 |
| FORUM | REGISTER | LOGIN | HOAXIPEDIA | TOP 100 APRIL FOOLS | COLLEGE PRANKS | ABOUT THE CURATOR | CONTACT |
| A HISTORY OF HOAXES | HOAX WEBSITES | HOAX PHOTOS | HOAX PHOTO TESTS | GULLIBILITY TESTS | TALL-TALE CREATURES |
About the Museum
The Museum of Hoaxes is dedicated to promoting knowledge about hoaxes. (Click here for opening hours, etc.) Areas of the site include the Hoaxipedia (the museum's online encyclopedia of hoaxes), the Hoax Forum, and the Hoax Photo Database.
The Museum of Hoaxes is dedicated to promoting knowledge about hoaxes. (Click here for opening hours, etc.) Areas of the site include the Hoaxipedia (the museum's online encyclopedia of hoaxes), the Hoax Forum, and the Hoax Photo Database.
Prankplace.com
RUDE ROVERThe Christmas dog with no class! He sings and toots Jingle Bells.
INFLATABLE TREEWho needs the hassle of a real Christmas tree?
FARTING SANTAGo ahead and pull his finger!
How To Make Fake Gold Bars
Status: Advice for would-be criminals
Recently the national bank of Ethiopia discovered that much of the gold in its possession was fake. It was simply gold-plated steel. It found this out after it sent a shipment of gold to South Africa, which promptly sent it back.Theo Gray, writing for popsci.com, points out that it's incredible that a national bank fell for a fraud like this, since simply by picking up the gold bars someone should have noticed that they were too light to be real -- gold being much heavier than steel.
Gray then considers a potentially very useful question: how could you create a fake gold bar that would be convincing enough to pass the pick-up test? The solution he comes up with is to use tungsten, which is about as heavy as gold, but much cheaper:
start with a tungsten slug about 1/8-inch smaller in each dimension than the gold bar you want, then cast a 1/16-inch layer of real pure gold all around it. This bar would feel right in the hand, it would have a dead ring when knocked as gold should, it would test right chemically, it would weigh *exactly* the right amount, and though I don't know this for sure, I think it would also pass an x-ray fluorescence scan, the 1/16" layer of pure gold being enough to stop the x-rays from reaching any tungsten. You'd pretty much have to drill it to find out it's fake.
Gray notes that it would cost about $50,000 to produce a fake gold bar in this way. But the bar, if accepted as real, would be worth around $400,000 -- which would be a pretty good return on your investment.