Inside the safe you have fake gold and silver worth only a few cents. The alarm outside the safe has wires connected to a seemingly elaborate digital system with blinking LED lights, another few cents worth. To the side of the system there a few cut dusty electric wires. That's where the gold is hidden.-- pashute, Mar 20 2013 Nanotube Conductivity http://www.nanocomp...rbon-nanotubes.htmlThis link rates carbon nanotubes far far above copper --and therefore above silver, too. [Vernon, Mar 20 2013] Copper Nanotubes http://www.chm.bris...cules/copperNTs.pdf [bs0u0155, Mar 21 2013] Iodine-laced Copper Nanotubes http://www.nature.c...full/srep00083.html [bs0u0155, Mar 21 2013] A recent spate of burglaries around London have, it would seem, been targeted at the Indian community who often tend to hold family gold.
The bugulars wait until the house is empty and then get in fast and use metal detectors to locate and steal any hidden gold and jewelry, leaving behind more traditional booty such as computers, and consumer electronics.
A decoy tactic might slow such a raid down - but it might be better to invest in a strong safe - or series of safes perhaps - only one of which contains the real loot.-- zen_tom, Mar 20 2013 Thanks for telling us where your gold is...muwahahaha...-- xandram, Mar 20 2013 Gold is a good electrical conductor, but not so good that electrically-better alternatives don't get used. The best metal conductor is silver. Then copper. Then aluminum. Gold is 4th-best. (Sometime I have to find out where carbon nanotubes rate on the scale; they may be about as good as copper and aluminum.)
Gold is used in electronics a lot, but almost exclusively for a single purpose: It is used at the point where Connector A and Connector B need to connect. That's because gold has the best corrosion-resistance of the electrical conductors. So, the electrical connection does not deteriorate with time.
Unfortunately for this Idea, that means that the gold would be plainly visible in any UNconnected fake connector....-- Vernon, Mar 20 2013 //Thanks for telling us where your gold is
Ahh, the cunning double-bluff. I'm sure pashute made the safe out of gold and painted it.-- not_morrison_rm, Mar 20 2013 Carbon nanotubes are very good conductors, if they are conductive. Only certain chiralities are, only end to end, and only single wall nanotubes. Of course this actually makes them very interesting for electronics, becomes some chiralities are efficient semi-conductors.
Something like a nanotube yarn typically ends up being a very poor conductor over it's length because the ends typically don't join up.
As far as gold, it has a couple advantages that would make it much more common in use if it were cheaper. The first is the non-corroding thing, which means that contacts and terminals stay clean, and the second is the low coefficient of expansion which means contacts are less likely to work loose (the primary reason you don't see aluminum wiring much these days).-- MechE, Mar 20 2013 It's also insanely maleable and would probably make really good flexible wires.
It's weight-to-conductivity ratio (or rather weight-to-resistivity inverse ratio) would likely be bad however.-- Custardguts, Mar 20 2013 //Carbon nanotubes are very good conductors, if they are conductive.// Ah, but what about the infamously-named copper nanotubes?-- MaxwellBuchanan, Mar 20 2013 //copper nanotubes?
The Police have their own nanotube network?-- not_morrison_rm, Mar 21 2013 it seems copper nanotubes <link> exist, however carbon nanotubes can exceed the conductivity of metals when properly treated <link>.-- bs0u0155, Mar 21 2013 random, halfbakery