Moderated Thermite: Was it there or not?

[leftysergeant]

This has never happened to any buildng on this planet in the entire recorded history of the world. in fact no oblect, big or small has ever been crushed down flat on the ground by the top one-tenth of itself by gravity alone..

That would be a rational argument, had any building ever had the top 10th of itself dropped on the lower 9/10.

And it matters little if people could stand around the up-wind hole in a burning building. There was fire down-wind.

Why do you think tyhey were not trying to jump down the space between floors or rapel down the broken stairways with emergency fire hoses?

 

[aggle-rithm]

I coulld easily argue that the flams were large while the jet fuel burned off and peope jumped to their deaths. A little later when the flames died down people were standing around and looking out of the hole.

What would make the fire stop burning after the jet fuel burned off? There was plenty of fuel in that building. I guarantee you there were many tons of printer paper there, hundreds of computers with plastic components, acres of carpeting, and many other combustible materials.

I remember a fireman who used to come to my elementary school when I was a boy, teaching us fire safety. One year he told the story of a fire-proof house, made entirely of concrete and steel. When the contents inside the house caught fire, the inferno was so intense that the firefighters, upon arrival, could only watch it collapse.

I learned that in elementary school. Perhaps you were sick that day?

But it doesn't really matter all that much. we know the area that had fire- we can see it on the videos. Even if those floors had burned like an inferno it doesn't change the dynmic of the top one-enth cushing the lower and stronger nine-tenths of the building down flat on the ground.

This has never happened to any buildng on this planet in the entire recorded history of the world. in fact no oblect, big or small has ever been crushed down flat on the ground by the top one-tenth of itself by gravity alone..

This is demonstrably untrue. You've been given so many examples of this that I won't bother bringing them up again.

 

[A W Smith]

"Inflationary Model of Conspiracy Theories,"

Here is a perfect example of the "Inflationary Model of Conspiracy Theories,"

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?p=2323813#post2323813

You should read bck a few pages Twinstead. For your convenience I am reposting post #308 here.


'' Suppse for a moment that you were Steven Jones and his team ? Then further suppose that you sent your samples off to Princeton or somewhere equally prestigeous for testing ?

But then you stop and think whether a place like Princeton might not be part of the intelligentsia...the American elite ? It's undeniably true that they would be very vulnerable to a call, say from the Whitehouse asking for a favour wouldn't you say ?

Jones would abslutely NOT need Princeton University saying that they had found no unreacted thermite in the WTC dust.

Are you getting the point ? ''

 

[ImANiceGuy]

and then we come full circle back to the Thermite claim and Dr. Jones(I always think of Indy)....

Let me just remind you that a good scientific skeptic should not be negative, but agnostic; so I appreciate dispassionate replies.

When we last left off, it seemed as though the general JREF skeptic's position is that Dr.Jones found paint(kaolinte; demonstrated by Sunstealer) and then lied about his findings either purposefully, or blissfully-ignorantly to further his agenda.

I provided the popular Truther reply that the MEK testing disproves the paint theory; however, Mackey was kind enough to point out that MEK testing is not the proper way to go about testing samples of paint, and that this was further proof of Jones' appeal to ignorance.

I looked into this, and firstly let me tell you it is not easy to sort through all the info, as the subject matter evoxes strong emotion, and consequently, biased information. Personally, everything I read must be cross-checked, sourced and referenced before I consider accepting it, conditionally, as fact.
This is why I prefer to ask the questions myself, rather then have to sort through 100's of pages of threads.....and believe me, I read through many more old threads then some people.

I have a couple questions;

How does the "paint" explanation configure with the DSC testing? Are the DSC results completey rejected because the test was not performed in an inert atmosphere? Therm-anything would have its oxidizer bonded within its structure, and therefore not need oxygen to ignite, correct?

 

[triforcharity]

Imaniceguy,

I am not a scientist, but let me try to play one for just a second.

Thermite itself does not need a supply of oxygen to burn, as it produces its own. HOWEVER, how do you light it if there is no oxygen?? Matches, flares, lighters, etc all need some kind of oxygen to work. IIRC, thermite is NOT explosive, so just a spark will not due.

I could be wrong though. I doubt it.

 

[Leviath]

Are the DSC results completey rejected because the test was not performed in an inert atmosphere?

Partly, yes. The chips consisted of a notable amount of an unknown carbon compound. Such a compund will ignite at elevated temperatures in an atmosphere containing oxygen. Since the carbon compound is unknown it is quite difficult to tell exactly what ignites in this test.

Therm-anything would have its oxidizer bonded within its structure, and therefore not need oxygen to ignite, correct?

Correct. So one can only speculate why Jones et al didn't perform this test in inert atmosphere in the first place.

Another point that hasn't been mentioned much is the heating rate which is, in my opinion, too rapid. I can elaborate on this later if there's interest.

 

[lapman]

Partly, yes. The chips consisted of a notable amount of an unknown carbon compound. Such a compund will ignite at elevated temperatures in an atmosphere containing oxygen. Since the carbon compound is unknown it is quite difficult to tell exactly what ignites in this test.


Correct. So one can only speculate why Jones et al didn't perform this test in inert atmosphere in the first place.

Another point that hasn't been mentioned much is the heating rate which is, in my opinion, too rapid. I can elaborate on this later if there's interest.

IIRC, they did not have any actual samples of nanothermite to perform a comparison. The same goes with the actual paint used on the tower steel. IMHO, that destroys the credibility of the study.

 

[Dave Rogers]

How does the "paint" explanation configure with the DSC testing? Are the DSC results completey rejected because the test was not performed in an inert atmosphere? Therm-anything would have its oxidizer bonded within its structure, and therefore not need oxygen to ignite, correct?

The presence of oxygen in the DSC tests is, in itself, a failure of technique. If an exotherm were observed in the absence of oxygen, that would suggest a thermite reaction, because it would eliminate the possibility of combustion using atmospheric oxygen. Therefore, we can reject the assertion that the results prove the presence of a thermite reaction, although they don't disprove it.

However, it gets even worse when we look at the energy yield of the reaction. Harrit et al claim that their chips produce more energy per unit mass than thermite, and this mind you on chips that appear to be at least part inert. We know, therefore, that some of the energy released by these chips is not from a thermite reaction, and combustion in ambient oxygen is the only likely additional energy source. Reasoning a little further, therefore, we know for certain that these chips are burning in oxygen and hence releasing energy, whereas we don't know for certain that there is a thermite reaction present. Since we would expect the energy density of a combustion reaction to be typically around ten times that of a thermite reaction (Wikipedia will give some typical values to back this up), there is ample energy in the known source to account for all the energy released.

Therefore, we know that combustion must be taking place, and we know that combustion is easily capable of supplying all the energy released. Although this still doesn't exclude the possibility of a thermite reaction taking place as well, it means that the results cannot be considered in any way to give positive evidence for a thermite reaction.

Dave

 

[TjW]

Partly, yes. The chips consisted of a notable amount of an unknown carbon compound. Such a compund will ignite at elevated temperatures in an atmosphere containing oxygen. Since the carbon compound is unknown it is quite difficult to tell exactly what ignites in this test.


Correct. So one can only speculate why Jones et al didn't perform this test in inert atmosphere in the first place.

Another point that hasn't been mentioned much is the heating rate which is, in my opinion, too rapid. I can elaborate on this later if there's interest.

I suspect it was cargo-cult science.

I think he read some journal articles on nano-thermite, and they did their tests in air, so he did his tests in air.

Now, if what you're doing is using exactly the same compound, and varying only the particle size, while looking for a change in the rate of reaction, doing the reaction in air is reasonable. It's a comparison, after all, and not an absolute value you're looking at, and you don't have the bother of maintaining the inert atmosphere.

But using that procedure to characterize an unknown compound seems ludicrous.

 

[alienentity]

and then we come full circle back to the Thermite claim and Dr. Jones(I always think of Indy)....

Let me just remind you that a good scientific skeptic should not be negative, but agnostic; so I appreciate dispassionate replies.

When we last left off, it seemed as though the general JREF skeptic's position is that Dr.Jones found paint(kaolinte; demonstrated by Sunstealer) and then lied about his findings either purposefully, or blissfully-ignorantly to further his agenda.

I provided the popular Truther reply that the MEK testing disproves the paint theory; however, Mackey was kind enough to point out that MEK testing is not the proper way to go about testing samples of paint, and that this was further proof of Jones' appeal to ignorance.

I looked into this, and firstly let me tell you it is not easy to sort through all the info, as the subject matter evoxes strong emotion, and consequently, biased information. Personally, everything I read must be cross-checked, sourced and referenced before I consider accepting it, conditionally, as fact.
This is why I prefer to ask the questions myself, rather then have to sort through 100's of pages of threads.....and believe me, I read through many more old threads then some people.

I have a couple questions;

How does the "paint" explanation configure with the DSC testing? Are the DSC results completey rejected because the test was not performed in an inert atmosphere? Therm-anything would have its oxidizer bonded within its structure, and therefore not need oxygen to ignite, correct?

It so happens I've got this page open, and have been going back and reading it. It's a blog titled "Active Thermitic Material" claimed in Ground Zero dust may not be thermitic at all'
by Enrico Manieri - Henry62

You might find it useful:

http://11-settembre.blogspot.com/2009/04/active-thermitic-material-claimed-in.html

One of the weaknesses of the DSC is, as others have mentioned, the fact that the material produces far too much energy. It is known that an ideal (perfect) combustion of thermite would produce 3.9kJ/g of energy.
But the chips produced as much as 7.5 kJ/g!! This is very good evidence that it was the carbon-based (organic) 'binder' material which was burning in air.

It's always bugged me that the Jones/Harrit method is not capable of determining what the organic binder is, nor the gray layer. Shouldn't it have been of paramount importance to determine the composition of those materials before jumping to a conclusion about the chips?

It just appears that they were in a rush to publish a finding of thermite, so they cut some corners that they shouldn't have. I strongly suspect that their claims will eventually be falsified when further data are available.

 

[Pantaz]

...Thermite itself does not need a supply of oxygen to burn, as it produces its own. HOWEVER, how do you light it if there is no oxygen?? Matches, flares, lighters, etc all need some kind of oxygen to work. IIRC, thermite is NOT explosive, so just a spark will not due. ...

I imagine some type of electric arc or hot-wire (e.g., tungsten) would suffice.

 

[TruthersLie]

and then we come full circle back to the Thermite claim and Dr. Jones(I always think of Indy)....

Let me just remind you that a good scientific skeptic should not be negative, but agnostic; so I appreciate dispassionate replies.

When we last left off, it seemed as though the general JREF skeptic's position is that Dr.Jones found paint(kaolinte; demonstrated by Sunstealer) and then lied about his findings either purposefully, or blissfully-ignorantly to further his agenda.

I provided the popular Truther reply that the MEK testing disproves the paint theory; however, Mackey was kind enough to point out that MEK testing is not the proper way to go about testing samples of paint, and that this was further proof of Jones' appeal to ignorance.

I looked into this, and firstly let me tell you it is not easy to sort through all the info, as the subject matter evoxes strong emotion, and consequently, biased information. Personally, everything I read must be cross-checked, sourced and referenced before I consider accepting it, conditionally, as fact.
This is why I prefer to ask the questions myself, rather then have to sort through 100's of pages of threads.....and believe me, I read through many more old threads then some people.

I have a couple questions;

How does the "paint" explanation configure with the DSC testing? Are the DSC results completey rejected because the test was not performed in an inert atmosphere? Therm-anything would have its oxidizer bonded within its structure, and therefore not need oxygen to ignite, correct?

That is one of over 20 methodological errors in this "paper" (snicker). Right there with that many methodological errors, it invalidates any conclusions from the "paper." (snicker)

I don't have to go any further. Give me a "paper" (snicker) riddled with methodological errors, and that tries to compare two DIFFERENT spectographs and to equate them together when they are different, the "paper" (snicker) gets filed in the circular bin.

 

[Scott Sommers]

I just discovered that Texas Tech University, Department of Mechanical Engineering has a combustion lab. Researchers there have published a large number of papers about thermite combustion
http://www.me.ttu.edu/ME/Research/CombustionLab/Publications

All you Truth folk, take a look at this. If Jones really did have something, this is what his publication record should look like. In fact, commentary from the people publishing these papers would certainly settle any of the problems he's having now with the credability of his current publications. Ask him or his friend Gage about this. Why don't they have the same credability as the authours of these papers? Why is there no one else who does research on thermite or nano-combustion standing up to support them? There's not even one other person from outside their community. You can't say that his research has been peer-reviewed but no one will stand up to support it.

Maybe I'm getting ahead of myself. Seriously, anyone out there has real questions about peer-review and why Jones is not it, go ahead and ask.