How does paper survive?

[Akzle]

Fair point, I meant getting out the milk and flesh.

then it would be a coconut, not a coconut shell.

Shoot a phonebook.
With x tonnage of aircraft falling ontop, i doubt paper would survive. Unless, as other scenario, it was free to leave.

[SMOKEU]

I think that was the one.

I remember that episode. I still don't know why the 146 has 4 turbofans, instead of 2 that are usually on this size aircraft. Being a regional jet it's not like ETOPS are going to be a factor.

[huff3r]

I remember that episode. I still don't know why the 146 has 4 turbofans, instead of 2 that are usually on this size aircraft. Being a regional jet it's not like ETOPS are going to be a factor.

To reduce noise. They can produce more thrust for less volume by using four smaller engines rather than two larger ones.

Also gives better short field performance, which is important considering it goes a few places no aircraft of similar size can.

[Fastmark]

Yeah, try that with your fucking Kindle

Love it

[Banditbandit]

Yeah, try that with your fucking Kindle

[Erelyes]

I know right, and have you seen the metal paper they make? It's called shim steel, even stronger than normal paper. You know what we need, is to make planes out of this shim steel stuff, maybe we could form it into beams and things with good structural rigidity (which of course would no longer be fit for shims, so would just be called steel), and perhaps rivet more of the thin stuff to it for aerodynamics

No they should make planes, trains and space shuttles out of 'black box' material. That part always seems to survive a crash.

Planes that could survive 1500g would give rise to the newest worst job in the world.

Cleaning the inside of the plane afterwards.

[oldrider]

I was watching a TV program yesterday called Mayday about airplane crashes. One of the crashes was caused by a murder/suicide by a passenger, and they put the jet into a direct nose dive at full power. The plane hit the ground with a force of 5,000 g (yes, 5,000 times the force of gravity). The plane had exceeded mach 1 at the point of impact.

The impact was so hard that the plane was shredded. The murder weapon, a 44 calibre pistol had it's short barrel broken. They couldn't identify anything that look like a human body or a bit of a body. Everything was pulverized beyond recognition.

Everything - except a lot of paper. In fact, they even found the suicide note. The paper wasn't even torn or marked. The crash site was surrounded by what looked like shrapnel from the plane being ripped apart - and lots of sheets of paper.


I sat there wondering how it is that with the engineering knowledge that society posses that all the different materials failed (under an huge impact load to be fair) but something as flimsy as paper survived undamaged. I'd tried doing some Googling about the forces that paper can withstand, but I mostly came up with unrelated searches (everything is a research "paper").


I did some thinking, and I'm guessing that paper has a very low shear force (which is why you can cut it with sissers and tear it) but can withstand a lot of compression force (try squashing a flat sheet of A4 paper between your hands).

It kind of makes me wonder if paper is really that resilient to huge compression forces that perhaps there is something we have overlooked about it that could be incorporated into other materials to make them withstand considerably higher compression forces.


So, anyone keen to swap their helmet for a paper hat?

Notice how when you flush everything goes except the damned skidmarked paper? .... Usually floats right back up .... sunnyside up of course! flush flush flush