Layman's terms please! Tower collapse issue

[Hornit]

Im conversing with some CT's about the collapse times of the towers and their conjectures about conservation of momentum. They claim that the observed times are too short and the explanations from folks like Bazant, Greening, and our own Newton's Bit dont jibe with the laws of conservation of momentum. I've linked some of Newtons Bit work, but not being an engineer, I'm out of my depth with some of this.

What I'm looking for is a simple explanation for why the towers could have come down inside of 12-15 seconds or so and still taken into account conservation of momentum. The way I understand Newton's Bit is that the collapse once started would be almost effortless due to buckling modes and the amount of and type of destruction and deformation of materials once you had initiation. It seems intuitive to me but some CT's using math (dangerous I know!) claim it had to be "helped" in order to come down so quickly.

Their argument is the buildings mass poses some resistance so the collapse could never progress as quickly as it did.

Any help with this is appreciated.

Thanks.

[Mr X]

Im conversing with some CT's about the collapse times of the towers and their conjectures about conservation of momentum. They claim that the observed times are too short and the explanations from folks like Bazant, Greening, and our own Newton's Bit dont jibe with the laws of conservation of momentum. I've linked some of Newtons Bit work, but not being an engineer, I'm out of my depth with some of this.

What I'm looking for is a simple explanation for why the towers could have come down inside of 12-15 seconds or so and still taken into account conservation of momentum. The way I understand Newton's Bit is that the collapse once started would be almost effortless due to buckling modes and the amount of and type of destruction and deformation of materials once you had initiation. It seems intuitive to me but some CT's using math (dangerous I know!) claim it had to be "helped" in order to come down so quickly.

Their argument is the buildings mass poses some resistance so the collapse could never progress as quickly as it did.

Any help with this is appreciated.

Thanks.

Dear Hornit

Why don't you get Newton's Bit to explain how 'collapse once started would be almost effortless due to buckling modes and the amount of and type of destruction and deformation of materials once you had initiation'.


Look forward to it.

[Dave Rogers]

Im conversing with some CT's about the collapse times of the towers and their conjectures about conservation of momentum. They claim that the observed times are too short and the explanations from folks like Bazant, Greening, and our own Newton's Bit dont jibe with the laws of conservation of momentum.

This is what we in the debunking community refer to as "a lie". Greening's calculations are based on the law of conservation of momentum.


What I'm looking for is a simple explanation for why the towers could have come down inside of 12-15 seconds or so and still taken into account conservation of momentum. The way I understand Newton's Bit is that the collapse once started would be almost effortless due to buckling modes and the amount of and type of destruction and deformation of materials once you had initiation. It seems intuitive to me but some CT's using math (dangerous I know!) claim it had to be "helped" in order to come down so quickly.

Their argument is the buildings mass poses some resistance so the collapse could never progress as quickly as it did.

Any help with this is appreciated.

Thanks.

OK, there are two issues that are getting confused here, and I'm sure the CT's wouldn't want to do anything to clear up that confusion.

First of all, there's conservation of momentum. The idea here is that every floor weighs something. Each time the top part of the tower hits another floor, that floor isn't moving, so the top part has to speed up that floor to match the speed it's falling at. That means that the top part loses a bit of momentum, and that makes it slow down a bit. It then accelerates down until it hits the next floor. By this time it's going faster than when it hit the last floor. Again it slows down a bit, but even after it's slowed down it's still falling faster than after it slowed down at the previous floor.

The amount the top block slows down depends on how heavy it is, and how heavy the floor below is. For the North Tower, the top block was about thirteen floors, so it only slowed down by one-thirteenth when it hit the first floor down. The weight of that floor was then added to the overall mass, and so the next floor slowed it even less, by one-fourteenth. And so on down.

That's a simple description without any math. To get the actual numbers, you have to do the actual math. Greening's done that, and got something in the region of 12 seconds for the total collapse. I've done the same myself, and so have some truthers. Everyone who actually works out the arithmetic finds out that the conservation of momentum approach gives something a bit shorter than the actual collapse time. Hence, we get back to my first point; when truthers say that the collapse times don't agree with the conservation of momentum, they're lying.

Now the second issue: the support columns. Truthers like to say that the columns would have slowed down the collapse much more because they're made of steel so they're very strong. However, when a steel column breaks, it does so by buckling; the column bends sideways, then breaks. Once it's broken, it isn't doing anything to slow down the collapse. So although it slows down the collapse a lot before it breaks, on average - since most of the collapse takes place after the column breaks, and before the top block hits the next one - most of the time, it isn't there to slow down the collapse, because it's already broken. Greening, Newtons Bit and Gregory Urich have all worked out the collapse times including the effect of column resistance, but - and here's the bit the truthers are lying about - they all accounted for conservation of momentum as well, and with both effects they end up with collapse times of around 13-16 seconds.

I hope that's kept clear enough of the technical language, but I'll say it one more time: the simple, non-technical explanation is that the truthers who say Greening and Newtons Bit's calculations ignore the conservation of momentum, are lying.

Dave

[Minadin]

Well, in very simple terms, the initial failure is a buckling one - that's where you see those exterior columns bending inward on all the photographs prior to the start of the collapse.

Subsequent failures as the collapse progressed would mostly consist of shear failures - that is to say that the connections between the various members were cut by the force of all the falling material hitting it. The reason they were sheared off by this force is because the force is a large dynamic (moving) load that is being delivered to the structural pieces in a way other than what they were designed to carry them.

For instance, a bolt might be designed to transfer a load from a beam into a column through its long axis, and still resist the shear force of a normal situation's dead (the permanent load or weight of what it's holding) and live (dynamic / temporary loads from moving things such as wind or people) loads. But if you give it a large shearing force across its axis it will fail quickly.

[westprog]

I'm conversing with some CT's about the collapse times of the towers and their conjectures about conservation of momentum. They claim that the observed times are too short and the explanations from folks like Bazant, Greening, and our own Newton's Bit dont jibe with the laws of conservation of momentum. I've linked some of Newtons Bit work, but not being an engineer, I'm out of my depth with some of this.

What I'm looking for is a simple explanation for why the towers could have come down inside of 12-15 seconds or so and still taken into account conservation of momentum. The way I understand Newton's Bit is that the collapse once started would be almost effortless due to buckling modes and the amount of and type of destruction and deformation of materials once you had initiation. It seems intuitive to me but some CT's using math (dangerous I know!) claim it had to be "helped" in order to come down so quickly.

Their argument is the buildings mass poses some resistance so the collapse could never progress as quickly as it did.

Any help with this is appreciated.

Thanks.

The fundamental fallacy is the assumption that mass inherently hinders collapse. Buildings are designed as static objects. They aren't designed to cope when bits of them start moving.

There's a new ad for Guinness showing a succession of dominos falling over. The initial momentum is clearly very, very small. And yet, we see a progressive collapse, getting bigger and bigger.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_-jjZT3DNQ

Clearly, this isn't exactly what happened to the WTC. The domino run was designed to be unstable. The WTC wasn't, of course. But it wasn't designed to deal with the massive forces it had to undergo. It wasn't designed to deal with moving chunks of steel. Start dislodging pieces, and that steel frame falls to bits. The building is designed to cope with specific forces acting in specific directions - not random forces acting randomly.

The important thing to remember is that as soon as something is dislodged - and it can take a relatively tiny amount of energy to dislodge - it will become not an obstacle to collapse, but part of the collapse, knocking more pieces away.

This is also why (from a layman's intuitive point of view) concrete-core buildings, such as in Madrid, tend to be more resistant.

Bear in mind the important point - if someone uses maths to prove that something is impossible, and you can see, from real-world examples, that it is possible, and actually happens, then it's reasonable to assume that either the maths or more likely, the assumptions behind it are faulty. When CT theorists use arguments that presuppose that sheer mass is equivalent to resistance, they are perpetrating an obvious fallacy that can be rebutted by a simple example.


I note that while I stand by everything in the post, it isn't an answer to the exact question given. I was going to delete it but that seems a waste, so I've just flagged it as possibly irrelevant.

[R.Mackey]

Im conversing with some CT's about the collapse times of the towers and their conjectures about conservation of momentum. They claim that the observed times are too short and the explanations from folks like Bazant, Greening, and our own Newton's Bit dont jibe with the laws of conservation of momentum. I've linked some of Newtons Bit work, but not being an engineer, I'm out of my depth with some of this.

What I'm looking for is a simple explanation for why the towers could have come down inside of 12-15 seconds or so and still taken into account conservation of momentum. The way I understand Newton's Bit is that the collapse once started would be almost effortless due to buckling modes and the amount of and type of destruction and deformation of materials once you had initiation. It seems intuitive to me but some CT's using math (dangerous I know!) claim it had to be "helped" in order to come down so quickly.

Their argument is the buildings mass poses some resistance so the collapse could never progress as quickly as it did.

Any help with this is appreciated.

Thanks.

As Mr X rapidly becomes the fastest non-antisemite to make my Ignore list, let me try to give you the simple answer you're looking for:

"Resistance" is a different issue than conservation of momentum. The "resistance" is basically the energy loss that occurs in the inelastic collisions. Momentum is conserved no matter what, but kinetic energy is not. Total energy is conserved, but in the collisions, a lot of the kinetic energy is converted into heat and strain energy, and it's hard to keep track of all this.

Dr. Greening's paper (www.911myths.com/WTCREPORT.pdf) is probably the simplest that treats both conservation of momentum and energy, and it agrees with the collapse time reasonably well given its assumptions.

If we only think about momentum, think of it like this: At the start, you have 12 floors. They fall and hit one floor. The combined mass has the same momentum, so it slows down by 1/13th. And it keeps falling. The combined mass speeds up as it does so. Then it hits another floor, slows down by 1/14th of the new, higher total. Then speeds up, hits, slows by 1/15th. And so on.

As a result, the slowdown at each impact decreases each time, eventually becoming almost negligible. This means the total average acceleration of the collapse front is less than one g, but not much less. In the actual collapse, we observe an average acceleration of about 0.5 g -- that's what a collapse time of 12 seconds means.

Back to resistance, I made a post describing the resistance as a function of collapse time here (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2236462#post2236462). Or see Appendix B of my whitepaper (http://wtc7lies.googlepages.com/drg_nist_review_2_0.pdf).

Bottom line, even a second or two of slowdown means an enormous amount of resistance by the structure. Your opposition is making up nonsense.

[CHF]

Exactly how long does the TM think the collapse should have taken?

I mean if there hadn't been bombs blasting each floor ahead of the collapsing mass.... :rolleyes:

[WildCat]

Im conversing with some CT's about the collapse times of the towers and their conjectures about conservation of momentum. They claim that the observed times are too short and the explanations from folks like Bazant, Greening, and our own Newton's Bit dont jibe with the laws of conservation of momentum.
Greening also posts here under the name "Apollo20".

[Metullus]

Is it not for you to 'explain anything at all about 9/11'. You and your pals here are the one who are so convinced that you're so right (even with a hint of self-righteousness ....... if I may add).

Anyway whilst you're here.... have you got an explanation for them squibs.. without (a) going on about I dont know what a squib is. and
(b) denying their existence.

Look forward to it.First you would need to:

a) establish what, in your world, a squib is, and,

b) demonstrate that they were where you believe them to have been, and,

c) explain what they were supposed to do.

[Mr X]

As Mr X rapidly becomes the fastest non-antisemite to make my Ignore list, let me try to give you the simple answer you're looking for:




Now this is an unfair comment bearing in mind I've hardly spoken to you since joining this forum. Do you resent me conversing with others on this forum?.... (and its not my fault they cant explain themselves). Trying to hint to others that we should ignore so and so is very immature..... and could be seen by some that you're running scared.

Anyway, whilst I'm here.
Could I/we have a diagram of these floors that apparently join together to form a single mass.

Look forward to it.

[T.A.M.]

Dear Hornit

Why don't you get Newton's Bit to explain how 'collapse once started would be almost effortless due to buckling modes and the amount of and type of destruction and deformation of materials once you had initiation'.


Look forward to it.

So the above was completely innocent, a legitimate desire to learn, rather than a snide comment concerning the debate going on over here???

http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=107267

and your opinions on the matter...here?

http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?p=3502918#post3502918

TAM:)

[Mr X]

So the above was completely innocent, a legitimate desire to learn, rather than a snide comment concerning the debate going on over here???





Very much so. Infact I'm still eagerly awaiting the responses.... but they're not forthcoming.

[Pookster]

Very much so. Infact I'm still eagerly awaiting the responses.... but they're not forthcoming.

Ryan replied to you just a few posts later ...

http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php?p=3503000&postcount=153

You stated you were confused. Are you still confused now? If so, explain what you're still confused about. We'll attempt to help clear it up if we can.

[Mr X]

Ryan replied to you just a few posts later ...

http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php?p=3503000&postcount=153

You stated you were confused. Are you still confused now? If so, explain what you're still confused about. We'll attempt to help clear it up if we can.


With all due respect and as cute as you are..... you cant really be speaking on R. Mackey's behalf.

What I'm confused about relates to HIS choice of authority that he is referencing....... as I've clearly stated. Sorry but thanks anyway.

[Minadin]

Now this is an unfair comment bearing in mind I've hardly spoken to you since joining this forum.

I agree that it's an unfair comment. We don't have any evidence that Mr. X isn't an anti-semite.

[Pookster]

With all due respect and as cute as you are..... you cant really be speaking on R. Mackey's behalf.

You seem to have a real problem with understanding the concept behind a discussion forum. I suggest you seek to remedy that.

What I'm confused about relates to HIS choice of authority that he is referencing....... as I've clearly stated. Sorry but thanks anyway.

Yes, you were confused about his choice. Ryan's post I linked to should've adequately cleared up your confusion. Again, if you're still confused, simply explain what you're still confused about. We'll attempt to help clear it up if we can.

[Heiwa]

Im conversing with some CT's about the collapse times of the towers and their conjectures about conservation of momentum. They claim that the observed times are too short and the explanations from folks like Bazant, Greening, and our own Newton's Bit dont jibe with the laws of conservation of momentum. I've linked some of Newtons Bit work, but not being an engineer, I'm out of my depth with some of this.

What I'm looking for is a simple explanation for why the towers could have come down inside of 12-15 seconds or so and still taken into account conservation of momentum. The way I understand Newton's Bit is that the collapse once started would be almost effortless due to buckling modes and the amount of and type of destruction and deformation of materials once you had initiation. It seems intuitive to me but some CT's using math (dangerous I know!) claim it had to be "helped" in order to come down so quickly.

Their argument is the buildings mass poses some resistance so the collapse could never progress as quickly as it did.

Any help with this is appreciated.

Thanks.

It is quite simple! The time it takes for a building to collapse is the time between (A) initiation of the collapse and (B) when all parts of the building has come to rest on the ground in a heap of rubble. The problem is evidently to establish (A) and (B).

(B) is difficult to pin point because the heap of rubble is not seen as it is covered in dust for a long time. (A) is easier ... if you know what initiation means and where to look for it.

In the WTC1 case initiation is supposed to be failures of supporting structure at an initiation zone between floors 94 and 98.

I have looked on many videos of the WTC1 collapse but I have not been able to pinpoint (A) and the associated structural failures.

What I see is (C) at least 3 seconds (!!) before (A) that the roof and mast start to displace downwards and nothing happens at floors 94-98 where the structure is intact. More at http://heiwaco.tripod.com/nist.htm .

So it would appear that there is not one collapse but two events when WTC1 is destroyed;

First, at time (C) the upper part far above the initiation zone floors 94-98 starts being destroyed and second, after the part destruction of the upper part, some sort of collapse starts at time (A) of the structure below the the initiation zone (floors 94-98) where many big parts seem to be pushed out sideways and to drop beside the building. Very strange collapse to say the least.

[Newtons Bit]

You seem to have a real problem with understanding the concept behind a discussion forum. I suggest you seek to remedy that.



Yes, you were confused about his choice. Ryan's post I linked to should've adequately cleared up your confusion. Again, if you're still confused, simply explain what you're still confused about. We'll attempt to help clear it up if we can.

I think he likes you. You may need to get a baseball bat.

[Pookster]

I think he likes you. You may need to get a baseball bat.

He better get a cup. :D

[beachnut]

Could I/we have a diagram of these floors that apparently join together to form a single mass.

Look forward to it.

http://beachymon.com/photo/wtc11.jpg
Or you could have the big picture.
One big mass.
http://www.beachymon.com/photo/mass.jpg
There, one big mass; now you can do some orbital mechanics and wow us all with the equations of motion for whatever.

http://www.911myths.com/WTCREPORT.pdf
ENERGY TRANSFER IN THE WTC COLLAPSE
By
F. R. Greening
http://www.911myths.com/WTCREPORT.pdf

[Heiwa]

Or you could have the big picture.
One big mass.


Most (95%) of the towers was air. Uniform density of the mass of the tower top part was <0.18, i.e. less than wool. Could not do much damage to anything.

[rwguinn]

Most (95%) of the towers was air. Uniform density of the mass of the tower top part was <0.18, i.e. less than wool. Could not do much damage to anything.
:dl: :dl: :dl: :dl: :dl:

[Corsair 115]

Most (95%) of the towers was air. Uniform density of the mass of the tower top part was <0.18, i.e. less than wool. Could not do much damage to anything.I'm no physicist, structural engineer, or architect, but even I can see how incredibly ludicrous your statement is.

[Alferd_Packer]

Let's drop a 100 tons of wool on Heiwa and we'll see just how much damage it doesn't do.

[twinstead]

I'm no physicist, structural engineer, or architect, but even I can see how incredibly ludicrous your statement is.

I totally agree. It's stundielicious!

If even I can see something is ludicrous, it IS indeed ludicrous.

[Tbone]

Let's drop a 100 tons of wool on Heiwa and we'll see just how much damage it doesn't do.

What weighs more? A ton of feathers or a ton of gold? :D

[Heiwa]

Let's drop a 100 tons of wool on Heiwa and we'll see just how much damage it doesn't do.

Why not? It seems the upper block of WTC1 had mass 33 000 tons spread over 4000 m² floor area or only 8.25 tons/m². With uniform density 0.18 it is a 46 meters high.

Now drop a 1 x 1 x 46 meters bale of wool (it weighs 8.25 tons) 3.7 meters on something that you want to collapse and see what happens. Try to pin point the time (A) initiation (when you drop the bale) and impact/start of collapse occurs a little later. I would assume the bale would compress at impact a little after time (A).

Nist, Bazant, Seffen and other eccentric and isolated 'experts' (and many people on JREF) suggest that it - the upper block of uniform density 0.18 - is rigid and stiff and impinges the something at enormous speed and energy and collapses the something - while the bale of wool remains intact on top. It is an optimistic idea according my understanding of physics and the world around us.

But subject is time. When did this collapse start (A) and end (B)? And what happened to the upper block during this time ... and before? Remember (C).

[applecorped]

Heiwa, what has all of your research led you to conclude about the collapse of WTC?

[Heiwa]

Heiwa, what has all of your research led you to conclude about the collapse of WTC?

Read my easy to understand paper written in layman's terms at http://heiwaco.tripod.com/nist.htm and you will see that the main conclusion is that Nist, Bazant and Seffen should improve their analysises of the initiations and collapses of WTC1 (and 2). For the sake of our children.

Rigid upper bodies, free fall, impacts, high velocity, enormous amount of potential energy released, shock waves, crush fronts, uniform density ... unscientific nonsense and dim assumptions, all of it. Every child understands that.

[Newtons Bit]

I'm no physicist, structural engineer, or architect, but even I can see how incredibly ludicrous your statement is.

If only it was a little less dense it would float in air!

[einsteen]

But the >90% air argument has been used a couple of times by official theorists. The air explains all the violent ejections (some windows are needed to build up pressure), and the air explains why the compaction from 3.7 meter to 25 cm is so successful, the air explains why steel is ejected with > 13.8 m/s while there is barely motion after collapse initiation, it also explains a rumbling sound that starts before visible motion, it explains a couple of isolated ejections (no transparant air because you can see it) far ahead of the statistical distribution of the collapse front. And don't forgot the chaos theory, with chaos in mind you can explain everything you want.

[Confuseling]

An ironclad ship is less dense than water. Otherwise it's a submarine.

Place your head in a bucket of water. Remove your head.

Place your head in an ironclad's hull. Compare and contrast.

[Architect]

Read my easy to understand paper written in layman's terms at http://heiwaco.tripod.com/nist.htm and you will see that the main conclusion is that Nist, Bazant and Seffen should improve their analysises of the initiations and collapses of WTC1 (and 2). For the sake of our children.

Rigid upper bodies, free fall, impacts, high velocity, enormous amount of potential energy released, shock waves, crush fronts, uniform density ... unscientific nonsense and dim assumptions, all of it. Every child understands that.

Heiwa

You seem to have forgotten about the threads where your paper was comprehensively questioned and you proved wholly unable to respond to the technical criticisms put to you. Why is this?

[Architect]

Heiwa, what has all of your research led you to conclude about the collapse of WTC?

Bear in mind that his research was so comprehensive that he didn't know that the towers had concrete floors, and he diesn't understand the composite nature of the building structure.

It wasn't a good start, and it just kept getting worse.

[Architect]

Most (95%) of the towers was air. Uniform density of the mass of the tower top part was <0.18, i.e. less than wool. Could not do much damage to anything.

Comedy Gold. Stundie success is guaranteed!

[Minadin]

But the >90% air argument has been used a couple of times by official theorists. The air explains all the violent ejections (some windows are needed to build up pressure), and the air explains why the compaction from 3.7 meter to 25 cm is so successful, the air explains why steel is ejected with > 13.8 m/s while there is barely motion after collapse initiation, it also explains a rumbling sound that starts before visible motion, it explains a couple of isolated ejections (no transparant air because you can see it) far ahead of the statistical distribution of the collapse front. And don't forgot the chaos theory, with chaos in mind you can explain everything you want.

Yes, well, the air does play a role in negating a couple of old conspiracy theorist "anomalies" like when they pretend that the towers were super-strong and should have acted like solid objects and toppled over like a tree in the forest, for instance. But, as you have mentioned, when they harp on things like the "squibs" it would seem to suggest that they immediately forget to account for the air again.

In Heiwa's example of the density when he accounts for all the air as part of the building, it's ludicrous for a number of reasons. And his comparison to the density of wool? I'm not sure how he resolves that with his position that steel is such a super strong material that it holds up just fine after losing much of its strength due to heavy fire conditions. Obviously the structure at the WTC was quite different from wool. Citing the density doesn't do anything to negate the mass of what's falling, unless he's expecting it to be rather buoyant in the ambient air, or something.

[tsig]

Im conversing with some CT's about the collapse times of the towers and their conjectures about conservation of momentum. They claim that the observed times are too short and the explanations from folks like Bazant, Greening, and our own Newton's Bit dont jibe with the laws of conservation of momentum. I've linked some of Newtons Bit work, but not being an engineer, I'm out of my depth with some of this.

What I'm looking for is a simple explanation for why the towers could have come down inside of 12-15 seconds or so and still taken into account conservation of momentum. The way I understand Newton's Bit is that the collapse once started would be almost effortless due to buckling modes and the amount of and type of destruction and deformation of materials once you had initiation. It seems intuitive to me but some CT's using math (dangerous I know!) claim it had to be "helped" in order to come down so quickly.

Their argument is the buildings mass poses some resistance so the collapse could never progress as quickly as it did.

Any help with this is appreciated.

Thanks.

If you can't be bothered by the math who cares what you think.

Keep your eyes wide closed and ignore the cliff.

[Confuseling]

Did you mean that? Did you misread his post?

[tsig]

He better get a cup. :D

Ouch!!

[Heiwa]

Heiwa

You seem to have forgotten about the threads where your paper was comprehensively questioned and you proved wholly unable to respond to the technical criticisms put to you. Why is this?

?? Unable to respond? Nothing wrong with my analysis. Give me an example where I err!

[tsig]

Most (95%) of the towers was air. Uniform density of the mass of the tower top part was <0.18, i.e. less than wool. Could not do much damage to anything.

Could've blown away on any given day.

[tsig]

Read my easy to understand paper written in layman's terms at http://heiwaco.tripod.com/nist.htm and you will see that the main conclusion is that Nist, Bazant and Seffen should improve their analysises of the initiations and collapses of WTC1 (and 2). For the sake of our children.

Rigid upper bodies, free fall, impacts, high velocity, enormous amount of potential energy released, shock waves, crush fronts, uniform density ... unscientific nonsense and dim assumptions, all of it. Every child understands that.

Shame we are not children.

[tsig]

?? Unable to respond? Nothing wrong with my analysis. Give me an example where I err!

Your analysis is totally anal do you love puppies too?

[tsig]

?? Unable to respond? Nothing wrong with my analysis. Give me an example where I err!

You are wrong every time you touch your fingers to the keys. lies are at your fingertips.

[Heiwa]

In Heiwa's example of the density when he accounts for all the air as part of the building, it's ludicrous for a number of reasons. And his comparison to the density of wool? I'm not sure how he resolves that with his position that steel is such a super strong material that it holds up just fine after losing much of its strength due to heavy fire conditions. Obviously the structure at the WTC was quite different from wool. Citing the density doesn't do anything to negate the mass of what's falling, unless he's expecting it to be rather buoyant in the ambient air, or something.

Well, it is Bazant and Seffen that introduced the assumtion that the upper block was rigid and of uniform - not varying in form or quality - density (relation of weight to volume) - and 0.18 is then the density (18% of water) = very light according my calculations. Most if it is air, which evidently is part of the volume of the upper block! How it then can be rigid (stiff, unbending, that cannot be bent, inflexible), I query.

The structure in initiation/fire zone was apparently not rigid at all! All supporting columns failed simultaneously within a second - and was swept away - allowing a rigid upper block structure of uniform density (0.18) to free fall, etc. we are told. Nonsense, of course. Only a fool believes that.

And not seen on any video. WTC1 is a clear example. Upper block is disintegrating long before anything happens to the supporting steel structure at the initiation/fire zone below. It does not bend or is being swept away. Clearly described in my paper. The supporting structure was only compressed <20-30% of yield at ambient temperature. Cannot crumple if heated to 500°C. Basic! And individual columns can definitely not be ripped apart at two locations with the intermediate part being swept away. Only a fool believes that.

And that this very light upper block impinges on the structure below and that gravity then produces a shock wave + a crush front that rips the structure below in 10 000 pieces in 10-15 seconds is simply not possible - and not seen on any videos. The upper block disappeared long before that.

Only a fool believes that the upper block crushed the lower structure during 10-15 seconds. Whar you see on the videos is a completely different collapse. Just look. No upper block anywhere.

[Heiwa]

You are wrong every time you touch your fingers to the keys. lies are at your fingertips.

Haven't I heard it before? Like parrots. Some kinds can be trained to imitate human speech. But also a person who repeats, without understanding what others say. Why am I wrong? Give an example!

[Heiwa]

Bear in mind that his research was so comprehensive that he didn't know that the towers had concrete floors, and he diesn't understand the composite nature of the building structure.

It wasn't a good start, and it just kept getting worse.

?? Concrete floors? The floor design/weight is well described in my paper. Why invent things, that are not true? Nothing better to do?

[Architect]

?? Concrete floors? The floor design/weight is well described in my paper. Why invent things, that are not true? Nothing better to do?

Is like you "forgetting" that you claimed that steel was inherrently fire resistant and didn't fail under normal fire loadings?

:rolleyes:

[Architect]

Haven't I heard it before? Like parrots. Some kinds can be trained to imitate human speech. But also a person who repeats, without understanding what others say. Why am I wrong? Give an example!


Well pretty much everywhere, to be frank. And it's been pointed out to yout time and time again on this and other threads. For example:

- The structural design of the WTC towers

- The ability of the outer envelope to stand on it's own

- The initiation zone.

- The initiation sequence.

- The meaning of basic technical terms such as "initiation".

- The performance of steel in fire.

- The error in suggesting that core column integrity is a key part of the initiation sequence.

- Any structural analogy comparing the towers to the density of wool.

- The use of concrete for floors.

But, hey - that doesn't matter, does it? Because all these pesky trained academics and professionals are all fools, right? Only YOU can see the truth!

[MRC_Hans]

Well, it is Bazant and Seffen that introduced the assumtion that the upper block was rigid and of uniform - not varying in form or quality - density (relation of weight to volume) - and 0.18 is then the density (18% of water)

There are some simulations out there that use a rigid upper block to show that progressive collapse will ensue. Obviously, nobody sane will claim that it actually stayed that way during the collapse.

= very light according my calculations. Most if it is air, which evidently is part of the volume of the upper block! How it then can be rigid (stiff, unbending, that cannot be bent, inflexible), I query.

Just like any other large building consists of mostly air and is rigid. Unflexible, it is not; high-rise buildings can sway a surprising amount under wind loads.

You know, not only would a solid block of material not be very useful, but it would collapse under its own weight.

Actually, very large, almost completely solid structures have in fact been built by man. They were indeed not particularly useful, and they have a quite different shape. We call them pyramids.

The structure in initiation/fire zone was apparently not rigid at all!

Exactly! That was sorta the reason the building collapsed: Part of it lost its rigidity.

All supporting columns failed simultaneously within a second - and was swept away -

Yes, all supports failing in rapid succession due to progressive oveload is a good description of a structural break-down. They weren't swept away, however. They just crumbled, snapped, etc.

allowing a rigid upper block structure of uniform density (0.18) to free fall, etc. we are told. Nonsense, of course. Only a fool believes that.

Absolutely nonsense, yes. Only a fool would claim that.

And that this very light upper block impinges on the structure belowVery light as in weighing 20-25% of the total mass of one of the world's largest building.


and that gravity then produces a shock wave + a crush front that rips the structure below in 10 000 pieces in 10-15 seconds is simply not possible - and not seen on any videos.
Gravity? Let's see you construct something that can withstand 1/5 of a skyscraper dropped from about 10 ft.

The upper block disappeared long before that.

Disappeared? It ceased being a block, obviously, but disappeared? Where on earth should it disappear to?

Hans

[einsteen]

There are some simulations out there that use a rigid upper block to show that progressive collapse will ensue. Obviously, nobody sane will claim that it actually stayed that way during the collapse.

Utter nonsense, a solid structure (no air) cannot collapse like the twin towers, if your simulation is based on the crush-down equation then I understand why. But the crush-down equation is only valid if there are floor slabs that can collapse because of the empty space between them. It's only a continuous (energetically) equivalence that makes it possible to solve using differential equations. Tree chunks topple.

[Heiwa]

Well pretty much everywhere, to be frank. And it's been pointed out to yout time and time again on this and other threads. For example:

- The structural design of the WTC towers

- The ability of the outer envelope to stand on it's own

- The initiation zone.

- The initiation sequence.

- The meaning of basic technical terms such as "initiation".

- The performance of steel in fire.

- The error in suggesting that core column integrity is a key part of the initiation sequence.

- Any structural analogy comparing the towers to the density of wool.

- The use of concrete for floors.

But, hey - that doesn't matter, does it? Because all these pesky trained academics and professionals are all fools, right? Only YOU can see the truth!

Well - evidently you have not read my paper because the structural design of WTC1 (or at least its upper part) is well described. One conclusion then is that the outer envelope, you mean the four outer walls consisting of 63 columns each, can stand on its own. The outer envelope does not need any floors to stand. Quite the opposite, the floors need the outer envelope to hang on (via bolts). Remove all floors and the walls stand. The initiation zone is apparently where the collapse started - no problem for me, except that the roof of WTC1 drops 20-25 meters and there is still no big damages at the initiation zone. The initiation sequence? One thing is sure - no mention that the upper block disintegrates prior to collapse below the initiation zone starts. The meaning of 'initiation' and other basic technical terms! Is 'initiation' a technical term? Sound more like magic and secret society to me! The performance of steel in fire is described (with a link) in the paper. The steel gets hot, etc! Strength is hardly affected below 500°C. Core column integrity! Yes, it is a mystery how 47 strong core columns were destroyed. Not by gravity in my opinion as explained in the paper. Solid stuff. Should deflect anything dropping on it. Comparison with wool! Well the uniform density of the upper block is less than that of wool, so I think it is a useful comparison. The use of concrete of floors. I thought you thought I did not know that there were concrete floors? Anyway - they poured concrete on the steel floors pans held by trusses to even them out, provide noise and fire insulation, etc. No big deal. I know Nist suggests that 6 or 11 floors fell down suddenly into the initiation zone and initiated the collapse, but it is nonsense. Only fools believe that.

Do you believe that 6 or 11 floors fell down and initiated the collapse?

[Heiwa]

There are some simulations out there that use a rigid upper block to show that progressive collapse will ensue. Obviously, nobody sane will claim that it actually stayed that way during the collapse.



Disappeared? It ceased being a block, obviously, but disappeared? Where on earth should it disappear to?

Hans

So you say the Mr Seffen of Cambridge university is not sane?

http://heiwaco.tripod.com/Seffen4.GIF

It is the basic assumption of Seffen that the upper block does not disappear. If it disappears, there will be no impact, no 30x local 'overload' and no global collapse. Obvious, n'est pas?

[applecorped]

So, everyone who contributed to the NIST report regarding collapse initiation are fools and you know the "real" truth. What have you done over the past several years to correct this? Just post at JREF?

[Minadin]

One conclusion then is that the outer envelope, you mean the four outer walls consisting of 63 columns each, can stand on its own. The outer envelope does not need any floors to stand.

There aren't any building professionals who will agree with your opinion here. This is one of those things even lay-people can look at and see that you're completely wrong about.

One thing is sure - no mention that the upper block disintegrates prior to collapse below the initiation zone starts.

When you use words like "disintegrate" or "destroyed" and etc, it seems that you're using the break-up of the structure to completely discount the mass of the upper portion. The mass doesn't go away for being smaller pieces. Does a 10-ton block of ice weigh more than 10 tons of ice cubes?

The performance of steel in fire is described (with a link) in the paper. The steel gets hot, etc! Strength is hardly affected below 500°C.

You persist with this idiocy despite all available data to the contrary. Structural steel has lost 40% of its strength at 500°C. And that's not even taking into account the changes in the modulus of elasticity or thermal expansion.

Comparison with wool! Well the uniform density of the upper block is less than that of wool, so I think it is a useful comparison.

Well, I think it's pretty stupid as comparisons go. How do the other properties of the two materials compare? They're pretty darn dissimilar as materials go.

The use of concrete of floors. I thought you thought I did not know that there were concrete floors? Anyway - they poured concrete on the steel floors pans held by trusses to even them out, provide noise and fire insulation, etc. No big deal.

Yet, in another thread here on this very forum, less than a month ago, you said:

Ships are built only of steel and the WTCs could probably have been done like that too. I always wonder why they poured so much concrete (4 inches) on the floors! Any ideas?

So, your position has changed? It's good to see that you can learn, but you might want to apply this to other areas when your ideas are shown to be in error as well.


I know Nist suggests that 6 or 11 floors fell down suddenly into the initiation zone and initiated the collapse, but it is nonsense. Only fools believe that. Do you believe that 6 or 11 floors fell down and initiated the collapse?

Only fools who haven't read the NIST report, or even the FAQ, believe that what you've described above is actually what the NIST states as the cause for collapse initiation.

[Mr X]

:He better get a cup. :D


Are you offering tea?...........:D

[Wolrab]

For the hell of it, if the upper block had the density of wool, wouldn't the lower portion also? Wouldn't the towers still collapse? It seems to be just switching one constant for another.

[Newtons Bit]

For the hell of it, if the upper block had the density of wool, wouldn't the lower portion also? Wouldn't the towers still collapse? It seems to be just switching one constant for another.

That's Heiwa's modus operandus. He changes the problem from something real to something that he can visualize (and usually absurd). He wouldn't need to do this if he actually had real training in engineering.

[Pookster]

:


Are you offering tea?...........:D

Actually, something more like a tee off. :p

[Heiwa]

So, everyone who contributed to the NIST report regarding collapse initiation are fools and you know the "real" truth. What have you done over the past several years to correct this? Just post at JREF?

I have last year written a paper about WTC1 for children that I copied Nist of course and then Nist changed opinion and suggested that 6-11 floors dropped down and caused global collapse. My paper has then been noted at JREF and there we are. No need to call anyone at Nist or contributing to Nist a fool. They are just working for the government.

[Heiwa]

1. There aren't any building professionals who will agree with your opinion here. This is one of those things even lay-people can look at and see that you're completely wrong about.



2. When you use words like "disintegrate" or "destroyed" and etc, it seems that you're using the break-up of the structure to completely discount the mass of the upper portion. The mass doesn't go away for being smaller pieces. Does a 10-ton block of ice weigh more than 10 tons of ice cubes?



3. You persist with this idiocy despite all available data to the contrary. Structural steel has lost 40% of its strength at 500°C. And that's not even taking into account the changes in the modulus of elasticity or thermal expansion.



4. Well, I think it's pretty stupid as comparisons go. How do the other properties of the two materials compare? They're pretty darn dissimilar as materials go.



5.Yet, in another thread here on this very forum, less than a month ago, you said:



6. So, your position has changed? It's good to see that you can learn, but you might want to apply this to other areas when your ideas are shown to be in error as well.




7. Only fools who haven't read the NIST report, or even the FAQ, believe that what you've described above is actually what the NIST states as the cause for collapse initiation.

1. Wrong.
2. Wrong.
3. Wrong.
4. Not really - the upper block has uniform density 0.18 and water has 1 - so the upper block is pretty light!
5. Right.
6. Wrong.
7. Your opinion is noted.

[tsig]

Haven't I heard it before? Like parrots. Some kinds can be trained to imitate human speech. But also a person who repeats, without understanding what others say. Why am I wrong? Give an example!

I have never read NIST no do I plan on doing so. I do not parrot anything. Some of us have real engineering knowledge. Steel weakens with heat and then buckles. Live with it.

[tsig]

I have last year written a paper about WTC1 for children that I copied Nist of course and then Nist changed opinion and suggested that 6-11 floors dropped down and caused global collapse. My paper has then been noted at JREF and there we are. No need to call anyone at Nist or contributing to Nist a fool. They are just working for the government.

Yes I just got my government check today. It's called Social Security. Only took 44 years to get it.

[Heiwa]

For the hell of it, if the upper block had the density of wool, wouldn't the lower portion also? Wouldn't the towers still collapse? It seems to be just switching one constant for another.

Evidently, you have got it - but what happens when you drop a bale of wool on another bale of wool? Collapse? Or a little bounce? Layman's terms, please.

[Minadin]

1. Wrong.
2. Wrong.
3. Wrong.
4. Not really - the upper block has uniform density 0.18 and water has 1 - so the upper block is pretty light!
5. Right.
6. Wrong.
7. Your opinion is noted.

1. I've yet to converse with any who do, certainly none of the ones here fit the category, and the only person anywhere who even comes close is Richard Gage, who flaunts his credentials around while parroting the work of other, unqualified people, without adding anything himself.

2. Well, then, what's your purpose in using those words? You hand-wave and say it's very light and ask us to forget about the mass.

3. All I can say is, the government of Canada (http://irc.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/pubs/bsi/87-5_e.html) disagrees with you:

http://forums.randi.org/imagehosting/1253247d5986e17ee8.gif

As do 9-11 conspiracy websites (http://911research.wtc7.net/mirrors/guardian2/wtc/WTC_apndxA.htm):

http://forums.randi.org/imagehosting/1253247d5986e412ff.gif

And, that's a pretty damning consensus against your claim. You can say I'm "wrong" all you want, but that doesn't change the facts. I don't think you can claim either of these sources is controlled by the USG.

4. The overall "density" is completely irrelevant here, and everyone else can see that. It also doesn't make it lightweight.

5. (and 6) These weren't separate points - I don't see how you can say that one is correct and the other not. You actually did say what's in the above quote and admitted it again by agreeing with it here, but in this thread you say that you know why they use concrete. How has your position not changed? Or, are you simply disagreeing that changing your false assumptions when faced with overwhelming evidence to the contrary is a good idea?

7. Thanks for noting my opinion. Check out the NIST FAQ (http://wtc.nist.gov/pubs/factsheets/faqs_8_2006.htm) and see for yourself.

[DGM]

Evidently, you have got it - but what happens when you drop a bale of wool on another bale of wool? Collapse? Or a little bounce? Layman's terms, please.
What does this have to do with a steel framed building? Density? Bales of wool? Is some one smoking something here?

[Wolrab]

Evidently, you have got it - but what happens when you drop a bale of wool on another bale of wool? Collapse? Or a little bounce? Layman's terms, please.

I don't have it anymore thanks to penicillin. So now the towers are bales of wool? Doesn't compressed wool have a different density than non-compressed wool? That would throw your calculations off. What about the baling wire? Does that add structural integrity? Is wool fireproof? Now I'm all confused.

[Heiwa]

1. I've yet to converse with any who do, certainly none of the ones here fit the category, and the only person anywhere who even comes close is Richard Gage, who flaunts his credentials around while parroting the work of other, unqualified people, without adding anything himself.


4. The overall "density" is completely irrelevant here, and everyone else can see that. It also doesn't make it lightweight.



7. Thanks for noting my opinion.

Thanks for the diagrams - I linked to similar ones in my article! Evidently the yield stress is reduced due to heat, as I point out in my article, but as the stresses in WTC1 at ambient temperature were <20-30% of yield, heating to 500°C does not cause buckling or ruptures. This is also the conclusion of British authorities (In the UK they may actually build with stresses up to 60% yield, it appears!).

The 'uniform density' is a term introduced by Bazant/Seffen to enable them to describe their phenomenoms about shock waves and crush-fronts in structures in mathematcial terms in support of Nist. As no 'uniform density' exists their analysises are of no value. I was curious to find out what the 'uniform density' could be that causes shock waves and crush-fronts and got the result 0.18, i.e. like wool or cotton. Don't blame me for that.

Does anybody at JREF believe that a mass of uniform density 0.18, that collides with something, causes global collapse of something?

Comments made in a polite manner I often reply to. Comments suggesting me to be a lier or worse I normally ignore, as they generally contain no info of any value.

[MRC_Hans]

Utter nonsense, a solid structure (no air) cannot collapse like the twin towers,

Probably not. Has anybody ever claimed that they failed like a solid structure?


Tree chunks topple.

Irrelevant.

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

So you say the Mr Seffen of Cambridge university is not sane?

http://heiwaco.tripod.com/Seffen4.GIF

It is the basic assumption of Seffen that the upper block does not disappear. If it disappears, there will be no impact, no 30x local 'overload' and no global collapse. Obvious, n'est pas?Tell me Heiwa, are you serious about this?

Seffen does not imply that it stayed a solid block. He also does not imply that it disappears.

I'll use layman's terms, here:

Take an emty beer-can (this is not meant to be a simulation of WTC collapse, it is a demonstration of semantics).

You now have a beer-can structure.

Now, put it on the ground and stomp it till it is flat.

Do you have a beer-can structure any longer? (Hint: The correct answer is "no".)

Has the beer-can disappeared? (Hint: The correct answer is "no"; it is just not a beer-can structure any longer).

So, Heiwa, the upper block broke down, but it did not disappear. It just turned into so many tons of junk.

But, you already knew this, right?

Hans

[Hokulele]

<snipped the good stuff>

But, you already knew this, right?

Hans


He has been told this, repeatedly, on many different threads. Even so, he apparently still doesn't know this.

[MRC_Hans]

Does anybody at JREF believe that a mass of uniform density 0.18, that collides with something, causes global collapse of something?We are talking about something that weighs over 30,000 tons. It is a structure strong enough to carry its own weight with sufficient margin for extra loads, dynamic loads, etc.

Yes, I think that that an integral structure weighing 30.000+ tons can cause destruction upon impact.

Heiwa, do you think that something with a density of 0.0013 and no integral structure at all can destroy a building on impact at high speed?

If your answer is no, then good luck if you are ever in a hurricane.

Hans

[twinstead]

Ah, I see Heiwa is practicing the ancient truther art of arguing an untenable position--against people who know what they are talking about--to infinity. Well, he isn't quite the master who could engineer the 10 story hole thread so brilliantly, but definitely Heiwa would make Chris proud.

Bravo, Heiwa!

[Heiwa]

Tell me Heiwa, are you serious about this?

Seffen does not imply that it stayed a solid block. He also does not imply that it disappears.


I am serious and Seffen implies that the upper block is rigid during the complete collapse. It is this rigid upper block that drives the gravity collapse via the beta L section on top of the crush zone according Seffen so he can write his mathematical equations (read rubbish). Read Seffens paper. Link is in my paper.

I wonder why a serious university lecturer does a thing like that!

Heiwa

[Heiwa]

We are talking about something that weighs over 30,000 tons. It is a structure strong enough to carry its own weight with sufficient margin for extra loads, dynamic loads, etc.

Yes, I think that that an integral structure weighing 30.000+ tons can cause destruction upon impact.

Heiwa, do you think that something with a density of 0.0013 and no integral structure at all can destroy a building on impact at high speed?

If your answer is no, then good luck if you are ever in a hurricane.

Hans

We are talking about something with a 4 000 m² base, 47 metres high, volume 190 000 m3 most of which is air. It, if it weighs 33 000 tons, can only apply a uniform vertical pressure of 0.85 bar (or 8.5 ton/m²) on the structure below, which is very small. Actually most of the load is applied on the walls and the core, which are very low stressed initially ... and stressed the same after the load has been shifted down.

The only 'extra' vertical load is the assumed impact load due to 'free fall', but there is no free fall. So the assumption by various experts of a free fall load is erroneous. Only fits a conspiray theory.

Re horizontal loads, eg moving air, wind, with uniform density 0.0013 (and unknown mass) it can of course apply a pressure on the side of the structure but no real impact of any kind. Answer is yes.

Heiwa

[Apollo20]

Heiwa:

You have to accept that treating the upper block of WTC 1 as a rigid mass is just an approximation; but I would say it's not a bad approximation. The upper block did NOT immediately disintegrate as you claim. On the contrary, all the columns and floor slabs in the upper block remained more or less interconnected for the first half of the collapse. Thus the upper block moved as a single unit and acted as a single mass of ~ 33,000 tonnes on the structure below. Thus you are incorrect when you argue that the upper section simply broke into a million pieces, and that these pieces mostly by-passed the structure below as they fell............., Heiwa, this is NOT what happened!

[CHF]

What on earth would have caused the top block to disintigrate into a million pieces right off the bat anyway?

[Mr X]

People....... hate to be the one to point this out.

Seffen's work is of no consequence.

Personally I'd be ashamed to quote him as reference.

[Dave Rogers]

Does anybody at JREF believe that a mass of uniform density 0.18, that collides with something, causes global collapse of something?

Just out of interest, Heiwa, what would you expect for the density of a cargo ship carrying five cranes? Considering the hull alone it had better be a lot less than 1, otherwise it'll quickly become a cargo submarine. Include the cranes themselves, which have a lot of volume and not much mass, and I'd be surprised if you get an average density much over 0.2. Look at the picture.

http://www.tradership.co.uk/News.cfm?URLID=9

Because a couple of weeks ago in Felixstowe this cargo ship collided with a container crane, causing a global collapse not only of that crane but of the crane next to it. Mind you, those were steel structures, so you can't compare them to the WTC towers, which were, errr....

Funny thing, density. The main thing about it is that it's a different property to weight, or to momentum, or to potential energy, or to structural rigidity, or anything else that's actually relevant to the situation you're describing. And you, of all people, should understand that. Ships are a classic case of structures that require high structural strength at low average density. If you honestly believe that, because an object is no more dense on average than a bale of wool, that it is therefore no more rigid and no more resilient than a bale of wool, then I fear for the safety of anyone who sails on a ship you designed. And if a ship you designed collides with a ship you didn't design, I know which one I want to be on.

What you're doing, Heiwa, is looking through the physical parameters of the WTC towers until you find one that looks small, and then implying that because that one parameter is small, the towers themselves were small. It would be reprehensibly dishonest if it weren't so transparently fraudulent as to be laughable.

Dave

[Dave Rogers]

People....... hate to be the one to point this out.

Seffen's work is of no consequence.

I'm sure we'd all love to hear why. Perhaps you could draw us a diagram to demonstrate it.

Dave

[Mr X]

I'm sure we'd all love to hear why. Perhaps you could draw us a diagram to demonstrate it.

Dave

It's fiction..... why waste energy on it. If you and others here want to waste time on it.... that your choice.

[twinstead]

Well. Mr X says it's fiction. Must be fiction then.

[Mr X]

Well. Mr X says it's fiction. Must be fiction then.


I refer you to my previous answer.

[Dave Rogers]

I refer you to my previous answer.

Mr X....... hate to be the one to point this out.

Your previous answer is of no consequence.

Dave

[Mr X]

Mr X....... hate to be the one to point this out.

Your previous answer is of no consequence.

Dave


You know.. your doing not bad for someone who ran off when he was asked to explain his ideas with a diagram.

[Dave Rogers]

You know.. your doing not bad for someone who ran off when he was asked to explain his ideas with a diagram.

Clearly I did a very bad job of running off, since I'm still here. Meanwhile, your diagram doesn't seem much in evidence. Since you can't advance an argument, can you draw me a picture that shows what's wrong with Seffen's analysis?

Dave

[Mr X]

Clearly I did a very bad job of running off, since I'm still here. Meanwhile, your diagram doesn't seem much in evidence. Since you can't advance an argument, can you draw me a picture that shows what's wrong with Seffen's analysis?

Dave


You're still here cos you haven't got anything else to do...... no?

Regarding: '.....that shows whats wrong with Seffen's analysis'.
Kind of get the feeling that you'll be arguing till you're blue in the face that you're so right.

Anycase, I don't care if you believe his analysis or not.

[applecorped]

If you don't care what Dave believes then please stop posting.

[chillzero]

Please stop bickering.

[Dave Rogers]

You're still here cos you haven't got anything else to do...... no?

Yes, that's right. Funny how everyone who disagrees with you either runs away or has nothing better to do than argue with you, whereas you either defend your position bravely against all comers or have important business elsewhere.

Regarding: '.....that shows whats wrong with Seffen's analysis'.
Kind of get the feeling that you'll be arguing till you're blue in the face that you're so right.

Arguing against what? At the moment you're claiming victory when you haven't even turned up for the game.

Anycase, I don't care if you believe his analysis or not.

Clearly not, otherwise you'd have made multiple posts to try and convince us it was false.

Hang on.....

Dave

[applecorped]

I have last year written a paper about WTC1 for children that I copied Nist of course and then Nist changed opinion and suggested that 6-11 floors dropped down and caused global collapse. My paper has then been noted at JREF and there we are. No need to call anyone at Nist or contributing to Nist a fool. They are just working for the government.

You wrote a paper that has been noted at JREF. That's it? No peer reveiw?
No Journal publication? And why exactly are you writing papers about 9/11 for children that contains so much (dubious) technical information. Are you trying to turn another generation into CTers?

[DGM]

It's fiction..... why waste energy on it. If you and others here want to waste time on it.... that your choice.
Why don't you tell us in detail what happened then? You know layman's terms. Go for it, tell a 30 year construction professional how it was done (don't be afraid of using trade terms I'll understand).

[Heiwa]

You wrote a paper that has been noted at JREF. That's it? No peer reveiw?
No Journal publication? And why exactly are you writing papers about 9/11 for children that contains so much (dubious) technical information. Are you trying to turn another generation into CTers?

You are right. I have published an article on my website about 9/11 (or rather the WTC1 collapse) for children. Why should I have it peer reviewed? Actually, the children do the review. Some of them got worried when they saw WTC1 collapsing. But they are good observers. And reality must be rooted in observations.
Dubious information? Pls specify!
Purpose is, if you read the conclusions of my article, that some 'experts' should re-do their analysises. Based on real observations. A time table would also fit well. But no differential equations based on erroneous assumptions, please. Write for children!

Heiwa

PS Children do not read Nist reports and I doubt many parents read it for children. Or at all?

[Dave Rogers]

You are right. I have published an article on my website about 9/11 (or rather the WTC1 collapse) for children. Why should I have it peer reviewed? Actually, the children do the review. Some of them got worried when they saw WTC1 collapsing.

I'm sure they've all been a lot less worried since you pointed out to them that their government is trying to kill them. And, of course, they're all a lot safer since you pointed out to them that they can trust terrorists never to do anything nasty to them. Next, you should write them a paper explaining how the scissor-man will cut their arms off if they bite their fingernails, and that there's really no need to look both ways before crossing the road because cars never hit children who've been good.

Purpose is, if you read the conclusions of my article, that some 'experts' should re-do their analysises. Based on real observations. A time table would also fit well. But no differential equations based on erroneous assumptions, please. Write for children!

If you honestly believe that, you're mad. By all means, when you've done the analysis properly, a summary for non-technical people is a good thing, and pitching such a summary at the level of comprehension of an intelligent child is an excellent approach for doing so. What you're suggesting, however, is that the analysis should be carried out at the level of an intelligent child. Do that, and you're more or less guaranteed to be wrong. Which more or less explains your paper.

Dave

[Heiwa]

Heiwa:

You have to accept that treating the upper block of WTC 1 as a rigid mass is just an approximation; but I would say it's not a bad approximation. The upper block did NOT immediately disintegrate as you claim. On the contrary, all the columns and floor slabs in the upper block remained more or less interconnected for the first half of the collapse. Thus the upper block moved as a single unit and acted as a single mass of ~ 33,000 tonnes on the structure below. Thus you are incorrect when you argue that the upper section simply broke into a million pieces, and that these pieces mostly by-passed the structure below as they fell............., Heiwa, this is NOT what happened!

What do you mean with: 'On the contrary, all the columns and floor slabs in the upper block remained more or less interconnected for the first half of the collapse.'

My observations of WTC1 are that most of the upper block disintegrates (telescopes into itself) before any collapse of the lower structure below the initiation zone has even started!

Therefore: 'Thus the upper block moved as a single unit and acted as a single mass of ~ 33,000 tonnes on the structure below.' is wrong. An upper block that disintegrates (telescopes into itself) is not a single unit or mass.

And what would this single unit/mass do then? Impact?

There is no impact. It is NOT what happened, It, the impact, is just an invention (or assumption) to fit some theory of conspiracy about shock waves and crush fronts.

I do not see any impact on all the WTC1 videos but I have seen and heard many in reality under other circumstances, none followed by 'global collapse'.

I do not say that the upper block broke into million pieces before 'impact'. The lower part broke into million pieces ... but that could not have been caused by the upper block + gravity. Gravity does not work like that!

Back to the ivory tower, doctor!

[Heiwa]

Just out of interest, Heiwa, what would you expect for the density of a cargo ship carrying five cranes? Considering the hull alone it had better be a lot less than 1, otherwise it'll quickly become a cargo submarine. Include the cranes themselves, which have a lot of volume and not much mass, and I'd be surprised if you get an average density much over 0.2. Look at the picture.

http://www.tradership.co.uk/News.cfm?URLID=9

Because a couple of weeks ago in Felixstowe this cargo ship collided with a container crane, causing a global collapse not only of that crane but of the crane next to it. Mind you, those were steel structures, so you can't compare them to the WTC towers, which were, errr....

Funny thing, density. The main thing about it is that it's a different property to weight, or to momentum, or to potential energy, or to structural rigidity, or anything else that's actually relevant to the situation you're describing. And you, of all people, should understand that. Ships are a classic case of structures that require high structural strength at low average density. If you honestly believe that, because an object is no more dense on average than a bale of wool, that it is therefore no more rigid and no more resilient than a bale of wool, then I fear for the safety of anyone who sails on a ship you designed. And if a ship you designed collides with a ship you didn't design, I know which one I want to be on.

What you're doing, Heiwa, is looking through the physical parameters of the WTC towers until you find one that looks small, and then implying that because that one parameter is small, the towers themselves were small. It would be reprehensibly dishonest if it weren't so transparently fraudulent as to be laughable.

Dave

OT of course, but cargo ships often carry cargoes with density >1 or even >4 (ore). And they do not sink! Arkimedes explained why >200 years BC. Smart guy. Google Arkimedes! He is still around!

Note: only cargo has density >1. Would sink like a stone. That's why we have cargo ships to carry cargo with density >1. They float.

FYI, it is quite easy to load a ship (wrongly) and it breaks apart in two pieces, both of which float! Why is that? Local failure. Fairly easy to put the two parts together again. After analysis why failure took place.

Same thing and exactly the same principles for WTC1. Start to explain the local failures. Then I will explain why the structure below will still stand.

You say: Ships are a classic case of structures that require high structural strength at low average density.

At low average density?

No serious person uses such words in engineering. Low? Average? Density? Seffen uses uniform density! Even worse! Low average density!! Have I have to laugh.

Heiwa

[CHF]

My observations of WTC1 are that most of the upper block disintegrates (telescopes into itself) before any collapse of the lower structure below the initiation zone has even started!

So the upper block turned to dust and then the collapse started? :eek:

Now that I gotta see! I don't think that claim has even been made by anyone other than perhaps Judy Wood.

What, in your opinion, caused this "disintegration" of the upper block, Heiwa?

[Heiwa]

So the upper block turned to dust and then the collapse started? :eek:

Now that I gotta see! I don't think that claim has even been made by anyone other than perhaps Judy Wood.

What, in your opinion, caused this "disintegration" of the upper block, Heiwa?

No, the upper block did not turn into dust so early as seen on videos. Look at any WTC1 video or check my web page. First sign of anything strange is that the roof starts to move down. And the roof is moving down for at least three seconds and nothing happens at the the initiation zone floors 93-98 below the upper block during that time (and no collapse of structure below floor 93). The upper block apparently becomes 20-25 meters shorter - compressed - in that time ... and noting happens below.

But then things start to happen at the initiation zone floors 93-98. Smoke is ejected through the windows for say 0.5 seconds. The columns are intact.

And then it goes fast. The lower steel structure is destroyed. Difficult to see. Smoke and dust obstructing the view.

And only then the upper block seems to have turned into dust. Not to be seen. It + mast should be seen above the dust/smoke.

It is only the weight of the rigid upper block + mast that is supposed to drive the gravity driven avalanche that chews up steel structure below.

But the upper block is not to be seen.

This is my observations rooted in reality. These observations must be explained in physical (or mathematical) terms. Hopefully layman's terms. No differential equations, please.

Nist has apparently changed opinion about the upper block. In their Dec 07 FAQ they suggest that 6-11 floors above the initiation zone suddenly dropped down and caused the global collapse. I do not believe that either. Why?

There are no observations of 6-11 floors dropping ... and reality must be rooted in observation.

[X]

To all you people talking density:
Please enlighten me as to what units you are using.

[Minadin]

;3517262']To all you people talking density:
Please enlighten me as to what units you are using.
Kirkmans.

[Apollo20]

Heiwa:

Sure there may have been some "telescoping" of the upper block of WTC during the first few seconds of collapse, but the mass of the upper block remained essentially the same. And you are incorrect when you say "nothing happens at the the initiation zone floors 93-98" at the start of the collapse. I would say that it's almost impossible to see what is going on between floors 95-99 after the first second or so of collapse... Can you see through all that smoke, dust and debris Heiwa? I can't!

[X]:

Density has the dimensions of mass/volume. I think some posters have used kg/m^3 while others have used g/cm^3, so we may have some inconsistency in this thread...

It's usually self evident what the implied units are when people say a density of 1 although they should really specify g/cm^3 (or use the term specific gravity).

[Newtons Bit]

[X]: It appears Heiwa is using specific gravity, not density. It's unitless.

[tsig]

OT of course, but cargo ships often carry cargoes with density >1 or even >4 (ore). And they do not sink! Arkimedes explained why >200 years BC. Smart guy. Google Arkimedes! He is still around!

Note: only cargo has density >1. Would sink like a stone. That's why we have cargo ships to carry cargo with density >1. They float.

FYI, it is quite easy to load a ship (wrongly) and it breaks apart in two pieces, both of which float! Why is that? Local failure. Fairly easy to put the two parts together again. After analysis why failure took place.

Same thing and exactly the same principles for WTC1. Start to explain the local failures. Then I will explain why the structure below will still stand.

You say: Ships are a classic case of structures that require high structural strength at low average density.

At low average density?

No serious person uses such words in engineering. Low? Average? Density? Seffen uses uniform density! Even worse! Low average density!! Have I have to laugh.

Heiwa

Only a fool laughs at tragedy.

[rwguinn]

Only a fool laughs at tragedy.


Someone needs to tell Heiwa's hypothesis to the folks on the various boats and ships in WWII that got cut in half, or blown in two, or to the Edmond Fitzgerald, the Titanic, and numerous other boats that broke in half and sank, or just sank.

[Heiwa]

Heiwa:

Sure there may have been some "telescoping" of the upper block of WTC during the first few seconds of collapse, but the mass of the upper block remained essentially the same. And you are incorrect when you say "nothing happens at the the initiation zone floors 93-98" at the start of the collapse. I would say that it's almost impossible to see what is going on between floors 95-99 after the first second or so of collapse... Can you see through all that smoke, dust and debris Heiwa? I can't!



Why would there be telescoping of the upper block for three seconds prior collapse at all? The gravity collapse has not begun! The gravity collapse begins at the initiation zone and continues downwards ... and assumes a rigid upper block (no telescoping) that free falls (not seen by a normal observer, like me) into the initiation zone because all the columns there have disappeared (not seen by me and not explained by Nist, Bazant, Seffen, Spoof & Co - just assumed).

And the rigid upper block shall then first make this solid impact (not seen) over 4000 m², no damping allowed by e.g. crunched columns left behind and second produce a shock wave (it takes 0 seconds as it is instant but assumes perfect hit on 4 000 m² - if not, no shock wave) and then third drive the gravity collapse or rather a crush front downwards, where all 280+ columns at each floor below are crunched, crumpled and crushed (and removed - columns ripped apart at two ends), accelerated to participate in the mess as a beta L part all the time during the collapse (10-15 seconds) of the lower structure. The upper block, rigid, cannot break up because then there is nothing to drive the avalanche and the crunching, crumpling, crushing and ripping aparts of columns ... so that the floors can drop one after the other.

You have to look at the videos frame by frame. Suddenly, at initiation, you see a row of smoke puffs split by ... I assume, intact columns. But the columns should have been gone then. Don't ask me how! Free fall = no columns, no smoke puffs. Floors dropping down as per Nist latest fairy tale? OK, but then the columns are intact. OK, you can't see that! Did you assume it?

I always wonder how gravity can throw away sideways a big block of a wall with numerous columns and spandrels! Doesn't look as gravity collapse to me.
A crush front cannot throw away a 10 storey tall wall piece that is 30 metres wide! And the squibs and fire works preceeding the crush front. Nothing can preceed the crush front! Etc, etc. Looks like assistance (extra energy input) of some kind was provided.

You don't really know what a gravity driven collapse are, do you? They are rare and do not occur in steel structure buildings. The gravity force applied from above has a tendency just to slip off the steel structure after a small local failure and hit the ground instead. Quite basic actually.

[Heiwa]

Only a fool laughs at tragedy.

Low average density is comedy. Music hall. Hollywood.

[tsig]

Someone needs to tell Heiwa's hypothesis to the folks on the various boats and ships in WWII that got cut in half, or blown in two, or to the Edmond Fitzgerald, the Titanic, and numerous other boats that broke in half and sank, or just sank.


Steel can't weaken, therefore Catch22.!

[X]

[X]: It appears Heiwa is using specific gravity, not density. It's unitless.

An odd thing to use for buildings, IMHO, but it would explain the numbers dancing around 1. Maybe he wanted numbers that were impressively small?

Which raises the question of why Heiwa, of all people, is talking about ships carrying cargoes of >1 spec. grav.

The overall density of the ship must still be <1. Probably considerably less for safety.

[Heiwa]

Someone needs to tell Heiwa's hypothesis to the folks on the various boats and ships in WWII that got cut in half, or blown in two, or to the Edmond Fitzgerald, the Titanic, and numerous other boats that broke in half and sank, or just sank.

Isn't that a little too late and OT? And Titanic? She surely hit an ice berg? Result? Local failure in the sheel plate (long fracture). No global collapse. She sank as she lost buoyancy due to inflow of water into the hull. 1500+ persons died because the ship lacked proper LSA and associated procedures/training.

[Heiwa]

;3517620']An odd thing to use for buildings, IMHO, but it would explain the numbers dancing around 1. Maybe he wanted numbers that were impressively small?

Which raises the question of why Heiwa, of all people, is talking about ships carrying cargoes of >1 spec. grav.

The overall density of the ship must still be <1. Probably considerably less for safety.

In the shipping industry we never use the term 'overall density of the ship'. It is really comical.

[DGM]

Isn't that a little too late and OT? And Titanic? She surely hit an ice berg? Result? Local failure in the sheel plate (long fracture). No global collapse. She sank as she lost buoyancy due to inflow of water into the hull. 1500+ persons died because the ship lacked proper LSA and associated procedures/training.
Surely frozen water can't hurt solid steel. LOL

[Minadin]

In the shipping industry we never use the term 'overall density of the ship'. It is really comical.

In the building industry we never refer to the 'uniform density' of a structure, either. There are specific loads and specific loading conditions and there are the various structural elements arranged in a certain way to handle them as efficiently as the design allows while still meeting the requirements for the useful occupancy of the building.

[Architect]

Well - evidently you have not read my paper because the structural design of WTC1 (or at least its upper part) is well described.

You know that I have, and no it wasn't well described.

One conclusion then is that the outer envelope, you mean the four outer walls consisting of 63 columns each

Your failure to grasp basic structural terminology is not my concern.

The outer envelope does not need any floors to stand.

With respect, that is a blatantly false proposition for anyone with a grasp of building structures. It would be uneconomical to upsize structural members of the envelope sufficiently to resist the typicaly dead and imposed loadings on any building as tall as WTC. This is implicit on all the discussions of the structure including NIST, Edinburgh, Sheffield, Arup, and so on.

If you cannot grasp basic structural concepts that what hope do you have that you can rigorously analyse the collapse itself?

In face, have you read any of the studies by the four I name above?


Quite the opposite, the floors need the outer envelope to hang on (via bolts). Remove all floors and the walls stand.

The envelope supports the floors but the floors in tunr restrain the outer facade. This is basic stuff, you know.


The initiation zone is apparently where the collapse started - no problem for me, except that the roof of WTC1 drops 20-25 meters and there is still no big damages at the initiation zone.


By definition the initiation zone is the point where collapse first occurs. You seem to be confusing it with immediate impact zone, which suggests you fail to grasp the fire modelling issues arising from NIST and other studies. This too is basic stuff.

The initiation sequence? One thing is sure - no mention that the upper block disintegrates prior to collapse below the initiation zone starts.

It's a shame your wrong about that, isn't it? I suggest you watch the video evidence again.


Is 'initiation' a technical term? Sound more like magic and secret society to me!

Not so hot at English, eh? Bummer. I remember that stage, at school. Keep working hard at it, mate.

The performance of steel in fire is described (with a link) in the paper. The steel gets hot, etc! Strength is hardly affected below 500°C. Core column integrity! Yes, it is a mystery how 47 strong core columns were destroyed.

Whilst encouraging that you now conceed steel fails in fires, despite your failure to address the point initially, you grossly underestimate the temperature and effect of fires. Why do you persist in doing so, in the face of all the evidence?

Well the uniform density of the upper block is less than that of wool, so I think it is a useful comparison.

A tonne of WTC in bits ways the same as a tonne of WTC and one bit. Do not waste our time with whollly irrelevant structural analogies.

The use of concrete of floors. I thought you thought I did not know that there were concrete floors? Anyway - they poured concrete on the steel floors pans held by trusses to even them out, provide noise and fire insulation, etc.

"Pans"? You're really struggling with this terminology issue.

And do you really think that the concrete was only to provide accoustic and fire insulation together with a level top surface? Really?


I know Nist suggests that 6 or 11 floors fell down suddenly into the initiation zone and initiated the collapse, but it is nonsense. Only fools believe that.


Who said that this was the collapse mechanism? Provide us with a page reference from NIST then?

[Dave Rogers]

;3517620']Which raises the question of why Heiwa, of all people, is talking about ships carrying cargoes of >1 spec. grav.

Because it's his MO. Look through all the possible physical parameters of a system, and pick the one that superficially appears to support his latest argument while ignoring (a) the fact that it doesn't and (b) all the other physical parameters.

I've also noticed another fallacy Heiwa is committing, which is based on semantics: he's defining processes to exclude specific events, then stating that the absence of those specific events from the process is contradictory. Here are a couple of examples.

1. Heiwa claims that there was no initial drop prior to the collapse. He therefore defines collapse initiation as all the processes that take place before there is any drop of the structure. Since there is no drop of the structure during the collapse initiation process, collapse cannot initiate. This is an absurd argument, in that it claims the anomaly that there is no collapse before the collapse starts.

2. Heiwa claims that there was no initial drop of the upper block into the collapse initiation zone, but rather there was a collapse of the lower floors of the upper block. This is a little more subtle; he's effectively defining the upper block so as to include what everyone else defines as the collapse initiation zone, and then defining the collapse initiation zone as being the top few floors of the lower block. This is an equally absurd argument, in that it claims that the first floors to collapse are not in the collapse initiation zone, when the collapse initiation zone is properly defined as the first few floors to collapse; in effect Heiwa is arguing that the first few floors to collapse were not the first few floors to collapse.

As for "average density", I don't particularly care what engineers do and don't talk about. The concept is trivially simple to understand. And Heiwa, as others have pointed out, your comments on "uniform density" are themselves laughable; nobody sane would seriously argue that the upper block of the North Tower was a homogeneous object of constant density, even though this might be used as a simplification in order to model the effects of its fall.

Dave

[Architect]

Seconded, Dave.

Ironically I'm in Manchester, waiting for rain and wind to ease off (ha!) in order that I can go on a site visit on a .... wait for it ......tall building somewhere near Deansgate. But hell, what would I know about building such things, eh?

Anyone got a boat I can design?

[uk_dave]

Hmmmmm 'Architect' is in Manchester at the same time as Manchester's chief Constable decides to go off and commit suicide during a period of unseasonal strong storms indicating that the 'weather modification' chemtrails are having the desired effect of pushing oil prices to a record high resulting in Warren Buffet becoming the new supreme ruler of the world and commissioning a new office building in Manchester.

Join the dots, people.

[Hokulele]

Seconded, Dave.

Ironically I'm in Manchester, waiting for rain and wind to ease off (ha!) in order that I can go on a site visit on a .... wait for it ......tall building somewhere near Deansgate. But hell, what would I know about building such things, eh?

Anyone got a boat I can design?


Sure! I am at the shipyard working on a newer version of one of these (http://www.deepwater.com/fw/main/Discoverer_Deep_Seas-60C16.html?LayoutID=17) this week. They just raised the derrick, and it should be ready for commissioning this fall. Funny how they are really, really concerned about fire protection issues, seeing as how fire has no effect on steel . . .

[Architect]

Hmmmmm 'Architect' is in Manchester at the same time as Manchester's chief Constable decides to go off and commit suicide during a period of unseasonal strong storms indicating that the 'weather modification' chemtrails are having the desired effect of pushing oil prices to a record high resulting in Warren Buffet becoming the new supreme ruler of the world and commissioning a new office building in Manchester.

Join the dots, people.

I've worried that the winds will damage the C4 coated reinforcement in the Tower and that it might not collapse into Deansgate when we press the button. And after the £millions we spent buying-off all the workers, too.....

:(

[peteweaver]

A structure can only be as strong as the bolts which hold it together.

[rwguinn]

A structure can only be as strong as the bolts which hold it together.
Conversly:
A Conspiracy theory is only as strong as the nuts that keep the loose screws from falling out...

[Alferd_Packer]

One conclusion then is that the outer envelope, you mean the four outer walls consisting of 63 columns each, can stand on its own. The outer envelope does not need any floors to stand. Quite the opposite, the floors need the outer envelope to hang on (via bolts). Remove all floors and the walls stand.


My god, that is one of the the stupidest things you have ever said.


Without the floors, what is there to keep the exterior columns from buckling under their own weight?

[uk_dave]

Without the floors, what is there to keep the exterior columns from buckling under their own weight?

Water pressure.

[Wolrab]

According to my sources, an average American sheep produces 8.2 pounds of wool per year.
http://www.sheep101.info/wool.html
The towers weighed approximately 154,000,000 kg per Tower /2.2 = 70000000 lbs each.
http://www.physforum.com/What-was-the-weight-of-a-WTC-Tower_4299.html
70000000/8.2= 8536585 sheep contributed to its construction (or one sheep's production for over 8.5 million years). There were 6.32 million sheep in the US in 2004. I can't be bothered to find out the US sheep population when the towers were built.
http://www.sheep101.info/farm.html
The US has less than 1% of the world's sheep population, so I'll approximate the world population at 100 times the US's or >600 million sheep (plenty of wool to construct the towers if imported wool was used).
Now I'm just asking questions.
What are yarmulkes made of?
Was there a spike in wool prices when towers were built?
Were people in the wool industry forewarned about the attacks?
Was there any suspicious futures trading in the livestock market around Sept. 11, 2001?
Wool is somewhat fireproof, would the fires have been able to get hot enough to weaken the structures enough to initiate collapse?
Was NIST allowed to examine all the wool or was it all sold to China to make cheap yarmulkes?
Wool is also pretty water repellent, why would anyone build with something that repels the number one fire fighting substance?
Why weren't the towers dyed in pretty colors for a more festive appearance?

[Alferd_Packer]

The "Loose Sheep" theory.

[Heiwa]

My god, that is one of the the stupidest things you have ever said.


Without the floors, what is there to keep the exterior columns from buckling under their own weight?

Sorry, you are totally wrong! How would the wall columns buckle without floors (and then no loads on them)? Outwards or inwards. Sorry, kept in place by the spandrels acting as belts around the tower. Inline, sideways? Sorry, no influence by floors there.

Main function of the floor, bolted on and hanging on the wall, was to walk on! Another function was to transmit horizontal wind loads on one wall to the opposite wall allowing the tower to sway, albeit steadily, sideways.

With all floors hanging on a wall the stress in the wall columns was 20% of yield all the way. Remove the floors and the stress was 1% of yield (only due to columns own weight). Buckling stress in both cases are >100% of yield, so nothing will happen.

Without floors WTCs were very strong cages. And cages of any size do not collapse due own weight. Read my article comparing WTC1,2 with a bird cage.

[Heiwa]

A structure can only be as strong as the bolts which hold it together.

In WTC1 case the bolt was only there to prevent the floor to fall down. Main steel structure would still stand.

[CHF]

Silly question, Heiwa...

Have you submitted any of your findings for peer-review?

[rwguinn]

Silly question, Heiwa...

Have you submitted any of your findings for peer-review?

The third graders were busy, so the engineers, architects, and scientists here have reviewed Heiwa's findings. We find them...wanting....inexcusable...and totally false

[Alferd_Packer]

In WTC1 case the bolt was only there to prevent the floor to fall down. Main steel structure would still stand.

So, can you explain to me how Euler's formula would NOT apply if the internal floors were removed?

[pomeroo]

{snip-a lotta silly nonsense}


Read my article comparing WTC1,2 with a bird cage.


It just doesn't get any better than this.

[Alferd_Packer]

It just doesn't get any better than this.

La cage aux folles

[beachnut]

In WTC1 case the bolt was only there to prevent the floor to fall down. Main steel structure would still stand.
You have no idea how the WTC towers were designed. Kids jumping on a bed solves the WTC falling in your fantasy world where you ignore the terrorist in planes impacting the WTC at 470 to 590 mph with KE of 1300 to 2093 pounds of TNT. You give a free pass to terrorist killing Americans so you can satisfy your fantasy conspiracy thinking. As you fail to grasp building concepts, the only thing you have proven to the world is your lack of understanding reality and your persistence at promoting failed ideas based in made up conspiracy theories.

Will you ever be on topic in this thread? If you have nothing to explain in layman terms on momentum transfer, you are spamming and exposing your lack of knowledge on 9/11.
Your dumb statements, proven wrong on 9/11 make your work pure failure on 9/11. Reason why a steel building cannot collapse due to release of potential energy is, in simple terms, that the potential energy will mainly be applied to secondary structure - the floors - that will be overloaded and detached from the primary structure - the columns! The potential energy will then not be applied to the primary structure ... that will remain intact! http://heiwaco.tripod.com/nist.htm
Your ideas on 9/11 are messed up, and reveal your lack on knowledge in physics, structures, and expose your propensity to see conspiracy theories in tragedies.

[Newtons Bit]

So, can you explain to me how Euler's formula would NOT apply if the internal floors were removed?

You can always spot a truther "engineer" by their failure to understand the concept of buckling.

[Heiwa]

You have no idea how the WTC towers were designed.

Your ideas on 9/11 are messed up, and reveal your lack on knowledge in physics, structures, and expose your propensity to see conspiracy theories in tragedies.

OK, short description. Gravity is a force of attraction between any two objects. WTC1 consisted of many objects and, when WTC1 was intact and all objects were attached to each other, gravity resulted in compressive stresses in the primary load bearing objects (the columns) that were <30% of the yield stress.
A floor is not a primary load bearing object. It just transmits its weight to the primary load bearing objects.
If you cut a primary load bearing object in one location it cannot transmit any load and the stress in it at the cut becomes zero. If you then cut the same object a bit away, the lose part will evidently fall down. If it is located in the wall, it is likely it drops down to the ground outside the structure.

In WTC1 we are told that 280+ primary load bearing objects were simultaneously cut in two locations in an initiation zone ... and disappeared. Fair enough! I do not believe it because it is a crazy idea, but let's assume it anyway.

What happens then?

Well, if the upper block above the initiation zone was then hanging in a crane and slowly lowered down and placed on the lower structure, the lower structure would evidently carry the upper block ... as before.

But there was no crane lowering the upper block!

We are told that it (1) free falls and (2) impacts instantaneously and (3) causes a shock wave in the lower structure, it is overloaded, etc. These are crazy ideas, but must be considered in a serious analysis.

PE is released at (1) and becomes KE at (2). Nist suggests that the PE = KE exceeded the total strain energy, SE, of the structure (below), KE=PE>SE, but it is nonsense. PE/KE and SE have nothing to do with each other!

Nothing to do with each other? Exactly.

The PE must evidently be applied to the structure below, but gravity does not work like that for lose objects!

The upper block consists of 280+ vertical primary load bearing objects (the columns).

In order for this upper block with 280+ objects to 'impact' the lower structure and overload it, it must be 100% aligned with all 280+ objects below. And then, if the 280+ objects touches the 280+ objects below, they must not slip off! Remember - each column has been split at two locations and the intermediate part has disappeared. Do you believe that the cross surfaces of the broken parts are identical allowing a perfect fit?

Evidently, the upper block was not 100% aligned at (1) with the lower structure and therefore it will miss the lower structure at (2). No impact, no shock wave! And no global collapse due to PE>SE!

So why did the lower structure blow up in 1000's of pieces if there were no impact and shock wave? Only answer is some sort of CD in my opinion.

That is one conclusion of the article on my web site.

[Architect]

OK, short description. Gravity is a force of attraction between any two objects. WTC1 consisted of many objects and, when WTC1 was intact and all objects were attached to each other, gravity resulted in compressive stresses in the primary load bearing objects (the columns) that were <30% of the yield stress.

What an interesting and unorthordox use of terminology. Now, what are you trying to say and what is the basis of your figures?


A floor is not a primary load bearing object. It just transmits its weight to the primary load bearing objects.


I see you still refuse to accept that the floors provide a bracing effect as part of the overall structural system, restraining the loadbearing outer envelope. Tell you what, why don't you post a proper structural analysis proving that the envelope was self-supporting. You know, with like, highyl detailed calculations and everything. Remember to take account of the wind loadings.

If you cut a primary load bearing object in one location it cannot transmit any load and the stress in it at the cut becomes zero. If you then cut the same object a bit away, the lose part will evidently fall down. If it is located in the wall, it is likely it drops down to the ground outside the structure.

Wrong


In WTC1 we are told that 280+ primary load bearing objects were simultaneously cut in two locations in an initiation zone ... and disappeared. Fair enough! I do not believe it because it is a crazy idea, but let's assume it anyway.


Really? Show me where "we are told" this.



Well, if the upper block above the initiation zone was then hanging in a crane and slowly lowered down and placed on the lower structure, the lower structure would evidently carry the upper block ... as before.

But there was no crane lowering the upper block!

We are told that it (1) free falls and (2) impacts instantaneously and (3) causes a shock wave in the lower structure, it is overloaded, etc. These are crazy ideas, but must be considered in a serious analysis.


Remind me again where we are allegedly told this. Remember to include full references in order that we can check it ourselves.

PE is released at (1) and becomes KE at (2). Nist suggests that the PE = KE exceeded the total strain energy, SE, of the structure (below), KE=PE>SE, but it is nonsense. PE/KE and SE have nothing to do with each other!

I hope this isn't what you consider to be some sort of structural analysis.


The upper block consists of 280+ vertical primary load bearing objects (the columns).

In order for this upper block with 280+ objects to 'impact' the lower structure and overload it, it must be 100% aligned with all 280+ objects below. And then, if the 280+ objects touches the 280+ objects below, they must not slip off! Remember - each column has been split at two locations and the intermediate part has disappeared. Do you believe that the cross surfaces of the broken parts are identical allowing a perfect fit?

Evidently, the upper block was not 100% aligned at (1) with the lower structure and therefore it will miss the lower structure at (2). No impact, no shock wave! And no global collapse due to PE>SE!


Don't be ridiculous. You have been told umpteen times about the design of the WTC structure. Impacting column-column is simply not required for collapse.


So why did the lower structure blow up in 1000's of pieces if there were no impact and shock wave? Only answer is some sort of CD in my opinion.


When did the lower stucture "blow up"? What the heck are you talking about?

That is one conclusion of the article on my web site.

Correct. It's just not the conclusion you think it is.

[Dave Rogers]

In order for this upper block with 280+ objects to 'impact' the lower structure and overload it, it must be 100% aligned with all 280+ objects below. And then, if the 280+ objects touches the 280+ objects below, they must not slip off! Remember - each column has been split at two locations and the intermediate part has disappeared. Do you believe that the cross surfaces of the broken parts are identical allowing a perfect fit?

Evidently, the upper block was not 100% aligned at (1) with the lower structure and therefore it will miss the lower structure at (2). No impact, no shock wave! And no global collapse due to PE>SE!

That's an utterly laughable oversimplification. You're assuming that there are two possible outcomes: (1) Everything lines up perfectly, therefore the upper structure impacts the lower structure, or (2) the alignment is not perfect, therefore every element of the upper structure misses every element of the lower structure. You're ignoring the following events, all of which are more or less certain:

(a) Some, but not all, columns impact vertically, leading to a massive overload of the impacted columns, leading to their collapse. Since the structure is interconnected, this will cause weakening of other columns, leading to their subsequent collapse when left unsupported.
(b) Columns will impact floor slabs, and floor slabs will impact columns. This will fragment the floor slabs, causing the floors to collapse. Without the support of the floors, the columns will collapse; your assertion that the unsupported perimeter column structure is stable is nothing more than fantasy.
(c) Columns falling at an angle will impact obliquely on other columns, leading to an impulse delivered to those columns in the direction in which they are least able to resist it. This will lead, among other things, to peeling outwards of large sections of perimeter column trees.
(d) Impacts between cross-members in the core structure, and between elements of the hat truss and the lower core columns. These can again either be axial or oblique, leading to different failure modes.

As usual, you're starting from a definition of an event which excludes the event which actually took place, then using that definition to prove that the actual events could not have taken place. It's a very cleverly constructed circular argument, the subtlety of which suggests to me that you're not as ignorant as you seem, but that you're deliberately trying to mislead. Just my opinion, though.

Dave

[Architect]

As usual, you're starting from a definition of an event which excludes the event which actually took place, then using that definition to prove that the actual events could not have taken place. It's a very cleverly constructed circular argument, the subtlety of which suggests to me that you're not as ignorant as you seem, but that you're deliberately trying to mislead. Just my opinion, though.


I'm beginning to wonder if he's deluded, rather than incompetent or trolling. No qualified engineer witha working knowledge of building structures could adopt this ludicrous position.

Are you ill, Heiwa?

[AZCat]

If you cut a primary load bearing object in one location it cannot transmit any load and the stress in it at the cut becomes zero.

What?! You are talking about objects in compression, right? This example makes no sense. Either you're making a total hash of the english language or your understanding of statics (a second-year college course) is total crap.

[Heiwa]

The upper block is 4 000 m² large where the primary load bearing columns occupy 5-6 m² cross area. Same with the lower structure.

If the upper block is supposed to impact the lower structure after alleged free fall, evidently the columns of the upper block must drop straight on the columns on the lower structure ... and not slip off. Otherwise there is no solid, instantaneous impact that can cause a shock wave that shakes the columns below into pieces.

Anything else is just ... well dropping a bale of wool on a very solid lower structure. No impact! The upper part misses the relevant structure below.

Re peer review. Some of you are my peer reviewers. The other greenhorns I just ignore.

Re floors - they are not primary load bearing structure of any static loads. They just transmit weights on them to the columns.

[Heiwa]

What?! You are talking about objects in compression, right? This example makes no sense. Either you're making a total hash of the english language or your understanding of statics (a second-year college course) is total crap.

Try to cut a structural member under any load and then see if it can transmit any load after that!

[DGM]

The load does not disappear though. It's redistributed to other columns. Once enough of these are compromised the rest will fail in rapid succession. Really simple if you think of a building as a 'system'.

[Dave Rogers]

If the upper block is supposed to impact the lower structure after alleged free fall, evidently the columns of the upper block must drop straight on the columns on the lower structure ... and not slip off. Otherwise there is no solid, instantaneous impact that can cause a shock wave that shakes the columns below into pieces.

Anything else is just ... well dropping a bale of wool on a very solid lower structure. No impact! The upper part misses the relevant structure below.

If the columns of the upper block miss the columns of the lower block, they hit the floor slab below. Your argument, therefore, is that the floor slab is strong enough to withstand the impact of the columns of the upper block. You may want to say that it isn't, but in fact that's your argument, and it's insane. Your "bale of wool" doesn't even have a flat lower surface to distribute the imp



Sorry, I gave up half way through writing this post. Heiwa's argument here is utterly insane, and there's no way it could possibly be mistaken for a sane argument. There is simply no way that communication is possible with someone who could believe any of it.

Dave

[Minadin]

The upper block is 4 000 m² large where the primary load bearing columns occupy 5-6 m² cross area. Same with the lower structure.

If the upper block is supposed to impact the lower structure after alleged free fall, evidently the columns of the upper block must drop straight on the columns on the lower structure ... and not slip off. Otherwise there is no solid, instantaneous impact that can cause a shock wave that shakes the columns below into pieces.

Anything else is just ... well dropping a bale of wool on a very solid lower structure. No impact! The upper part misses the relevant structure below.

Re peer review. Some of you are my peer reviewers. The other greenhorns I just ignore.

Re floors - they are not primary load bearing structure of any static loads. They just transmit weights on them to the columns.

The columns themselves may have only taken up a small % of the overall footprint, but the floors and anything in between such as partition walls did actually take up the rest of the footprint. As you yourself have noted, the composite floor structure (concrete, metal decking, bar joists) transfers loads to the core columns as well as the outer envelope. It doesn't "miss" - nor are the floors themselves completely irrelevant. They're just inconvenient for your fantasy. So what do you think happens when the floors are impacted?

Continuing with this wool analogy is beyond stupid:
Anything else is just ... well dropping a bale of wool on a very solid lower structure. No impact! The upper part misses the relevant structure below. And in fact I've decided to add that to this month's list of dubious nominations.

[Architect]

Sorry, I gave up half way through writing this post. Heiwa's argument here is utterly insane, and there's no way it could possibly be mistaken for a sane argument. There is simply no way that communication is possible with someone who could believe any of it.



Seconded.

It's all getting a bit ChristopherA, don't you think?

[ElMondoHummus]

Sorry, I gave up half way through writing this post. Heiwa's argument here is utterly insane, and there's no way it could possibly be mistaken for a sane argument. There is simply no way that communication is possible with someone who could believe any of it.

Dave

Seconded.

It's all getting a bit ChristopherA, don't you think?


Well, there is some value in responding at points to repititious demonstrations of insanity: You get the truth out. You may no longer be talking to the fantasy peddler, but the words still stand for other people reading the thread.

But don't take that to mean I think you all should respond endlessly. I absolutely agree that going around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and AROUND is futile. All I'm saying is that a word or two here and there helps the bystanders, especially with esoteric subjects or in depth arguments.

[Dave Rogers]

But don't take that to mean I think you all should respond endlessly. I absolutely agree that going around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and around and AROUND is futile. All I'm saying is that a word or two here and there helps the bystanders, especially with esoteric subjects or in depth arguments.

Yeah, but I did that in post #2.

Dave

[ElMondoHummus]

Yeah, but I did that in post #2.

Dave

Oh, yes, and that's fine. All I was saying was that there's some value in measures responses. That's all.

[Heiwa]

The load does not disappear though. It's redistributed to other columns. Once enough of these are compromised the rest will fail in rapid succession. Really simple if you think of a building as a 'system'.

You are 100% right. If there is local failure of one column, the load is transmitted to intact supporting columns. This is part of the alleged initial initiation.

But when do free fall and impact and shock wave and overload of the structure below take place? The second initiation. When enough local failures have taken place?

These failures must take place just above the so called impact zone. Any evidence for that?

And all the failed parts must be removed to allow free fall! Any evidence for that?

And an impact must evidently be between really solid parts that can really resist a load from above, i.e. only the vertical columns. And these parts must be aligned and arranged that the upper part does not slide off at impact. Any evidence for that?

If anything impacts a floor, the floor will really sag (easy to visualize) and either break in one location ... or spring back. But what could impact a floor? Another floor above? According NIST nothing happens then! You need 6 floors impacting one floor ... and then only that floor breaks. Any evidence for that?

And a lose floor cannot destroy 280+ vertical columns below.

I find it strange that many greenhorns still believe in the impact theory when even NIST has abandoned it.

[Alferd_Packer]

Snip - a lot of nonsense. . .


Is this one of your designs?

http://forums.randi.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=10356&stc=1&d=1205488768

[MRC_Hans]

I am serious and Seffen implies that the upper block is rigid during the complete collapse. It is this rigid upper block that drives the gravity collapse via the beta L section on top of the crush zone according Seffen so he can write his mathematical equations (read rubbish). Read Seffens paper. Link is in my paper.

I wonder why a serious university lecturer does a thing like that!

HeiwaNo, he does not imply that the upper block is rigid in the real world. He uses the assumption in his simulation, for simplicity.

Didn't you know that simulations always imply some degree of simplification?

Oh, and in case you forgot: The important thing is how the real buildings behaved.

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

We are talking about something with a 4 000 m² base, 47 metres high, volume 190 000 m3 most of which is air. It, if it weighs 33 000 tons, can only apply a uniform vertical pressure of 0.85 bar (or 8.5 ton/m²) on the structure below, which is very small.

It applies a pressure of 33,000 tons. Do you consider that small?
Do you consider 8.5 tons/m² a small pressure? It is around the pressure rating for heavy industrial buildings.

However, all these are statical figures. Of course the building could withstand that. It did for several decades. The problem arose when that weight was shifted out of alignment with the supporting columns and started aquiring kinetic energy.

Actually most of the load is applied on the walls and the core, which are very low stressed initially ...

What do you mean low stressed? They were stressed by the weight of the the upper building (33,000 tons). Yes, in the steady state, when the building was intact, those loads were nicely applied to the supporting structure, and the building stood for decades.

and stressed the same after the load has been shifted down.

Wrong. First of all there was the extra load from the impact, but more importantly, the integrity of the support columns was lost, and the alignment was also lost.


The only 'extra' vertical load is the assumed impact load due to 'free fall', but there is no free fall. So the assumption by various experts of a free fall load is erroneous.

Did the upper part of the building move down or did it not move down? Answer: It moved down. Thus, it gained an kintic energy. An energy that was converted to pressure on the (compromised) lower structure where it impacted. The exact speed at which it moved down and whether that was a complete free fall or not is not too interesting.

Only fits a conspiray theory.

Does it? Please explain just how. How is it that loss of structural integrety due to fire and impact damage cannot cause a progressive collapse, but loss of structural integrety due to planted explosives can? Be specific about the differences.

Re horizontal loads, eg moving air, wind, with uniform density 0.0013 (and unknown mass) it can of course apply a pressure on the side of the structure but no real impact of any kind. Answer is yes.

HeiwaThank you. So you agree also that your "wool bale" analogy is false?

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

What do you mean with: 'On the contrary, all the columns and floor slabs in the upper block remained more or less interconnected for the first half of the collapse.'

Ahh, an easy one. Refer to my earlier beer-can scenario. When you stomp the beer-can (or the next one if it's too late with the first one) do it so the top part comes down more or less on the bottom part. Now iti s 'telescoped' together. The two "floors" are now together, but still more interconnected. They also weighthe same.

My observations of WTC1 are that most of the upper block disintegrates (telescopes into itself) before any collapse of the lower structure below the initiation zone has even started!

That is not what others observe, but let's, for the sake of discussion, asume it was so: So now you have your 33,000 tons mass "telescoped" into into a more or less solid junkheap. What is it's density now (re. your wool-bale analogy)? Please explain the difference between the effect of an intact, low density structure, and a compressed, high-density 'structure'.

Therefore: 'Thus the upper block moved as a single unit and acted as a single mass of ~ 33,000 tonnes on the structure below.' is wrong. An upper block that disintegrates (telescopes into itself) is not a single unit or mass.

If it did not move as a single unit, please explain where those parts that were not part of a single unit went.

And what would this single unit/mass do then? Impact?

What else should it do? Hover??

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

The upper block is 4 000 m² large where the primary load bearing columns occupy 5-6 m² cross area. Same with the lower structure.

If the upper block is supposed to impact the lower structure after alleged free fall, evidently the columns of the upper block must drop straight on the columns on the lower structure ... and not slip off. Otherwise there is no solid, instantaneous impact that can cause a shock wave that shakes the columns below into pieces.

And if they don't do that, what stops it then? And if nothing stops it, what keeps it from crashing all the way down, taking everything in its way with it?

In other words, you have now given yourself the choice of the devil and the deep blue sea:

Either it precisely impacted the lower ends of the severed supports, in which case we have a crushing concentration of force,

or it missed them, in which case there was nothing with the strengh to stop it from accelerating further downwards.

In both cases, progressive collapse will ensue.

Anything else is just ... well dropping a bale of wool on a very solid lower structure. No impact! The upper part misses the relevant structure below.

You have here claimed that the upper part of the structure is equal to a wool bale, whereas the lower is a very solid structure. Please explain the difference in the building structure above and below the plane impact point. If the upper part is a wool bale, why isn't the lower part also a wool bale?

Re peer review. Some of you are my peer reviewers. The other greenhorns I just ignore.

Aha. And how do these "peers" receive your arguments?

Is this the reason you have started writing for kids?

Re floors - they are not primary load bearing structure of any static loads. They just transmit weights on them to the columns.

Correct, and do you know how they do that?

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

You are 100% right. If there is local failure of one column, the load is transmitted to intact supporting columns. This is part of the alleged initial initiation.

But when do free fall and impact and shock wave and overload of the structure below take place? The second initiation. When enough local failures have taken place?

In your opinion, what will the upper part of the building do when the structure supporting it fails? Hover?

These failures must take place just above the so called impact zone. Any evidence for that?

Why so-called? Are you a no-planer :p??

Why must it take place just there? We have photographic evidence of the perimeter columns being pulled inwards below the impact zone.


And all the failed parts must be removed to allow free fall! Any evidence for that?


Let us assume they were not removed. Let's assume they stayed, but failed (bent, broke, were twisted). What will the building, the 33,000 tons of building they have been supporting then do? Hover??

And an impact must evidently be between really solid parts that can really resist a load from above, i.e. only the vertical columns. And these parts must be aligned and arranged that the upper part does not slide off at impact. Any evidence for that?

Let's suppose the descending (let's not discuss speed, I'm sure you are not claiming it should hover) did not come to rest exactly and securely on the severed and bent support ends. Where did the 33,000 tons of upper building come to rest? What stopped it??

If anything impacts a floor, the floor will really sag (easy to visualize) and either break in one location ... or spring back. But what could impact a floor? Another floor above? According NIST nothing happens then! You need 6 floors impacting one floor ... and then only that floor breaks. Any evidence for that?

Are you claiming that a floor can withstand the pressure from 33,000 tons of building?

And a lose floor cannot destroy 280+ vertical columns below.

Can 33,000 tons of building material?

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

Well, let's us just take this one, too, even if you are mostly repeating the same faults:

OK, short description. Gravity is a force of attraction between any two objects. WTC1 consisted of many objects and, when WTC1 was intact and all objects were attached to each other, gravity resulted in compressive stresses in the primary load bearing objects (the columns) that were <30% of the yield stress.

Ehr, or to put it more simply, the weight of the building and the objects in it were supported by by the structural columns, which had appr. 200% safety margin of strenght.

A floor is not a primary load bearing object. It just transmits its weight to the primary load bearing objects.

And it does this by transferring vertical forces anywhere on its surface to vertical forces on the supports.

If you cut a primary load bearing object in one location it cannot transmit any load and the stress in it at the cut becomes zero. If you then cut the same object a bit away, the lose part will evidently fall down. If it is located in the wall, it is likely it drops down to the ground outside the structure.

Yes, but we have no evidence that his happened.

In WTC1 we are told that 280+ primary load bearing objects were simultaneously cut in two locations in an initiation zone ... and disappeared. Fair enough! I do not believe it because it is a crazy idea, but let's assume it anyway.

It is indeed a crazy idea, and the only people I've seen promoting it are the CD proponents.

What did observably happen was that those supports that were not severed by plane impacts (which may well have been taken away as you describe) were bent over a lengh of several floors.

What happens then?

Then, when bent, they are no longer able to support the weight they were designed for.


Well, if the upper block above the initiation zone was then hanging in a crane and slowly lowered down and placed on the lower structure, the lower structure would evidently carry the upper block ... as before.

But there was no crane lowering the upper block!


No, and it didn't hover, either. So since it was neither suspended from a crane not able to hover, in your own words, what exactly did it do?

We are told that it (1) free falls and (2) impacts instantaneously and (3) causes a shock wave in the lower structure, it is overloaded, etc. These are crazy ideas, but must be considered in a serious analysis.

So, in your opinion, bereft of supports, what did the 33,000 tons of upper building do?

The PE must evidently be applied to the structure below, but gravity does not work like that for lose objects!

No, the KE was applied to the building below. If you claim it wasn't, please explain where it went. Be specific.

In order for this upper block with 280+ objects to 'impact' the lower structure and overload it, it must be 100% aligned with all 280+ objects below. And then, if the 280+ objects touches the 280+ objects below, they must not slip off! Remember - each column has been split at two locations and the intermediate part has disappeared. Do you believe that the cross surfaces of the broken parts are identical allowing a perfect fit?

No, I sincerely doubt that. So where did it impact? What else was there to stop it on its path downwards??


Evidently, the upper block was not 100% aligned at (1) with the lower structure and therefore it will miss the lower structure at (2). No impact, no shock wave! And no global collapse due to PE>SE!


No impact? So it just continued downwards?? Please elucidate.

Hans

[Heiwa]

1. It applies a pressure of 33,000 tons. Do you consider that small?
Do you consider 8.5 tons/m² a small pressure? It is around the pressure rating for heavy industrial buildings.

2. However, all these are statical figures. Of course the building could withstand that. It did for several decades. The problem arose when that weight was shifted out of alignment with the supporting columns and started aquiring kinetic energy.

3.What do you mean low stressed? They were stressed by the weight of the the upper building (33,000 tons). Yes, in the steady state, when the building was intact, those loads were nicely applied to the supporting structure, and the building stood for decades.

4. Wrong. First of all there was the extra load from the impact, but more importantly, the integrity of the support columns was lost, and the alignment was also lost.

5. Did the upper part of the building move down or did it not move down? Answer: It moved down. Thus, it gained an kintic energy. An energy that was converted to pressure on the (compromised) lower structure where it impacted. The exact speed at which it moved down and whether that was a complete free fall or not is not too interesting.



6. Does it? Please explain just how. How is it that loss of structural integrety due to fire and impact damage cannot cause a progressive collapse, but loss of structural integrety due to planted explosives can? Be specific about the differences.

Thank you. So you agree also that your "wool bale" analogy is false?

Hans

1. The 33 000 tons are carried by 280+ columns. Average 118 tons/column

2. So 33 000 tons were shifted out of alignment with the columns below! Good. Actually 118 tons per column was shifted out of alignment. It means that these 118 tons will never again be applied on any column below! And it is valid for all columns.

3. <30% yield. Good industry standard!

4. ?? How can a column below be impacted when the load above has shifted out of alignment?

5. The upper part disintegrates before anything happens below the 'impact' zone. Very visible for WTC1! But see 4. How can a mass above impact a column below if it is not aligned?

6. See above. The beauty of a multi-column steel structure is that, if for any reason a mass above gets lose and starts to drop, it will not be aligned with the structure below = no global collapse. The weight drops beside the primary structure below!

The wool bale analogy I only use when 'experts' talk about uniform density above and other nonsense. The weight of the wool bale is evidently transmitted to 280+ columns as packing ... but when the packing has shifted out of alignment with any support below ... the weight above drops like a bale of wool. Then the stresses in the packing is ZERO. And the wool will just drop by the solid structure below.

Heiwa

PS Above replies all questions in your other comments. Just note that the initiation/impact zone is where the upper part allegedly free falls and vertically impacts the lower structure. Has nothing to do with a plane impacting same area 45-100 minutes earlier horizontally (another thread) which did not cause any global collapse of the intact structure below.

[CHF]

Heiwa,

where has your work been published or reviewed?

Just curious.

[Alferd_Packer]

2. So 33 000 tons were shifted out of alignment with the columns below! Good. Actually 118 tons per column was shifted out of alignment. It means that these 118 tons will never again be applied on any column below! And it is valid for all columns.


So, it the 33,000 ton mass was no longer being supported by the columns, what was supporting it then?

[Dave Rogers]

2. So 33 000 tons were shifted out of alignment with the columns below! Good. Actually 118 tons per column was shifted out of alignment. It means that these 118 tons will never again be applied on any column below! And it is valid for all columns.

[...]

6. See above. The beauty of a multi-column steel structure is that, if for any reason a mass above gets lose and starts to drop, it will not be aligned with the structure below = no global collapse. The weight drops beside the primary structure below!



It's always entertaining to watch the process by which unsupportable assertions descend into total, utter, unarguable lunacy. Heiwa, what you're suggesting is that the upper block should have shifted sideways so that none of the columns were aligned, but remained upright. It should then have fallen till the columns impacted the floors, then... what?

I think we have to go to multiple choice here.

Did the floors (a) suddenly acquire the ability to support the 30,000 ton weight of the upper block, or (b) collapse?

Choose (a) and you're clearly insane. Let's assume (b).

Now, even if the upper block shifted sideways, it must have rested on the lower block at two specific points, where the perimeter columns crossed each other.

http://forums.randi.org/imagehosting/1476447daaa50d8833.jpg (http://forums.randi.org/vbimghost.php?do=displayimg&imgid=11256)

This must have concentrated the entire weight of the upper block on two column trees of the perimeter structure. Did these column trees either (a) suddenly increase in strength by over 20 times and support the upper block all by themselves, or (b) fail under the additional load?

Again, choose (a) and you're clearly insane. Choose (b) and suddenly the perimeter column structure is starting to collapse.

Of course, none of this actually happened, because the upper block actually tilted as it fell, giving the additional result that oblique impacts occurred between formerly vertical columns. However, even if we imagine that the upper block miraculously just shifted a small amount sideways and stayed upright throughout the collapse, it's still geometrically impossible for all the columns to have missed each other, and this is obvious to anyone with a kindergarten level understanding of geometry.

Heiwa's explanations are getting more insane with every post.

Dave

[DGM]

Heiwa's explanations are getting more insane with every post.

Dave

Now that's saying something considering where he started. He's always assumed that the columns from the upper block landed on the lower in perfect alignment and simultaneously.

[rwguinn]

Now that's saying something considering where he started. He's always assumed that the columns from the upper block landed on the lower in perfect alignment and simultaneously.
What I find amusing it his basic, unstated, but inherent assumption:
When a tightrope walker steps off of the tower onto the rope, we can now remove the towers and he'll stay up there, along with the wire!

Waaaayyy too much Buggs Bunny and Roadrunner...

[Heiwa]

So, it the 33,000 ton mass was no longer being supported by the columns, what was supporting it then?

You do not know?? Come on! Use your brain! Nothing, of course! The 33 000 tons are alleged to free fall, impact on the column stubs below, create shock waves in the columns below and a 4000 m² crush front somewhere (in the columns??), etc = no support of any kind is absolutely required for that. The 280+ supports in the impact/initiation zone disappeared instantaneous according various 'experts' allowing free fall, etc. Never happened before, though. Happened twice on 911. Never seen on any video. Reminds me of WW2 901 1939. Hitler announced that Poland had attacked Germany (so Poland had to be wiped out).

[DGM]

You do not know?? Come on! Use your brain! Nothing, of course! The 33 000 tons are alleged to free fall, impact on the column stubs below, create shock waves in the columns below and a 4000 m² crush front somewhere (in the columns??), etc = no support of any kind is absolutely required for that. The 280+ supports in the impact/initiation zone disappeared instantaneous according various 'experts' allowing free fall, etc. Never happened before, though. Happened twice on 911. Never seen on any video. Reminds me of WW2 901 1939. Hitler announced that Poland had attacked Germany (so Poland had to be wiped out).
Alleged by who? Your the only one I've ever seen suggest anything so absurd. How do you translate what is reported into what you say they said (crap, that hurt my head)?

[Heiwa]

It's always entertaining to watch the process by which unsupportable assertions descend into total, utter, unarguable lunacy. Heiwa, what you're suggesting is that the upper block should have shifted sideways so that none of the columns were aligned, but remained upright. It should then have fallen till the columns impacted the floors, then... what?

I think we have to go to multiple choice here.

Did the floors (a) suddenly acquire the ability to support the 30,000 ton weight of the upper block, or (b) collapse?

Choose (a) and you're clearly insane. Let's assume (b).

Now, even if the upper block shifted sideways, it must have rested on the lower block at two specific points, where the perimeter columns crossed each other.

http://forums.randi.org/imagehosting/1476447daaa50d8833.jpg (http://forums.randi.org/vbimghost.php?do=displayimg&imgid=11256)

This must have concentrated the entire weight of the upper block on two column trees of the perimeter structure. Did these column trees either (a) suddenly increase in strength by over 20 times and support the upper block all by themselves, or (b) fail under the additional load?

Again, choose (a) and you're clearly insane. Choose (b) and suddenly the perimeter column structure is starting to collapse.

Of course, none of this actually happened, because the upper block actually tilted as it fell, giving the additional result that oblique impacts occurred between formerly vertical columns. However, even if we imagine that the upper block miraculously just shifted a small amount sideways and stayed upright throughout the collapse, it's still geometrically impossible for all the columns to have missed each other, and this is obvious to anyone with a kindergarten level understanding of geometry.

Heiwa's explanations are getting more insane with every post.

Dave

It is always fascinating to see what gray ideas/questions the yellow greenhorns produce to support the red tape of NIST.

To start with - if an upper column is misaligned with a lower column a distance corresponding to the thickness of the plate of the columns after free fall (takes 0.5 seconds - not seen of course), the columns will never impact each other. In layman's terms the upper column misses the lower column.
I would then assume that 50% of the upper perimeter columns are outside the building - no floors there unless balconies were fitted (not seen on any videos) - and will meet no resistance. They should thus drop straight down.

So, the columns never impact! What we would expect then is that it is the bottom floor of the upper part that impacts the upper floor of the lower part.

No problem according NIST. Nothing happens! The upper block just drops another storey. Another floor then impacts the floor sandwich on the top of the lower structure. Nothing happens according NIST except that another floor impacts the tripple sandwich below. According NIST you can stack 11 floors on top of the uppermost floor of the lower structure and then that floor will fall down. The global collapse apparently starts.

Bfore that time 50% of the perimeter columns of the upper block are hanging in free air on the outside of two walls, and the remaining 50% perimeter columns have been punching holes in 11 floors below just inside the other walls. Never seen on any videos or Hollywood production. It is quite insane, what NIST proposes.

Very strange collapse, cowboy! Just watching the ears of your horse?

[DGM]

It is always fascinating to see what gray ideas/questions the yellow greenhorns produce to support the red tape of NIST.

To start with - if an upper column is misaligned with a lower column a distance corresponding to the thickness of the plate of the columns after free fall (takes 0.5 seconds - not seen of course), the columns will never impact each other. In layman's terms the upper column misses the lower column.
I would then assume that 50% of the upper perimeter columns are outside the building - no floors there unless balconies were fitted (not seen on any videos) - and will meet no resistance. They should thus drop straight down.

So, the columns never impact! What we would expect then is that it is the bottom floor of the upper part that impacts the upper floor of the lower part.

No problem according NIST. Nothing happens! The upper block just drops another storey. Another floor then impacts the floor sandwich on the top of the lower structure. Nothing happens according NIST except that another floor impacts the tripple sandwich below. According NIST you can stack 11 floors on top of the uppermost floor of the lower structure and then that floor will fall down. The global collapse apparently starts.

Bfore that time 50% of the perimeter columns of the upper block are hanging in free air on the outside of two walls, and the remaining 50% perimeter columns have been punching holes in 11 floors below just inside the other walls. Never seen on any videos or Hollywood production. It is quite insane, what NIST proposes.

Very strange collapse, cowboy! Just watching the ears of your horse?
Does this mean something when it's translated back to your native language? In English it's pure gibberish.

[Heiwa]

Alleged by who? Your the only one I've ever seen suggest anything so absurd. How do you translate what is reported into what you say they said (crap, that hurt my head)?

NIST in its report, of course! It is not absurd, it is a fact. Release of PE. I quote them in my article. Another word for free fall. This PE is supposed to exceed the strain energy, SE, of the structure below and global collapse ensued. NIST forgot to explain that the PE must first be applied to the structure below. And that it could not.

[rwguinn]

Does this mean something when it's translated back to your native language? In English it's pure gibberish.

I think it translates to "I am out of Dried Frog Pills can you help me?"

[X]

What about the floors, Heiwa?
The floors, which provide supporting structure without which the building could not stand (yes, I am aware that you claim it was a "birdcage", but you have been unable to provide any proof of this, and many people have shown that assertion to be false). The floors, which, by an amazing coincidence, cover a significant portion of the cross-sectional area of the building. The floors, which could not avoid being impacted unless the top of the building shifted sideways by the full width of the building.

You are, in effect, claiming that because the columns didn't line up exactly when they failed, not load would have been transmitted since the top part of the building would have fallen right through the gaps between the columns of the remaining lower half to the ground below.

It's insane! Utterly insane.
You claim to be an engineer. Can you not see the flaw in your reasoning? Or are you going to keep spinning obfuscations to try and handwave it away?

[DGM]

NIST in its report, of course! It is not absurd, it is a fact. Release of PE. I quote them in my article. Another word for free fall. This PE is supposed to exceed the strain energy, SE, of the structure below and global collapse ensued. NIST forgot to explain that the PE must first be applied to the structure below. And that it could not.
Heiwa:
COULD IT FREAKING MISS!

Let me put this as a child could understand. The top was over the bottom. When the top fell it hit the bottom. It couldn't miss.

Does that help you understand, Heiwa?

[rwguinn]

Heiwa:
COULD IT FREAKING MISS!

Let me put this as a child could understand. The top was over the bottom. When the top fell it hit the bottom. It couldn't miss.

Does that help you understand, Heiwa?

Apparently, between the bouts of talking with himself, heiwa has trouble understanding that .5g =/= 1.0g.
(i have him on ignore, so I wonder --is he arguing with himself, and if so, does he win those arguments?)

[Newtons Bit]

I'm making an exception to my rule of not responding to Heiwa:

It is always fascinating to see what gray ideas/questions the yellow greenhorns produce to support the red tape of NIST.

To start with - if an upper column is misaligned with a lower column a distance corresponding to the thickness of the plate of the columns after free fall (takes 0.5 seconds - not seen of course), the columns will never impact each other. In layman's terms the upper column misses the lower column.
I would then assume that 50% of the upper perimeter columns are outside the building - no floors there unless balconies were fitted (not seen on any videos) - and will meet no resistance. They should thus drop straight down.

So, the columns never impact! What we would expect then is that it is the bottom floor of the upper part that impacts the upper floor of the lower part.

No problem according NIST. Nothing happens! The upper block just drops another storey. Another floor then impacts the floor sandwich on the top of the lower structure. Nothing happens according NIST except that another floor impacts the tripple sandwich below. According NIST you can stack 11 floors on top of the uppermost floor of the lower structure and then that floor will fall down. The global collapse apparently starts.

Bfore that time 50% of the perimeter columns of the upper block are hanging in free air on the outside of two walls, and the remaining 50% perimeter columns have been punching holes in 11 floors below just inside the other walls. Never seen on any videos or Hollywood production. It is quite insane, what NIST proposes.

Very strange collapse, cowboy! Just watching the ears of your horse?

Nothing could be further from the truth than this insane drivel of a mindless fanatical zealot of a ******** religion. All you have done here is show the extent of your own ignorance. You have told us all what you think NIST proposes and knocked this down, but all you have knocked down is your own fantasy: every word about NIST comes out of your mouth is a lie. Their report says nothing of what you do. Stop doing this, it is childish.

This is what NIST actually says: (http://wtc.nist.gov/pubs/factsheets/faqs_8_2006.htm)
Based on this comprehensive investigation, NIST concluded that the WTC towers collapsed because: (1) the impact of the planes severed and damaged support columns, dislodged fireproofing insulation coating the steel floor trusses and steel columns, and widely dispersed jet fuel over multiple floors; and (2) the subsequent unusually large jet-fuel ignited multi-floor fires (which reached temperatures as high as 1,000 degrees Celsius) significantly weakened the floors and columns with dislodged fireproofing to the point where floors sagged and pulled inward on the perimeter columns. This led to the inward bowing of the perimeter columns and failure of the south face of WTC 1 and the east face of WTC 2, initiating the collapse of each of the towers. Both photographic and video evidence—as well as accounts from the New York Police Department aviation unit during a half-hour period prior to collapse—support this sequence for each tower.

NIST’s findings do not support the “pancake theory” of collapse, which is premised on a progressive failure of the floor systems in the WTC towers (the composite floor system—that connected the core columns and the perimeter columns—consisted of a grid of steel “trusses” integrated with a concrete slab; see diagram below). Instead, the NIST investigation showed conclusively that the failure of the inwardly bowed perimeter columns initiated collapse and that the occurrence of this inward bowing required the sagging floors to remain connected to the columns and pull the columns inwards. Thus, the floors did not fail progressively to cause a pancaking phenomenon.

They discounted the pancake or sandwich theory. That theory was the speculation FEMA, and it is old and incorrect and has been stated so.

I've already done hand-calcs verifying that the columns would pull in (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=107267) as NIST states. I've shown that the idiotic truther notion that there isn't enough potential energy to continue the collapse (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=97584) is complete BS.

What have you done? You wrote a paper that has been self-described as targeting to children. But this forum is where men* dwell, Heiwa. You want to make these bold claims you do, do so with math and with engineering. I don't want to see completely false metaphors to small real-world objects. Start breaking out engineering principles and perform accurate computations of this inane drivel you spout. Put up or shut up.

*And women.

[Heiwa]

Heiwa:
COULD IT FREAKING MISS!

Let me put this as a child could understand. The top was over the bottom. When the top fell it hit the bottom. It couldn't miss.

Does that help you understand, Heiwa?

Of course it misses, if misaligned >thickness of the column plates. If <thickness of the column plates it may slide off. Very difficult to hit a nail with another nail.

We are talking columns of course.

That a complete lowest floor of the top part (weight 0.4 ton/m²) impacts a complete uppermost floor of the lower structure (that can carry according to Nist 4 ton/m²) is a completely different matter and just causes local failure (when 11 floors have been loaded) and will not affect the columns evidently, function of which is to transmit the load in the floors via the columns to the ground.

[Architect]

It is always fascinating to see what gray ideas/questions the yellow greenhorns produce to support the red tape of NIST.


Listen, pal, I've had just about enough of your insanity.

How many nation awards have you won for your work on tall buildings, eh?

How about if I can show to a mod that I've got more than you, you admit that you're the greenhorn and I'm the friggin expert?

Put up, or shut up.

[Heiwa]

This is what NIST actually says: (http://wtc.nist.gov/pubs/factsheets/faqs_8_2006.htm)


They discounted the pancake or sandwich theory. That theory was the speculation FEMA, and it is old and incorrect and has been stated so.

I've already done hand-calcs verifying that the columns would pull in (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=107267) as NIST states. I've shown that the idiotic truther notion that there isn't enough potential energy to continue the collapse (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=97584) is complete BS.

What have you done? You wrote a paper that has been self-described as targeting to children. But this forum is where men* dwell, Heiwa. You want to make these bold claims you do, do so with math and with engineering. I don't want to see completely false metaphors to small real-world objects. Start breaking out engineering principles and perform accurate computations of this inane drivel you spout. Put up or shut up.

*And women.

Hm, NIST is not talking about any global collapse in your quote but only about initiation in the so called initiation/impact zone before global collapse of structure below, that is not described at all. And that description is not very accurate, to say the least!

It ignores that the WTC1 upper block above the initiation/impact zone telescopes into itself, disintegrates, visible columns high above are displaced sidways several meters, etc. several seconds before 'initiation'. Such a block cannot cause and damage below!

That is the one main message of my article at http://heiwaco.tripod.com/nist.htm . Have you actually read it? Some easy maths there to check! BTW, my audience is also women. The Nist paper includes women as writers.

Normally I do not reply to obnoxious comments but your quote was a little ... misaligned.

[Heiwa]

Listen, pal, I've had just about enough of your insanity.

How many nation awards have you won for your work on tall buildings, eh?

How about if I can show to a mod that I've got more than you, you admit that you're the greenhorn and I'm the friggin expert?

Put up, or shut up.

You just proved my point.

[Alferd_Packer]

I would then assume that 50% of the upper perimeter columns are outside the building - no floors there unless balconies were fitted (not seen on any videos) - and will meet no resistance. They should thus drop straight down.

Like this?

http://forums.randi.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=10361&stc=1&d=1205589042

[Alferd_Packer]

It ignores that the WTC1 upper block above the initiation/impact zone telescopes into itself, disintegrates,

Even if it telescopes into itself and disintegrates, as you put it, the mass will still be there. All 33,000 tons of it.

Furthermore, because it has telescoped into itself and disintegrated, the load path of that mass will no longer be transmitted to the columns, now, will it?


visible columns high above are displaced sidways several meters, etc. several seconds before 'initiation'. Such a block cannot cause and damage below!


Once again, I ask you: Under your theory, if the 33,000 ton mass of the upper block was no longer supported by the columns, then how would the lower block have supported it as you claim that it should have? How would this structure been able to withstand the dynamic load of the falling mass?

[bofors]

Listen, pal, I've had just about enough of your insanity.

How many nation awards have you won for your work on tall buildings, eh?

How about if I can show to a mod that I've got more than you, you admit that you're the greenhorn and I'm the friggin expert?

Put up, or shut up.

How do your "nation awards" make up for your inability to understand basic physics?

[stateofgrace]

How do your "nation awards" make up for your inability to understand basic physics?

Maybe you could back up this question and point out the inabilities.

Thanks in advance.

[Newtons Bit]

Hm, NIST is not talking about any global collapse in your quote but only about initiation in the so called initiation/impact zone before global collapse of structure below, that is not described at all. And that description is not very accurate, to say the least!

It ignores that the WTC1 upper block above the initiation/impact zone telescopes into itself, disintegrates, visible columns high above are displaced sidways several meters, etc. several seconds before 'initiation'. Such a block cannot cause and damage below!

That is the one main message of my article at http://heiwaco.tripod.com/nist.htm . Have you actually read it? Some easy maths there to check! BTW, my audience is also women. The Nist paper includes women as writers.

Normally I do not reply to obnoxious comments but your quote was a little ... misaligned.

No, don't squirm away. Don't dodge. It's right there. You said that the columns would "miss" on two whole walls. That they would slide off. How can they do that if the collapse initiation results in the one whole wall being pulled inwards and the tower rotating into that void? They didn't miss on the outside, the missed on the INSIDE. Like this:
http://forums.randi.org/imagehosting/thum_1632947dbe85f60a84.jpg (http://forums.randi.org/vbimghost.php?do=displayimg&imgid=11262)
Or like this:
http://www.waarheid911.nl/wtc2collapse.jpg

The columns did not just magically move over a foot, like you claim. They obvious fell inside the building due to the rotation, not outside. Do you want to retract this claim? Man up to something.

I asked you to provide actual calculations, not the inaccurate little childish things you do on your "paper". I've read it, I posted criticisms of it, and then you called me a fraud and a charlatan because I didn't agree with you. Remember that? Do you want to respond to my criticisms are shall we just let it stand that your paper is complete b.s.?

Now then, are you actually going to do something real, or you going to keep squirming away and dodging serious questions? I've already shown that the PE is far greater than the strain energy of the towers. But if you think otherwise, show us with man. Come now, there's a lot of people here who can understand this. Don't be shy, do some math for us. Show us your theory based on engineering principles, not ridiculous metaphors to beds or fish tanks. But remember, I get paid to design buildings so they won't fall down. I'm going to look at what you say carefully.

[Newtons Bit]

How do your "nation awards" make up for your inability to understand basic physics?

Hey remember when you said this (http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php?p=3142287&postcount=122):
Perhaps we should consider appling Euler to entire WTC twin towers, they are certainly long and skinny.

Or how about: this (http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php?p=3142695&postcount=139):
According to this, k = 2 for the free standing WTC towers and 0.5 for columns members:

This one is hilarious (http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php?p=3143484&postcount=163): Here, Newtons Bit makes a calculation that any structural engineer should frankly be ashamed of. Instead of treating the WTC towers as interconnected structure of 240 perimeter columns and 47 core columns, he treats the columns as if they were independent of one another. Then he merely tries to sum their resistance to bending together. This is a gross error because the radius of gyration varies with both the cross-sectional area of the towers and their moment of inertia. Because the moment of inertia varies with depth and square of the width of the towers, we can see how extreme Newtons Bit's error is.

HILARIOUS. You can't even figure out how columns behave in a building and you're accusing someone else of have an inability in physics? Architect may be not an engineer, but he's certainly more qualified then you. Remember son, you're talking to professionals. We don't have to look up concepts on wikipedia or type them into Google because we don't know what other people are talking about when they say things like "shear, moment, moment of inertia, radius of gyration, shear flow, etc". We learned those things in school, we still have our textbooks on these subjects. Some of us even get paid to use them on a daily basis.

[Heiwa]

Even if it telescopes into itself and disintegrates, as you put it, the mass will still be there. All 33,000 tons of it.

Furthermore, because it has telescoped into itself and disintegrated, the load path of that mass will no longer be transmitted to the columns, now, will it?



Once again, I ask you: Under your theory, if the 33,000 ton mass of the upper block was no longer supported by the columns, then how would the lower block have supported it as you claim that it should have? How would this structure been able to withstand the dynamic load of the falling mass?

Nobody suggests that the mass goes missing. But it breaks up. It is not solid. It is a mess. Disorder. And such a mess cannot impact anything instantaneously. And not cause any global collapse because PE>SE. Gravity does not work like that. Most PE will just be deflected by solid structure and pushed to the side. That's why steel structure scyscrapers, etc. do not fall down like houses of cards.

My theory? Nist, Basant, Seffen, Spoof & Co suggest that the upper block was no longer supported by the columns at the impact/initiation zone ... and free falls, PE becomes KE, and impacts instantaneously the lower, intact structure. And that the upper block then remains intact and aligned with the lower structure all the time and produces global collapse chopping the columns below in pieces - like spaghetti. Nonsense of course.

My theory is just the opposite. The upper block, or what remains of it 3 seconds after the roof started to drop, is still connected to the structure, iwo the impact/initiation zone. Local collapses started far above the impact/initiation zone before anything else happened down below. The upper block disintegrates before destruction of the lower structure started. There is no free fall and no impact ... and no gravity driven collapse. What you see is some advanced type of CD.

[Heiwa]

No, don't squirm away. Don't dodge. It's right there. You said that the columns would "miss" on two whole walls. That they would slide off. How can they do that if the collapse initiation results in the one whole wall being pulled inwards and the tower rotating into that void? They didn't miss on the outside, the missed on the INSIDE. Like this:
http://forums.randi.org/imagehosting/thum_1632947dbe85f60a84.jpg (http://forums.randi.org/vbimghost.php?do=displayimg&imgid=11262)
Or like this:
http://www.waarheid911.nl/wtc2collapse.jpg

The columns did not just magically move over a foot, like you claim. They obvious fell inside the building due to the rotation, not outside. Do you want to retract this claim? Man up to something.

I asked you to provide actual calculations, not the inaccurate little childish things you do on your "paper". I've read it, I posted criticisms of it, and then you called me a fraud and a charlatan because I didn't agree with you. Remember that? Do you want to respond to my criticisms are shall we just let it stand that your paper is complete b.s.?

Now then, are you actually going to do something real, or you going to keep squirming away and dodging serious questions? I've already shown that the PE is far greater than the strain energy of the towers. But if you think otherwise, show us with man. Come now, there's a lot of people here who can understand this. Don't be shy, do some math for us. Show us your theory based on engineering principles, not ridiculous metaphors to beds or fish tanks. But remember, I get paid to design buildings so they won't fall down. I'm going to look at what you say carefully.

Nice picture of WTC2 that proves my point 100%. No alignment at all of upper block with lower intact structure. No free fall, no impact columns against columns. What you see on the photo is part of an unusual CD of WTC2. A second later the upper block disintegrates completely ... no load acting on it so you should wonder why! ... and long before it hits the ground. Where did the upper block of WTC2 go? It is supposed to drive the global collapse of the lower structure by falling straight down on it; impacts, crush front, etc.

Read my article, the math is not too difficult, it is peer reviewed but have a try to find something wrong. Just copy/paste the erroneous part.

As a test I have hidden one minor error in my article.

[rwguinn]

Is he winning his argument with himself yet?

[X]

What you see is some advanced type of CD.

And we're back to controlled demolition.

You know what? I'm not going to argue about all the evidence against a CD. The evidence which should be present, but isn't.
No. Forget about that.

Instead, I want you to answer one simple question, which I feel poses perhaps the biggest problem to controlled-demolition theorists.

Where do you think "they" found a company/organization willing to secretly rig the towers for demolition knowing full well that the collapse was going to kill thousands of people?

Where do you find a compay to do that? By your theory, whatever group did it must have done it in secrecy, leaving no signs of demolition devices, and every single member of that group had to remain silent during the entire set up, and after if they weren't silenced. A lot of people had to reamin silent about knowing fulll well that their actions would result in untold innocent deaths.

Where do you find a company capable of doing such a heinous thing to their own countrymen?

If you can't answer that, everything else is pointless, including erroneous speculation (oft corrected to no avail) about how the towers were constructed and fell.




ETA: I apologize if this is off-topic. Mods: Please split this if it is inappropriate to the thread.

[Architect]

How do your "nation awards" make up for your inability to understand basic physics?

Don't make me laugh. Spelling error aside, the challenge stands. I've got a Civic Trust award for my work on tall buildings, and I'll prove it to the Mods. You and your little shipbuilding chum can either accept the challenge, or quit claiming that we're greenhorns.

Come on, put up or shut up.

[Dave Rogers]

How do your "nation awards" make up for your inability to understand basic physics?

Hey, Bofors, remember when you claimed that the Second Law of Thermodynamics stated that a high symmetry state couldn't evolve spontaneously from a low symmetry state, and I pointed out that you'd just effectively claimed that crystal growth from a solution was impossible? What did that say about your ability to understand basic physics?

Dave

[Heiwa]

;3529118']And we're back to controlled demolition.

You know what? I'm not going to argue about all the evidence against a CD. The evidence which should be present, but isn't.
No. Forget about that.

Instead, I want you to answer one simple question, which I feel poses perhaps the biggest problem to controlled-demolition theorists.

Where do you think "they" found a company/organization willing to secretly rig the towers for demolition knowing full well that the collapse was going to kill thousands of people?

Where do you find a compay to do that? By your theory, whatever group did it must have done it in secrecy, leaving no signs of demolition devices, and every single member of that group had to remain silent during the entire set up, and after if they weren't silenced. A lot of people had to reamin silent about knowing fulll well that their actions would result in untold innocent deaths.

Where do you find a company capable of doing such a heinous thing to their own countrymen?

If you can't answer that, everything else is pointless, including erroneous speculation (oft corrected to no avail) about how the towers were constructed and fell.




ETA: I apologize if this is off-topic. Mods: Please split this if it is inappropriate to the thread.

Well, if gravity alone could not do the job, what happened? I only demonstrate in my article, in layman's terms, that WTC1,2 were not gravity driven collapses. Too little PE available and the PE/KE is not applied on the structure below, actually the PE/KE (the upper block) disappears before initiation at WTC1, and has tilted so far outside WTC2 that it cannot apply any PE/KE below (and the upper block WTC2 disappears then too completely). The initiations are very suspect!
The PE/KE of any rubble produced after initiation below is just broken pieces and cannot be included in any gravity energy calculation as being applied to lower structure still intact to drive a gravity collapse - it just is broken structure of the lower structure. The only PE available is, as Bazant and Seffen points out correctly, the upper block ... but then they make the arroneous assumtion that it, the upper block, has uniform density and is applied to the structure below ... like a snow/soil avalanche. But it is not seen on any videos or photos.

You should evidently put your questions to the FBI.

[Architect]

Your bizarre theory is based, as ever, on your failure to grasp the basic structural design concept of the tower.

Let me repeat this, if only in order that later readers can be aware of how little knowledge you really have of the building. I'll write it in terms a second year structures student will understand, in order to give you a fighting chance.


Each of the WTC Towers was constructed in a similar tubular formation, reaching heights of 1,362 feet and 1,368 feet for WTC 1 and 2 respectively. The structures were designed as a combination of three main components: the external envelope or perimeter columns, the interior core columns, and the floors.

Each facade consisting of prefabricated steel lattices formed each building and collectively they were the world's highest load-bearing walls. The lattices were made up of more than 130 closely spaced vertical cantilevered steel columns, creating a "hollow tube" structure. Each column was itself a hollow 14-inch square steel box section placed at approximately 39 inch centres. These exterior columns served as wind bracers for the building to resist overturning forces such as high speed winds.

Each tower's core comprised a series of columns, beams, and bracing. The core was designed to support its own gravity load, the elevator system, and of course half of the floors. It did support the external structure. This design left the office space free of constricting interior columns.

Prefabricated steel trusses, 33 inches in depth, were welded to the exterior columns and supported the compiste steel and concrete floor plates of the two towers. These floors spanned the entire 60 feet to the core against wind loadings, deflection, and the like.

Not one person in the professional engineering community has produced any meaningful analysis which even suggests that the core, or the outer facade, can survive as anything other than an inter-linked structure. Not one. This is not surprising; the engineering and cost implications of such a design would be simply untennable.

The collapse sequence is well understood, based on visual evidence and structural modelling.

The fire results in failure of the floor trusses at a number of locations, which in turn pull the outer envelope inwards rather than shearing. Buckling impairs the structural perormance of the envelope, transferring the loads elsewhere, and rapid progressive collapse occurs.

As far as I can tell, Heiwa, your structural hypothesis is based upon a number of untennable assumptions which barely qualify as engineering including, inter alia:

- That steelwork is not susceptible to fire induced failure (although I note that you are gradually stepping back from this absurd claim).

- That the floors do not, in fact, pay a part in the overall composite structure and that the external envelope was designed to act as a freestanding structure in its own right.

- That columnar failure would only be precipitated by overloading immediately thereone, i.e. an end to end impact, and not by any interaction with the floor structure.

- That the fragmented nature of the collapse following initiation would have, as far as I can tell, have resulted in a more gradual increase in floor loadings which would, in turn, allow us to discount the overall kinetic energy arising from impact of the upper structure.

- That rendering mass as overall desnity rather than considering load paths, point loadings, and so on is an appropriate means of considering such kinetic energy issues as might arise.

I put it to you, as others have done before, that this is little more that a preposterous bluff which owes absolutely nothing to any branch of construction or structural engineering which those of us who are actually qualified in the field would understand.

It is particularly amusing that, in discussions pertaining to the hard realities around structural engineering and building design, you have adopted the position that your lay opinion is to be preferred no just to myself or NB but rather the entire engineering community - Arup, Nist, BRE, Bazant, Edinburgh University, Sheffield University, the authors of the Eurocodes, and indeed the rest of our field.

Under such circumstances, Heiwa, I really can only conclude that you must be ill. There is no way in which a purportedly competent and sane professional could so fail to grasp the basic analysis and then simply ignore cogent points put to him. I would therefore encourage you to cease your sensless posting and seek professional help, before it all goes too far.

[Heiwa]

1. Prefabricated steel trusses, 33 inches in depth, were welded to the exterior columns and supported the compiste steel and concrete floor plates of the two towers. These floors spanned the entire 60 feet to the core against wind loadings, deflection, and the like.

2. The collapse sequence is well understood, based on visual evidence and structural modelling.

3. The fire results in failure of the floor trusses at a number of locations, which in turn pull the outer envelope inwards rather than shearing. Buckling impairs the structural perormance of the envelope, transferring the loads elsewhere, and rapid progressive collapse occurs.



1. The floor trusses were generally bolted to the columns.

2. The collapse sequence is not understood at all. First PE>SE (local failures + freefall + impact + >90 impacts = none seen anywhere) and then in a FAQ Dec 2007 floors dropping down according Nist. Impacts can only occur between two solid objects, perfectly aligned. Basic. Do not exist in any steel structure.

3. A failed floor (local failure) cannot pull an outer envelope inwards. What would pull in the outer envelope? A floor broken in two?

Many people believe that when ships impact water/waves in rough weather, e.g. that the ship's bottom slams down onto the water surface or that the bow flare above water impacts an oncoming wave and that water/ship meets but it is all nonsense. The ship surface and the water surface are never perfectly aligned (flat to flat) for a solid impact to take place! You can test it yourself - drop a flat solid surface on an absolutely flat water surface and you will find that the air between the solid surface and the water will affect the water surface and make it rounded = no real impact. It is more obvious if you ripple the water a little. No impact at all! What is observed as an impact is only air trapped between the two surfaces that compresses ... and then explodes a a certain pressure (often about 10 bars) and most energy produces a big splash. For similar reasons an upper part structure of a WTC tower can never impact on the lower structure; no alignment, no solid to solid touch/impact, one part will be deflected by the other, neither part is solid, very small load bearing areas that can really impact each other, etc. Result? Most PE is lost into the air. That's why steel buildings never collapse on itself due to gravity. So the WTC collapse sequence assuming any sorts of impacts is just nonsense. Real impacts only occur between solid steel balls or similar to explain momentum transfers and no such things took place 911.

But please, copy/paste anything you find wrong in my article and explain what is wrong in lieu of vague references to unknown experts of all kinds about OT subjects.

[Architect]

It did not support the external structure. This design left the office space free of constricting interior columns.


An apparently minor but critical typo there.

[Architect]

1. The floor trusses were generally bolted to the columns.

Well there's a statement of the blindingly obvious.


2. The collapse sequence is not understood at all. First PE>SE (local failures + freefall + impact + >90 impacts = none seen anywhere) and then in a FAQ Dec 2007 floors dropping down according Nist. Impacts can only occur between two solid objects, perfectly aligned. Basic. Do not exist in any steel structure.


Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Firstly, no-one has uniform pancake collapse -which is what you're describing - as the udnerlying cause. Show me a linked reference, if you can. Secondly, you once again ignore the effects that destabilisation of the floor structure has on the outer and inner envelopes.

This is basic stuff. Why can't you grasp it?


3. A failed floor (local failure) cannot pull an outer envelope inwards. What would pull in the outer envelope? A floor broken in two?


Sag in the trusses. Really, have you even read the NIST report properly?

Many people believe that when ships impact water/waves in rough weather, e.g. that the ship's bottom slams down onto the water surface or that the bow flare above water impacts an oncoming wave and that water/ship meets but it is all nonsense. The ship surface and the water surface are never perfectly aligned (flat to flat) for a solid impact to take place! You can test it yourself - drop a flat solid surface on an absolutely flat water surface and you will find that the air between the solid surface and the water will affect the water surface and make it rounded = no real impact. It is more obvious if you ripple the water a little. No impact at all! What is observed as an impact is only air trapped between the two surfaces that compresses ... and then explodes a a certain pressure (often about 10 bars) and most energy produces a big splash.

Are you seriously trying to make a comparison between the interaction of a fluid and the collapse of two structural components? Is this what underpins your hypothesis?


For similar reasons an upper part structure of a WTC tower can never impact on the lower structure; no alignment, no solid to solid touch/impact, one part will be deflected by the other, neither part is solid, very small load bearing areas that can really impact each other, etc.

That is just so wrong that it hardly merits a reply. So 33000 tonnes were just going to gently slide off the bottom structure, were they?

Result? Most PE is lost into the air. That's why steel buildings never collapse on itself due to gravity. So the WTC collapse sequence assuming any sorts of impacts is just nonsense. Real impacts only occur between solid steel balls or similar to explain momentum transfers and no such things took place 911.

That's right, the 30,000 tonnes - in bits - would magically bounce sideways and would never cause an overload in the underlying structure! How could we all be so wrong?!?!

But please, copy/paste anything you find wrong in my article and explain what is wrong in lieu of vague references to unknown experts of all kinds about OT subjects.

It's been done already. You're just ignoring it, as ever. Just like you "forgot" that you claimed that steel was magically fireproof.


Get medical help.

[X]

Well, if gravity alone could not do the job, what happened? I only demonstrate in my article, in layman's terms, that WTC1,2 were not gravity driven collapses. Too little PE available and the PE/KE is not applied on the structure below, actually the PE/KE (the upper block) disappears before initiation at WTC1, and has tilted so far outside WTC2 that it cannot apply any PE/KE below (and the upper block WTC2 disappears then too completely). The initiations are very suspect!
The PE/KE of any rubble produced after initiation below is just broken pieces and cannot be included in any gravity energy calculation as being applied to lower structure still intact to drive a gravity collapse - it just is broken structure of the lower structure. The only PE available is, as Bazant and Seffen points out correctly, the upper block ... but then they make the arroneous assumtion that it, the upper block, has uniform density and is applied to the structure below ... like a snow/soil avalanche. But it is not seen on any videos or photos.

You should evidently put your questions to the FBI.



That is not an answer, and rests upon the assumption that "gravity alone could not do the job".
You have been repeatedly shown that this is untrue. But instead of realizing the outlandishness of your claims, instead of this question making you think that maybe your answer isn't correct, you launch into more absurd and incorrect theories.



Heiwa, Let me tell you something. I do not mean this as a personal attack, I am saying it as a last-ditch effort to get you to take a dispassionate look at exactly what it is you are claiming:

In Canada, you would be at serious risk of losing your engineering certification for your claims here and on your website. You make claims outside your area of expertise, but back them up by using your professional status as an engineer.
- You make claims that are wrong, and refuse to correct them.
- You maintain the position that every single expert in the relevant fields are wrong and amateurs, and that you, a ship deisgner, know more about buildings and structural mechanics than do people who actually design buioldings.
- You peddle your nonsense to children and other people without the technical knowledge to see the errors.
- You are falsely accusing the U.S. government of murdering it's own people.

It is dishonest. It is borederline incompetent. I do not doubt that you know a lot about nautical engineering. But you are out of your depth when it comes to buildings.
The professional responsibility you are shredding is the same professional responsibility that would have all knowledgeable engineers worldwide up in arms demanding answers (and listeneing to them) if there were indeed anything at all in their analysis or the evidence that did not fit with aircraft impact and fires. Engineers are professionals. They have to be, because their work is often critical to public safety.

Please stop.

[ElMondoHummus]

;3531537']In Canada, you would be at serious risk of losing your engineering certification for your claims here and on your website.

Hmm... problem is, I don't think he has to worry about losing certification in Sweden:


Swedish engineers are not required to have a license or certification from a specific state or central organization.


Source: http://www.overseasdigest.com/country/Sweden.htm#Engineering

Assuming that Heiwa resides and practices in Sweden, that is.

[Architect]

Assuming that Heiwa resides and practices in Sweden, that is.

Oh for heaven's sake......they must be just about the only country in the EU that doesn't require registration/chartering of their engineers.

It explains a lot.

[Heiwa]

;3531537']
That is not an answer, and rests upon the assumption that "gravity alone could not do the job".
You have been repeatedly shown that this is untrue.

Where? PE>SE according Nist! Nonsense.

No, it is a well known FACT that if local failure occurs in an upper part of a steel structure, gravity alone will NOT destroy the whole structure due to that 'initiation'. The PE released due local failure is always diverted away by intact structure. Quite basic. WTC 1 and 2 are the only exceptions.

It seems we have different opinions.

But please feel free to copy/paste any errors you find in my article.

[Architect]

Heiwa

Don't make us laugh. We've responded umpteem times and challenged you to provide structural calculations. You've evaded such issues time and time again. You're not interested in debate, only your own personal delusion.

[Apollo20]

This debate is going nowhere, so let me offer this:

I believe Heiwa's main point is that the Twin Towers were like very tall cages. And the more a cage structure is multiply connected horizontally as well as vertically, the more robust it gets. So how can a cage, or a part of a cage, collapse/crush another cage?

Now that's a fair question. But I think the answer to this question is that such a collapse can in fact happen if the cage unit-cells are weakly inter-connected, and this was probably the case for the Twin Towers. WTC 1 & 2 had relatively weak welds and relatively weak bolts. The buildings could literally "fall to pieces" if struck/stressed in a particular way.

Thus there is no need for explosives to explain the collapse of WTC 1 & 2. The structure of each tower was very sensitive (anywhere below the 100th floor) to local lateral stresses/impacts + heating rates. As a consequence, certain conditions are capable of triggering a self-propagating domino-effect/unzipping type of collapse, especially in the case of top-heavy buildings such as the Twin Towers.

[Sizzler]

Look at the upper left side of the falling upper block. I never noticed the bowing of the perimeter columns so high up in the building. Did this occur before or after collapse initiation?



http://www.waarheid911.nl/wtc2collapse.jpg

[R.Mackey]

Yes, NIST refers to this as "The Kink." It is strongly implied that this occurred after collapse initiation (but only just). Search for it in NCSTAR1-5A and NCSTAR1-6.

[Apollo20]

Sizzler

Yes, it's Heiwa's box spring bending. They also talk about it in the NIST Report (of course!)... sorry I cant give the reference, but I see RM can!

[Sizzler]

Thanks guys. Never noticed that before.

[MRC_Hans]

Sorry, you are totally wrong! How would the wall columns buckle without floors (and then no loads on them)? Outwards or inwards. Sorry, kept in place by the spandrels acting as belts around the tower. Inline, sideways? Sorry, no influence by floors there.

Main function of the floor, bolted on and hanging on the wall, was to walk on! Another function was to transmit horizontal wind loads on one wall to the opposite wall allowing the tower to sway, albeit steadily, sideways.

With all floors hanging on a wall the stress in the wall columns was 20% of yield all the way. Remove the floors and the stress was 1% of yield (only due to columns own weight). Buckling stress in both cases are >100% of yield, so nothing will happen.

Without floors WTCs were very strong cages. And cages of any size do not collapse due own weight. Read my article comparing WTC1,2 with a bird cage.You are wrong. Why do you think pylons have stays?

A very high column can only stand as long as the vertical pressure vector falls within it's circumference. If it bends just a little bit, then the pressure comes outside the circumference and it bends more. This leads to collapse. Thus has nothing to do with buckling stress which presupposes that the force vector stays within the column.

Layman's explanation:


Take a wooden broomstick.
Saw about one foot of lenght off it.
Take the one foot piece and put it on two bricks so just the ends are supported.
Try to break it pushing down on the middle with your hand.Odds are you can't.

Now repeat the procedure with the long piace of the broomstick. Much easier to break, right?

Now imagine a 100ft broomstick. Will it be able to carry its own weight?
Hardly.

Re. Bird cages:

A lot of people make the mistake of thinking that mechanical structures are freely scalable. They are not. Far from, in fact. The reason for this is that if you take a mechanical part, say, a steel girder and make it twice as big (scale it 2:1) then its width will be doubled, but its weight will be 8 times as big. This means that if you scale it sufficiently, it will buckle under its own weight. Likewise, a bird-cage is a quite rugged structure. But scale it 100:1, and it will collapse under its own weight.

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

1. The 33 000 tons are carried by 280+ columns. Average 118 tons/column

2. So 33 000 tons were shifted out of alignment with the columns below! Good. Actually 118 tons per column was shifted out of alignment. It means that these 118 tons will never again be applied on any column below! And it is valid for all columns.

So, you agree that the 33,000 tons are now no longer supported by the columns that used to support them. Good, we are making progress! Now, bereft of support, what will the 33,000 tons do? Hover??


3. <30% yield. Good industry standard!


So you concede that it was just standard margin. Thanks.


4. ?? How can a column below be impacted when the load above has shifted out of alignment?


Who says it was impacted directly? Where does the load go, now the column no longer supports it?


5. The upper part disintegrates before anything happens below the 'impact' zone. Very visible for WTC1! But see 4. How can a mass above impact a column below if it is not aligned?


I see no sign of that. Please provide support for that claim. Not that it matters. Disintegrated or not, it weights 33,000 tons. What carries the 33,000 tons?

6. See above. The beauty of a multi-column steel structure is that, if for any reason a mass above gets lose and starts to drop, it will not be aligned with the structure below = no global collapse. The weight drops beside the primary structure below!

Where does it go? If the primary structure below does not stop it, what does?


The wool bale analogy I only use when 'experts' talk about uniform density above and other nonsense. The weight of the wool bale is evidently transmitted to 280+ columns as packing ... but when the packing has shifted out of alignment with any support below ... the weight above drops like a bale of wool. Then the stresses in the packing is ZERO. And the wool will just drop by the solid structure below.


So you mean that it passes frictionlessly through the structure below or what exactly do you claim happens to it? There is 33,000 tons perched over the remains of the building, with nothing to support it. What do you claim happens to it?


PS Above replies all questions in your other comments. Just note that the initiation/impact zone is where the upper part allegedly free falls and vertically impacts the lower structure. Has nothing to do with a plane impacting same area 45-100 minutes earlier horizontally (another thread) which did not cause any global collapse of the intact structure below.

No, you did not answer all my questions, but never mind; I was never into Larsen Lists. Just answer the question here: What happened to the 33,000 unsupported tons of building?

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

It is always fascinating to see what gray ideas/questions the yellow greenhorns produce to support the red tape of NIST.

To start with - if an upper column is misaligned with a lower column a distance corresponding to the thickness of the plate of the columns after free fall (takes 0.5 seconds - not seen of course), the columns will never impact each other. In layman's terms the upper column misses the lower column.
I would then assume that 50% of the upper perimeter columns are outside the building - no floors there unless balconies were fitted (not seen on any videos) - and will meet no resistance. They should thus drop straight down.

So, the columns never impact! What we would expect then is that it is the bottom floor of the upper part that impacts the upper floor of the lower part.

No problem according NIST. Nothing happens! The upper block just drops another storey. Another floor then impacts the floor sandwich on the top of the lower structure. Nothing happens according NIST except that another floor impacts the tripple sandwich below. According NIST you can stack 11 floors on top of the uppermost floor of the lower structure and then that floor will fall down. The global collapse apparently starts.

Bfore that time 50% of the perimeter columns of the upper block are hanging in free air on the outside of two walls, and the remaining 50% perimeter columns have been punching holes in 11 floors below just inside the other walls. Never seen on any videos or Hollywood production. It is quite insane, what NIST proposes.

Very strange collapse, cowboy! Just watching the ears of your horse?

So we have this 33,000 tons of upper building, which, you apparantly agree, has been robbed of its support. Now, cowboy, what does it do:

1) Fly away to Kansas?

2) Hover and wait for the Marines?

3) Settle calmly on top of the remaining building, which, in spite of the supports being misaligned, carries its weight?

4) Jump to the side and land in the street below?

5) Crash down though the remaining building gathering momentum as more and more of the building is turned into falling junk?

Please pick only one. (Hint: The right answer is likely to be consistent with observed facts).

Hans :dio:

[MRC_Hans]

Apparently, between the bouts of talking with himself, heiwa has trouble understanding that .5g =/= 1.0g.
(i have him on ignore, so I wonder --is he arguing with himself, and if so, does he win those arguments?)No, not even those. That would require a minimum of logical consistence.

Hans

[Heiwa]

This debate is going nowhere, so let me offer this:

I believe Heiwa's main point is that the Twin Towers were like very tall cages. And the more a cage structure is multiply connected horizontally as well as vertically, the more robust it gets. So how can a cage, or a part of a cage, collapse/crush another cage?

Now that's a fair question. But I think the answer to this question is that such a collapse can in fact happen if the cage unit-cells are weakly inter-connected, and this was probably the case for the Twin Towers. WTC 1 & 2 had relatively weak welds and relatively weak bolts. The buildings could literally "fall to pieces" if struck/stressed in a particular way.

Thus there is no need for explosives to explain the collapse of WTC 1 & 2. The structure of each tower was very sensitive (anywhere below the 100th floor) to local lateral stresses/impacts + heating rates. As a consequence, certain conditions are capable of triggering a self-propagating domino-effect/unzipping type of collapse, especially in the case of top-heavy buildings such as the Twin Towers.

I think the debate is very good when it is On Topic. I have got very valuable information. Photos, etc.

However, there are 1000's of photos of the collapses but unfortunately some are missing, i.e. those during the 0.5 seconds when the upper blocks start to free fall 3.7 meters - all columns failed - and then collide/impact with the structure below transmitting the upper block KE to the structure below. It is then the clock of collapse time should start.

But if there is no 'free fall' and no 'impact' then no gravity driven collapses can even be initiated and no collapse time clock will start. Any calculations about what happens after the alleged 'impact' become then pretty theoretical and, why not, meaningless?

So I would be grateful to see some photos when the upper blocks starts to free fall with the relevant columns missing, some photos a little after during free fall and some photos when the upper blocks collide/impact/strike with the lower structure.

That would settle the debate, I assume, that the collapses were actually started by gravity.

[Alferd_Packer]

oops, never mind

[Apollo20]

Heiwa:

There are plenty of photos/videos of WTC 1 AND WTC 2 showing the perimeter columns in the fire-affected impact zones bowing inwards. What do you think caused this bowing to occur? And do you think it contributed to collapse initiation?

[Alferd_Packer]

Heiwa, have you ever seen this formula before?

http://www.efunda.com/formulae/solid_mechanics/columns/images/Fcr.gif

[NobbyNobbs]

I have last year written a paper about WTC1 for children that I copied Nist of course and then Nist changed opinion and suggested that 6-11 floors dropped down and caused global collapse. My paper has then been noted at JREF and there we are. No need to call anyone at Nist or contributing to Nist a fool. They are just working for the government.

You wrote a paper for kids? How on earth does that solve any problems?



Does anybody at JREF believe that a mass of uniform density 0.18, that collides with something, causes global collapse of something?


1. Go get a rowboat, and fill it with water until just before it sinks. The density of the rowboat is now only very slightly less than 1.

2. Now, row that boat out into the path of a battleship. (Bonus question: is the density of the battleship greater than or less than that of the rowboat?) See what happens to the rowboat.

3. After you swim back to shore, revise your theory about the twin towers.

[Myriad]

But if there is no 'free fall' and no 'impact' then no gravity driven collapses can even be initiated and no collapse time clock will start.


Heiwa, this is something you've been consistently wrong about all along. All that is needed to start a collapse is enough force to start things moving. The weight of the top of the tower is a force. When enough support members have been severed and weakened to no longer exert an upward force equal to the weight they have to support, f = ma will take over. The weight will start moving. That's collapse initiation. No impact (except, in this case, the impact of the airplane that caused support members to be severed) is required. No free-fall is required.

The conversion of gravitational potential energy into inelastic strain energy of the overloaded buckling columns, and into kinetic energy, happens as a result of the unbalanced force causing the mass to move. It doesn't have to happen "first."

Respectfully,
Myriad

[Newtons Bit]

Nice picture of WTC2 that proves my point 100%. No alignment at all of upper block with lower intact structure.

No, it completely disproves your point. You said it fell OUTSIDE. Stop trying to squirm away and admit that you made a small goof.

No free fall, no impact columns against columns. What you see on the photo is part of an unusual CD of WTC2. A second later the upper block disintegrates completely ... no load acting on it so you should wonder why! ... and long before it hits the ground. Where did the upper block of WTC2 go? It is supposed to drive the global collapse of the lower structure by falling straight down on it; impacts, crush front, etc.

This is complete B.S. The upper block does not disintegrate. It is heavily damaged, but so is the upper floors of the lower block, imagine! And then it travels inside of the tower and causing more damage to the floors below.


Read my article, the math is not too difficult, it is peer reviewed but have a try to find something wrong. Just copy/paste the erroneous part.

As a test I have hidden one minor error in my article.

From your paper
The major problem is that the authorities suggest that the top part, the upper block of WTC1 with mean density 0.18 tons/m3 above the alleged buckled columns in the initiation zone - no such damaged, buckled, columns have been retrieved from the rubble - drops free fall (!) as a rigid mass and releases potential energy, PE, and then destroys the weak steel structure below due to lack of strain energy, SE, there after an impact between the upper rigid part and the lower non-rigid part, while all videos of the collapse show that the upper block in fact telescopes into itself for 2-4 seconds, while the steel structure below is still intact! WTC2 is similar. The whole upper part of WTC2 tips over and disappears soon after. No free fall or impact occurs ... and cannot occur!

False. The upper block obviously falls at NEAR free-fall, otherwise we wouldn't have seen it fall. You can't say something didn't happen when there's video recording that it did.

Gravity is a force of attraction between any two objects. WTC1 and 2 consisted of many objects and, when WTC1 and 2 were intact and all objects were attached to each other, gravity resulted in compressive stresses in the primary load bearing columns that were <30% of the yield stress as will be shown in 3. below.

Inaccurate. You cannot take the entire cross-section of the tower and the entire load and say all columns were below a certain stress. This is because columns near severed and damaged columns are primary to resolving the loss of nearby strength. Furthermore, this ignores simple concepts such as a cantilever (ONE example) developing after a column is severed/damaged. This will multiply the vertical loads, easily overloading columns.

A floor is not a primary load bearing object. It just transmits its weight to the primary load bearing objects. It will also be clarified in 3. below.

False, the floors are necessary to provide bracing against buckling.

If you cut a primary load bearing vertical column in one location, it cannot transmit any load and the stress in it at the cut becomes zero. If you then cut the same object a bit away, the lose part will evidently drop out and fall down. If it is located in the wall, it is likely it drops down to the ground outside the structure. A core column may fall on a floor or down a lift shaft.

WTF. Obviously there is no stress in a column just above a cut. But the force that used to exist in that column has to be TRANSFERED SOMEWHERE ELSE. And it will not do that in a pure vertical fashion. You cannot understand the simple fact that the vertical forces will apply more than just a compressive force to the structure. This is BASIC statics.

In WTC1 and 2 we are told that 280+ primary load bearing vertical columns simultaneously failed in two locations in an initiation zone ... and disappeared allowing free fall. Fair enough! I do not believe it, because it is a crazy idea, but let's assume it anyway so this article can describe the madness.

Strawman. No one ever said that the columns failed simultaneously. Nor is this implied by the phyiscal evidence. The fact that both towers leaned noticeably during collapse shows that the towers collapsed linearly (roughly) from one side to another. This makes sense from how the tower actually resists core column failures.

Well, if the upper block above the initiation zone was then hanging in a crane and slowly lowered down and placed on the lower structure, the lower structure would evidently carry the upper block ... as before. The columns would again be stressed to <30% yield stress.

WTF? The upper block wasn't lowered, it collapsed. That's the entire point. Dynamic forces are much higher than static forces. That's why we design framing below corridors for 100psf live load, even though they will never expierence that amount of load statically. They will expierence something close to that dynamically.

These are the first six of your paragraphs. They are all complete crap. I'm just going to randomly select a few more.

How is the yield stress of steel affected by heat? In this writer's opinion it is not affected very much at about 500°C. This is confirmed by any fire test - the test chamber and what's in it never collapses due to the heat inside up to 1000°C. The heat inside is normally by kerosene set on fire.

Complete crap. I recommend you do a little research rather than relying on your own "opinion".

The total strain energy our wall and core columns and attached spandrels and floors can absorb is evidently the energy required to first strain them to 100% yield - the elastic strain energy - and second to buckle or rip them apart - the buckle or rupture strain energy. In order to rip a column apart, the stresses in the structure must exceed the rupture/break stress of the steel that is much higher than the yield or buckling stress.

Uneducated in engineering. The column will buckle before 100%, energy is absorbed when the column rotated about a plastic hinge (buckling), and THEN there will be a small amount of energy in rupture. Buckling is not the same rupture strain energy.

Reason why a steel building cannot collapse due to release of potential energy is, in simple terms, that the potential energy will mainly be applied to secondary structure - the floors - that will be overloaded and detached from the primary structure - the columns! The potential energy will then not be applied to the primary structure ... that will remain intact!

The floors are necessary to support the columns, otherwise they will just fall over and outwards (which is what happened) under smallish forces.

You also seem to be of the opinion that the entire upper block should disintegrate. But that doesn't make any sense. If the upper block can disintegrate from the striking the lower block, shouldn't the lower block (made of the same material, same craptacular uniform density measurement that you use) also be able to take damage from the upper block? You can't have it both ways.

Now then, you said something about calculations in your paper. The only thing I saw was inaccurately calculating weight and compressive stresses. Was there something else that I missed?

[Heiwa]

Heiwa, this is something you've been consistently wrong about all along. All that is needed to start a collapse is enough force to start things moving. The weight of the top of the tower is a force. When enough support members have been severed and weakened to no longer exert an upward force equal to the weight they have to support, f = ma will take over. The weight will start moving. That's collapse initiation. No impact (except, in this case, the impact of the airplane that caused support members to be severed) is required. No free-fall is required.

The conversion of gravitational potential energy into inelastic strain energy of the overloaded buckling columns, and into kinetic energy, happens as a result of the unbalanced force causing the mass to move. It doesn't have to happen "first."

Respectfully,
Myriad

Hm, enough force to start things moving. Only force available is gravity acting towards centre of earth. It acts on a mass above. The mass above is supported by 280 columns. Gravity compresses these columns <30% yield stress.
Columns are heated and failing (how?) one after the other so that the stresses in the remaining columns become 100% yield stress! OK. Due to Euler we know that they will not bucklebend then (no buckled columns from the initiation zone found), so they start to deform, compress plastically (none found either!). The mass moves down. When does this happen? Any photos? Due to gravity. Always equilibrium due to reaction forces in the lower structure columns equal to the gravity force acting on the mass above. Any PE released due to mass moving down is consumed to deform the supporting columns. Columns do not rupture in compression, as far as I am concerned.

So, why would the mass start to move down apart due plastic deformation in turn due to heating the columns? What about the reaction forces in the intact structure below?

Only way the reaction forces below cannot support the mass above is that the connecting columns are physically removed. Any photos of that?

And because the columns cannot be removed by gravity, there will be no collapse due to gravity.

So what removed the columns in the initiation zone? The outside columns are intact until they cannot be seen in the smoke/dust.

You haven't read my article, have you? Or done the model test, http://heiwaco.tripod.com/nist1.htm#6 ?

It would appear that the WTC1 upper block above the initiation zone implodes/telescopes into itself/disintegrates before gravity collapse starts below the initiation zone. It cannot have been caused by gravity. No photos of any failed columns there.

Whatever caused the upper block to implode/telescope into itself and produce smoke/dust to prevent further viewing prior collapse below initiation zone is probably also the cause of the destruction of the lower structure.

According Bazant and Seffen (read my paper) you need an intact, loose, rigid (all the time) upper block falling at a certain velocity on a structure to drive a gravity collapse of the latter, like an avalanche, until it runs out of energy.
During the complete process - avalanche - the lose KE must be applied uniformly on the structure (soil/snow) below. Uniform density you know is required.

But there is no intact, loose, rigid upper block at any velocity in the WTCs to drive a gravity collapse. And no uniform density.

The WTCs are nice examples of high tech CD. I wonder how the perpetrators did it! Clever to blame gravity for it using university profs as useful idiots.

Kind regards

Heiwa

[Heiwa]

Heiwa:

There are plenty of photos/videos of WTC 1 AND WTC 2 showing the perimeter columns in the fire-affected impact zones bowing inwards. What do you think caused this bowing to occur? And do you think it contributed to collapse initiation?

Any alleged deformations prior start of collapse is of little interest. Pls provide photos of the perimeter columns taken after the upper block started to move and before the lowest floor of the upper block reaches the uppermost floor of the intact structure 3.8 meters below. Time for this initial 'collapse' is 0.5 seconds assuming free fall acceleration = several frames on any video. Longer if the columns are assumed connected to the upper block and lower structure and fails in one way or another but offering resistance = many more frames of any video.

Thanks for your assistance. I will publish any of these photos on my web site.

[Architect]

Heiwa

It's time to come clean, mate.

You haven't *actually* studied building structures, have you?

Tell the truth. We'll respect you for it.

[stateofgrace]

Hiewa, I have been following this thread and I must say I do find your theory somewhat " out there" but hey you are entitled it.

From what I gather you seem to base your entire agrument on your belief that the upper portion of the tower did not impact the lower portion.It seems you are agruing that the entire upper portion above the impact zone completly disintegrates before any such an impact took take.

OK, it as been pointed out to you that the "upper block" weighted in at some 30,000 tons. Can you please tell me how much explosive power would be needed to produce such a complete disintegration?

Equally so can you also tell me, once the complete disintegation of the upper portion has happened how much explosives would be needed to stage the rest of the top down demolision?

Thank you.

[NobbyNobbs]

I'm not sure I'm following here, but the impression I get is that Heiwa believes that the upper portion of the building, along with all its support beams and such, was moved two feet to the right, and then came straight down.

Have I got it right?

[Apollo20]

Heiwa:

Sorry to be pedantic about this but the free fall time for 3.8 meters is not 0.5 seconds.

s = 1/2 a.t^2

3.8 = 1/2. 9.81 . t^2

t^2 = 0.7747

t = 0.8802 seconds

Also I believe the floor height was closer to 3.7 meters so a better value for the free fall time of a WTC floor would be t = 0.8685 seconds

Anyway, the free fall time to which you refer is closer to one second than half a second.

Regardless of this, the behavior of the north face of WTC 1 at the 98th floor is obscured very quickly after the first movement of the roof line.

Unfortunately all the "action" during the first few seconds of the collapse of WTC 1 was at the south face where we know there was pre-collapse bowing.

Please explain this pre-collapse bowing and/or explain why "any alleged deformations prior (to the) start of collapse are of little interest."

[Dave Rogers]

There are plenty of photos/videos of WTC 1 AND WTC 2 showing the perimeter columns in the fire-affected impact zones bowing inwards. What do you think caused this bowing to occur? And do you think it contributed to collapse initiation?

Heiwa answered this one a long time ago. He said that this bowing was highly unlikely, therefore the photographs must have been faked.

Dave

[einsteen]

Yes, NIST refers to this as "The Kink." It is strongly implied that this occurred after collapse initiation (but only just). Search for it in NCSTAR1-5A and NCSTAR1-6.
From studying videos I also would say that it happened after the top block dropped a few stories.

[einsteen]

Heiwa, this is something you've been consistently wrong about all along. All that is needed to start a collapse is enough force to start things moving. The weight of the top of the tower is a force. When enough support members have been severed and weakened to no longer exert an upward force equal to the weight they have to support, f = ma will take over.
Myriad,

This is exactly the difficulty of collapse initiation. If you look at the problem in 1d and use F=Ma you need to explain the initial movement, if you assume there is no initial movement (or a small constant movement) the netto force is zero. Only a fraction of the core columns were destroyed and due to heat weakening they still are able to provide a huge force (what we see because the whole top section was standing for an hour). At a certain moment in time it starts moving, implying a>0, implying a netto force, implying that the columns no longer can provide the static force. I believe that the perimeter columns are never able to keep the mass of the top section in the air (the NIST also says that a floor is able to take 10 times its mass, which is related) which is also consistent with the behaviour of those perimeter columns during collapse. But what happened with the core ? Since a 1d model cannot explain it the tilting of the top section then must play a key role, because I'm almost sure that a 1d model cannot explain it.

[Alferd_Packer]

One more time.


Heiwa, have you ever seen this formula before?

http://www.efunda.com/formulae/solid_mechanics/columns/images/Fcr.gif

I'll give you a hint.

E is the Young's modulus of the column material.
I is the area moment of inertia of the column cross-section
I'll let you figure out the other terms

[X]

Myriad,

This is exactly the difficulty of collapse initiation. If you look at the problem in 1d and use F=Ma you need to explain the initial movement,


Very well. Let's do so. This wil be a very simple back-of-the-envelope sort of analysis.
To start with, let's figure out what "F" is.
"F" is the net external force on the upper block. It is the force which causes the upper block to move.



if you assume there is no initial movement (or a small constant movement) the net force is zero.


Correct. And for the net force to be zero (thus ma = 0), the weight of the upper block must be supproted by the structure below.
From this, we can deduce that F = mg - Fcolumns
Therefore, F = ma becomes:
mg - Fcolumns = ma
(positive is downards, Fcolumns is the support provided by the columns, equal to mg until the columns reach a critical scenario of heat weakening/impact damage that they can no longer provide full load bearing capacity.)


Only a fraction of the core columns were destroyed and due to heat weakening they still are able to provide a huge force (what we see because the whole top section was standing for an hour).


I think you make a poor assumption here.
You say: "Only a fraction of the core columns were destroyed and due to heat weakening".
Would you agree the following statement is perhaps more accurate?:
"Only a fraction of the core columns were destroyed by the aircraft impact, and more were subject to heat weakening and unsusual loading from the fires and sagging floor trusses."


At a certain moment in time it starts moving, implying a>0, implying a net force, implying that the columns no longer can provide the static force.


Correct. We can assume the weight (mg) would not change appreciably (ejected debris and people jumping (One of the most chilling things about the day, in my opinions, that they would do so. Tragic.) would not subtract a noticable amount of mass from the upper block.
This does indeed imply that the columns have reached that critical level I referenced earlier. This ciritical level is defined as:
Fcolumns < mg


I believe that the perimeter columns are never able to keep the mass of the top section in the air (the NIST also says that a floor is able to take 10 times its mass, which is related) which is also consistent with the behaviour of those perimeter columns during collapse. But what happened with the core ? Since a 1d model cannot explain it the tilting of the top section then must play a key role, because I'm almost sure that a 1d model cannot explain it.


The tilting is a natural consequence of the fact that is was not a 1 dimensional event.
You could get a better idea by modelling it in 2 dimensions, and seeing how, if the core columns on one side get damages, that section of coplumns will fail before the undamaged section as the load in that area becomes greated than the columns can support. This will result in the uper block having unbalanced forces. The side without sufficient support will go down, while the side with suport will remain, until the situation gets to the point where the re-distributed loads (no longer axial to the columns) overwhelms the columns ability to hold up the upper block. This situations is complicated. The load will be shifting and re-adjusting as columns fail. And as more fail, the load on the remaining ones becomes greater, making them more likely to fail. AAlso, the loads on the remaining collumns will be transmitting through an angled connection, due to the block's angulation, which is not ideal for columns, and can result in them failing before a critical axial load is reached.

[Heiwa]

Hiewa, I have been following this thread and I must say I do find your theory somewhat " out there" but hey you are entitled it.

From what I gather you seem to base your entire agrument on your belief that the upper portion of the tower did not impact the lower portion.It seems you are agruing that the entire upper portion above the impact zone completly disintegrates before any such an impact took take.

OK, it as been pointed out to you that the "upper block" weighted in at some 30,000 tons. Can you please tell me how much explosive power would be needed to produce such a complete disintegration?

Equally so can you also tell me, once the complete disintegation of the upper portion has happened how much explosives would be needed to stage the rest of the top down demolision?

Thank you.

According videos of WTC1 the upper block above the initiation zone (floors 94-97) does not impact the lower structure below.
According videos the upper block telescopes into itself (becomes shorter) while the columns at the initiation zone are still intact. These observations are described in my article. Free fall of the upper block and an impact between the upper block and anything below is not seen either.

I have no idea what made the upper block disintegrate before the destruction of the lower structure. According Nist, Bazant, Seffen & Co the upper block is supposed to be rigid, of uniform density and intact ... and 100% aligned with the structure below all the time ... in order to drive a gravity collapse of the lower structure after an initial impact followed by many other impacts.

It is only the PE/KE of the intact upper block that is available to drive the gravity collapse (avalanche) and if the upper block is not intact (and of uniform density) ... and disappears ... it cannot drive any gravity collapse to the ground.

The rubble produced by the upper block PE/KE in the lower structure evidently does not contribute to the gravity collapse! Agree? It just flies out and drops to the ground. Small pieces.

In my article I assume free fall/impact of the upper block - initiation as per Nist is assumed correct (even if my model test shows the opposite http://heiwaco.tripod.com/nist1.htm#6 ) - and find that they will produce a bump, elastic compression of the lower structure ... and that's it. OK, there may be some plastic local deformation but hardly columns being ripped apart. So the collapse would stop after hitting the uppermost storey of the upper block. All PE/KE is consumed then! End of collapse!

But not according Nist & Co. Because the strain energy of the uppermost storey structure of the lower structure and all the columns down to ground was too small they suggest without any calculations (everything was destroyed in the uppermost storey), the whole process is repeated with a new impact on the next floor below, etc.

But all this assumes that the upper block is still there ... intact ... to drive the collapse like a hammer, repeatedly hammering the lower structure into pieces. If it is not there ... there is no gravity collapse. And the upper block - the hammer - is definitely not there.

One reason why the upper block is not there is that is not rigid, not of uniform density and to put it bluntly, all 33 000 tons of it should then behave like a bale of wool!

And if there is any 'initiation' = failures of structure in the 4000 m² large initiation/fire zone, it will be gentle and the upper block should just land on the lower structure. No impact! All the failed, actually deformed, columns in between would ensure that the force of the mass above would be transmitted to the structure below one way or another (that I can describe). Equilibrium would be reinstated. No hammer hitting!

In the article I suggest Nist, Bazant, Seffen redo their calculations with a flexible, non-rigid, non-uniform density upper block (that does not disappear) and see what happens then! Evidently no global collapse - the upper block will really be shaken at the 'impact' ... and that's it. No big deal.

Small car hitting stationary big truck.

[Dave Rogers]

According videos the upper block telescopes into itself (becomes shorter) while the columns at the initiation zone are still intact. These observations are described in my article.

Heiwa, I've pointed this out before: The initiation zone is, by definition, the zone in which the collapse initiated. A region in which the columns are still intact, while a region above it is telescoping into itself, is not, by definition, the initiation zone. Your statement quoted above is therefore nonsense.

Dave

[Heiwa]

One more time.


Heiwa, have you ever seen this formula before?

http://www.efunda.com/formulae/solid_mechanics/columns/images/Fcr.gif

I'll give you a hint.

E is the Young's modulus of the column material.
I is the area moment of inertia of the column cross-section
I'll let you figure out the other terms

Of course! I use it in my article to describe the columns, but use stresses, not forces (you have to divide the Force with the cross area :)- . The buckling stress > yield = no buckling. Only yielding. And the yielding will be of the crumple up, type. The columns used and supported by spandrels and beams (and to less extent floors) cannot bucklebend due to gravity.

[stateofgrace]

According videos of WTC1 the upper block above the initiation zone (floors 94-97) does not impact the lower structure below.
According videos the upper block telescopes into itself (becomes shorter) while the columns at the initiation zone are still intact. These observations are described in my article. Free fall of the upper block and an impact between the upper block and anything below is not seen either.

I have no idea what made the upper block disintegrate before the destruction of the lower structure. According Nist, Bazant, Seffen & Co the upper block is supposed to be rigid, of uniform density and intact ... and 100% aligned with the structure below all the time ... in order to drive a gravity collapse of the lower structure after an initial impact followed by many other impacts.

It is only the PE/KE of the intact upper block that is available to drive the gravity collapse (avalanche) and if the upper block is not intact (and of uniform density) ... and disappears ... it cannot drive any gravity collapse to the ground.

The rubble produced by the upper block PE/KE in the lower structure evidently does not contribute to the gravity collapse! Agree? It just flies out and drops to the ground. Small pieces.

In my article I assume free fall/impact of the upper block - initiation as per Nist is assumed correct (even if my model test shows the opposite http://heiwaco.tripod.com/nist1.htm#6 ) - and find that they will produce a bump, elastic compression of the lower structure ... and that's it. OK, there may be some plastic local deformation but hardly columns being ripped apart. So the collapse would stop after hitting the uppermost storey of the upper block. All PE/KE is consumed then! End of collapse!

But not according Nist & Co. Because the strain energy of the uppermost storey structure of the lower structure and all the columns down to ground was too small they suggest without any calculations (everything was destroyed in the uppermost storey), the whole process is repeated with a new impact on the next floor below, etc.

But all this assumes that the upper block is still there ... intact ... to drive the collapse like a hammer, repeatedly hammering the lower structure into pieces. If it is not there ... there is no gravity collapse. And the upper block - the hammer - is definitely not there.

One reason why the upper block is not there is that is not rigid, not of uniform density and to put it bluntly, all 33 000 tons of it should then behave like a bale of wool!

And if there is any 'initiation' = failures of structure in the 4000 m² large initiation/fire zone, it will be gentle and the upper block should just land on the lower structure. No impact! All the failed, actually deformed, columns in between would ensure that the force of the mass above would be transmitted to the structure below one way or another (that I can describe). Equilibrium would be reinstated. No hammer hitting!

In the article I suggest Nist, Bazant, Seffen redo their calculations with a flexible, non-rigid, non-uniform density upper block (that does not disappear) and see what happens then! Evidently no global collapse - the upper block will really be shaken at the 'impact' ... and that's it. No big deal.

Small car hitting stationary big truck.

Yes, very good,Hiewa but this is not what I asked you.

Please respond to the questions I asked.

Thank you.

[Alferd_Packer]

Of course! I use it in my article to describe the columns, but use stresses, not forces (you have to divide the Force with the cross area :)- . The buckling stress > yield = no buckling. Only yielding. And the yielding will be of the crumple up, type. The columns used and supported by spandrels and beams (and to less extent floors) cannot bucklebend due to gravity.


What beams are you talking about?

What pinned the exterior columns in place from in and out movement?
The spandrels only pinned them from side to side.

[Heiwa]

Heiwa

It's time to come clean, mate.

You haven't *actually* studied building structures, have you?

Tell the truth. We'll respect you for it.

Actually, when I started steel structural analysis 1965 (in shipbuilding) every member was supposed to be a beam with a web and flanges or a tube or a box or a pillar ... like a static building on land. So the structures were all 3-D beam structures - only the loads applied a little different. Same courses for civil engineers and shipbuilding engineers. Only later some 'beams' were replaced with real stiffened plate members, but then you needed a computer to calculate what happened. But you got a good feel using 3-D beam models where the loads ended up and what forces and bending moments were produced and what the the stresses were and how to avoid buckling. With beams and pillars, no problem with buckling. Stiffened plate fields would buckle under testing ... and soon we found out why.

You have not read my CV, have you? I am a structural steel man. No wooden JREF greenhorn.

[Dave Rogers]

It is only the PE/KE of the intact upper block that is available to drive the gravity collapse (avalanche) and if the upper block is not intact (and of uniform density) ... and disappears ... it cannot drive any gravity collapse to the ground.

Well, yes, if it disappeared it wouldn't be able to drive a gravity collapse. However, it doesn't disappear. Your error here is one of the more collossally stupid standard truther errors, that if an object is broken it loses its mass. It doesn't.

The rubble produced by the upper block PE/KE in the lower structure evidently does not contribute to the gravity collapse! Agree? It just flies out and drops to the ground. Small pieces.

Disagree. You can't quantify the amount of dust and debris expelled simply from photographs. There's no evidence that a significant amount of concrete was broken into dust in the early stages of the collapse, and good reason to believe it wasn't. There's evidence of some perimeter column trees being ejected in the earlier stages of collapse, but these appear to be from the lower block. There's no evidence of core column sections or any part of the hat truss being ejected in the early stages of collapse, nor is it in any way feasible that they might have been. Therefore, the majority of the mass of the upper section is available to transfer PE to KE to fracture energy. Your burning desire to handwave away anything that disagrees with your insane theories has no basis in reality.

Dave

[rwguinn]

Well, yes, if it disappeared it wouldn't be able to drive a gravity collapse. However, it doesn't disappear. Your error here is one of the more collossally stupid standard truther errors, that if an object is broken it loses its mass. It doesn't.
Let's not tell him that the PE of the lower portionof the building is pretty important, too--because it translates into strain energy that the non-disapearing mass of the upper portion's KE adds to.



Disagree. You can't quantify the amount of dust and debris expelled simply from photographs. There's no evidence that a significant amount of concrete was broken into dust in the early stages of the collapse, and good reason to believe it wasn't. There's evidence of some perimeter column trees being ejected in the earlier stages of collapse, but these appear to be from the lower block. There's no evidence of core column sections or any part of the hat truss being ejected in the early stages of collapse, nor is it in any way feasible that they might have been. Therefore, the majority of the mass of the upper section is available to transfer PE to KE to fracture energy. Your burning desire to handwave away anything that disagrees with your insane theories has no basis in reality.

Dave
Reality is for folks who can't handle chemical enhancement?

[einsteen]

Heiwa, I've pointed this out before: The initiation zone is, by definition, the zone in which the collapse initiated. A region in which the columns are still intact, while a region above it is telescoping into itself, is not, by definition, the initiation zone. Your statement quoted above is therefore nonsense.

Dave
Unless he is able to prove that it started not at the weakest part of the building.

ps. correction: then that is still the initiation zone, but a more suspicious one...:-)

[Dave Rogers]

Unless he is able to prove that it started not at the weakest part of the building.

He's not saying that. He's saying that the collapse didn't initiate in the collapse initiation zone. If you want to prove that, go ahead and try, but defending obviously self-contradictory statements by misrepresenting them is pointless and irrelevant.

Dave

ETA: Missed your ETA. So you admit he's contradicting himself?

[Newtons Bit]

So I posted a fairly lengthy rebuttal to the introduction of Heiwa's "paper". And he ignores it. Should I be suprised? Or should I chalk this up to the typical truther mentality of asking for criticism, ignoring it when it arrives, and then pretending that there has been none?

[einsteen]

He's not saying that. He's saying that the collapse didn't initiate in the collapse initiation zone. If you want to prove that, go ahead and try, but defending obviously self-contradictory statements by misrepresenting them is pointless and irrelevant.

Dave

ETA: Missed your ETA. So you admit he's contradicting himself?
ETA means ? I'm normally a nitpicker but with things like this you have to read between the lines. I think he means that the top section compacts above the stories that are first expected to fail.

[Heiwa]

1. No, it completely disproves your point. You said it fell OUTSIDE. Stop trying to squirm away and admit that you made a small goof.

2. This is complete B.S. The upper block does not disintegrate. It is heavily damaged, but so is the upper floors of the lower block, imagine! And then it travels inside of the tower and causing more damage to the floors below.



From your paper


3. False. The upper block obviously falls at NEAR free-fall, otherwise we wouldn't have seen it fall. You can't say something didn't happen when there's video recording that it did.



4. Inaccurate. You cannot take the entire cross-section of the tower and the entire load and say all columns were below a certain stress. This is because columns near severed and damaged columns are primary to resolving the loss of nearby strength. Furthermore, this ignores simple concepts such as a cantilever (ONE example) developing after a column is severed/damaged. This will multiply the vertical loads, easily overloading columns.



5. False, the floors are necessary to provide bracing against buckling.



6. WTF. Obviously there is no stress in a column just above a cut. But the force that used to exist in that column has to be TRANSFERED SOMEWHERE ELSE. And it will not do that in a pure vertical fashion. You cannot understand the simple fact that the vertical forces will apply more than just a compressive force to the structure. This is BASIC statics.



7. Strawman. No one ever said that the columns failed simultaneously. Nor is this implied by the phyiscal evidence. The fact that both towers leaned noticeably during collapse shows that the towers collapsed linearly (roughly) from one side to another. This makes sense from how the tower actually resists core column failures.



8. WTF? The upper block wasn't lowered, it collapsed. That's the entire point. Dynamic forces are much higher than static forces. That's why we design framing below corridors for 100psf live load, even though they will never expierence that amount of load statically. They will expierence something close to that dynamically.

These are the first six of your paragraphs. They are all complete crap. I'm just going to randomly select a few more.



9. Complete crap. I recommend you do a little research rather than relying on your own "opinion".



10. Uneducated in engineering. The column will buckle before 100%, energy is absorbed when the column rotated about a plastic hinge (buckling), and THEN there will be a small amount of energy in rupture. Buckling is not the same rupture strain energy.



11. The floors are necessary to support the columns, otherwise they will just fall over and outwards (which is what happened) under smallish forces.

12. You also seem to be of the opinion that the entire upper block should disintegrate. But that doesn't make any sense. If the upper block can disintegrate from the striking the lower block, shouldn't the lower block (made of the same material, same craptacular uniform density measurement that you use) also be able to take damage from the upper block? You can't have it both ways.

Now then, you said something about calculations in your paper. The only thing I saw was inaccurately calculating weight and compressive stresses. Was there something else that I missed?

Thanks for the peep review:

1. The photo of WTC2 shows the upper block inclined outside the lower structure and, logically, cannot drop on the lower structure (it will contine to incline and slide off). In fact it disappears completely soon after.

2. The upper block is supposed to be rigid and intact. It is not supposed to be damage before initiation. My point is that the upper block of WTC1 disintegrates 3-4 seconds before initiation, which is not explained.

3. The upper block of WTC1 is not NEAR free falling on the lower structure below the initiation zone. It telescopes into itself, while the structure in the initiation zone is intact! Just look at the bottom of the upper block - floor 97.

4. No, the static stresses in the load bearing columns prior collapse are >20% yield in the walls and <30% yield in the core. Calculations are given in the paper.

5. Still, the floor is not a primary load bearing part. Clear from the article. It only transmit a load on the floor to the column. Remove all floors and no loads are transmitted to the columns, the latter then only being stressed by their own weight <3% of yield. Buckling is then prevented by the spandrels/beams and the other walls. Service floors are different with strong beams connecting perimeter/core.

6. The columns of the upper block are interconnected with spandrels/beams at every floor that will transmit the load on the cut column to the other columns. Remember that 38 wall columns were cut 100+ minutes earlier and nothing happened.

7. For an upper block to free fall vertically and impact all columns of the structure below simultaneously, evidently all the remaining supports must be removed at the same time. If the upper block tilts or gets inclined because the supports do not fail simultaneusly, the impact cross area of the upper block is also inclined = no instantaeous impact! Compare 1 above.

8. I know the upper block was not lowered. It collapsed into itself before it started the move down into the initiation zone.

9. Reference link is British authorities. At 500°C only yield stress is reduced, say 20%.

10. It is more likely that the energy will slip off the relevant structure (vertical column) and do no harm whatsoever. Read the complete paragraph.

11. No, the floors only there to transmit load on the floor to the columns. Remove the floor (and the load) and the column will still stand (thanks to spandrels and beams - and extra structure at the service floors).

12. You do not know what a gravity driven collapse is, do you?. You need KE for that and it can only be provided by an intact, rigid, uniform density upper block that remains intact, rigid, with uniform density during the whole destruction of the lower structure. The upper block is the only part that can provide KE during the alleged global collapse. The lower structure does not add any extra KE to the collapse or contribute to the collapse - it is being destroyed (lack of strain energy according NIST).

Actually, the upper block, intact, rigid and of uniform at start of collapse, should according to Bazant's and Seffen's theories remain INTACT after the global collapse ... on top of all rubble the upper block has produced of the lower structure. Nothing could destroy a rigid block of uniform density - not even the final impact with the ground forgetting that the rubble is there to dampen the final impact.

But thanks anyway for your input!

[Alferd_Packer]

Once again

What beams were attached to the exterior columns?

What strucutral element prevented the in and out movment of the exterior columns?

[tsig]

Actually, when I started steel structural analysis 1965 (in shipbuilding) every member was supposed to be a beam with a web and flanges or a tube or a box or a pillar ... like a static building on land. So the structures were all 3-D beam structures - only the loads applied a little different. Same courses for civil engineers and shipbuilding engineers. Only later some 'beams' were replaced with real stiffened plate members, but then you needed a computer to calculate what happened. But you got a good feel using 3-D beam models where the loads ended up and what forces and bending moments were produced and what the the stresses were and how to avoid buckling. With beams and pillars, no problem with buckling. Stiffened plate fields would buckle under testing ... and soon we found out why.

You have not read my CV, have you? I am a structural steel man. No wooden JREF greenhorn.

Oh man, leaving us on the edge of our seats like.... that.

It's just so woodenly greenhorn.

[tsig]

So I posted a fairly lengthy rebuttal to the introduction of Heiwa's "paper". And he ignores it. Should I be suprised? Or should I chalk this up to the typical truther mentality of asking for criticism, ignoring it when it arrives, and then pretending that there has been none?

Then quote mining you to prove the opposite of what you said.

[tsig]

Thanks for the peep review:

1. The photo of WTC2 shows the upper block inclined outside the lower structure and, logically, cannot drop on the lower structure (it will contine to incline and slide off). In fact it disappears completely soon after.

2. The upper block is supposed to be rigid and intact. It is not supposed to be damage before initiation. My point is that the upper block of WTC1 disintegrates 3-4 seconds before initiation, which is not explained.

3. The upper block of WTC1 is not NEAR free falling on the lower structure below the initiation zone. It telescopes into itself, while the structure in the initiation zone is intact! Just look at the bottom of the upper block - floor 97.

4. No, the static stresses in the load bearing columns prior collapse are >20% yield in the walls and <30% yield in the core. Calculations are given in the paper.

5. Still, the floor is not a primary load bearing part. Clear from the article. It only transmit a load on the floor to the column. Remove all floors and no loads are transmitted to the columns, the latter then only being stressed by their own weight <3% of yield. Buckling is then prevented by the spandrels/beams and the other walls. Service floors are different with strong beams connecting perimeter/core.

6. The columns of the upper block are interconnected with spandrels/beams at every floor that will transmit the load on the cut column to the other columns. Remember that 38 wall columns were cut 100+ minutes earlier and nothing happened.

7. For an upper block to free fall vertically and impact all columns of the structure below simultaneously, evidently all the remaining supports must be removed at the same time. If the upper block tilts or gets inclined because the supports do not fail simultaneusly, the impact cross area of the upper block is also inclined = no instantaeous impact! Compare 1 above.

8. I know the upper block was not lowered. It collapsed into itself before it started the move down into the initiation zone.

9. Reference link is British authorities. At 500°C only yield stress is reduced, say 20%.

10. It is more likely that the energy will slip off the relevant structure (vertical column) and do no harm whatsoever. Read the complete paragraph.

11. No, the floors only there to transmit load on the floor to the columns. Remove the floor (and the load) and the column will still stand (thanks to spandrels and beams - and extra structure at the service floors).

12. You do not know what a gravity driven collapse is, do you?. You need KE for that and it can only be provided by an intact, rigid, uniform density upper block that remains intact, rigid, with uniform density during the whole destruction of the lower structure. The upper block is the only part that can provide KE during the alleged global collapse. The lower structure does not add any extra KE to the collapse or contribute to the collapse - it is being destroyed (lack of strain energy according NIST).

Actually, the upper block, intact, rigid and of uniform at start of collapse, should according to Bazant's and Seffen's theories remain INTACT after the global collapse ... on top of all rubble the upper block has produced of the lower structure. Nothing could destroy a rigid block of uniform density - not even the final impact with the ground forgetting that the rubble is there to dampen the final impact.

But thanks anyway for your input!

Well they weren't virgins anymore.

Oh you said intact I read intacta.

What with rigid blocks blocks impacting with the ground and leaving a damp imprint it was a natural mistake.

[Heiwa]

Then quote mining you to prove the opposite of what you said.
I like the quillets. And you know, reputation is an idle and most false imposition, often got without merit and lost without deserving. When Nist speak fustian, hot and moist means anything.

[Newtons Bit]

Thanks for the peep review:

1. The photo of WTC2 shows the upper block inclined outside the lower structure and, logically, cannot drop on the lower structure (it will contine to incline and slide off). In fact it disappears completely soon after.

No it doesn't. How hard can it be to use your own eyes when looking at a picture? The upper block has ROTATED, and it cannot slide. For an object to be able to slide off the surface of another, both surfaces must be capable of resisting a force that will move the upper block over. Homogeneous objects can do this (tree trunks, bales of wool). Steel structures cannot. The upper block physically can't slide off the lower block.

2. The upper block is supposed to be rigid and intact. It is not supposed to be damage before initiation. My point is that the upper block of WTC1 disintegrates 3-4 seconds before initiation, which is not explained.

The upper block is NOT supposed to be rigid and intact. It is modeled that way by people like Bazant to make the MATH EASIER. Do you understand this concept, yes or no? That's a direct question, I expect an answer. Furthermore, how can the upper block disintegrate before the collapse even starts? Do you even read what you write?

3. The upper block of WTC1 is not NEAR free falling on the lower structure below the initiation zone. It telescopes into itself, while the structure in the initiation zone is intact! Just look at the bottom of the upper block - floor 97.

I would say, "no it's not" again. But that doesn't have the same affect as me saying, "prove it". You say the lower structure is intact. You can't see this because it's obscured by smoke. Logic suggests that damage done to the upper block must also correspond damage to the lower block.

4. No, the static stresses in the load bearing columns prior collapse are >20% yield in the walls and <30% yield in the core. Calculations are given in the paper.

Complete B.S. Again, you do not provide calculations in your paper. This is your "calculation":
The mass above the core is only13 200 tons supported by the 47 core columns with total area 2.1 m². On average each core column carries abt 280 tons so the average compression is 629 kgs/cm² or 63 MPa or 25% of yield

THIS IS NOT AN ACCEPTABLE MANNER IN WHICH TO CALCULATE INDIVIDUAL STRESSES IN THE COLUMNS. It ignores individual columns being overloaded, it ignores columns being stressed laterally by the structure redistributed vertical forces.

5. Still, the floor is not a primary load bearing part. Clear from the article. It only transmit a load on the floor to the column. Remove all floors and no loads are transmitted to the columns, the latter then only being stressed by their own weight <3% of yield. Buckling is then prevented by the spandrels/beams and the other walls. Service floors are different with strong beams connecting perimeter/core.

Again, complete ********. The spandrels cannot brace the columns in the out-of-plane direction. This is simple engineering mechanics. Please explain to me how a 5/8" over the course of 208ft is going to brace a column against buckling.


6. The columns of the upper block are interconnected with spandrels/beams at every floor that will transmit the load on the cut column to the other columns. Remember that 38 wall columns were cut 100+ minutes earlier and nothing happened.

Then why do you not include the effect of this in your calculations? I have, I found that the columns being cut alone wouldn't cause collapse, but if the other columns nearby where then heated above 600c that they would fail. Why can't you do this? Are p-delta calculations too difficult, or are you afraid of the result?


7. For an upper block to free fall vertically and impact all columns of the structure below simultaneously, evidently all the remaining supports must be removed at the same time. If the upper block tilts or gets inclined because the supports do not fail simultaneusly, the impact cross area of the upper block is also inclined = no instantaeous impact! Compare 1 above.

No, the columns do not fail at the same time. There is a chain reaction from one wall failing due to p-delta affects causing large stress redistribution to the other remaining columns which in turn get pulled over. The fact that these do no fail simultaneously is shown BY HOW THE TOWER ROTATES. THIS HAS ALREADY BEEN EXPLAINED, STOP WITH THE STRAWMAN.

8. I know the upper block was not lowered. It collapsed into itself before it started the move down into the initiation zone.

How the frick can something collapse into itself before it moves down?

9. Reference link is British authorities. At 500°C only yield stress is reduced, say 20%.

A picture is worth a thousand words
http://forums.randi.org/imagehosting/thum_1632947e051936e249.jpg (http://forums.randi.org/vbimghost.php?do=displayimg&imgid=11326)

I have to wonder why you didn't say 600°C That's more than a 50% reduction. And then of course, there is the modulus of elasticity decreases, which are significant from a p-delta perspective.

And then in your paper, your say:
How is the yield stress of steel affected by heat? In this writer's opinion it is not affected very much at about 500°C. This is confirmed by any fire test - the test chamber and what's in it never collapses due to the heat inside up to 1000°C. The heat inside is normally by kerosene set on fire.

Why do you mention 1000°C tests without mentioning the change in yield stress? Are you trying to confuse the "children" that read your paper?

10. It is more likely that the energy will slip off the relevant structure (vertical column) and do no harm whatsoever. Read the complete paragraph.

STOP DODGING. You confused the terms "rupture" and "buckling" in your paper. If you had experience in the subject you wouldn't do so.

[/quote]11. No, the floors only there to transmit load on the floor to the columns. Remove the floor (and the load) and the column will still stand (thanks to spandrels and beams - and extra structure at the service floors).[/quote]

NO. See my response to 5.

12. You do not know what a gravity driven collapse is, do you?. You need KE for that and it can only be provided by an intact, rigid, uniform density upper block that remains intact, rigid, with uniform density during the whole destruction of the lower structure. The upper block is the only part that can provide KE during the alleged global collapse. The lower structure does not add any extra KE to the collapse or contribute to the collapse - it is being destroyed (lack of strain energy according NIST).

The lower structure does provide additional energy to the collapse, it does this because it is a spring and it compresses. This is simple freshmen physics. Furthermore, as the upper block is damaged, it also falls and adds KE into the mix. Or are you trying to say that a section of column that weighs over 100 pounds per foot can't damage a 4" concrete slab?

Actually, the upper block, intact, rigid and of uniform at start of collapse, should according to Bazant's and Seffen's theories remain INTACT after the global collapse ... on top of all rubble the upper block has produced of the lower structure. Nothing could destroy a rigid block of uniform density - not even the final impact with the ground forgetting that the rubble is there to dampen the final impact.

Stop confusing assumptions made for ease of calculation with reality. No one says the upper block ACTUALLY REMAINS INTACT except you moronic truthers searching for strawmen to validate your religion with.

I'm not some contractor, or a physicist, or a kid in college. I get paid to design buildings. You cannot go toe to toe with me with fake engineering and expect me to not call out your crap.

[Heiwa]

Stop confusing assumptions made for ease of calculation with reality. No one says the upper block ACTUALLY REMAINS INTACT except you moronic truthers searching for strawmen to validate your religion with.

I'm not some contractor, or a physicist, or a kid in college. I get paid to design buildings. You cannot go toe to toe with me with fake engineering and expect me to not call out your crap.

The FACT remains that the basic assumption of Bazant, Seffen and Nist is that the upper block remains rigid, has uniform density (0.18 tons/m3) and is intact during ... and after ... the complete global collapse in order to produce and apply the PE/KE required to defom, rip apart and throw out of the way all components in the lower structure down to ground level originally held together by their strain energies, SE.

As no such upper block is seen during ... and after ... the collapse of WTC1 or 2 the theory of Bazant, Seffen and Nist is simply wrong. It is in fact another smoking gun, very easy for everyone to see!

Bazant, Seffen and the Nist engineers are in my opinion a shame for the scientific engineering society producing obscure fantasies in support of political means and ends ... and very few object. Very sad!

I have seen it before, of course! http://heiwaco.tripod.com/ekatastrofkurs.htm

[Architect]

Nice posts, NB. I expect more handwaving from Heiwa.

Heiwa. I don't believe you have any structural experience. You ignore or overlook basic aspects of structural analysis in a way that suggests that it is, in fact, you who are the greenhorn.

Incidentally, you never responded to my challenge. I can prove to the Mods that I've won a Civic Trust award for my work on the design of tall buildings. I'll do so on the understanding that, having done so, you ackowledge that I know more about this specialist field than you do.

[Dave Rogers]

ETA means ? I'm normally a nitpicker but with things like this you have to read between the lines. I think he means that the top section compacts above the stories that are first expected to fail.

ETA = Edit To Add, I think.

Read between the lines? I think you've defined the truther fallacy in a nutshell. You've decided in advance that Heiwa is reasonable and sane, and therefore when he says something that is unreasonable and insane, you adjust its meaning to correspond to your predetermined conclusion. In the same way, you've decided in advance that 9-11 was an inside job, so when presented with contradictory evidence, you adjust its meaning to circumvent the contradiction. I've seen you having problems with this because you have enough honesty to feel uncomfortable with what you're doing, but so far you've been clever enough to fool yourself.

Read what Heiwa says, not what you want to think he says. Then you'll see it's nonsense. He's not claiming that the collapse started in the wrong place, because he isn't making any comment about where the collapse should have started. He is repeatedly stating that the structure in the initiation zone remained intact while the top section telescoped. That's self-contradictory.

Dave

[Architect]

Einsteen

If you look back over Heiwa's posts and the lengthy technical critiques, I suspect that you too will have concerns about his analysis. Do your really agree with him that 30,000t of debris wouldn't weight the same as 30,000t of intact building? Do you really think that it should have slid off the lower part? Do you really think that the building is designed as a "birdcage" when all the facts say otherwise?

I fear that Heiwa is the new ChristopherA.

[MRC_Hans]

The FACT remains that the basic assumption of Bazant, Seffen and Nist is that the upper block remains rigid, has uniform density (0.18 tons/m3) and is intact during ... and after ... the complete global collapse in order to produce and apply the PE/KE required to defom, rip apart and throw out of the way all components in the lower structure down to ground level originally held together by their strain energies, SE.

As no such upper block is seen during ... and after ... the collapse of WTC1 or 2 the theory of Bazant, Seffen and Nist is simply wrong. It is in fact another smoking gun, very easy for everyone to see!

Bazant, Seffen and the Nist engineers are in my opinion a shame for the scientific engineering society producing obscure fantasies in support of political means and ends ... and very few object. Very sad!

I have seen it before, of course! http://heiwaco.tripod.com/ekatastrofkurs.htmI think they will survive. In fact they will conclude that you must be an extremely ignorant person if you try to project the simplifications of a simulation model back to reality.

Perhaps you are unfamiliar with simulation models? Then I can tell you that simplifications like these are the norm, and indeed necessary, if calculations are not to take days, even on a supercomputer.

And since the purpose of this simulation is to calculate the energies involved, such simplifications are really of little consequence for the result.

Hans

[Dave Rogers]

Do you really think that it should have slid off the lower part?

That would actually make more sense than what Heiwa is proposing. Einsteen, do you really think that every column of the upper section should have fallen past every column of the lower section, without any contact with it, thereby allowing the upper section of the building to fall without falling off the lower section and also without damaging it in any way? According to Heiwa, this is why a steel-framed building cannot collapse under any circumstances.

Dave

[Newtons Bit]

The FACT remains that the basic assumption of Bazant, Seffen and Nist is that the upper block remains rigid, has uniform density (0.18 tons/m3) and is intact during ... and after ... the complete global collapse in order to produce and apply the PE/KE required to defom, rip apart and throw out of the way all components in the lower structure down to ground level originally held together by their strain energies, SE.

As no such upper block is seen during ... and after ... the collapse of WTC1 or 2 the theory of Bazant, Seffen and Nist is simply wrong. It is in fact another smoking gun, very easy for everyone to see!

Bazant, Seffen and the Nist engineers are in my opinion a shame for the scientific engineering society producing obscure fantasies in support of political means and ends ... and very few object. Very sad!

I have seen it before, of course! http://heiwaco.tripod.com/ekatastrofkurs.htm

It's an ASSUMPTION to make the MATH easier, maybe even necessary to make the math possible. This is not what they say happened that day. If you think that assumption is too far from reality to be accurate, then make your own. And no, your "paper" doesn't apply. It's junk and doesn't have any calculations of this magnitude in it.