Monday, July 3, 2023

Even the densest metal doesn't exceed USPS shipping weight limit

So many words there...

That's 48 pounds of tungsten in a post office mailing box right there that people are trying to pick up. 

Apparently it's really tough to pick up 48 pounds of tungsten - which makes sense because tungsten is really dense...but not as dense as osmium.

Apparently filling the same box with osmium would give you 61.5 pounds (source) - thankfully still below the post office's maximum weight limit of 70 pounds. To quote...

Osmium’s density is 22.6 grams per cubic centimeter. OP measured the inside dimensions of the small flat rate box and multiplied them to get the volume, 75.3 cubic inches. This is equal to 1,234.5 cubic centimeters. So all we have to do is multiply 22.6 x 1234.5. This gives us 27,899.7 grams, which is 61.5 pounds.

So, unless you go hunting neutron star matter or dark matter or something exotic like that, you're good to put just about anything inside one of those post office mailers.

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