3313: Fusion Device

Fusion Device

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Title text: I don't see why people have trouble doing this at room temperature. Using hot rivets would honestly have been MORE work.

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Explanation

This is one of 52 incomplete explanations: This page was fused together at room temperature. Don't remove this notice too soon. You can help by editing the explanation!

Nuclear fusion is a process in which lighter nuclei of atoms fuse into a heavier one. Because both nuclei are positively charged, overcoming their mutual repulsion and bringing them together requires colliding them at high speed. This can be done directly with particle accelerators, but if the goal is to do the process on a scale that allows net energy release, accelerators aren't a workable solution because they require a great deal of energy input. Another approach is to bring the nuclei to a very high temperature, so they're moving randomly at high speeds, and will occasionally collide in such a way as to fuse. The process is usually performed at very high temperatures (tens to hundreds of millions of degrees Celsius). Ponytail is extremely surprised at Cueball and Megan's claim that they have built a working cold fusion machine, which would create such reactions at room temperature, and even more so that it was "easy", because this is a long-hypothesised technology that has remained stubbornly unachievable. Had they actually managed to do this, it would certainly put them in contention for the Nobel prize they are expecting.

It turns out that they have mistaken an atomic diagram of a deuterium–tritium fusion for a physical picture of a machine used to create such a reaction, replacing the particles involved with fasteners that have a similar appearance to the depictions in the diagram. They have interpreted protons, illustrated by a circle with a plus sign (+), as Phillips head screws; electrons, marked with a minus sign (−), as slotted screws (commonly known as flat head); and neutrons, denoted by an empty circle, as rivets. They seem not to have wondered how a box of screws could create cold fusion, or why no-one else has done it before if it's that simple, and still believe that they deserve the Nobel Prize for it. Nor do they notice Ponytail's repeated disdain for their attempts, ignoring it entirely.

Whereas high temperatures are (so far) essential for fusion technology, working with hot rivets (i.e. those that are heated to the point of being malleable so they can be splayed to lock them into the joint that they are being used to fasten) is a markedly more skilled and hazardous task than using room-temperature rivets whose much thinner metal can be splayed easily with a hammer and shaped spreading tools – where one side is struck while the other rests in a shaped spreading anvil – or using single-sided variants for blind fastening in situations where only one side can be accessed, using dedicated tools that pull the buried end back toward the accessible end, thus squashing the material between these extremities to create the spreading effect, e.g. pop rivets or rivnuts. The title text plays off this as a continuation of Cueball and Megan's mistake, having one of them point out that the additional hassle of using hot rivets – such as one would employ for heavy-duty industrial steelwork – would make construction of their 'device' far more difficult than doing it at room temperature.

Transcript

This is one of 35 incomplete transcripts: Don't remove this notice too soon. You can help by editing the transcript!

[Megan and Cueball are walking towards Ponytail, sitting at a desk. Megan is holding a rolled up sheet of paper, and Cueball is holding a box.]

Cueball: We built the room-temperature fusion device you wanted.

Ponytail: You what??

[Megan is displaying the sheet of paper to Ponytail, while Cueball is showing the box.]

Megan: Yeah, we looked it up on a diagram, and it was really easy. We were able to build it with parts we had around the shop.

Ponytail: "Easy?"

[A focus on Megan and Cueball, with Ponytail off-panel. Megan is holding up the paper. On it you can see a diagram of various protons, neutrons and electrons clustered in groups on it. Cueball is displaying the box, which has various protrusions on its surface.]

Megan: It was just six Phillips head screws, six flat-head screws, and nine rivets.

Ponytail [off-panel]: *Sigh*

Cueball: So do they mail us a Nobel Prize, or do we have to go pick it up?

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Discussion

First?Velocifyer (talk) 13:08, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

Yes, they would be. 86.22.132.121 13:39, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

hence why win nobel prize not impreessive if the're are the 2nd. everyone remebers openhimer but none remebers communsit openhimer 121.74.57.152 21:08, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

Looks like they’re screwed. 192.64.64.114 13:14, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

Nah, just screwy. Nuts, even. But their subject is riveting. 2605:59C8:160:DB08:2D80:EC68:6BE0:28E3 14:05, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

Idk how to format and write a proper explanation but the joke is that room-temperature fusion isn’t actually known to be possible (IRL), and they (Cueball and Megan?) misinterpreted the symbols denoting the subatomic particles (plus sign for positive proton, minus sign for negative electron, no sign for neutral neutron) as slots for screw types (cross-shaped Phillips head, line-shaped flathead, rivet that doesn’t use a slot in its head) because they have the same corresponding appearances when they’re just circles, so they literally built the diagram at room-temperature that represents fusion using those fasteners instead of making an actual room-temperature fusion device and thought that was it (thus the surprise that something impossible seemed so "easy"). Then they ask about a Nobel Prize, because they think they actually made room-temperature fusion. The title text is a joke on how making a "room-temperature fusion device" that’s actually a diagram like that would be harder if you used hot metal fasteners (which burn, melt, and deform), playing on how actual "hot" fusion happens at millions of degrees Kelvin. The woman at the desk (presumably some researcher) was very surprised by their claim because she knows deliberate room-temperature fusion isn’t known to be possible, but she immediately realizes their misunderstanding and is let down (hence the sigh). 2601:182:300:D6A0:B5B8:EEF0:9CF0:AC6D 13:22, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

I've updated the explanation to indicate that hot rivets are not simply rivets that are prohibitively hot. Yorkshire Pudding (talk) 16:02, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

-OR- People had the diagram but nobody bothered to build one until they did and it worked. Maybe the atoms just needed to be shown what to do? 19:54, 19 October 2026 (UTC) Lordpishky (talk) 19:54, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

I accidentally broke the transcript and I have no idea how. How do I fix it? GSLikesCats306 (talk) 13:46, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

If in doubt, undo and try what you're trying again. With a judicious Preview. And perhaps better as a whole-page edit (rather than going via a Section-header 'edit' link) as the breaking can sometimes not be obvious when restricted to a 'section Preview'. But that's something that only occasionally catches one out. ;)

But it's been fixed now. And looked not to have been all your own errors to have caused it, anyway. 92.23.2.123 18:52, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

I don't wanna hear your excuses! The building has to be at least... three times bigger than this! 136.226.19.62 16:46, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

Megan looks so cute holding that schematic 2804:7F0:7C80:7100:414B:3C3C:BD1B:DE85 17:08, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

Contemplating a walk-through of university physics departments on 1 April 2027, to find out how many pranks this comic has spawned. 205.175.118.78 18:56, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

Sounds like fun. Be sure to follow up here if you do. I'd love to know how it goes and might consider doing the same.--Twisted Code (talk) 21:07, 19 October 2026 (UTC)
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