So it seems that the Titan imploded.
I knew that pressure vessels can be made with glass fibre, which is strong in tension, but I just can’t understand why they would use carbon fibre for something that had to withstand external pressures. Also, if you can’t make a vehicle without a hatch perhaps you should think again.
It’s been ages since I studied engineering but it sounds like they were putting their faith in little more than epoxy.
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jonbob loves you, Thu 22 Jun 2023, 20:42,
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I’m not a materials engineer, nor am I experienced in designing pressure vessels
But I have to say I’m thinking much the same. It looks as if it was the carbon fibre side that failed, which makes me wonder about duty cycles, load increase rates, and how the material might react to such extreme stresses.
One thing that can be said though is that the occupants wouldn’t have known much about what happened.
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wheresthefish Partly filled with wrong, Fri 23 Jun 2023, 1:47,
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Load cycles don't really apply to carbon fibre composites.
In a bad way. The company touted some sort of real-time fatigue measurement system, that in hindsight only exists because composites can fail unexpectedly.
Then there are the lawsuits from "old white guys*" who claim they were sacked for pointing out flaws in the design.
Honestly I expect that this story will go on for a lot longer and the company will face many more lawsuits than they already have.
There's a certain musk about this story, but as you say the poor bastards who died down there wouldn't have suffered. On the other hand, exposure to vacuum must be an absolutely awful way to go.
*The management's words, not mine. Apparently they preferred younger folks without much experience in the way of submarines.
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jonbob loves you, Fri 23 Jun 2023, 4:16,
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2am terminology fail
Duty cycles are for batteries.
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wheresthefish Partly filled with wrong, Fri 23 Jun 2023, 7:49,
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Almost tempted to logout so I can see what the Sage of Screwfix has to say about this
(, Fri 23 Jun 2023, 9:53, Share, Reply)
But at least it makes some kind of visual sense, unlike the previous films.
(, Fri 23 Jun 2023, 10:30, Share, Reply)
A recognisable item turning into a jumbled, screwed up mess? I think it's just more of the same
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Turtle Power & Knuckles, Fri 23 Jun 2023, 10:51,
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Here, I can recognize it as a crushed can.
In the previous films, they all just start dissolving into meaningless polygons.
(, Fri 23 Jun 2023, 12:04, Share, Reply)
Some designer looked at Starscream in the 1980s cartoon
then looked at what their sandwich lunch was wrapped in
and made a choice
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Turtle Power & Knuckles, Fri 23 Jun 2023, 12:38,
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Definitely not the worst way to go, all things considered. I don't imagine there was much in the way of warning before they were instantaneously pulped.
Certainly preferable to the fate of poor Truls Hellevik in the Byford Dolphin Diving Bell Incident.
Really puts it into perspective when you consider the Byford Dolphin accident took place at 9 atmospheres. The crew of the Titan were dealt 340-400 atmospheres of pressure.
(, Fri 23 Jun 2023, 11:56, Share, Reply)
I don't imagine Truls knew much about what was going on before he was turned into salsa either.
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evil_andy Stick stick stick stick sticky sticky stick stick, Fri 23 Jun 2023, 15:44,
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General consensus appears to be
that the carbon fibre cylinder would have failed by shattering, leaving the occupants in a rapidly collapsing bubble of air. That bubble, and its occupants, would have been superheated to plasma in about 20ms by the pressure. To quote one commenter “they went from biology to physics“.
The human nervous system has a delay of about 200ms so they wouldn’t have known a thing about it.
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wheresthefish Partly filled with wrong, Fri 23 Jun 2023, 21:12,
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