Mythbusters at the White House [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

Ravens_cry

2010-12-13, 06:59 AM

Yup, that was last week's new episode. Wasn't really the best, since they're retreading ground they've already been over twice now, but the smashed cars to retreading old ground ratio is still ok.
Yeah, I hate to say this but, maybe it should end soon? I love Mythbusters, I do, I think they are shining examples of real nerdosity in the media and that Zombie Feynman was right. (http://xkcd.com/397/)
But I want it to end with a bang not a whimper, hopefully literally.

Grumman

2010-12-13, 07:47 AM

{Scrubbed}

Eldan

2010-12-13, 07:48 AM

The question is: how do they connect explosions to birth certificates?

Ravens_cry

2010-12-13, 08:14 AM

The question is: how do they connect explosions to birth certificates?
Hmm, he's from Hawaii, Hawaii has volcanoes, volcanoes can erupt with the force of several nuclear bombs, nuclear bombs explode!
Think Mythbusters can get their hands on a thermonuclear device?

Eldan

2010-12-13, 08:26 AM

Of course. They just have to test it on an abandoned airport somewhere in the desert.

Hey, I know! They could test if you could survive being thrown through the air in a fridge, and if lead fridges protect you from radiation!

Manga Shoggoth

2010-12-13, 08:34 AM

Hmm, he's from Hawaii, Hawaii has volcanoes, volcanoes can erupt with the force of several nuclear bombs, nuclear bombs explode!
Think Mythbusters can get their hands on a thermonuclear device?

Wrong sort of volcano, I'm afraid. The Hawaiian volcanoes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawaiian_eruption) do not erupt explosively in that way.

Emperor Ing

2010-12-13, 08:39 AM

I don't think it's bad they look at some myths that may have had procedural issues. Did they look at the "exploding cars by shooting them" myth again yet?

Also, can we...you know...not talk about the birth certificate here? Not only has it been scientifically proven that paper is not impervious to fire, but it is a topic that incites political discussion.

Knaight

2010-12-13, 08:42 AM

Also, can we...you know...not talk about the birth certificate here? Not only has it been scientifically proven that paper is not impervious to fire, but it is a topic that incites political discussion.

There has got to be a burning paper myth that is fun to test. Maybe something about spontaneous combustion in a high oxygen atmosphere...

Ravens_cry

2010-12-13, 08:46 AM

Wrong sort of volcano, I'm afraid. The Hawaiian volcanoes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawaiian_eruption) do not erupt explosively in that way.
I know that, hence the word 'can'. I was using volcano in the more general sense of something that converts magma to lava.:smallwink:

2010-12-13, 08:51 AM

Wrong sort of volcano, I'm afraid. The Hawaiian volcanoes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawaiian_eruption) do not erupt explosively in that way.Now that sounds like a myth worth busting

Emperor Ing

2010-12-13, 08:54 AM

There has got to be a burning paper myth that is fun to test. Maybe something about spontaneous combustion in a high oxygen atmosphere...

Oily rags are prone to spontaneous combustion...allegedly. :smallbiggrin:

Eldan

2010-12-13, 08:57 AM

Now that sounds like a myth worth busting

"So, Jamie. I think the question now becomes: what is necessary to make a Hawaiian volcano explosively erupt?"

Ravens_cry

2010-12-13, 09:19 AM

"So, Jamie. I think the question now becomes: what is necessary to make a Hawaiian volcano explosively erupt?"
Two words: hydrovolcanic eruption. Interestingly, according to Wikipedia at least, these are fairly common for waterbound shield volcanoes like, you guessed it, the Hawaiian Island volcanoes. So, to answer the question, one word: water.

Joran

2010-12-13, 03:04 PM

Yup, that was last week's new episode. Wasn't really the best, since they're retreading ground they've already been over twice now, but the smashed cars to retreading old ground ratio is still ok.

I understand why they did it. The POTUS probably asked them for an experiment that required a lot of students to participate and this was the one they came up with.

They've retread the same ground twice already, but they still haven't tried to replicate the results. I'm wondering if it's possible to use a very large parabolic mirror, or perhaps an array of smaller ones, to ignite a ship. And barring that, a high powered laser.

Yeah, I hate to say this but, maybe it should end soon? I love Mythbusters, I do, I think they are shining examples of real nerdosity in the media and that Zombie Feynman was right. (http://xkcd.com/397/)
But I want it to end with a bang not a whimper, hopefully literally.

I'd disagree. Adam, Jaime, and the others are starting to crack into American popular culture. So far, Grant Imhara has had a couple appearances on Craig Ferguson, Adam and Jaime have showed up at Jon Stewart's rally and now an appearance with the President.

There's still plenty of myths around that can be busted, especially since shows like Burn Notice and websites like Youtube keep generating more.

From Burn Notice, I'd like them to test if Thermite could actually burn through an engine block of a car and whether you can make a microwave bomb. They've already done the phone book car one, which was extremely fun to watch.

Eldonauran

2010-12-13, 03:23 PM

They've already done the phone book car one, which was extremely fun to watch.

That AND the Duct Tape Hour (first one). Boat out of duct tape, classic AND priceless. I swear I am going to do that one day. Make a Kayak out of duct tape. :smallamused:

I love the Mythbusters show. It is practically the ONLY reason I watch television. The SciFi (read: SyFy) channel is already ruined, as far as I am concerned. Its going to go the same way as MTV. (Where's my damn music!?!? :smallmad:)

Starbuck_II

2010-12-13, 03:35 PM

{Scrubbed}

averagejoe

2010-12-13, 04:43 PM

Also, can we...you know...not talk about the birth certificate here? Not only has it been scientifically proven that paper is not impervious to fire, but it is a topic that incites political discussion.

The Mod They Call Me: This would be preferable. Contentious topics related to politicians are usually inappropriate on these forums.

Cristo Meyers

2010-12-13, 05:38 PM

I understand why they did it. The POTUS probably asked them for an experiment that required a lot of students to participate and this was the one they came up with.

Well, they made it as interesting as they could, but for me the third time going over it just didn't grab my attention.

They've retread the same ground twice already, but they still haven't tried to replicate the results. I'm wondering if it's possible to use a very large parabolic mirror, or perhaps an array of smaller ones, to ignite a ship. And barring that, a high powered laser.

Nah, one of the attempts the second time around was a mirror array. It still didn't work.

I honestly think the reason they haven't seriously tried to replicate the results is because the amount of resources it would take to actually build something that could focus sunlight enough to hit that 400+ degree burning point. Some of those arrays the last time were pretty massive.

I'd disagree. Adam, Jaime, and the others are starting to crack into American popular culture. So far, Grant Imhara has had a couple appearances on Craig Ferguson, Adam and Jaime have showed up at Jon Stewart's rally and now an appearance with the President.

There's still plenty of myths around that can be busted, especially since shows like Burn Notice and websites like Youtube keep generating more.

Same here. Hell, I can think of a few things right off the top of my head that I don't believe they've tested and would make for some interesting TV (i.e. is it possible to actually split a medieval warrior's shield?)

From Burn Notice, I'd like them to test if Thermite could actually burn through an engine block of a car and whether you can make a microwave bomb. They've already done the phone book car one, which was extremely fun to watch.

They've done both, actually. :smallbiggrin:

Jamie literally split a car in two with Thermite and they microwaved a block of C4 when testing myths from the movie Grosse Pointe Blank.

Arcane_Secrets

2010-12-13, 06:04 PM

I understand why they did it. The POTUS probably asked them for an experiment that required a lot of students to participate and this was the one they came up with.

They've retread the same ground twice already, but they still haven't tried to replicate the results. I'm wondering if it's possible to use a very large parabolic mirror, or perhaps an array of smaller ones, to ignite a ship. And barring that, a high powered laser.

What I'd really like them to do to finally bust the myth (for good) is the following:

1) Figure out how many mirrors it would actually take to get something to the ignition point. I suspect that there may be some kind of maximum involved in this; if so, then the myth is already busted on that basis.

2) Try to make a multi-mirror array that really can do the job. One really obvious problem I noticed is that human hands just aren't steady enough to focus the reflections onto a single point for any length of time (as neat as it looked on television). What I was thinking of instead was a mirror array in which each mirror's position could be individually adjusted to put as much light on the target reliably.

(I watch the show way too much...)

Joran

2010-12-14, 01:03 AM

They've done both, actually. :smallbiggrin:

Jamie literally split a car in two with Thermite and they microwaved a block of C4 when testing myths from the movie Grosse Pointe Blank.

Crap, I remember the Thermite now, but the microwave bomb in Burn Notice included some household chemicals that he threw in. Very different from using a few wires in a microwave as a detonator.

My friend wanted to see if a Bat Signal would actually work.

WitchSlayer

2010-12-14, 05:31 AM

I want to know if shaving an area actually makes hair grow back faster and longer.

leakingpen

2010-12-14, 09:52 AM

Yup, that was last week's new episode. Wasn't really the best, since they're retreading ground they've already been over twice now, but the smashed cars to retreading old ground ratio is still ok.

Its not though. They never tested the main method of the actual myth, which was that archimedes had 500 soldiers each holding a mirror, manually adjusting as they went.

arcane secrets, I have a friend who made an array like that, created a focus point at about 5 feet. Using 1.5 inch mirror tiles, a 3 foot square piece of plywood covered in it melts, and then burns, aluminum cans. He uses it to melt cans and pour into plates for making sca armor.

Arcane_Secrets

2010-12-14, 12:01 PM

Its not though. They never tested the main method of the actual myth, which was that archimedes had 500 soldiers each holding a mirror, manually adjusting as they went.

arcane secrets, I have a friend who made an array like that, created a focus point at about 5 feet. Using 1.5 inch mirror tiles, a 3 foot square piece of plywood covered in it melts, and then burns, aluminum cans. He uses it to melt cans and pour into plates for making sca armor.

I'd really like to see a youtube video of that (although not seeing it personally, it isn't absolute proof of course).

Closet_Skeleton

2010-12-14, 03:25 PM

leakingpen

2010-12-14, 03:34 PM

I'd really like to see a youtube video of that (although not seeing it personally, it isn't absolute proof of course).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tt7RG3UR4c

zoom to 1:25 much better setup than i've used before.

WitchSlayer

2010-12-14, 04:59 PM

I think they should test vampires (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Plogojowitz). Doesn't sound too hard. Just find a small village where people are dying mysteriously and see if digging up corpses and beheading them helps.

"Well Jamie, myth busted, beheading corpses did not slow down mysterious deaths.
"Well you know we can't stop there, we have to replicate the results"
"Blow up the graveyard?"
"Blow up the graveyard."

Katana_Geldar

2010-12-14, 05:15 PM

I think Mythbusters are tame compared to their Irregular Webcomic counterparts.

Kris Strife

2010-12-14, 09:13 PM

I think Mythbusters are tame compared to their Irregular Webcomic counterparts.

Its kind of hard to measure up to time travel and intentionally destroying the universe. :smalltongue:

VanBuren

2010-12-14, 11:05 PM

I want to know if shaving an area actually makes hair grow back faster and longer.

Pretty sure that one's false.

IIRC, it comes out of the idea that if a teenager shaves his "beard", then it will grow back thicker next time, which doesn't have to do with shaving so much as it has to do with puberty.

Katana_Geldar

2010-12-14, 11:27 PM

I want to know if shaving an area actually makes hair grow back faster and longer.

No, it just seems to as you are cutting off the hair follicle at the top when you shave rather than ripping it out through plucking or waxing or weakening the hair itself so it breaks with depilitory cream.

The Glyphstone

2010-12-14, 11:30 PM

Its kind of hard to measure up to time travel and intentionally destroying the universe. :smalltongue:

Repeatedly.:smallcool:

leafman

2010-12-14, 11:31 PM

My friend wanted to see if a Bat Signal would actually work.

It works on the small scale, I've built a mock up, so in theory it would work full scale if you projected the signal onto a thick cloud or building.

Katana_Geldar

2010-12-14, 11:32 PM

I honestly wonder if Adam and Jamie know about the strip, and if they do what they think.

Arcane_Secrets

2010-12-15, 12:02 AM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tt7RG3UR4c

zoom to 1:25 much better setup than i've used before.

That's pretty impressive.

Ravens_cry

2010-12-15, 12:09 AM

That's pretty impressive.
The odd thing is when they actually show it flowing and melting, it's not glowing, but it is when they go back to it.

Dexam

2010-12-15, 01:53 AM

Repeatedly.:smallcool:

Well, it's not science unless the experiment is reproducible. :smallwink:

Eldan

2010-12-15, 05:07 AM

I've seen similar with solar furnace, yes. Them melting through a tile of space shuttle heat resistant tiles was pretty amazing to watch.

leakingpen

2010-12-15, 02:04 PM

The odd thing is when they actually show it flowing and melting, it's not glowing, but it is when they go back to it.

thats because they had special filters on the camera to even be able to see it. The white light you see ringing the meta is BLINDING in person. im guessing the filter also cut out a good deal of red glare. I had to put welding goggles on to look at the cans we melted with the 2 foot square model while melting them, i cant imagine how bad this one is.

Ravens_cry

2010-12-16, 03:21 AM

thats because they had special filters on the camera to even be able to see it. The white light you see ringing the meta is BLINDING in person. im guessing the filter also cut out a good deal of red glare. I had to put welding goggles on to look at the cans we melted with the 2 foot square model while melting them, i cant imagine how bad this one is.
If so, I wish they had explained that. Because frankly to a layman, i.e. me, it looks like they substituted something with a much lower melting point that doesn't glow in the visible spectrum when molten, like lead, then cut to the panel melted by some more conventional means. I know solar furnaces can concentrate staggering amounts of energy (http://www.digtheheat.com/Solar/solar_furnace.html).

cattoy

2010-12-17, 02:02 AM

Jimorian

2010-12-17, 02:15 AM

they didn't really think things through in trying to replicate the death ray.

The secret is that you don't want to use a flat mirror, you want to use a curved one.

A curved one (assuming you've got the right curvature) focuses the collected light on a narrower area than a flat one, which is why they couldn't get anything to burn.

This isn't true because if you make it curved in any way, you only have ONE focal length that you can use for the mirror, and the margin of error is ridiculously small. "OK, soldiers, make sure that you all are precisely 64.7 meters from the enemy!"

In fact, the biggest problem is that because of this, the tolerances for a flat mirror are also ridiculous. Any curvature at all, even from bending under weight or pressure, makes it impossible to get a decent spot of light if you have any distance to the target at all.

The other secret to using curved mirrors is that if you make them cylindrical, then each mirror will concentrate its light onto a line. That way you can have different soldiers holding them at different angles.

The reason this is important is that nobody knows where their light is going. All of the reflected light spots look the same, so you don't know if you're on target or not. This way, you can have individual soldiers rotate their mirrors a little, so they can tell which light spot is theirs, and make appropriate corrections. Without such a system, how are the people who aren't aligned properly ever going to know?

If you are achieving enough light concentration to ignite something, the soldiers wouldn't be able to look at that spot and see anything, much less whether their own particular spot is hitting the target. You would probably need some kind of sextant-like aiming device to mount the mirror on and calibrate it beforehand.

Grumman

2010-12-17, 02:09 PM

This isn't true because if you make it curved in any way, you only have ONE focal length that you can use for the mirror, and the margin of error is ridiculously small. "OK, soldiers, make sure that you all are precisely 64.7 meters from the enemy!"
Wrong. There is one focal length where the light from your mirror will come to a point, but well to either side of that distance, a curved mirror will be more effective than a flat mirror.

Let's just say your flat mirror puts the reflected light onto a ~10*10 cm surface (100 square centimetres). A correctly curved mirror will put that light onto a very small surface at a distance of 64.7 metres, but anywhere between 0 metres and 129.4 metres, it will still be less than 100 square centimetres. We're not talking about photography here, it doesn't need to be perfect, just better than what a flat mirror can do.

Foeofthelance

2010-12-17, 03:33 PM

If you are achieving enough light concentration to ignite something, the soldiers wouldn't be able to look at that spot and see anything, much less whether their own particular spot is hitting the target. You would probably need some kind of sextant-like aiming device to mount the mirror on and calibrate it beforehand.

Or just a ton of soldiers. Remember, the first rule is "There is no such thing as over-kill." If you need X number of soldiers to cause a ship to catch fire, then you use 100x soldiers, that way only 1% actually need to be on target. Sure, you're losing 99% of your energy on various degrees of misses, but the target is still catching fire. Its easier than trying to calculate the numerous variables that doing it exactly would require, as well as trying to train individual soldiers to focus a narrow beam of light on a specific spot of a semi-moving target. Flood the target area with as much energy as possible, and wait for the tar or pitch or cloth to catch fire and spread from there when it runs into a particularly dense patch of power.

cattoy

2010-12-17, 06:17 PM

This isn't true because if you make it curved in any way, you only have ONE focal length that you can use for the mirror, and the margin of error is ridiculously small. "OK, soldiers, make sure that you all are precisely 64.7 meters from the enemy!"

get this guy - he thinks a curved surface can only have one radius along its entire length...

The Big Dice

2010-12-17, 08:27 PM

IO don't think setting things on fire using mirrors is likely to work. Especially not when your mirror is a piece of polished bronze. But blinding the crews of ships with reflections, causing them to crash into each other or into your harbour wall, that I can see being very plausible.

Claudius Maximus

2010-12-17, 08:58 PM

Maybe someone should run an experiment on the matter.

Jimorian

2010-12-18, 03:45 AM

Wrong. There is one focal length where the light from your mirror will come to a point, but well to either side of that distance, a curved mirror will be more effective than a flat mirror.

Let's just say your flat mirror puts the reflected light onto a ~10*10 cm surface (100 square centimetres). A correctly curved mirror will put that light onto a very small surface at a distance of 64.7 metres, but anywhere between 0 metres and 129.4 metres, it will still be less than 100 square centimetres. We're not talking about photography here, it doesn't need to be perfect, just better than what a flat mirror can do.

Well, tell me exactly how much curvature would be necessary for this out to 200 meters. I can tell you without even breaking out a calculator that you can't measure a difference that small on a meter square mirror without modern equipment.

This is the point I'm making, the tolerances for any of this are microscopic. A plant that makes retail-grade astronomic telescopes might be able to manufacture mirrors that are good enough for what you are talking about.

get this guy - he thinks a curved surface can only have one radius along its entire length...

Sure, you can do that, but it rather defeats the purpose of what we're trying to accomplish here because only a very narrow band of reflected light (~ 1mm wide maybe) will have the correct focal distance.

Foeofthelance has the right idea here. Minor distortions and inaccurate aiming are such huge factors that the only way this can work is with massive overkill.