Just wondering, how do you think a niobium yoyo would work out? You can anodize niobium just like aluminum, and it never rusts.
Mine precocious’s stays shiny forevers?
Seriously tho, I never liked the oxidation that Nickel or raw aluminum gets on them. I always polish them up every so often. To not have to do that would be nice.
Some people see the oxidation as “earned”, I see it as tainted.
Sounds too heavy.
True, a double coating of copper on the dri-ywet’s weigh 3 grams. Niobium’s atomic mass is about 50% more than copper. Don’t know if that related directly, but it would probably add some heft than the already heavy copper plating.
Yeah a Coating might work, I was thinking we were talking a solid yoyo. XD
You could make a niobium pacquiao.
A plastic with niobium rims would be insanely stable.
The atomic mass really doesn’t have much to do with the density. Niobium has a density of about 8.6 g/mL, which is more than 3 times more dense than 6061 aluminum (2.71 g/mL).
Searching around more online shows that 6061 Al has a smaller Mohs rating (hardness), a smaller shear modulus, and a smaller Poisson’s ratio than Nb, among other things. I was thinking that niobium would be too soft. It is harder, moves less when sheared, but swells more when compressed. That is just what I have learned doing a few Google searches.
But if we made a niobium yo-yo to about the same size as “standard” now, it would be about 200 grams. I don’t want to trow one of those, it would hurt my wrist. And I don’t know how well the anodization will hold up to dings. And I wonder if the tolerances that we can get machining niobium are up to par with those of aluminum.
How thin we can make the walls of the Nb yo-yo, and how well it springs back into shape when it is dropped, and how much it will flex while spinning (like Ti does) will all make a difference. I don’t know what to search for to answer those questions. That is up to the person that actually tries it.
But I wouldn’t buy one. Way too heavy when made to “normal” size.
-Jacob
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One drop could make some niobium side effects
That sounds like a pretty good idea to me. It could also be a Ti/Nb alloy throw to cut down on weight, but that would require melting the original metal and possibly creating air bubbles. The Nb side effects also sound smart, it would look way better than brass.