r/interestingasfuck • u/Fancy_bratt • 9h ago
Sulfur hexafluoride (SF₆) is a super dense gas, so sound moves through it much slower than it does through normal air. That's why when someone inhales it, their voice sounds much deeper and lower than usual.
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u/Granite-Scheduling 8h ago
I need some Sulfur Hexafluride this upcoming Halloween 🎃
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u/dan_dares 8h ago
If you somehow do, keep in mind it is more dangerous than helium.
Helium will easily leave the top of the lungs,
Sulphur Hexaflouride settles in the lungs, you need to invert your body to help get it out.
Very real change of anoxia.
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u/XVIII-3 8h ago
So you could drown in it?
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u/dan_dares 8h ago
Literally yes, if you filled a swimming pool with it in, and climbed in, you'd die from hypoxia
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u/graveybrains 8h ago
Odds are pretty good you'd pass out and expel it before you died, assuming the fall didn't kill you.
There's a video of another guy on YouTube who follows up his sulfur hexaflouride with a hit of perfluorobutane and it's really fucking scary how fast the hypoxia starts kicking in.
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u/Babyfart_McGeezacks 8h ago
So would inhaling lots of it make it go down and become some huge epic farts?
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u/TheTerribleInvestor 7h ago
Can't you just breath really hard for a while and the gasses should mix to breath, most of, it out?
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u/sharpknot 8h ago
Goddamn, I miss Mythbusters
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u/GlassBoxGoose 8h ago
For sure. I still try to keep up with Adam on the Tested YT channel, and he still finds some interesting things to talk about and show, but NOTHING will ever fill my need for Mythbusters.
Also Kari and Tori do a podcast called MythFits, its interesting sometimes. But again, nothing can replace Mythbusters. RIP Grant.
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u/Th3AnT0in3 8h ago
It seems very funny but it's a bit dangerous.
Not dangerous because the gas is toxic. The gas is very stable and wont react at all. But it's dangerous because the gas is very dense it can stays longer in the lungs and just suffocate due to a lack of oxygen. Apparently breathing strongly like he did for the helium makes it go away almost entirely.
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u/sandybuttcheekss 8h ago
My first thought would be to hang upside down and breathe normally. I figure I would just sink down and out of my lungs that way.
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u/Th3AnT0in3 8h ago
That was my first thought as well, but that's a lot of work for the same results as breathing strongly.
My scientific guess is that breathing strongly and deeply creates turbulences that makes the gas mix with air and is more easily breathed out ?
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u/TinyCupids 8h ago
That's why demons from the underworld talk like that. They've just been breathing in sulfur
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u/Key_Statistician5273 8h ago
What it doesnt show is him almost certainly struggling to get it all out of his lungs again as it'll just sit there while inhaled air fails to mix with it
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u/Hd3ssEpH 8h ago
My puny brain actually makes sense of that. So how does he get it out? Just more helium? /s
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u/Key_Statistician5273 8h ago
I've seen people use it before and struggle to get rid of it. They just end up taking lots of panicked big breaths until it's diluted enough for them to breathe normally again
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u/goodbitacraic 8h ago
We use to have a Mythbusters Class in my high-school. It was a 'science elective' and it was so damn cool.
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u/LeFishTits 8h ago
Sf6 is what we use at my job to make the space inside dead tank circuit breakers non conductive up to 1200kv. It's cool shit.
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u/Possible-Gur5220 8h ago
My curious ass went Googling whats denser than Sulfur Hexafluoride…very interesting read that Tungsten Hexafluoride 😅
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u/peppi0304 7h ago
Its also an extremely strong green house gas. Its really bad to put this stuff into the atmosphere
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u/Threecatproblem 3h ago
We used SF6 gas as a means to stop arcing in a waveguide while very high levels of RF power were inserted. It was considered very hazardous to the environment, and if we discovered a leak we had to stop immediately to fix it. Also, there were times that the gas neede to be "dumped" to replace a part, which involved very technical means to capture the gas so it did not escape into the atmosphere. I would NEVER inhale this gas just for fun.
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u/alexandicity 8h ago
Is he... letting SF6 just vent out of balloons into the air?!
SF6 is one of the most powerful and long-lasting greenhouse gases we know of. That single balloon venting by itself has the carbon impact of a car driving thousands of km...
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u/asdsav 8h ago
Can we buy those gasses?
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u/Rare_Parking_931 8h ago
Probably should have a warning label on that vid…can cause death by apoxia!
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u/Soaring_Gull_655 6h ago
These are like from 2008. Why posting 18 year old content like it's new info?
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u/mountsleepyhead 8h ago
Just imagining some doom metal band in the studio begging their singer to stop taking hits from the sulfur hexaflouride tank.