Prince Rupert's Drop.

Hello all, welcome to my current lockdown post about a little thing called Prince Rupert's Drop.

Basically, Prince Rupert's Drop occurs when molten glass is added to cold water. This creates a little tadpole shaped droplet with a long, skinny tail. 

The interesting part comes with how the glass breaks. When the bulbous part of the glass is hit with anything, from a hammer to a bullet, it will NOT break. However, when the tail is hit, the whole thing will explode into millions, or probably thousands, of tiny little glass specs.

It's a strange phenomenon, so let me explain.

From the moment the molten glass comes into contact with the water, the outer layer of the glass immediately begins to solidify and cool down, whereas the inside will remain hot. As time goes on, the inside will also begin to cool down. The problem is, the outside has already solidified, so instead of coming together as one singular unit, the inside will start to push in against itself and compress. This is where its strength comes from, since the inside cannot push against the outside, causing both to compress inwards. The inside will then harden in this state of high compressive stress.

Now, when the tail bit is cut or hit, the energy stored in the tail will break off down the line, causing the rest of the glass to feed off of that energy and, in result, explode.

The speed of which, also, is about 1900m/s or about 1.9km/s.

Now, if one would like to try it, here's some obvious safety equipment:

- Safety Glasses.

- Closed towed shoes.

- Long Sleeved Shirts.

Alright that's me.

Thanks for reading and stay safe boys.