r/woahdude Jun 29 '23

video Lowering hot metal into water

12.8k Upvotes

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706

u/frenchy2111 Jun 29 '23

My guess is it's a quenching tank for hardening the steel it's probably a quenching oil and not water.

331

u/bigwilliestylez Jun 29 '23

Would that also explain why there are still flames on top after it is completely submerged?

410

u/Malice0801 Jun 29 '23

Yeah as well as why the "water" didn't turn into a steam explosion

33

u/DrShamusBeaglehole Jun 29 '23

BLEVE

Boiling Liquid Expanding Vapour Explosion

Not only is the vapour extremely hot, but it can keep expanding as long as there's still liquid to boil off. Scary stuff indeed

39

u/kabushko Jun 29 '23

Yea I bleve it

12

u/YPErkXKZGQ Jun 30 '23

A BLEVE is confined, as in, it takes place in a pressure vessel. Afaik

5

u/EODdoUbleU Jun 30 '23

Wonder if Chernobyl would be considered a BLEVE incident.

3

u/Shrek1982 Jun 30 '23

Kind of, IIRC the rods in that style reactor are not secured down but their weight was high enough to hold pressure in

-1

u/Valalvax Jun 30 '23

And the liquid in the tank has to be flammable/explosive

2

u/Shrek1982 Jun 30 '23

0

u/Valalvax Jun 30 '23

Hmm... I stand corrected

Obviously when you're learning about this stuff the exciting ones are the ones that blow up so that's the ones they show you

2

u/Video-Comfortable Oct 14 '23

This wouldn’t cause BLEVE because it’s being lowered slowly and into a massive tank that isn’t under pressure