A couple of  years ago I was in Moscow, Russia on a business trip for a high
level technology transfer.  My Russian is quite rusty since I haven't used
it since my teen years but it was my first language.  According to the
Russians, the more we drank the better my Russian got and the same for their
English.  As things progressed we became used to each other and opened up
especially after consuming beer along with  vodka.
From time to time we strayed from our main objectives and when one of the
PHD scientists heard that I had  a Mercedes diesel he cornered me.
He worked at  Zelenograd Research Institute, a heavily guarded facility
outside Moscow  that is similar to our NASA facilities, space age research.
According to him  a not so good or interesting objective was to develop a
better starting system for their diesels in Siberia because their batteries
had to supply all they could for turning the starter at minus 40C without
block heaters, not leaving much for glow plug heating.  He said they
succeeded but I didn't find out much more because the vodka led me astray.
We returned to the US with many small samples of metals, ceramics, and
materials we had no English words for.  When the labs got these samples to
test them, they were totally lost because of such weird properties.  Common
properties such as tensile and compressive strengths exceeded the
capabilities of the labs destructive testing facilities, in fact some
testing equipments failed while the sample to be destroyed survived.  Some
samples defied all chemical and spectrographic tests to identify their basic
chemistry.  Expansion on cooling and no change on heating or cooling were
common observations as were weird electronic properties.   The Soviets
ability to launch heavy payloads into space of the class of a steam
locomotive we're just beginning to be understand.  There is no end to the
problems identifying the properties or the final application for the
material.  But to get to the point,  buried  in all the samples boxes was a
box that contained a small plastic accordian atomizer with a fine salt and
pepper powder in it with a cryptic note in Russian instructing me to give
one squeeze of the bottle into the nozzle of the air cleaner at below zero
temperatures when the  diesel starts cranking, so  it takes two people and
only one puff,  without any need to preheat.  I had forgotten that I had it
but have since found it I can hardly wait for winter to test it out but I'm
a little concerned that it has caked up while in storage.  I took the lid
off and poked with a stick to break it up and got enough loose to be able to
squirt the powder.  It makes a little cloud that kind of floats in the air.
The particles are finer than any talc or flour I've seen and its hard to
wash off..  It makes your eyes water and causes you to sneeze.  I got brave
and made another small cloud about a foot in diameter, backed up and threw a
match at it.   It ignited and made sort of a fireball of spectacular colors
like a rainbow, then just white smoke.  I told the lab guys and they just
laughed and said  they've not surprised but they've  had their fill of
chasing their tails trying to figure out the unknown.  I can't find any
funds to have the powder tested    Letters to Zelenograd have not been
answered.  So I guess I have to wait for winter and see what gives.

73
Hank WD5AFD