A near indestructable metal?

[TransformerRobot]

What is the strongest metal in the world?

 

Whatever metal it is, is there a way to make it nearly indestructable?

 

If not, would anyone be able to make such an element?

[mississippichem]

What is the strongest metal in the world?

 

Whatever metal it is, is there a way to make it nearly indestructable?

 

If not, would anyone be able to make such an element?

Depends on what you mean by indestructible...high melting point? Tensile strength? Hardness? All physical properties are pretty specifically defined.

[Phi for All]

The problem you run into when you want to make something "strong" is that the harder the material, usually the more brittle it is. Titanium is incredibly strong and hard but it would make a very brittle sword that would shatter more easily than simple carbon steel.

 

It also really depends on why you want the item to be strong. Is it so it can withstand the most impact? The most weight? Are you making a hammer or a bridge? When you say indestructible, does that include high temperatures or corrosion, or just impact?

[TransformerRobot]

I want it to be a metal so hard that it will be hit by fighter plane at top speed, without a scratch on the wearer. Yes, I know it seems like a stretch, but I was thinking a suit of armor that survives impacts from incredibly fast objects, and makes the wearer almost invincible to the deadliest blows. Would it need to be chemically altered to achieve that level of hardness tensile strength (Such as if it was pulled apart by g-forces or knocked off the wearer)?

[StringJunky]

I want it to be a metal so hard that it will be hit by fighter plane at top speed, without a scratch on the wearer. Yes, I know it seems like a stretch, but I was thinking a suit of armor that survives impacts from incredibly fast objects, and makes the wearer almost invincible to the deadliest blows. Would it need to be chemically altered to achieve that level of hardness tensile strength (Such as if it was pulled apart by g-forces or knocked off the wearer)?

 

You are thinking about it the wrong way. If a material was rock hard it could still transmit the vibrational or impact energy to the wearer of the armour and kill him. What you need is armour that absorbs or dissipates the energy away from him but won't let the projectile penetrate right through. Believe it or not gels are the way forward in protecting against projectiles.

 

http://ajitjagan.blogspot.com/2009/03/bullet-proof-vests-made-of-gels.html

Edited December 21, 2011 by StringJunky

[TransformerRobot]

Bullet proof vests wouldn't stop the impact of an F-15 Eagle, would they (Not that something like that is likely to happen in our time)?

[StringJunky]

Bullet proof vests wouldn't stop the impact of an F-15 Eagle, would they (Not that something like that is likely to happen in our time)?

 

I know you are only fantasising but what are you going to do to lose the impact energy. You want to be in an extremely heavy vehicle (Transformer Robot ) with sufficient mass and clad with impact proof plates perhaps mounted on some suspension system tuned to absorb those sort of impact energies. A google search reveals the hardest and least compressible stuff to date are aggregated diamond nano rods so you could use sheets of that for your plates.

[TransformerRobot]

But aggregated diamond nano rods sound both expensive and rare, but I get what you mean about suspension plates. It might be hard to get that same effect with a suit of armor though, unless the suspension plates are internal and hidden by a flexible external shell.

[Phi for All]

Another idea is to create a multilayered material that has it's softest layer on the outside and gets progressively harder, with the aim at slowing whatever is trying to get through it.

 

Of course, nothing is going to stop an object with more mass that's traveling at the speed of an F-15. You could be wrapped in 2 tons of titanium but if a 22 ton F-15 hits you at Mach 2.5, I don't think you'll survive.

[TransformerRobot]

Thanks for telling me about the multilayered material that gets harder as you go deeper into it.

 

If that idea was used, would the wearer survive being thrown off a vehicle at 700 km/h or more? Or would that be so fast that it would kill the driver?

[dragonstar57]

But aggregated diamond nano rods sound both expensive and rare, but I get what you mean about suspension plates. It might be hard to get that same effect with a suit of armor though, unless the suspension plates are internal and hidden by a flexible external shell.

i hate to say that something is impossible but there is no material that known that would make armor that could survive a direct impact from an aircraft. the energies involved would break any thing that was not thick enough to be too heavy to walk in. such a material would have to have a high melting point yet very low heat transfer good shock absorber strong and light. and all of these proprieties would have to be in a single material. (most of these things do not exist together)

and why armor to survive plane impacts? who would pay millions even if such a technology could exist? not the military most troops don't have to deal with getting rammed by fighter jets.

[TransformerRobot]

i hate to say that something is impossible but there is no material that known that would make armor that could survive a direct impact from an aircraft. the energies involved would break any thing that was not thick enough to be too heavy to walk in. such a material would have to have a high melting point yet very low heat transfer good shock absorber strong and light. and all of these proprieties would have to be in a single material. (most of these things do not exist together)

and why armor to survive plane impacts? who would pay millions even if such a technology could exist? not the military most troops don't have to deal with getting rammed by fighter jets.

 

Because I thought such a blow would have the same impact as being thrown to the ground at 700+ km/h.

[Phi for All]

Because I thought such a blow would have the same impact as being thrown to the ground at 700+ km/h.

No, completely different in the approach to survival. Where is the person starting from? How is the person reaching such speeds before hitting the ground?

 

This is more of an engineering or physics problem, not a chemistry thang. Which section would you prefer to move to?

[TransformerRobot]

I think we should carry it on to Engineering then. At first I put it in Inorganic Chemistry because I was wondering if the suit would need to be chemically altered to become stronger for the wearer.

 

What I was thinking of was the vehicle goes from 0-700 km/h in 3 seconds, and somehow the rider is thrown off the vehicle (which had been carrying them 3 feet above the ground) and hits the road at the vehicle's same max speed. Yes, head first, I'm thinking of the most dangerous situations I can think of.

 

Anyway, as this thread is carried into Engineering (if necessary), I ask you; What would the suit need so the wearer would sustain as minor injuries as possible?

[Moontanman]

The problem you run into when you want to make something "strong" is that the harder the material, usually the more brittle it is. Titanium is incredibly strong and hard but it would make a very brittle sword that would shatter more easily than simple carbon steel.

 

It also really depends on why you want the item to be strong. Is it so it can withstand the most impact? The most weight? Are you making a hammer or a bridge? When you say indestructible, does that include high temperatures or corrosion, or just impact?

 

 

Damn, I wanted a titanium bat'leth, now not so much... if you insist on one metal i think depleted uranium is supposed to be quite tough.

[hypervalent_iodine]

Engineering it is!

[John Cuthber]

Just for the record, titanium is not brittle.

[TransformerRobot]

I didn't think titanium was brittle. Unless they didn't research the metal, the writers at Marvel Comics named one of Iron Man's enemies Titanium Man. Just like Iron Man, Titanium Man's suit makes him much stronger and more durable.

 

Power Rangers used the same sort of idea in their eighth season, with a new Ranger named the Titanium Ranger. As you can imagine the Titanium Ranger was much more powerful than the other 5 Rangers of his respective season, and had an even deadlier arsenal with him.

[Phi for All]

Just for the record, titanium is not brittle.

I've always heard that trying to heat-treat titanium to take a good enough edge for a sword or knife made it too brittle to be effective.

[John Cuthber]

It's difficult to heat treat Ti without it picking up enough N or O to make it brittle, but that's not a property of TI itself.

[TransformerRobot]

Is it safe to heat treat steel? At first I was thinking aluminum, but then I thought that materials from a soft drink canister had to be melted down to be recycled.

[Phi for All]

Is it safe to heat treat steel?

Absolutely. In some cases, heat treating is essential to the application.

[Xittenn]

I used to manufacture log chain. We would form the side bars using a 50 Ton Press and then weld in the barrel. For special orders that required a hardened finish, we then sent the formed links for heat treating, prior to riveting and assembly of chain sections. Often we would also use heat treated rivets. Heat treated product was considered to be of a higher quality, more durable, and was graded as such. There were also options for further product treatment that included a dip in a tar like substance, mostly for rust prevention.

 

I also recall having heat treated a number of finished steel bearings. These were CNC Machined and then hardened using the same technique. I think the stages here are important. First you machine annealed steel and then you harden it.

[doG]

What I was thinking of was the vehicle goes from 0-700 km/h in 3 seconds, and somehow the rider is thrown off the vehicle (which had been carrying them 3 feet above the ground) and hits the road at the vehicle's same max speed. Yes, head first, I'm thinking of the most dangerous situations I can think of.

Do you realize that even if you made a suit that could survive a 700km/h impact the wearer would not survive the 700 km/h impact they would have inside the suit when the suit comes to a sudden stop?

[Xittenn]

There are tanks that use steel plating that is formed as sandwiches with depleted uranium. There was a tank developed a few years ago that would sense incoming projectiles and eject the plating towards the projectile. The expectation was that if it was an incoming missile, the explosion would take place further away from the tank thereby reducing the damage incurred by the tank itself. Just sayin' . . .