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Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

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Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#371

Post by serf »

kuschku wrote: post #352
IgorPartola wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your keys are by no means hardened steel. If they are steel at all (most are brass or silver/zinc), they would be mild steel. If they were hardened they would be really difficult to cut. The harder you make a steel the more brittle it gets. Think about what happens when you slam a file with a hammer vs a large nail.

Considering how easy it is to break keys in the lock, I'd say they're definitely more brittle than malleable?

I think that's mostly from mild work-hardening, I haven't experienced that with a brand new key.

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#372

Post by tiborsaas »

dimgl wrote: post #200
poisonborz wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why and how became diamonds a necessity of marriage in the US? Did your fiancé really expect a diamond, and would have she be disappointed by something that has only worth to you?

Women expect it. It's that simple.

Why do plastic/silicone wedding rings exist then?

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#373

Post by nsteel »

namibj wrote: post #261
nsteel wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are they not more popular as a material for heatsinks? Especially with those that like decorating the inside of the PC with fairy lights.

Oh they are. But heat pipes/vapor chambers have them beat. So they are only used where electrical insulation (pure diamond sheet) or mechanical strength (cheap diamond grains sorted into a densely packed single layer of diamonds embedded into a copper matrix; this fits nicely for silver sinter bonding dies to due to the low thermal expansion of diamond) is needed from the heatsink.

Thanks. I since found https://www.cell.com/cell-reports-physical-science/fulltext/..., perhaps it makes sense where you don't have a lot of space.

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#374

Post by jiggawatts »

db48x wrote: post #301
jiggawatts wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Magic book = iPad or Remarkable Atomic fabber = chip fabs making things on ~10 atom scales 3D printing homes is possible now, just a bit niche

And yet we’re not really there yet. The book wasn't just a tablet computer; it was programmed to continually analyze everything happening around it and relate those events back to the education of the owner. It shocked a bully who was playing keep–away with it. It noticed that the owner was eating junk food, and taught her a better diet. It taught her to read, as well as manners and exercises and elocution. Later a c…

About 70% of those are covered by the Internet especially if you include ChatGPT.

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#375

Post by regularfry »

vladvasiliu wrote: post #344
Stedag wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s definitely price performant at 6.5 on the mohs scale, sapphire panels are 2-4x more expensive to produce but 9 on the mohs scales so they’re typically only found in watches I bet. At a 10 on the mohs scale diamond is still best for hardness. Maybe the same effect of the prince Rupert’s drop could be induced on a round diamond with an alpha particle beam treatment where you add these ions primarily on the surface…

I'm not exactly a watch nerd, so don't know how true this is, but I hear that sapphire shatters on impact. Or maybe that's just an excuse for people peddling "alternative" materials for their watches? But if it is true, then I'd say that sapphire is a poor choice for mobile phones. IME I'm far more likely to drop the phone, preferably on some form of hard surface, that to scratch it. Phones are nowadays so ridiculous…

Diamonds also shatter. It's got roughly the same toughness as sapphire but the cleavage planes are more annoying (in that it has them, while sapphire doesn't).

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#376

Post by regularfry »

namibj wrote: post #270
trhway wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>diamond windows for lasers 10cm across sounds like may be soon we'll see diamond wafers for the chips (especially as the price of processed wafer from a fab increases, the cost of the source wafer itself is becoming less important) Add to that X-ray lithography, and the Moore's Law will continue for quite a while.

AFAIK you can still only buy diamond diodes outside of secret military stuff, and even those are not at all accessible. Sadly GaN suffers from horrible p-channels (they use resistor/nmos logic as the non-differential logic family for GaN ICs), and SiC from kinda sorta delaminating gate oxide (JFETs are fine though, and vertical ones are very nicely behaved, including a lot of resilience like avalanche resistance (tho…

Impure diamonds for semiconductors were a plot device in Michael Crichton's Congo. I never knew if there was much basis to it.

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#377

Post by program_whiz »

For any aspiring inventors / engineers out there, take a good look at how Hall was treated by GE. He literally invented game-changing tech with every obstacle thrown in his way by management, and was given a 10% raise and $10 savings bond.

Had he done it on his own, he would have been extremely wealthy, being the supplier of synthetic diamonds to the world (assuming he wouldn't have faced legal challenges by former employer). He would have also been able to pursue this full time, who knows how much he could have improved the tech.

Just because the powers that be don't think its a good idea, doesn't mean it isn't (it also doesn't mean it is). And if they don't want you building it, for goodness sakes, don't just give them your amazing idea, build it so you can profit when it turns out to be a golden nugget.

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#378

Post by passwordoops »

biomcgary wrote: post #183
mitthrowaway2 wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is certainly good news for lasers. Many people don't realize how good diamonds are for this. Transparent with a 65% higher refractive index than glass, and 8x the thermal conductivity of copper. And completely scratch-proof!

Diamond eyeglasses? The lenses would still be cheaper than the Luxottica frames.

Like Luxottica wouldn't immediately roll up the diamond lens company...

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#379

Post by dijit »

user_of_the_wek wrote: post #370
dijit wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They did however manage to get Sapphire on the watch display (at least on the stainless steel LTE edition of the apple watch series 4 and 8, which I'm aware of). The difference between my watch (which was 4 years old at the time) and a colleagues almost brand new apple watch (without the sapphire) was really telling, is his was lightly scratched on the edges despite him being quite careful, and I was exceedingly reck…

I have a Series 5 with the Saphire glass but my clumsy ass dropped it in the kitchen onto a stone floor. The edge of the glass shattered and while I still use it to this day, it's an ugly reminder of my clumsiness. The repair offer from Apple was to get a new one with a very slight discount. Long story short, it is more scratch resistant but also more prone to break. So be careful.

Thanks for the warning!

I suspect the edges are more at risk than the face, as I've struck the face very hard against the edge of a scaffolding pole and there was no damage - which, actually shocked me a lot based on the force.

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#380

Post by xeonmc »

Stedag wrote: post #324
chasil wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gorilla glass is already some percentage of "Prince Rupert's Drop" in strength. This is not sufficient? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_Rupert%27s_drop

It’s definitely price performant at 6.5 on the mohs scale, sapphire panels are 2-4x more expensive to produce but 9 on the mohs scales so they’re typically only found in watches I bet. At a 10 on the mohs scale diamond is still best for hardness. Maybe the same effect of the prince Rupert’s drop could be induced on a round diamond with an alpha particle beam treatment where you add these ions primarily on the surface…

also note that Mohs is a qualitative ranking rather than a linear scale. Huuuuuge difference in hardness at the top end.[0]

[0] https://geology.com/minerals/photos/mohs-vickers-comparison-...

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