DIY Solar Death Ray!

From what I remember they werent as close to the mirrors when they tried it.
 
Mythbusters tried to manually create parabolic reflection with many independent (and large and flat) reflectors and a very large focal length.

This kid made a makeshift traditional parabolic relfector with a short focal length and used many small squares (instead of large ones). This will work reasonably well. Better though is just a single parabolic mirror, and yes, it will burn most anything you place on its focal point. Notice how you can see the light when the smoke is blowing towards the dish converging on a small area. It's basically taking all the light hitting the entire dish and putting it on a small point.

You can play with it yourself if you buy a big parabolic mirror. However, be careful. You can blind yourself, or burn yourself pretty easily.
 
You can cook food hotter than a stove with a parabolic lens and the sun, that's it. Without a doubt as I have seen it happen!

You can definitely make a "death" ray with one and kill someone with it technically but they'd obviously have to be tied down and unable to run :)
 
ScratchDrive said:
You can cook food hotter than a stove with a parabolic lens and the sun, that's it. Without a doubt as I have seen it happen!

You can definitely make a "death" ray with one and kill someone with it technically but they'd obviously have to be tied down and unable to run :)
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Dr. No, is that you?
 
Good for the kid wearing goggles.
I say he should go bigger with those huge dishes people used to have to get satellite.
 
attaching all of those little mirrors had to take a long time. Seems like it's have been a lot easier to just glue a piece of Mylar to the dish.
 
ah, fun in the sun....

It's just a nice little reminder of the "sweet spot" distance we are from the sun.
 
Cool sun alignment idea. Mythbuster didn't have anything like that.

$10 says there a huge discussion on their forum regarding this video.
 
Meh, was ok I guess. Increase the focal length so you can torch a neighbors' yipping dog and then I'll be impressed. :D
 
"Unfortunately the R5800 was completely destroyed in a burning shed..."

lol... wonder if it was pointing at the window.
 
i like how he holds the concrete with his hands. wonder how many burns he has.
 
I was also waiting for the "Human flesh" segment where he inadvertently placed his hand a little too close to the focal point...
 
Hrmmm this kid must have seen the video of the MIT students that did this a couple years ago posted on here lol, which was a lot more powerful. Would be nice if added the cost of his setup and where he got his materials for other people.
 
This thing needs to be used for Heatsink tests. Then we'll find out who can handle the heat :D
 
caniba said:
I thought Mythbusters couldn't get this to work.
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There's a big difference between burning a piece of wood close to the reflector and destroying an invading fleet of ships out on the ocean with material available to the ancient Greeks,which is the myth they were testing.
 
michael.pa2 said:
There's a big difference between burning a piece of wood close to the reflector and destroying an invading fleet of ships out on the ocean with material available to the ancient Greeks,which is the myth they were testing.
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Yea but there still idiots..
 
rather use a magnifying glass. That way, at least if i break it I won't have 40600 years of bad luck.
 
Couldn't help but think you could use a bigger one of these to vaporize water or a similar liquid and drive a turbine. I wonder how many mirrors you would need to vaporize enough water to equal the output of a nuke? I could probably do the math, but I am sure someone already has. Seems like it would have a better efficiency than solar panels per acreage of space used... plus a lot cheaper to maintain.
 
EchtoGammut said:
Couldn't help but think you could use a bigger one of these to vaporize water or a similar liquid and drive a turbine. I wonder how many mirrors you would need to vaporize enough water to equal the output of a nuke? I could probably do the math, but I am sure someone already has. Seems like it would have a better efficiency than solar panels per acreage of space used... plus a lot cheaper to maintain.
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Been done.
 
michael.pa2 said:
There's a big difference between burning a piece of wood close to the reflector and destroying an invading fleet of ships out on the ocean with material available to the ancient Greeks,which is the myth they were testing.
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No difference at all really. The problem is the Mythbusters didn't have nearly 6000 mirrors to focus that much sunlight, not to mention they had no way to really accurately focus all that light even if they had that many mirrors.
 
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