Is Spruce Lighter than Aluminum?

[perdue3]

Anyone?

[Devil 505]

No.

[kilo2]

Yes because you cannot type math on the computer.

[Devil 505]

math



Hey, I got it!


Poor, poor, Schlowy.

[Tank-Ace]

Depends on the respective volumes. The question you should be asking is spruce denser than aluminum  .

[perdue3]

I know aluminum is more dense, but does that make it heavier?

[Brooke]

He might mean, given a part of equal strength (like a spruce wing spar vs. an aluminum wing spar), which is lighter?

[nrshida]

It depends on the application and required types and values of loads but it can be, yes.

[Kingpin]

I know aluminum is more dense, but does that make it heavier?

Yes, if objects are of the same volume (size), then the denser object is heavier. 

Aluminum is about 5-6 times denser than spruce, so given equal volumes, aluminum is much heavier.

However, if you are talking about volumes based on achieving an equal strength between the materials, then it gets much more complicated.  As Shida said, that all depends on the application and types of forces/stresses being applied.

Here's an interesting article comparing light aircraft construction materials, with charts and numbers for the math wizards:
http://exp-aircraft.com/library/heintz/material.html

<S>

[Greebo]

Wood has most of its strength in one direction and is strong in compression in this direction only. Aluminium is much better than wood in tension and for this reason it was used on the lower skins of the Mosquito's wings. The Mosquito had a very clever structure using inner and outer plywood skins separated by a balsa wood filler or longerons. Like most aluminium aircraft a lot of the loads were carried in this composite outer skin rather than through the internal structure.

Most Soviet fighters using wooden construction carried more of the loads internally which was less efficient. So when all metal versions of the La-7 and Yak-9 appeared after the war their skin was designed to take more of the loads and so their airframes were much lighter than their predecessors'.

[Randy1]

A tid bit.  Concrete can weigh less per cubic foot than aluminum.

[Slate]

\
   It has been put to the test, no?

[LCADolby]

Oh my farking Jesus H Christmas!

aluminIum!

[Volron]

Oh my farking Jesus H Christmas!

aluminIum!

NO!  It's alOOminum!

[Brooke]

Oh my farking Jesus H Christmas!

aluminIum!

From "A Short History of Nearly Everything," by Bryson:

"The confusion over the aluminum/aluminium spelling arose because of some uncharacteristic indecisiveness on Davy's [Humphry Davy's] part.  When he first isolated the element in 1808, he called it 'alumium'.  For some reason he thought better of that and changed it to 'aluminum' four years later.  Americans dutifully adopted the new term, but many British users disliked 'aluminum', pointing out that it disrupted the '-ium' pattern established by sodium, calcium, and strontium, so they added a vowel and syllable."

So, you see that "aluminum" is the correct form if you go by what it was named by the man himself.