Working with a material 10 times lighter than steel - but 250 times stronger - would be a dream come true for any engineer, right? If this material also had amazing properties that made it highly conductive of heat and electricity, it would start to sound like something out of a science fiction novel wouldn't it? Yet here it is: >>

Buckypaper is made from carbon nanotubes - amazingly strong fibers about 1/50,000th the diameter of a human hair that were first developed in the early 1990s. Buckypaper owes its name to Buckminsterfullerene, or Carbon 60 - a type of carbon molecule whose powerful atomic bonds make it twice as hard as a diamond. Sir Harold Kroto, now a professor and scientist with Florida State University's department of chemistry and biochemistry, and two other scientists shared the 1996 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their discovery of Buckminsterfullerene, nicknamed "buckyballs" for the molecules' spherical shape. Their discovery has led to a revolution in the fields of chemistry and materials science - and directly contributed to the development of buckypaper.

Among the possible uses for buckypaper are:

… If exposed to an electric charge, buckypaper could be used to illuminate computer and television screens. It would be more energy-efficient, lighter, and would allow for a more uniform level of brightness than current cathode ray tube (CRT) and liquid crystal display (LCD) technology.

As one of the most thermally conductive materials known, buckypaper lends itself to the development of heat sinks that would allow computers and other electronic equipment to disperse heat more efficiently than is currently possible. This, in turn, could lead to even greater advances in electronic miniaturization.

… Because it has an unusually high current-carrying capacity, a film made from buckypaper could be applied to the exteriors of airplanes. Lightning strikes then would flow around the plane and dissipate without causing damage.

… Films also could protect electronic circuits and devices within airplanes from electromagnetic interference, which can damage equipment and alter settings. Similarly, such films could allow military aircraft to shield their electromagnetic "signatures," which can be detected via radar.

"The potential applications are mind-boggling."

Although, even though cost is a huge obstacle at the moment, it nevertheless demonstrates that "composite" materials are out there that don't have to have the negative connotation that "plastic" seems to imply i.e. lighter composites like certain plastic(s) = equals cheap and/or flimsy'. That is not necessarily so and the near future could prove a massive migration "away" from steel or metal in the construction of certain products, and be replaced with "lighter" and "stronger" composites like buckypaper.

For instance, the Motif XS8 weighs 63 lbs. If buckypaper were used instead, the XS8 would probably weigh under 30 lbs or so, since the majority of the XS8 weight is its metal casing. As an example, if indeed 100% of the XS8 weight were its metal casing i.e. the total 63 lbs, replacing it instead with buckypaper the weight of the XS8 would then be 6.6 lbs. i.e. 10x lighter. PS: I allowed a 20 plus poundage difference to take into account the innards of the XS like the Motherboard, Amplifier(s), power supply, the weighted key bed, and all the other parts inside the casing to come up with the guestimate of "under 30 lbs" figure if buckypaper were used instead of its current metal casing.

Lighter/Stronger composites are the wave of the future in my humble opinion, and since they will be lighter/stronger than "steel" they will replace many of the heavy metal fabricated products that are currently on the market. Hopefully in the future that will include the ultra heavy fully weighted 88 key workstation keyboards too huh? You could then, theoretically speaking, carry around an 88 key Motif XS8 (or some other 88 key Workstation) under one arm like you can now do with e.g. a PSR S900 etc. - that is, one of the 'many' "plastic" Yamaha keyboards currently produced. See, we're laughing at Yamaha's "plastic" keyboards, no? But if they were made of e.g. buckypaper, etc., then there wouldn't be a need to laugh anymore. But since Yamaha still continues to make these flimsy cheaply made plastic keyboards like the S900 or T2/T3 etc., we can still laugh right? lol..

>> Although down the road, the ultra heavy METAL workstations will be the thing that young hip hoppers will avoid like the plague and instead will aquire and vouch for the much lighter and stronger 'composite' constructed keyboards and wondering all the while how they EVER got along with the ultra heavy "metal" ones to begin with. Much like how they now avoid the current crop of plastic arrangers, etc. But if they were made with the "lighter/stronger" composites there would definitely be a greater market for young people getting Arrangers too if you ask me. [img]http://www.synthzone.com/ubbs/cool.gif[/img]

All the best,
Mike