From dphillip@mail.usyd.edu.au Tue Jun 10 15:55:02 1997
Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 14:08:18 +1000 (EST)
Subject: Charcoal lighting (fwd)
matt,
> Our subject today is lighting charcoal grills. One of our favorite
> charcoal grill lighters is a guy named George Goble (really!!), a computer
> person in the Purdue University engineering department.
>
> Each year, Goble and a bunch of other engineers hold a picnic in West
> Lafayette, Indiana, at which they look hamburgers on a big grill. Being
> engineers, they began looking for practical ways to speed up the charcoal-
> lighting process. "We started by blowing the charcoal with a hair dryer,"
> Goble told me in a telephone interview. "Then we figured out that it would
> light faster if we used a vacuum cleaner."
>
> If you know anything about (1) engineers and (2) guys in general, you
> know what happened: The purpose of the charcoal-lighting shifted from
> cooking hamburgers to seeing how fast they could light the charcoal.
>
> From the vacuum cleaner, they escalated to using a propane torch,
> then an acetylene torch. Then Goble started using compressed pure oxygen,
> which caused the charcoal to burn much faster, because as you recall from
> chemistry class, fire is essentially the rapid combination of oxygen with
> a reducing agent (the charcoal). We discovered that a long time ago,
> somewhere in the valley between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers (or
> something along those lines).
>
> By this point, Goble was getting pretty good times. But in the world
> of competitive charcoal-lighting, "pretty good" does not cut the mustard.
> Thus, Goble hit upon the idea of using - get ready - liquid oxygen. This is
> the form of oxygen used in rocket engines; it's 295 degrees below zero and
> 600 times as dense as regular oxygen. In terms of releasing energy, pouring
> liquid oxygen on charcoal is the equivalent of throwing a live squirrel into
> a room containing 50 million Labrador retrievers. On Gobel's World Wide Web
> page (the address is http://ghg.ecn.purdue.edu/), you can see actual
> photographs and a video of Goble using a bucket attached to a 10-foot-long
> wooden handle to dump 3 gallons of liquid oxygen (not sold in stores) onto
> a grill containing 60 pounds of charcoal and a lit cigarette for ignition.
> What follows is the most impressive charcoal-lighting I have ever seen,
> featuring a large fireball that according to Goble, reached 10,000 degrees
> Fahrenheit. The charcoal was ready for cooking in - this has to be a world
> record - 3 seconds.
>
> There's also a photo of what happened when Goble used the same technique
> on a flimsy $2.88 discount-store grill. All that's left is a circle of
> charcoal with a few shreds of metal in it. "Basically, the grill vaporized,"
> said Goble. "We were thinking of returning it to the store for a refund."
>
> Looking at Goble's video and photos, I became, as an American, all
> choked up with gratitude at the fact that I do not live anywhere near the
> engineers' picnic site. But also, I was proud of my country for producing
> guys who can be ready to barbecue in less time than it takes for guys in
> less-advanced nations, such as France, to spit. Will the 3-second barrier
> ever be broken? Will engineers come up with a new, more powerful charcoal-
> lighting technology? It's something for all of us to ponder this summer
> as we sit outside, chewing our hamburgers, every now and then glancing in
> the direction of West Lafayette, Indiana, looking for a mushroom cloud.
>
>
> ---------------- end forwarded message -------------------
_______________________________________________________________
web: http://www-personal.usyd.edu.au/~dphillip/ * david
http://www.cs.su.oz.au/~davep phillips
^^ NEW WEB ^^ email: dphillip@mail.usyd.edu.au
_______________________________________________________________
"If there is a gap in history that fits the size and shape of the
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