1980s all-ceramic engine development initiative

Brief reference — "in the mid-80s the ceramists were touting that ceramics were going to take over the world." Used as a foil for the steel-as-future argument.

I remember 20, 25 years ago I was going around giving talks, because in the mid-80s the ceramists were touting that ceramics were going to take over the world, that ceramics had much better properties. The problem is, the ceramists had never studied mechanical properties very much, because the mechanical properties of ceramics are pretty lousy. We'll talk about this more.

Tom's mid-1980s ONR-Tokyo experience at Shinjuku ceramics conferences with millions attending; his standing taunt that "the only structural materials made out of ceramics are Portland cement and toilet bowls"; ceramic kitchen knives that stay sharp but chip catastrophically.

The history of this paper is that around 1990, I was sick of listening to people talk about fine ceramics and how they were going to make ceramic engines. I worked for the Office of Naval Research in Tokyo, Japan in the mid-80s, and they would have a ceramics conference at Shinjuku station and two million Japanese would come to this display of fine ceramics. Only like four square blocks of people.