What could be some problems faced when you have a metal ore that is completely weightless but still has mass (I. E. Unaffected by gravity)? How would you refine it? How would you transport it? How would you forge it? For stability sake just use the density and mass of iron.
>>45654114
Is it excreted by worms too?
>>45654154
What? No. That'd be retarded.
>>45654114
Wouldn't it just fly off into space, like when they activated proper antigravity in that E.E. Smith novel? Assuming your fantasy word travels through space like the Earth does.
>>45654204
All the surface deposits are long gone but the ones underground are stuck and have basically kept up with the earth's rotation as well. Helium weighs basically 0 and it still remains in the atmosphere.
>>45654114
You'd have to use sealed forges that spin to accumulate the melted shit on the wall. You'd have to start normally and while it floats shove it using some sort of implement through a filter to get rid of slag where the centrifugal force would catch it and shove the clean melt onto the walls where it would meet in a divet. From there you'd have to get a counterweight on one side of the forge and an ingot form on the sealed hole where the divet is then popped open to let the melt slip into the ingot form. Once its cooled you could let the furnace slow. You'd have to hold the ingot down while you forge welded a handle to it and from there its pretty much normal forging barring the need to hang magnets around the grind wheel to prevent thermite style dust explosions from free floating metal particles.
Would float out of the atmosphere due to bouyancy.
The ore wouldn't even sediment in the ground - if it were exposed at any point in geologic history, it would be lost forever. Needless to say, that goes for every item that slipps accidentally.
Okay, so let's say the ore has some weight, ans only the refined metal has the properties you described.
Its probably quite rare and expensive, since it requires carefull handling, and generally tends to diminish in quantity over time.
The refined material would need to be transported in wagons with closed ceiligs, and with a counter weight. Economically speaking, probably other goods. They wouldn't be floating, since finding the exact balance is difficult and the material too risky for potential fuckups, but lighter than normal vehicles.
Depending on if it's affected by inertia, it wouldn't necessarily make for an armor that's easy to manouver in, or a blade that's easy to wield. Standing and running in a single direction would be easier though, as well as leaping great distances.
>>45654231
Most Helium does fly off into space, but it's being continually replaced so there's still some in the atmosphere.
>>45654399
The thing is, there's a huge difference betweeen almost zero and zero.
Helium can sit in the top layer of the atmosphere and be slowly worn away as the effects of buoyancy get weaker, but a material that is not affected by gravity won't be slowed down by gravity, and instead be flung out immediately.
Also, as you pointed out, helium is extreamly abundant, being the second simplest element and all. Metals, generally, aren't.
>>45654114
There was this one RPG I played when I was growing up where certain monsters had armor with negative weight. The point of this was of course that the monsters would be able to move swiftly despite wearing heavy gear, but the question always came up
>"what happens if one of them gets hold of an armor with more negative weight than he actually weights?"
We houseruled that they started floating away.
>>45654586
That is actually a legitimately terrifying method of execution, now that I think about it.
>>45654586
Negative weight?
I'm not sure I can wrap my head around that
>>45654114
I Made up an ore for a homebrew PF campaign sort of like this idea once and called it Heliite. I played it off as a non-magical but incredibly, rare quazi-crytalized metal that naturally contained large amounts of helium for this purpose. Doesn't answer the forging method but I thought I'd share.
>>45654644
From my really basic understanding of physics, there's a hypothetical repulsive gravity. Its supposedly what is pushing stars apart from each other. It's possible, I guess.
>>45654693
What about inertia?
How would it respond to forces, i.e. trying to accelerate it?
Furthermore, a massless object has to travle at the speed of light at all times, I can't even...
>>45654749
It has mass, it just is reacting to gravitational forces differently.
>>45654749
OP you are dumb but since this is a way better /tg/ thread than any of the fucking garbage or general thread trash that gets posted here these days I'll bite.
The obvious answer here is to make your weightless metal an alloy that exhibits the property of weightlessness more strongly the more precise the admixture is and the more pure the ingredients are.
>>45654399
But that's wrong, you big silly dummy head.
>>45654749
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass#Inertial_vs._gravitational_mass
He's talking about something that has inertial mass, but no gravitational mass.
>>45654944
Or just make it naturally occur in ores that weigh something because weightless metal is not the only thing they're made of.
>>45654114
It would float for starters.
>>45654275
Inertia is what makes armor useful, I think. If it has mass it would have inertia so changing the acceleration of armor made out of it would still reduce the force of the attack.
>>45654114
The only real problem would be while it's liquid, wouldn't it. As a solid, you can just tie it to something.
As a liquid, it'll first rise to the top of whatever other stuff's in the ore you're smelting, and then slowly float off. So you'll have to catch it in a kind of upside-down bowl.
I don't know how far advanced your setting's technology is, but this stuff would be fucking incredible for airships.
>when you have a metal ore
>How would you forge it?
Step one is to not confuse the ore with the metal itself. Those two will be as different as sodium metal and table salt.
Now assuming both are weightless we probably won't be able to use a "chimney" type smelter (like an old bloomery, or a modern blast furnace) to turn the ore into metal, since the air flow will blow it out of the furnace.
In a modern setting we have plenty of alternative ways of making the metal (electrolysis, direct reduction, some cold chemical process, it all depend son the chemistry of the metal in question), but with medieval technology things might get harder. Or someone manages to invent some other method and at worst we get a slightly higher price than what would otherwise have been the case (alternatively go with somethign along the lines of a very primitive pit furnace and accept that you're getting a pretty poor exchange out of the conversion). And that of course assuming they can't just magic the problems away.
As for working the finished metal, doing it indoors seems prudent. Dust from grinding and polishing will probably be quite an issue for lungs, electrical equipment, and so on since it isn't going to settle down any time soon, so that will have to be managed depending on what equipment is used and what level of workplace safety is acceptable.
Also, don't just let chunks of it sit around, tie some weights to them or so.
>>45655080
It should float very slowly though, shouldn't it? One ton of sky iron displaces 150 grams worth of air.
>>45655270
Slightly faster than a helium balloon.
>>45654631
I'm pretty sure weight is directly dependent on mass, so even in a fantasy setting it's impossible but what the fuck ever, I'm not gonna pretend you think this stuff is realistic.
Pros:
>as lightweight as it gets
>doesn't lose effects to a 'dispel magic'
>great for armor, bullets and bomb casings
Cons:
>in a weapon it'd be like hitting someone with a particularly sturdy balloon sword
>the material must be ungodly expensive
>if your weapon or armor is shattered all the shards would nearly immediately fly off in all directions, showering your teammates in deadly shrapnel and forcing you to buy an entirely new piece of the stuff after you fail to retrieve anything
>would need entirely unique gear to smelt
>probably couldn't make alloys out of the stuff if it just floats to the top of the ingot before solidifying
I'd say it sounds pretty fun without instantly winning your combats for you. That said, it has much better applications in alloys if you can make that work somehow.
Source: I took a single semester physics class nearly a decade ago
>>45655270
According to some internet calculator, that gives a one-ton cube of the stuff a terminal velocity of about two meters per second or so. And it takes more than four hours to reach that.
>>45655318
>tfw you think you have a funny or interesting idea but a popular TV show uses it before you ever mention it to anyone
>>45655323
>in a weapon it'd be like hitting someone with a particularly sturdy balloon sword
That's assuming it doesn't have inertia. OP is saying it has inertia, what it doesn't have is weight. So as a weapon I think it should work pretty much as normal, unless you're planning to use it like a sledgehammer.
>>45654114
is the material still subject to electromagnetic forces?
if it is, it could potentially be found mixed with other magnetic ores that would keep it it earth bound.
>>45655294
It should have a similar terminal velocity, but it should take a lot longer to get there.
And be a lot harder to stop, of course.
>>45655270
Meanwhile 1 ton of "medieval" iron will probably contain something like 1-10 kg of accidental alloying elements (not counting carbon there), plus some amount of slag inclusions. Hell, getting down to below 150g of random junk per ton today seems to mean you're going for the expensive kinds of lab-grade iron powder.
They're probably going to need a good deal of magic to get this pure enough to float on its own, without any help form the wind or some such.
>>45655409
Maybe it could work as hull material for armored balloons or dirigibles. They could use hot air, lifting gas or even lifting vacuums.
>>45655409
>without any help form the wind or some such
refine it light enough to make a crude pedal powered metal glider
>>45655323
>>probably couldn't make alloys out of the stuff if it just floats to the top of the ingot before solidifying
Alloys tend to be solutions in their liquid phase, not some kind of dispersion. Come to think of it, are there any metals that aren't perfectly soluble in each other as long as we stay above the liquidus temperature? So the weightless metal won't float on top any more than the alcohol in vodka will.
Should we get a precipitate of the pure weightless metal as the primary phase during solidification that could be a problem, but we should be able to re-homogenise the whole thing through heat treatment, folding, or some such. Or we just pass on that specific alloy.
The "pure" form of that metal probably would float, but the other crap that's interdispersed into it is probably why it only lightly floats up instead of shooting off into space. Forging it would require mixing in enough alloy to give just enough weight that it just slowly falls, kinda like how things work in 0.002 gravity.
>>45655165
>Inertia is what makes armor useful, I think. If it has mass it would have inertia so changing the acceleration of armor made out of it would still reduce the force of the attack.
No, being a solid physical barrier that can't be penetrated is what makes armor useful. Impacts on armor are spread out over a wider area, so attempts to cut or stab through it are turned into *clang* - the armor is attached to a human body, which has plenty enough inertia of it's own.
The hard part of wearing armor that weighs nothing but still has all of the inertia of a full set of plate armor is that you can start running really easy, but stopping or turning will be unexpectedly difficult.
Swords and clubs and other melee weapons are the things that use inertia. A sword that weighs nothing, but swings and hits like a sword that weighs lots will hack and smash quite well.
>>45655760
>which has plenty enough inertia of it's own.
The head is an exception, because the brain really doesn't like being shaken around. You want a good deal of inertia there for a helmet protecting against weapon blows.
Does this mean I can use size 6 swords if I'm strong enough?
>>45657486
seems like inertia would be a problem
Are people claiming that this skyiron would float off because "lol immovable rod" or from an earnest understanding of buoyancy? Because I think it's probably much easier and more interesting to start with the assumption that this material can be refined to a point that it is neutrally buoyant at 1 ATM of pressure using pre-industrial methods. Only 100% purity would make it more buoyant than any other medium, while keeping the same mass as an equivalent amount of iron.
Actually, making it ferrous opens up a ton of other interesting options, would this material mean we'd get the maglev before the steam engine?
>>45654693
Nope. Gravity is the one fundamental force in this universe that always attracts.
We know little about the force that expands the universe, but reverse gravity has been ruled out.
So, no negative weight.
>>45658079
Depends on if this is as common as iron or as common as titanium. If it's the former that means mag-lev trains would be working almost immediately after electricity and efficient ore smelting methods are invented.
>>45654775
Trouble is, Einstein proved that gravity is an acceleration (due to bending space), thereby explaining why nobody ever measured the slightest difference between mass and inertia.
In other words, this hypothetical stuff cannot exist in our universe.
>>45654944
Disarms are going to be hilarious
>>45658784
Yeah, but this is a fantasy setting we're talking about there. I'd assume its physics to work on common sense unless specified otherwise. And relativity is really far from common sense.
>>45654114
Hi J.
>>45658740
Assuming it's a basic magnetic metal like nickel, cobalt, or iron and there's even a hundredth as much of it as the equivalent metal then it'd probably be waaay more abundant than iron in the planet's crust. Most of our heavy metals are in the core because they sunk there while the earth was molten, which isn't a problem for our skyiron. It staying on the planet is another question entirely though, I don't have enough background in materials science to say. Would this hypothetical hematite bond into big enough crystals to sink back down to earth?
>>45659654
If this material is unaffected by gravity, why would it accrete into a solar system and eventually a planet in the first place?
This kind of stuff can clearly only exist on a world that didn't form through a process like that.
>>45659817
Maybe I should start a new thread, this idea of super buoyant metals seems to produce a similar result without the headache of ignoring a fundamental force completely.
>>45654114
Well, there's the fact that it would likely immediately accelerate to the speed of light, and then crash into a random air molecule, with enough force that it would make a nuclear bomb look like a cap gun.
>>45655015
No, it's correct. Helium has less density than the nitrogen-oxygen mix that makes up most of our atmosphere. So it floats to the top and tends to be lost to space.
>>45659950
Might work, might lead to people beating you over the head with archimedes.
Anyway I thought this thread produced some fairly interesting results. It summoned KM, for one.
>>45659817
>why would it accrete into a solar system and eventually a planet in the first place?
Maybe it's an element formed during the formation of the planet when its constituent parts were in a molten state?
The weird anti-gravity thing is something it only has in its alloyed form.
What if...
>It only has anti-gravity when inside a gravity field.
>>45658079
>would this material mean we'd get the maglev before the steam engine?
Having it be magnetic in itself only really removes the weight of the magnets from the list of shit the engineer has to deal with. That you can make the overall construction for your railway car or whatever weightless probably matters more. Either way though, you're going to need a lot of very strong magnets in the "rail" to repulse it, and more importantly, to repulse the payload's weight.
This will probably restrict its use to toys and curiosities.
>>45658079
It would mean motherfucking air battleships is what it would mean.
>>45654204
>>45654231
>>45654275
>>45654523
Why are you assuming positive bouyancy? It's not affected by gravity, not repelled by it. If anything it'd be neutrally bouyant, staying at what ever level you left it at due to air pressure, though it would be moved if acted on by an outside force, IE. a weight or the wind.
>>45662180
>Why are you assuming positive buoyancy?
Anything that displaces air experiences buoyancy.
>>45662220
True, but neutral bouyancy does exist. A weight displaces just enough to counter its own weight.
>>45662275
But the ATM is not the same everywhere. Temperature, elevation, and even humidity all affect the humidity, even if it's only a small degree.
>>45662275
If it weighs the same as the air it displaces, yeah. This stuff weighs nothing.
Unless you factor in impurities, like MK said up there somewhere.
In any case, because it has so much more inertial mass than the air it displaces, its buoyancy will only lead to very small accelerations. It certainly won't woosh off to the sky like a rocket.
>>45654114
Assuming "magic", since mass, weight and density are directly related to gravity. But fuck physics, right?
>>45662425
Assuming magic correct. Except a anti-magic field won't work.
>>45659992
It still has mass for most purposes, dummy. It just isn't affected by gravitational fields.
Anyway, a massless object wouldn't have any kinetic energy anyway, even at the speed of light.
Probably.
I mean, I guess photons do.
And photons, interestingly enough, ARE affected by gravitational fields.
Fuckin' curvature of space, how does it work?
>Feels like carrying a jug of half-filled water whenever you move it.
>You can apply more energy to the swings due to gravity not taking up a lot of that energy to keep the sword lifted.
>Animu sized weapons now possible for the strongest warriors.
>Lightweight 3-inch thick skysteel armor.
>You'll have to re-train yourself in using any skysteel weapons.
>Skysteel crossbow bolts now have near infinite range.
>Wizards will probably screw something up and make sentient skysteel dust coulds.
>Maybe this would work great as a rehabilitation metal to help people move again.
>The forges would be quite efficient at creating the pure form of the metal due to the metal and slag having entirely different physics working on them.
>Someone is going to make a dildo out of it.
I'm not understanding this whole "it has inertia but not weight" issue
Doesn't make sense to me, and I'm not talking scientifically
Inertia occurs both moving and stationary, the same force that makes a heavy object difficult to move from standstill makes that same object difficult to stop when it's moving
And just intuitively trying to imagine this substance, I can't imagine it any other way
If it has inertia, then it has all the same qualities that normal things with weight have, except we are stipulating apparently that it floats in the air
>>45654114
>weightless but still has mass
That is a direct contradiction, given that gravitation (and therefore perceived weight) is a consequence of having mass. The inverse is also true: When you're not warping spacetime, you don't have mass either.
>>45664079
>>45664117
It's magic. You shouldn't really expect for it to be logical.
>>45660261
I like this idea. Explain more?
>>45664117
Think of it like you're in space and you push the ISS. Your body will move more than the space station because of its mass.
>>45664117
Gravitational Mass is technically separate from inertial mass, though they have always been observed to be equal.
