No not that Climatology

Well, back to writing some posts. A fellow I know needed me to help him move some cattle. That meant quite a bit of time in the saddle, and then hauling winter feed to the new location. Oh great I get to ride drag, and no that doesn't mean riding in women's clothes. It's where you get to smell the cow flatulence all day and eat dust for hours on end at the back of the drive.

I have worked with a lot of people over the years in what I call planetary sciences. This also includes atmospheric research. Over the years I have built a number of instruments and conducted experimental studies in support of this type of work so I naturally developed an interest in the subject. One aspect of this field is obviously the climate of earth both in the past and the present. The present day arguments over modern climate change don't hold much interest for me but the past or paleoclimate studies do. 

What Do You Believe?

Given our last election and some of the rather unusual events I thought I would create a mathematical model to explore this strange space. So the first thing to do is to express the thing in some form and see if it makes sense. An exponential model first comes to mind such as:

Explosives Applications: The Shaped Charge

One major use for explosives is in the oil and gas industry to complete a well. For a simple well the process is straightforward. The well is drilled, cased and then perforated. This involves inserting a length of tubing with a series of shaped charges along it's length into the cased well and setting off the charges that perforate the casing and the oil and gas bearing strata.

A shaped charge in its simplest form is nothing more than a metal cone surrounded by explosives. The charge is end initiated and the explosive collapses the conical liner into a jet of material that penetrates at very high velocity. The jet penetrates in the same manner as I previously posted about hypervelocity penetration. A model of a simple 65 degree angled shaped charge is shown in the first video. As the detonation proceeds up the charge the cone collapses inward in a symmetrical manner with an upwards momentum. At the collision point the cone coalesces into a jet of material that has a high velocity and has a final form of a long slender rod.