Firefighting is all about that bass. A pair of George Mason University engineering students built a handheld fire extinguisher that puts out flames with low-frequency sound.
Seniors Viet Tran and Seth Robertson created the souped-up subwoofer for an advanced design class after they read about how the U.S. Department of Defense built a similar, stationary sound-based extinguisher.
But the team wanted to make a portable version. The 20-pound prototype cost them about $600, the school said in a statement.
Tran and Robertson tinkered with the kind of sound would be the best at battling a blaze. First they tried high frequencies, but those tests failed.
Two engineering students built a fire extinguisher that puts out flames with sound.
Two engineering students built a fire extinguisher that puts out flames with sound.
“It’s low-frequency sounds — like the thump-thump bass in hip-hop that works,” Tran said.
The duo has filed a patent for their invention. The technology is versatile — it could be used in the kitchen to fight stovetop flames or by fire departments in high-risk blazes as an alternative to human firefighters.
BY Meg Wagner | New York Daily News
mwagner@nydailynews.com
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/engineering-students-put-fire-sound-article-1.2164237
[Contributed by Alex Teitz – http://www.femmusic.com][Can you imagine what kind of a fire Sepultura could put out??!!]
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