RSS
Wolfgang Puck is releasing self-heating coffee- can't wait to pick one up and use it for some projects! It took a California company named OnTech seven years and $24 million to create the self-heating cans, which are activated by pushing a plastic button on the bottom. Water flows into a sealed inner cone filled with quicklime, which is mostly calcium oxide. A chemical reaction heats the coffee to a pleasant 145 degrees in six to eight minutes, the amount of time it might take to order, pay for and receive a latte from a barista. Link.
Cheap Portable Heating for Projects
Posted by Phillip Torrone |
May 14, 2005 12:14 AM
DIY Projects |
Permalink
| Comments (7)
| Email This |
| Digg this!
Recent Entries
- Cigar box music player
- The 'bike tree', an automatic storage system for cycles, can hold up to 6,000 bikes
- Building a folding table
- Maker Shed weekly wrap-up
- The Chumby has landed!
- Brainwave sofa by Unfold & Lucas Maassen
- Full MIDI drumset with Guitar Hero and Rock Band drums
- Hole punched art
- Portable induction accelerator
- Make: Halloween Contest 2009 - WINNERS!
Comments
Oldest comments listed first.
Leave a comment
Subscribe to MAKE Magazine!
Subscribe today, save 42% and get web access to MAKE free. MAKE Digital Edition is available only to subscribers.
$34.95 / 1 year
(4 Quarterly Issues)
It's an interesting product. However, instead of sugar it uses a sugar substitute. There's no telling what that stuff does to one's health regardless of what the manufacturer says. I bought two four packs of the stuff but gave it away when I erroneously discovered the sweetener product.
Reply to this comment
You've been able to buy Nescafe self-heating cans of coffee in the UK for a few years now, and they work in the same way - you puncture a tab at the bottom of the can and then wait while the chemical reaction heats your coffee. Doesn't taste too bad, either, but it's a bit expensive for what you get.
Reply to this comment
Nice to know but I still like the Japanese vending machines that heat your cans better. It makes for a great hand warmer in a pocket while it is too hot. Or in the summer when they turn it to cooling the cans.
Plus, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quicklime indicates that it can cause skin, eye, inhalation, and just about everything else irritation which may be permanent and ingestion may be fatal. Time to break out the mad scientist outfit for modding this one. Cans are pressurized, aren't they?
Reply to this comment
This was actually featured as an ingredient in a terrorist attack in the program Numb3rs (Episode 2.06 - "Soft Target" - November 4) so I wouldn't be surprised if Homeland Security decides the product is too much of a security risk. I guess any poison that is activated by heat...
Reply to this comment
I just bought the self heating can of coffee and had the worst experience in my life. That button on the bottom would not press in, I had to bash it in. Then the green water barely dripped down. It heated up a bit but not that much. Then When I tried to turn the black top to open the darn thing i needed a darn vice. The WORST part was when I took a sip. It tasted like chemicals and not like coffee. I was literaly scared that I was poisened. I will not purchase again.
Reply to this comment
one of these things blew up about 2 weeks ago. i would be very careful, thats a lot of chemicals your dealing with. the local store that sold it pulled it off the self. heard it on the local news. ...................
Reply to this comment
one of these things blew up about 2 weeks ago. i would be very careful, thats a lot of chemicals your dealing with. the local store that sold it pulled it off the self. heard it on the local news. ...................
Reply to this comment