Active Thermitic Material Discovered in Dust from the 9/11 World Trade Center

reply to post by billybob

What were the spheres in Figure 3c? This was the initial sample and spheres were seen and isolated, magnetically. Could they be iron?

Oxygen, or not. Are you saying that drywall, iron and aluminum magically
mixed together to form a substance with more energy than a known
thermite control sample (which was also tested with the same parameters)?

Is this what you believe? If so, is this logical and 'good science' in your opinion?

reply to post by turbofan


I am not sure who ths post is intended for but I will guess that it might be me. DSC of combustible materials in air will show many things have more energy than thermite. If you look carefully, you will see that the data you refer to is plotted as watts/gram or kJ/gram. thermite brings its own oxygen source, iron oxide. Combustible materials don't need a heavy oxide to react and the air is not weighed as part of the sample. Aluminum will have far more energy released per gram in air than the mixture of aluminum and iron oxide. Other combustible materials will do the same, which is why I stated that Jones failed in his attempts to prove thermitic materials by burning materials in air instead of reacting them under an inert atmosphere.

Originally posted by pteridine
reply to post by billybob

 

What were the spheres in Figure 3c? This was the initial sample and spheres were seen and isolated, magnetically. Could they be iron?

yes they could be iron.
however, the ones i'm referring to were found only after igniting a single isolated red gray chip. see fig. 23, 24, 25......"post-DSC".

reply to post by billybob


Page 22 in the paper........."The DSC used in our studies does not allow for visual inspection of the energetic reaction. Therefore tests were also
performed with a small oxyacetylene flame applied to red/gray
chips.... In a later flame-ignition test, the end product was recovered
and is shown in the photomicrograph and SEM image in
Fig. (23)."

Anything done in an oxyacetylene flame cannot be used to prove thermitic reactions as the flame temperature is high enough to make all sorts of spherical particles from minerals and metals.

No the DSC tests were done at a much lower temperature than an oxycatelene torch,that was a visual test.

The DSC test was done around 600c .Iron melts at 1500c therefore its impossible for spheres to form at 600c ,unless a thermitic reaction occurs.

Spheres are the result of molten iron due to surface tension.

The claims that the red chips are Kaolin paint are bunk ,because kaolin is a aluminosilicate, therefore when paint solvent is used on aluminosilicates it doesnt dissolve aluminosilicates, but paint solvent dissolves elemental iron mixed with rust.

DSC test showed narrow exotherms at 430c the result was molten iron spheres which is indicative of 1400c + .

What problem do you have with the test being used in air.Yes there is oxygen in air, but oxygen does not cause such a exothermic chemical reaction without the combustable material being explosive anyway.

Even if its not nanothermite(which it clearly is) its proven nanosized elemental aluminium , which is a explosive by itself anyway and is used in cutting edge military explosives.

The paint solvent proves this is not paint. Kaolin is a aluminosilicate not aluminium its not explosive and guess what when you try and dissolve aluminosilicates with solvents nothing happens.

When you use solvents with chemicals which are not chemically bound to one another they seperate.
So it proves the aluminium is not chemically bound to the rust.

Apr 22, 2009
Scientists Find Unignited Explosive Residues in WTC Dust
— Gregg Roberts

www.ae911truth.org...


Explosives Found in
World Trade Center Dust
Scientists Discover Both Residues
And Unignited Fragments
Of High-Tech Metal Incendiaries
In Debris From the Twin Towers
by
Jim Hoffman
Version 1.0, April 3, 2009

911research.com...

Originally posted by starchildtesla
No the DSC tests were done at a much lower temperature than an oxycatelene torch,that was a visual test.

The DSC test was done around 600c .Iron melts at 1500c therefore its impossible for spheres to form at 600c ,unless a thermitic reaction occurs.

Spheres are the result of molten iron due to surface tension.

The claims that the red chips are Kaolin paint are bunk ,because kaolin is a aluminosilicate, therefore when paint solvent is used on aluminosilicates it doesnt dissolve aluminosilicates, but paint solvent dissolves elemental iron mixed with rust.

The figure that was referred to in the post I was replying to showed spheres as a result of the torch; see the quote from the paper in my post.

Your claims of paint solvent dissolving elemental iron mixed with rust are incorrect. Organics don't dissolve such things. MEK was not the best for dissolving cured paint but, then again, there don't seem to be any chemists on Jones' team.

reply to post by starchildtesla

What problem do you have with the test being used in air.Yes there is oxygen in air, but oxygen does not cause such a exothermic chemical reaction without the combustable material being explosive anyway.
..........As I explained previously, to prove an exothermic reaction you must rule out combustion and run the experiment in an inert gas. The organic binder combusting in air would show a significant exotherm and this would mask any reaction.

Even if its not nanothermite(which it clearly is) its proven nanosized elemental aluminium , which is a explosive by itself anyway and is used in cutting edge military explosives.
.........It is not proven and clearly is not nano-thermite. If it were a nano-engineered thermitic material, all the particles would be in a narrow size range. The SEM shows them to be in a very broad range. Elemental aluminum was not demonstrated.

The paint solvent proves this is not paint. Kaolin is a aluminosilicate not aluminium its not explosive and guess what when you try and dissolve aluminosilicates with solvents nothing happens.
...........The inability of a solvent used in paint to dissolve a cured coating is not proof that the coating was not a paint. The only thing it shows is the general incompetence of the Jones team for selecting such a poor solvent.

When you use solvents with chemicals which are not chemically bound to one another they seperate.
So it proves the aluminium is not chemically bound to the rust.

.............Why would you expect aluminum to be bound to rust? Thermite is just a mixture of a metal oxide and aluminum. They are not chemically bound, just mixed together. Plain old thermite looks like a fine sand with grains of aluminum and black iron oxide.

Originally posted by pteridine

..........As I explained previously, to prove an exothermic reaction you must rule out combustion and run the experiment in an inert gas. The organic binder combusting in air would show a significant exotherm and this would mask any reaction.

If you're so much better than those scientists, you should publish your
rebuttal for peer review.

Dr. Jones has an open challenge to all of you so called 'scientists' posted
on 911blogger.com.

To paraphrase Dr. Jones, your comments mean absolutely nothing until
they are published for review.

If you think Bentham is a vanity publication, he also urges you to try
and get your results published.

You all can speculate about paint chips and drywall until you're blue in
the face. To date NOBODY has offered a peer reviewed challenge to
the thermite paper. I'm not surprised.

We'll wait for somebody in the duhbunker community to step up. Until
then, have fun playing scientist beyond your anonymous account on the internet!


[edit on 10-5-2009 by turbofan]

reply to post by turbofan


I have never visited the 911blogger website because I didn't know of it. I will read it and see if my criticisms have been made by others before I bother to post.
I take it that Jones decided to use this site so that he could respond to criticisms in a public forum.

I take it your referring to

Fig. (26). Residue of red chip subjected to flame test; XEDS spectrum of left-most microsphere.

yet these xeds and photomicrographs show spheres under the DSC test
Fig. (20).
Fig. (21).
Fig. (25). Spheres formed during ignition of red/gray chip in DSC,

I assume you meant to say that the Methyl Ethyl Ketone Solvent showed elemental aluminium not iron, and rust iron oxide.

here from the report

"It was discovered in this process
that a significant migration and segregation of aluminum had
occurred in the red-chip material. This allowed us to assess
whether some of the aluminum was in elemental form"

Fig. (16).
Shows silicon oxide rich region

Fig. (17). shows aluminium rich region.

As we can see the aluminium and silicon oxide? also seperated due to the solvent.Any paint such as kaolin wont dissolve into elemental form because its chemically bound such as aluminosilicates like kaolin...

Fig. (18). Shows the iron oxide rich region.

The paint solvent effectively seperated the 3 main consituents of thermite, thankfully to debunkers claims that its paint .

Originally posted by pteridine
reply to post by starchildtesla

 

What problem do you have with the test being used in air.Yes there is oxygen in air, but oxygen does not cause such a exothermic chemical reaction without the combustable material being explosive anyway.
..........As I explained previously, to prove an exothermic reaction you must rule out combustion and run the experiment in an inert gas. The organic binder combusting in air would show a significant exotherm and this would mask any reaction.

Even if its not nanothermite(which it clearly is) its proven nanosized elemental aluminium , which is a explosive by itself anyway and is used in cutting edge military explosives.
.........It is not proven and clearly is not nano-thermite. If it were a nano-engineered thermitic material, all the particles would be in a narrow size range. The SEM shows them to be in a very broad range. Elemental aluminum was not demonstrated.

The paint solvent proves this is not paint. Kaolin is a aluminosilicate not aluminium its not explosive and guess what when you try and dissolve aluminosilicates with solvents nothing happens.
...........The inability of a solvent used in paint to dissolve a cured coating is not proof that the coating was not a paint. The only thing it shows is the general incompetence of the Jones team for selecting such a poor solvent.

When you use solvents with chemicals which are not chemically bound to one another they seperate.
So it proves the aluminium is not chemically bound to the rust.

.............Why would you expect aluminum to be bound to rust? Thermite is just a mixture of a metal oxide and aluminum. They are not chemically bound, just mixed together. Plain old thermite looks like a fine sand with grains of aluminum and black iron oxide.

1.Ok then show a combustible materiable able to melt iron.

2.Fig. (17). Clearly shows Elemental aluminium ,you would know this if you knew chemistry.
Also the size of the aluminium granules smaller than 1um .Not large like you say.
Fig. (8). The results
indicate that the small particles with very high BSE
intensity (brightness) are consistently 100 nm in size and
have a faceted appearance. These bright particles are seen
intermixed with plate-like particles that have intermediate
BSE intensity and are approximately 40 nm thick and up to
about 1 micron across

A nanometre is smaller than micrometre if you didnt know..

3.huh?
4. No i dont expect aluminium to be chemically bound to rust at all thats the point of thermite, its not chemcically bound,however paints such as kaolin are chemically bound stable molecules.
Thats why you will never get your peer reviewed article because you cannot show any material of aluminium mixed with iron oxide thats not chemically bound, none exists, aluminium oxidizes readily and its impossible to have elemental aluminium nanosized particles in the towers unless they were deliberately placed there.

reply to post by starchildtesla
"1.Ok then show a combustible materiable able to melt iron."
.....I am glad that someone finally sees the error of running the DSC in air. While there are many combustible materials able to melt iron, Jones' premise cannot be proved by this and the entire experiment is invalid.

"2.Fig. (17). Clearly shows Elemental aluminium ,you would know this if you knew chemistry."
.........You don't need to "know chemistry" to see that Figure 17 shows an aluminum peak. What you have to know is that the XEDS beam is not as controllable as everyone believes and when trying to get an analysis near the edge of a sample, or when using a 20 KeV beam on a thin sample, one often illuminates the sample stage which is made of Aluminum, of all things. Given the questionable scientific merit of this paper, if they wish to claim elemental aluminum, they should carefully exclude the possibility of stage illumination through some common techniques that Herrit should know.

"Also the size of the aluminium granules smaller than 1um .Not large like you say. Fig. (8)."
.....In Nano terms, microns are large. They are not proven to be aluminum and their morphology is similar to kaolinite.

"The results indicate that the small particles with very high BSE
intensity (brightness) are consistently 100 nm in size and
have a faceted appearance. These bright particles are seen
intermixed with plate-like particles that have intermediate
BSE intensity and are approximately 40 nm thick and up to
about 1 micron across."

....When you quote the paper, make sure that you so indicate. This statement is not yours, but is in the paper.

"3.huh? "
....What I said is that MEK is not a good solvent for dissolving polymeric matrices. If these guys would have asked a chemist, they would have been referred to much better solvents.

"4. No i dont expect aluminium to be chemically bound to rust at all thats the point of thermite, its not chemcically bound,however paints such as kaolin are chemically bound stable molecules.
Thats why you will never get your peer reviewed article because you cannot show any material of aluminium mixed with iron oxide thats not chemically bound, none exists, aluminium oxidizes readily and its impossible to have elemental aluminium nanosized particles in the towers unless they were deliberately placed there."

..............Kaolin is an aluminosilicate clay, not a paint. It is often added to paint.
You shouldn't worry about my list of publications. The rest of your statement is not totally comprehensible, but finely divided aluminum is also used in paint and primers.

Originally posted by pteridine
reply to post by starchildtesla

 

"1.Ok then show a combustible materiable able to melt iron."
.....I am glad that someone finally sees the error of running the DSC in air. While there are many combustible materials able to melt iron, Jones' premise cannot be proved by this and the entire experiment is invalid.

"2.Fig. (17). Clearly shows Elemental aluminium ,you would know this if you knew chemistry."
.........You don't need to "know chemistry" to see that Figure 17 shows an aluminum peak. What you have to know is that the XEDS beam is not as controllable as everyone believes and when trying to get an analysis near the edge of a sample, or when using a 20 KeV beam on a thin sample, one often illuminates the sample stage which is made of Aluminum, of all things. Given the questionable scientific merit of this paper, if they wish to claim elemental aluminum, they should carefully exclude the possibility of stage illumination through some common techniques that Herrit should know.

"Also the size of the aluminium granules smaller than 1um .Not large like you say. Fig. (8)."
.....In Nano terms, microns are large. They are not proven to be aluminum and their morphology is similar to kaolinite.

"The results indicate that the small particles with very high BSE
intensity (brightness) are consistently 100 nm in size and
have a faceted appearance. These bright particles are seen
intermixed with plate-like particles that have intermediate
BSE intensity and are approximately 40 nm thick and up to
about 1 micron across."

....When you quote the paper, make sure that you so indicate. This statement is not yours, but is in the paper.

"3.huh? "
....What I said is that MEK is not a good solvent for dissolving polymeric matrices. If these guys would have asked a chemist, they would have been referred to much better solvents.

"4. No i dont expect aluminium to be chemically bound to rust at all thats the point of thermite, its not chemcically bound,however paints such as kaolin are chemically bound stable molecules.
Thats why you will never get your peer reviewed article because you cannot show any material of aluminium mixed with iron oxide thats not chemically bound, none exists, aluminium oxidizes readily and its impossible to have elemental aluminium nanosized particles in the towers unless they were deliberately placed there."

..............Kaolin is an aluminosilicate clay, not a paint. It is often added to paint.
You shouldn't worry about my list of publications. The rest of your statement is not totally comprehensible, but finely divided aluminum is also used in paint and primers.

1. yea but not at 430c, forming molten iron spheres.Thus a very exothermic reaction took place.
Can you provide another chemical reaction at 430c which is more energetic than tnt and forms iron spheres no !

2.the stage sample was made of carbon.

3.MEK is a strong solvent, it worked on seperating the rust and aluminium.Try it on your paint kaolin whatever im sure it will work.Regardless it wont magically seperate your aluminosilicate into aluminium and silicon oxide.

4.Please give an example of elemental aluminium being used in paint.

"1. yea but not at 430c, forming molten iron spheres.Thus a very exothermic reaction took place. Can you provide another chemical reaction at 430c which is more energetic than tnt and forms iron spheres no !" .......Many things are more energetic than you think. Butter will beat TNT and thermite on a per gram basis. The spheres from the oxyacetylene torch are unremarkable as they are to be expected. The spheres that are claimed to be from the DSC may not be from a reaction but may be contained within the materials. This has yet to be shown.

"2.the stage sample was made of carbon."
....The mounts are generally aluminum unless otherwise stated. The conductive carbon tabs that were mentioned are two sided tape that hold samples and conduct electrons to ground so that the material doesn't charge and disturb the image.

"3.MEK is a strong solvent, it worked on seperating the rust and aluminium.Try it on your paint kaolin whatever im sure it will work.Regardless it wont magically seperate your aluminosilicate into aluminium and silicon oxide."
.............MEK is an organic solvent that is easily bettered by methylene chloride, DMF, or DMSO. What any of these solvents do is to dissolve, or partially dissolve, the organic matrix and any sort of separation will be the result of that dissolution. It is unfortunate that Jones' team used the comparatively weak MEK.
Thank you for the information on the aluminosilicate decomposition but I wasn't really concerned about that particular reaction.

"4.Please give an example of elemental aluminium being used in paint."
........."Silver" spray paint has finely divided aluminum as a pigment. High temperature aluminum paint is used on exhaust manifolds and similar applications. Many metallized paints use aluminum as a pigment.

Originally posted by pteridine
"1. yea but not at 430c, forming molten iron spheres.Thus a very exothermic reaction took place. Can you provide another chemical reaction at 430c which is more energetic than tnt and forms iron spheres no !" .......Many things are more energetic than you think. Butter will beat TNT and thermite on a per gram basis. The spheres from the oxyacetylene torch are unremarkable as they are to be expected. The spheres that are claimed to be from the DSC may not be from a reaction but may be contained within the materials. This has yet to be shown.

"2.the stage sample was made of carbon."
....The mounts are generally aluminum unless otherwise stated. The conductive carbon tabs that were mentioned are two sided tape that hold samples and conduct electrons to ground so that the material doesn't charge and disturb the image.

"3.MEK is a strong solvent, it worked on seperating the rust and aluminium.Try it on your paint kaolin whatever im sure it will work.Regardless it wont magically seperate your aluminosilicate into aluminium and silicon oxide."
.............MEK is an organic solvent that is easily bettered by methylene chloride, DMF, or DMSO. What any of these solvents do is to dissolve, or partially dissolve, the organic matrix and any sort of separation will be the result of that dissolution. It is unfortunate that Jones' team used the comparatively weak MEK.
Thank you for the information on the aluminosilicate decomposition but I wasn't really concerned about that particular reaction.

"4.Please give an example of elemental aluminium being used in paint."
........."Silver" spray paint has finely divided aluminum as a pigment. High temperature aluminum paint is used on exhaust manifolds and similar applications. Many metallized paints use aluminum as a pigment.

1.The spheres formed in the dsc with very narrow exotherms prove its explosive, explosives release energy very quickly rather than butter which take along time to convert into energy .
The spheres were not in the red chips before the reaction,proving that they were formed in the explosion,temperatyres of 1400c + were formed

2. only carbon is in the background of eds .
3.the mek proved elemental aluminium, it also doesnt dissolve the red chips, mek is a paint solvent.Is there any paint that doesnt dissolve from paint solvent.

3.yea nanosized granules of aluminium are used in paints and spray...

reply to post by pteridine


"1.The spheres formed in the dsc with very narrow exotherms prove its explosive, explosives release energy very quickly rather than butter which take along time to convert into energy.
The spheres were not in the red chips before the reaction,proving that they were formed in the explosion,temperatyres of 1400c + were formed"
...........From the paper Page 25.. "In addition to the red/gray chips, many small spheres have been found by our group in the WTC dust. These contain the same elements as the residue of thermite, as noted in
a previous paper [5]." I will reserve judgement because Jones has not shown that the spheres he claims were the result of DSC were not present in the matrix to begin with.

"2. only carbon is in the background of eds."
....I have explained how aluminum could be inadvertently included in EDAX data. You are reading the paper where it discusses use of carbon to prevent charging.

"3.the mek proved elemental aluminium, it also doesnt dissolve the red chips, mek is a paint solvent.Is there any paint that doesnt dissolve from paint solvent."
........A solvent used in uncured paint does not necessarily dissolve a cured coating. Cured coatings are polymeric in nature. You can dissolve components of epoxy resin with common solvents but the cured epoxy is much more difficult to dissolve.

"3.yea nanosized granules of aluminium are used in paints and spray..."
............You asked about pigment and I responded. The elemental aluminum data is questionable. The paper has many faults that prevent Jones from proving his thesis. The DSC in air is his biggest problem and a comparison of the DSC of an energetic aerogel and the red chips [figure 29] shows marked differences in onset temperature and shape. Jones completely botched the analysis by doing the DSC in air because he doesn't understand chemistry.

Originally posted by pteridine
reply to post by pteridine

 

"1.The spheres formed in the dsc with very narrow exotherms prove its explosive, explosives release energy very quickly rather than butter which take along time to convert into energy.
The spheres were not in the red chips before the reaction,proving that they were formed in the explosion,temperatyres of 1400c + were formed"
...........From the paper Page 25.. "In addition to the red/gray chips, many small spheres have been found by our group in the WTC dust. These contain the same elements as the residue of thermite, as noted in
a previous paper [5]." I will reserve judgement because Jones has not shown that the spheres he claims were the result of DSC were not present in the matrix to begin with.

"2. only carbon is in the background of eds."
....I have explained how aluminum could be inadvertently included in EDAX data. You are reading the paper where it discusses use of carbon to prevent charging.

"3.the mek proved elemental aluminium, it also doesnt dissolve the red chips, mek is a paint solvent.Is there any paint that doesnt dissolve from paint solvent."
........A solvent used in uncured paint does not necessarily dissolve a cured coating. Cured coatings are polymeric in nature. You can dissolve components of epoxy resin with common solvents but the cured epoxy is much more difficult to dissolve.

"3.yea nanosized granules of aluminium are used in paints and spray..."
............You asked about pigment and I responded. The elemental aluminum data is questionable. The paper has many faults that prevent Jones from proving his thesis. The DSC in air is his biggest problem and a comparison of the DSC of an energetic aerogel and the red chips [figure 29] shows marked differences in onset temperature and shape. Jones completely botched the analysis by doing the DSC in air because he doesn't understand chemistry.

1.
Fig. (20). Photomicrographs of residues from red/gray chips ignited in the DSC. Notice the shiny-metallic spheres and also the translucent
spheres. Each blue scale-marker represents 50 microns.

This should answer your question.No spheres before dsc test,after spheres.


2.Why then the xeds show no aluminium in silicion rich region of the nanothermite,shouldnt there be background contamination,The only repeating contamination is the carbon.

3. Did you read that on jref forum or can you back it up by a source or experiment,

4.All im asking is what pigment or paint uses nanoaluminium particles .
The dsc is fine, it shows a faster reaction than the known sol gel formula.Depending on the size of the nanoparticles will give a faster reaction,thats why the red chips have higher wattage than the sol gel formula.Such high wattage means its more explosive than known nanothermite materials.As the reaction is faster.The faster the heat/pressure the more explosive the material.The lower reaction temperature of the red chips is more proof that the nanoparticles are smaller because surface area reduces ignition temperature.