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Comment by thro1 | Hacker News Reader

.. There was this French bloke at the turn of the 20th century who built a giant whistle that produced sub-bass frequencies of around 7.1 or 7.2 Hz. The first time that he got it to work, he liquidized himself. It just turned his insides to mush—poor bugger.

https://djtechtools.com/2014/04/10/funktion-ones-tony-andrew...

Someone knows more about it ?

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Maybe Vladimir Gavreau? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Gavreau

EDIT: who may or may not be the same as this "Professor Gavraud": https://www.dickbowdler.co.uk/content/publications/A_Short_H...

Those are incredibly interesting reads, thank you!

Yeah, this is good stuff. The device could kill a person at 5 miles away, but was just as dangerous to its operators as to its enemy. It could deliver tens of thousands of watts. Wow.

Perfect doomsday MAD device for something important but automated

So is that the official frequency of the brown note?

From looking at the patents I think it's less about a specific frequency and more about a power level. Infrasonics are defined as less than 20hz and higher than geologic vibrations like once ever hundred seconds or so. If I'd guess it's somewhere between .5 and 10 hz, but again it's not about playing something of that frequency, it's about delivering tens of thousands of watts to the air which just happens to be at that frequency

"who built a giant whistle that produced sub-bass frequencies of around 7.1 or 7.2 Hz. The first time that he got it to work, he liquidized himself"

specifically talking about frequencies liquefying someone. the quoted comment mentioned nothing about power levels.

the TFA is talking about power levels. that's a different conversation than the one you replied

That's my point, it's not the frequency that liquifys someone.

You could easily play a 7.1 hz sound on a good thx sub or concert sound system. Simply playing that tone would not liquefy someone.

At the same time, one could play a 6 hz or a 7.3 hz tone at the same power level as this guy did, and it would liquefy someone.

The frequency is the result of a bunch of other variables that are the true drivers of the phenomenon. Power level, physical properties of air and the limits to the power you can couple to it before cavitation and negative pressure regions occurs, resonance, and the geometry of your device. Put that all together, get it ringing, constructively interfering, and it will be at a certain frequency. It's the result of the equation, not the input.

More accurate to call it a “red note” I think

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