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Whats so bad about putting metal in the microwave?

T

Train

Lifer
I know your not supposed to do it, and ive even accidentaly done it once or twice (like not realizing a container had foil under the lid, etc.) but ive always pulled it out right away for fear of damaging the microwave oven, or starting a fire or something.

But as i was standing there watching my frozen burrito warm up, i wondered, why can non metals warm up just fine, but metals have such a problem? and since i dont want to risk it myself, what exactly WOULD happen if i put a fork in there and just let it run?
 
It sparks.

Edit: Dunno why it'd spark, but maybe something about the microwaves not being able to penetrate the metal like it does with other materials.
 
Basically, certain types of metal reflect the microwave energy instead of absorbing it like water does. This causes sparks as the energy has to go somewhere.
 
Here's a scientific explanation as to why you can't put metal in the microwave: Why You Can't Put Metal in a Microwave

Also, if you put a fork in, what'll happen is that you'll get sparking, then eventually a flame sprouting from the fork. Some of my friends once put a CDR into the microwave, and well being composed of metal it sparked and ignited in flames. Quite amusing actually.

--Mark
 
I'd also like to know the exact reason, but my guess is that a microwave oven heats up food by exciting the atoms (or just the electrons?) in whatever's in there...and in something like metal that's conductive and has a molecular build that's so solid, something's gotta go wrong.

odd. I don't know the answer. weird.
 
i heard something about the energy being reflected back into the microwave damaging it... dunno how true that is but the sparking/arcing and the resulting overheating is probably the real problem
 
Originally posted by: johneetrash
whoa what happens when you put in a grape? someone do it and capture it tonight, i dont have any grapes!
Click to expand...

yes please someone please do it
 
If you want to see something cool go zap an uncooked egg, still in the shell, in a microwave that does not belong to you. Stand away from the door.
 
There's a website devoted to experiments with things in microwaves.... I'm too tired to look for it right now though.. It includes ways to make ball lightning in the microwave...

Here's a similar site though, with links (that may be to the site I was looking for)
unwise microwave experiments
 
The grape just whistled for a second then everything inside of it boiled into bubbles and spilled onto the plate... nothing really entertaining. Wasn't even worth me taking pictures of it 😛
 
Originally posted by: johneetrash
whoa what happens when you put in a grape? someone do it and capture it tonight, i dont have any grapes!
Click to expand...

Here you go.... quicktime movie of the event:
too much time on someone's hands
Grapes in the microwave oven.

This is a lesson that it is not necessarily metal which is most dangerous to put in the microwave.

Take a relatively think skinned grape and cut it in half, but not all the way. Leave a small bridge of skin connecting the two. Dab the excess juice from the grape and place the whole thing like an open book in the microwave oven. After 10 seconds of cooking, a large spark blows the two halves apart!

I first found this demo at the web site of Patrick R. Michaud.

Our suspicion is that the grape halves act as a small dipole antenna for the microwaves. Optimally such an antenna is 1/4 the size of the wavelength, which is pretty close for our grape. The skin flap is a conductor and currents run back and forth across it. As it heats up, it dries out, increasing it's resistance further, causing more heat, etc. Finally it ignites. The smell of burnt sugar fills the oven after it is turned off. The spark will not occur if the grape is too wet. Juice boils up and covers the skin bridge and there is no spark.

On rare occasion we noticed rising clouds of luminous plasma (often referred to as 'ball lightning' in other microwave oven web pages). While testing for repeatability (so we could demonstrate it in front of a large group of high school students) we ran out of grapes. Carl Acampado, one of our undergraduate assistants, started to cut used grape halves in half again, as shown in the next figure:

[\q]
Click to expand...
 
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