaned up handsomely on book sales, and if he's still around he's probably flogging tapes and CDs.

So there's no need to dummy up a genuinely exotic piece of scrap. Just CLAIM that you've got one.

 

[geni]

The instability of trans-uranic elements is generally thought to be a temporary thing. They should get stable again somewhere around atomic number 150 to 200. The presence of such an element would be easy to test for, but we don't know how to make them.

Source? I'm aware that there is a theory that there should be an isalnd of stability but I've not heard anything about them being that stable and I rather doubt that they would be much good as building materials.

 

[derekcbart]

Metal Analysis

One thing to keep in mind is that the main purpose of an examination of the alloy is to confirm or deny Marcel Vogel's original analysis. Remember, Vogel stated that the alloy contained nearly every element in the periodic table.

I'm not a metallurgist, but I'm fairly certain that that is impossible.

 

[Ladewig]

I would be very suspicious if an alien gear had a standard 20 degree pressure angle, given the way the standards here have evolved. Some things are universal, like the value of pi and the charge on an electron, but most mechanical things are optimized for a particular set of circumstances at the expense of others. There would have to be too many things happening exactly the same between the two cultures for them to arrive at the same designs.

Just to play devil's advocate: If you were going to travel several light years to carry on a continuing investigation of a somewhat primative civilization, wouldn't you make all the moving parts in your interstellar spaceship match the engineering standards of the target civilization? First off, if a bolt's threads get stripped, then you can materialize yourself inside a local hardware store and pick up a replacement - a much easier solution than waiting for a repair ship to show up. Second, if a careless ensign drops a worm gear on a rural highway, then the people who find it will not think it too extraordinary. The latter would be an important consideration if one were following the Prime Directive and trying to remain secretive about one's presence.

The second point carried to its logical conclusion would mean that aliens would not make spaceships out of exotic alloys that cannot be produced on earth, but rather would make spaceships out of balsa wood and mylar so that if one crashed near an inhabited area, then no rational person could consider the ship's pieces to be proof of alien visitation. Might clever those aliens.

 

[Atlas]

The second point carried to its logical conclusion would mean that aliens would not make spaceships out of exotic alloys that cannot be produced on earth, but rather would make spaceships out of balsa wood and mylar so that if one crashed near an inhabited area, then no rational person could consider the ship's pieces to be proof of alien visitation.

Ladewig,

That is freaky... When I was a kid I remember finding pieces of balsa wood and mylar in our back yard. I also found a rubber band and some plastic bits but thats's not important.

If what you're saying is true.... then.... I think you're intimating that... I'm not a rational person!

 

[Beanbag]

Just to play devil's advocate: If you were going to travel several light years to carry on a continuing investigation of a somewhat primative civilization, wouldn't you make all the moving parts in your interstellar spaceship match the engineering standards of the target civilization? First off, if a bolt's threads get stripped, then you can materialize yourself inside a local hardware store and pick up a replacement - a much easier solution than waiting for a repair ship to show up. Second, if a careless ensign drops a worm gear on a rural highway, then the people who find it will not think it too extraordinary. The latter would be an important consideration if one were following the Prime Directive and trying to remain secretive about one's presence.

The second point carried to its logical conclusion would mean that aliens would not make spaceships out of exotic alloys that cannot be produced on earth, but rather would make spaceships out of balsa wood and mylar so that if one crashed near an inhabited area, then no rational person could consider the ship's pieces to be proof of alien visitation. Might clever those aliens.

I can't say what would be practical from a non-human point of view. I can only base my suppositions on my human experience. IF I was to travel to another world, I would want my transportation made out of the best, most reliable technology that my civilization could produce, so as to greatly increase the chances for a successful return home. I would imagine such a craft would be expensive and difficult to build, so why complicate the issue with adopting "alien" technology which at this point is markedly inferior to your own? Imagine having to completely re-engineer a 1957 Ford Edsel to use only metric fasteners and copper-based alloys because you wanted to blend in with a non-ferrous society who likes the metric system? You could do it, but the results would be expensive and most likely not as reliable as the original. Trying to blend in would require adapoting too many of the disadvantages of the host technology.

Let's forget replicators or any other "christmas" machines that magically produce items on demand, and stick with what we know works -- physically machined items. Regular interstellar travel would -- in my opinion -- require a level of technology quite superior to our own, and would have characteristics that would be both similar and quite different in certain aspects from what our civilization has produced. I suspect a reasonably intelligent technophile would be able to recognize and understand the functions, given enough time to study them. I doubt that any other civilization would spontaneously adopt the 1/4-20 threaded fastner as their standard bolt.

No, common sense tells me that any alien visitors would use what works well for their civilization.

Regards;
Beanbag

 

[Hand Bent Spoon]

^That's very well said!

And I would add that there would be certain aspects of your superior technology which simply couldn't be made out of 'primitive parts' such as a standard metric screw. So after putting all that effort into making your ship seem to be made out of primitive tech, there would still be many telltale bits of technology obviously far in advance of the rest. You would be putting in all that effort, risking your very safety and the correct functioning of your ship, and still risking some of your super tech falling into primitive hands.

That's just not practical.

 

[DrMatt]

When meteorite fragments survive to the ground, they tend to have a fair amount of iron and nickle in them.
Speaking of iron, Mars has a fair bit of it.
Real extraterrestrial metal can be nifty, though in chemical and other properties it mostly looks like our own.
Moon rocks carry lots of craters and mini-craters that earth rocks don't have. So there are differences....