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craichead

Skydiving on "Mythbusters"

By craichead, in The Bonfire

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craichead    0

craichead
Tonight AndyMan and I saw an excellent episode of Mythbusters where the two guys test the myth of "Can a penny be embedded in the cement if thrown off the Empire State Building?" To determine the terminal velocity of a penny, one of the hosts, Adam, went on a tandem skydive and released a handful of pennies in freefall. Too cool! Kinda stupid, but cool! ;) Here's the episode guide blurb, and also a list of dates and times of when it will be shown again:

http://dsc.discovery.com/schedule/episode.jsp?episode=4&cpi=24344&gid=11489&channel=DSC

_Pm
__
"Scared of love, love and aeroplanes...falling out, I said takes no brains." -- Andy Partridge (XTC)

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craichead    0

craichead
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Which DZ did they use?? I think they do the show in the bay area?? Maybe not, I am not sure. Just curious..



I was wondering that myself...AndyMan suggested that they probably didn't even get out over a dropzone since they were releasing a handfull of pennies. It looked very desert-like from the glimpses I caught of the ground, but I could be wrong!

_Pm
__
"Scared of love, love and aeroplanes...falling out, I said takes no brains." -- Andy Partridge (XTC)

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kallend    2,146

kallend
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Tonight AndyMan and I saw an excellent episode of Mythbusters where the two guys test the myth of "Can a penny be embedded in the cement if thrown off the Empire State Building?" To determine the terminal velocity of a penny, one of the hosts, Adam, went on a tandem skydive and released a handful of pennies in freefall. Too cool! Kinda stupid, but cool! ;) Here's the episode guide blurb, and also a list of dates and times of when it will be shown again:

http://dsc.discovery.com/schedule/episode.jsp?episode=4&cpi=24344&gid=11489&channel=DSC

_Pm



So - what was the terminal velocity of a penny? I'd guess it isn't much more than 20 - 30mph.
...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

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dgskydive    0

dgskydive
I saw the show as well last night. The terminal velocity was something like 64 mph. Not only did they prove it wouldn't kill ya. they also stuck there hands about 2 feet from this nail gun they had set up to test the pennies and it didn't even break the skin on the guy. He did it twice.
Dom


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PhreeZone    20

PhreeZone
It was between 35 and 64 mph depending on if it was on edge or not. They created a wind tunnel that floated the penny and measured the airspeed at the top and bottom to determine it.

Not too sure how scientific the top was though.
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CrazyIvan    0

CrazyIvan
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Yeah that episode was great...However, my fav is the one with the dead pigs in the Vette



Oh gosh, that's a classic!!!! and then tried to sell it, and THEY DID!!!.

Another favorite of mine is the BURSTING CD's.
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kallend    2,146

kallend
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It was between 35 and 64 mph depending on if it was on edge or not. They created a wind tunnel that floated the penny and measured the airspeed at the top and bottom to determine it.

Not too sure how scientific the top was though.



Hmmm - "on edge" is not a stable confiuration for a falling disk. You could certainly test it in that configuration to find a theoretical TV, but if you dropped it from a skyscraper it would never go there of it's own accord, and if by random fluke it got in that attitude, it wouldn't stay there.
...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

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lfhower    0

lfhower
Ya they sold it Ivan, but the guy that bought it on used the engine and tranny. They were asking 3k and got 2k for it. The body was not usable even after stripping out the interior. It was hilarious!! Seeing those guys gagging was over the top!!!


Always remember, when you get where you're going, there you are!

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AndyMan    7

AndyMan
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Hmmm - "on edge" is not a stable confiuration for a falling disk. You could certainly test it in that configuration to find a theoretical TV, but if you dropped it from a skyscraper it would never go there of it's own accord, and if by random fluke it got in that attitude, it wouldn't stay there.



They put a penny in a windtunnel and showed the speed was a pretty definitive 64 MPH. The tunnel was a foot high, and the penny remained in the tunnel.

During the tests to determine how much damage a 64 MPH penny would do, they cut two sides off the penny so that it would fit into a compressed air powered nail gun. My guess is the penny was 1/4 smaller because of the cutting. The penny did no damage whatsoever, except that when it impacted bone, the stinging feeling was quite pronounced.

What was really fun was when they fitted a penny to the end of a rifle firing blanks, it was only when the penny was doing mach-3 did it do any actual damage.

_Am
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You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

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craichead    0

craichead
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Sounds like it would hurt if it hit someone on the head.



Yah, it would probably hurt, but it wouldn't be lethal, as the myth proclaims. Apparently most of the pennies thrown from the Empire State Building never make it very far anyway--most of them land on a ledge five stories below the observation deck.

_Pm
__
"Scared of love, love and aeroplanes...falling out, I said takes no brains." -- Andy Partridge (XTC)

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Cornholio    0

Cornholio
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During the tests to determine how much damage a 64 MPH penny would do, they cut two sides off the penny so that it would fit into a compressed air powered nail gun. My guess is the penny was 1/4 smaller because of the cutting. The penny did no damage whatsoever, except that when it impacted bone, the stinging feeling was quite pronounced.



I saw that last night too. However, after the initial testing with the cut penny, they modified the nailer so that a full penny would fit into it. All the tests done after that were with a full penny, not a chopped up one.

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CrazyIvan    0

CrazyIvan
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So what is the story behind the pigs and the 'vette?

FallRate



To bust the myth that if a corps is left in a car for a long time, the odor will remain forever, so, they bought a Vette, a huge dead pig and placed it inside the car for 4 months, then, tried to clean the car, it was fun watching that episode, and yucky too :S

BTW, the myth was busted because it's possible to clean a vehicle and remove the odor.
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