Intellectual Ventures Lab

I just wanted to point out that I’m not the only one who designed and built the coin shrinker. It represents about three months of work by about a dozen folks at our lab. I like to show it off and talk about it, but it couldn’t have been built without the Hackerbot Labs team.

Thanks again for the opportunity to make this video!

We’ve just posted more photos and details about what we did that day on our blog: http://www.hackerbotlabs.com/2009/06/high-speed-coin-shrinking/

Did this have any effect on the density of the quarter?

Physics is wonderful; no magic, no hocus-pocus, just clear, unmuddled reasoning and math

Does the quarter weigh the same after? Thanks

is it still worth $0.25?

Out of curiosity, what would happen with a more dense metal (like lead[PB] or plutonium[Pu])? Or a non-metallic structure that had a negative charge added? And have you guys tried “cooking” a quarter a second time?

@Don
We’ve not tested that many different materials, however, we will need to be careful with some of the materials you’ve suggested. Both PB and Pu are things which could be really hazardous if turned into small particulate and inhaled.

@curio
Yes, quarters do weigh the same before and after. In one example, a year 2000 New Hampshire state quarter was shrunk with 15 KJ; it weighed 5.731g before, and 5.737g after (the difference being within the measurement error of the balance employed).

Getting an accurate measurement of the density (or the volume) of the quarter is more difficult, but simple experiments tend to indicate little impact on the density of the quarter as well.

doesn’t the rapid magnetization of the coil create a large electromagnetic pulse?

@Geoff

How can the density not be affected? You’ve retained the mass and shrunk the volume, the density has to have risen.

This is a super-nifty device. What I’m curious about is the durability of the coin afterwards.

@Geoff Deane
Re: Measuring volume… Could you not borrow an idea from Archimedes and drop the quarter into a small tube of water? Or is that not accurate enough?

Nice work guys… thoroughly enjoyed the video! Quick question: what is the material that catches on fire?

@Geoff that doesn’t make sense. If the volume is getting smaller, and mass is staying the same, density should increase…

I happened upon this just before the boys arrived for chess. They all gathered around and loved watching it! Thanks, it was great fun.

Geoff Deane :
@curio
Yes, quarters do weigh the same before and after. In one example, a year 2000 New Hampshire state quarter was shrunk with 15 KJ; it weighed 5.731g before, and 5.737g after (the difference being within the measurement error of the balance employed).
Getting an accurate measurement of the density (or the volume) of the quarter is more difficult, but simple experiments tend to indicate little impact on the density of the quarter as well.

So you’re saying 2 objects with the same mass, but different volumes, can have the same density?

The density HAS to increase if the volume decreases and the mass remains the same.

-Eric

I want to go to a bar with you guys.

Getting an accurate measurement of the density (or the volume) of the quarter is more difficult

Can’t you just use water displacement? It’s not like it’s going to melt or anything.

How thick is the new quarter? I don’t see any edge on pictures.

Have you calculated the strength of the magnetic field? How many peak Tesla do you think it outputs?

How would a sphere respond to the magnetic field? What would happen if the sphere contained some liquid?

Cool. Could you build a coil out of wire that’s heavy enough to handle the peak current?

It’s been over thirty years since I’ve been a wires-and-pliers guy. I’ve been searching my wetware for the formulas but haven’t found them yet.

If the quarter shrunk but weighs the same, its density must have increased unless it’s thicker than it was previously, which is not evident from the photos.

How can the density NOT change by a proportional amount of volume change? (Or are you saying the volume DOESN’T change much? Is the quarter getting “fatter” as well as smaller diameter?)

Can I purchase a quarter that has been through the shrinking process? Shoot me an email if I can!

If the quarter is both reduced in diameter and thickness, and the weight is unchanged, the density should be higher. Or is the thickness increased?

Clear skies, Alan

Can the resulting quarter be shrunk again?

What are the practical applications of this process? I’m guessing its not really about shrinking quarters!

Um…. In the picture above, it appears that the diameter was cut in half. Did it get thicker? If not, the volume shrank to about a quarter of the original. If the mass stayed the same, doesn’t that quadruple the density? Am I missing something?

“but simple experiments tend to indicate little impact on the density”

Considering the decrease in volume but preservation of mass, by “little” I presume you mean “considerable” above.

If it’s smaller and weighs the same after the experiment, isn’t it inherently more dense?

Do you sell shrunk quarters? If so, how much per quarter?

Cool, if dangerous little experiment. Quite illuminating – probably in more ways than one!

One thing I wondered tho, the measured mass of the coin before and after the “treatment” varied, but not as much as I would have expected. Granted the coin seemed to have gained mass, 6µg to be exact, I wonder why more weighings could have been taken to average the results, both before and after. Or why a more precise scale was not available. 6/5731 or approximately 0.1 % accuracy is quite small, but it a pity that the measurements are seemingly “exchanged”, at least to a casual glance, but it does create confusion.

No mention as to the temperature of the coin immediately after the Zapping is also worrying, though I reason that if it were hot, hot, hot, it would have melted. As the coin still has a recognisable face, (not really familiar to we Australians), I suggest it has not suffered a great heat burden. That it has shrunk is un-deniable.

So what can I deduce from all this? It appears (and as of yet I have not gone into any other link or study), that the structure of the coin has been re-arranged. A different and more compact crystalline matrix has been produced. I wonder what the physical properties of this metal alloy would be now. Changed melting point? More or less malleability? Softer or harder? Brittle or more robust? What about resistivity, more or less resistance to electric current flow? And so on.

I grabbed a text book on the properties of elements, and notice that, of the various shapes of molecules, the Tetrahedral form could be “flattened” to a Square Planar by eliminating a few bonds, thereby reducing the “thickness” or size of the molecule, albeit in one dimension (?). I wonder if the coin was not only smaller across, but also thinner. Or was it thicker? I also wonder if that coin had had a hole in the middle, would that hole get bigger or smaller? Bigger, I say.

Was there more “oxide” on the surface? I ask this because in the reaction, the surrounding “atmosphere” would have been ionised, as if struck by a bolt of lightning. When this happens on your average golf course, the air is displaced by a vacuum, momentarily, and in our coin blast, some of the Oxygen in the air could have been fused (utilised?) by the coin metal, (which I surmise is an alloy of copper and nickel). (This could also account for any genuine weight gain, though I doubt it.) I happen to think some of the oxygen may have been stripped out, enabling the structure to “flatten” in at least one dimension, and there may have been a weight loss actually. As the alloy is probably made up of random alignments of molecules, the shrinkage may be in all directions. I am not aware of the lattice and/or matrix arrangements of the alloy used for coinage.

How could this curious behavior be used? Well, it could be useful where a metal (?) needs to be fitted and retained, especially in a fabricating process, but needs to be removed later, and the hole, after forming, is too small. That piece, suitably Zapped, and minimised, would drop out. Now I don’t know of any process that needs this treatment, as usually the opposite is required. I’m sure heavy industry would be interested to use the reduction technique somewhere.

Who knows, it may be a solution to a problem we have not yet envisioned or needed yet. Shades of the claim when Lasers were first developed, “Yeah, interesting, but it does nothing!” Have you counted the number of lasers in the average home these days? I even have a $6 laser pointer on my key ring, so in a decade or two, we may all have need of the cute little trick with the coin!

OOps, just noticed I typed “µ” (micro) instead of “m” (milli), in my maths at the beginning. At least the percentage was correct (ish).

Sorry, but it was a very interesting article, and I think I enjoyed it very much. Thanks to all concerned.

I’d like to see a palladium coin filled with tritium and then shrunk like that. Just curious if you could get a “small” amount of fusion going.

This is amazing. I am really impressed. This is a great example of really cool science.

throw some coal in there an squeeze out a diamond

Can I buy one (the quarter, not the shrinker)?

Clearly you can shrink something keeping the same weight and NOT increase density. That is, if the magnetic force crushes all porosity out of the coin down as compact as possible. This isnt like a shrink ray or something, the copper and nickel atoms are still the same.

Wow, you guys completed in one month (+/-) what took the Fed 100 years, you shrunk the U.S. $ to a small fraction of what it was. The Government dose not like that kind of competition. Ya’ll a will probably get auditided by the IRS now. Will this contraption work on the deficit? What about the Congress???

What good is this Technology? Looks like a scientific warm fuzzy to me.

For everybody thinking it’s denser: you’re forgetting the 3rd dimension. The quarter shrank to 2/3 the diameter, but obviously thickened to 2.25 the thickness. Thus, the volume and density didn’t change.

Oooh. How about a drop of mercury?
What would happen to a flame?

That’s a large capacitor. Cool device, yet also terrifying.

Also, guys: it’s clear by looking at the before and after photos that the quarter got thicker. coins are already as compressed as they can be from the minting process (i.e. not very compressed at all, really), the metal’s not going to get any denser.

Seeing that the shrunk coin casts a shadow across the ruler, and the unshrunk coin does not, i deduce that the shrunk quarter has indeed increased in thickness. Since both weigh roughly the same and supposing the thickness has increased, then density does not need to change.

If you look at the photo at the Hackerbot website you will see that the coin is much thicker after the “shrinking”. Sorry, but if the density is the same, the volume must be the same. You aren’t going to be changing the desity of a metal this way. Looks like fun though. Professional question, would this lyse bacterial spores?

Quote from website.
“No material is lost from the original coin: the weight and volume are the same as the original. But the coin now has a smaller diameter and is thicker, while retaining much of its surface detail. It’s also extremely hot just after firing!”

To answer the density question, it appears that volume is not changed. Diameter decreases, but the thickness is obviously higher, even in the picture provided here. The quarter is literally bulging. I’d wager if the same quarter were run though this process multiple times it would start to take on a cylindrical or conical shape.

EPIC FAIL! This is actually a FEDERAL OFFENSE to deface, mutilate or alter (in ANY way) legal U.S. currency.

Wonder if you could start a chain reaction in uranium or plutonium this way.

Be very careful trying to make one of these… I did and messed up way too much power over too small of a wire and no wheres near the amount of saftey precaution. When I charged the wire it burnt up to fast and ended up killing the half of the feild shooting the bent and warped quarter out like a gun. I dont have video of the quarter crusher but of us playing with the cap bank (much larger that this one) after words (video is old and poorly encoded)

any way you can shrink our Monsterous Federal Deficit with that thing?

Congress could use something like that.