1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:02,000 We're starting without you, Jamie. 2 00:01:00,000 --> 00:01:22,000 Jamie, I'm going to get right to the point. 3 00:01:22,000 --> 00:01:29,000 The goal of this episode is for you and I to destroy two cars in a way that we've never done before. 4 00:01:30,000 --> 00:01:38,000 So what's your pick? 5 00:01:38,000 --> 00:01:42,000 There is a story that's been on our list for a long time. I've always wanted to test it. 6 00:01:42,000 --> 00:01:48,000 The myth is that a standard household vacuum cleaner has enough suction to lift a car. 7 00:01:48,000 --> 00:01:50,000 Come on, baby! 8 00:01:50,000 --> 00:01:54,000 Well, I'm dubious, but it sounds like fun. 9 00:01:54,000 --> 00:01:55,000 What are you going to do? 10 00:01:55,000 --> 00:02:00,000 Well, you know, I've always wanted to do something that I call pancaking a car. 11 00:02:00,000 --> 00:02:05,000 It involves using explosives to perfectly flatten a car. 12 00:02:05,000 --> 00:02:09,000 So using the power of explosives to do work rather than just gratuitously? 13 00:02:09,000 --> 00:02:11,000 That's always floated in my boat in the past. 14 00:02:11,000 --> 00:02:12,000 Well, have at it! 15 00:02:12,000 --> 00:02:15,000 Explosions. 16 00:02:15,000 --> 00:02:17,000 Detonations. 17 00:02:17,000 --> 00:02:20,000 Here comes the shock wave. 18 00:02:20,000 --> 00:02:23,000 Or just blowing crap up. 19 00:02:23,000 --> 00:02:30,000 It's the science of C4 that gets Jamie jazzed. 20 00:02:30,000 --> 00:02:39,000 But can you really harness the brawn of a boom to completely crush a car? 21 00:02:39,000 --> 00:02:46,000 Well, in this final season special, Jamie's starting his story in scale, but not with this. 22 00:02:46,000 --> 00:02:51,000 So if we're going to do a scale down attempt at crushing a car, we could use a nice little model like this one. 23 00:02:51,000 --> 00:02:54,000 This is Dicast Zinc and it's 1-12th scale. 24 00:02:54,000 --> 00:03:00,000 The problem is if you measure the thinnest parts of it, you get about a 1-16th of an inch. 25 00:03:00,000 --> 00:03:05,000 And 1-12th scale, 1-16th of an inch times 12, you get 3-4th of an inch. 26 00:03:05,000 --> 00:03:10,000 I don't know any passenger vehicles that have 3-4-inch thick steel walls on them. 27 00:03:10,000 --> 00:03:16,000 So what we're going to do instead is use something like this can here, which has very thin sheet steel. 28 00:03:16,000 --> 00:03:21,000 And we'll make something that may not look as good, but it'll crush a lot more realistically. 29 00:03:21,000 --> 00:03:26,000 If this was Adam's story, his scale cars would be captivating. 30 00:03:26,000 --> 00:03:27,000 I think that's great. 31 00:03:27,000 --> 00:03:33,000 But Jamie's always preferred a more practical approach, where substance surpasses style. 32 00:03:33,000 --> 00:03:35,000 This is actually working. 33 00:03:35,000 --> 00:03:39,000 And in this case, by using simple steel cans for the body. 34 00:03:39,000 --> 00:03:40,000 Sure. 35 00:03:40,000 --> 00:03:43,000 And steel piping for the wheels and engine. 36 00:03:43,000 --> 00:03:48,000 He is able to scale a car's strength surprisingly well. 37 00:03:48,000 --> 00:03:49,000 Well, there you have it. 38 00:03:49,000 --> 00:03:52,000 I've got a sort of unibody sheet metal structure. 39 00:03:52,000 --> 00:03:55,000 I've got four wheels and I've got an engine block. 40 00:03:55,000 --> 00:03:58,000 Now, all of these things will crush differently. 41 00:03:58,000 --> 00:04:03,000 The sheet metal being the weakest, the wheels being next, and then the engine block being the sturdiest. 42 00:04:03,000 --> 00:04:10,000 Hopefully we'll be able to overcome the differences in those things and still end up with a flat thing. 43 00:04:14,000 --> 00:04:19,000 Well, to find out the guys head once again to their home away from home. 44 00:04:20,000 --> 00:04:25,000 This is the Alameda County Sheriff's Department bomb range in Dublin, California. 45 00:04:25,000 --> 00:04:29,000 It is the most important location in Mythbusters history. 46 00:04:34,000 --> 00:04:39,000 I've spent literal months on this location when you tally up all the location days. 47 00:04:39,000 --> 00:04:42,000 I've spent more time on this location than I spent learning typing in high school. 48 00:04:42,000 --> 00:04:45,000 And typing is the most important thing I learned in high school. 49 00:04:45,000 --> 00:04:54,000 And so it's fitting that our last explosion, our last experiment here, should be Jamie's choice to do work with explosives instead of just destructing. 50 00:04:56,000 --> 00:05:00,000 And to do just that, time to level out our work area. 51 00:05:00,000 --> 00:05:04,000 Jamie's starting with some pre-proof of concept preparation. 52 00:05:04,000 --> 00:05:07,000 Look at him, a man in his element. 53 00:05:07,000 --> 00:05:10,000 He's building a kind of car sandwich. 54 00:05:10,000 --> 00:05:17,000 A steel plate is the base, then his small scale car, then more steel on top. 55 00:05:17,000 --> 00:05:19,000 But what's the next ingredient? 56 00:05:19,000 --> 00:05:24,000 This is next. It's called data sheet. It's a high explosive in sheet form. 57 00:05:24,000 --> 00:05:26,000 We put this on top of our steel plate. 58 00:05:26,000 --> 00:05:30,000 Okay, that ought to work. And it goes kaboom. 59 00:05:30,000 --> 00:05:39,000 Yep, by adding a four-mil layer of data sheet, Jamie's hoping to force the upper steel plate down to completely crush his scale car. 60 00:05:39,000 --> 00:05:47,000 Fire the hole! Fire the hole! Fire the hole! 61 00:05:47,000 --> 00:05:49,000 Here we go. 62 00:05:50,000 --> 00:05:58,000 Okay, single layer of data sheet in three, two, one. 63 00:05:58,000 --> 00:06:02,000 Yeah, that's aggressive. 64 00:06:02,000 --> 00:06:07,000 That's got a real ring to it. I felt the walls of this thing vibrate. 65 00:06:07,000 --> 00:06:09,000 Yeah, let's go check it out. 66 00:06:09,000 --> 00:06:10,000 All right. 67 00:06:10,000 --> 00:06:17,000 The data sheet sure packed a punch, but has it created a small-scale crush? 68 00:06:17,000 --> 00:06:23,000 That looks like a positive result there, Mr. Heidemann. 69 00:06:23,000 --> 00:06:26,000 That's like one of the wheels right there. 70 00:06:26,000 --> 00:06:27,000 Yeah. 71 00:06:27,000 --> 00:06:28,000 And... 72 00:06:28,000 --> 00:06:29,000 That's the engine. 73 00:06:29,000 --> 00:06:30,000 The engine. 74 00:06:30,000 --> 00:06:34,000 Did you expect such a spectacular result on the first try? 75 00:06:34,000 --> 00:06:40,000 No, actually. I'm actually a little speechless. 76 00:06:40,000 --> 00:06:46,000 At a little under an inch thick, the car's been crushed to one-fifth its original size. 77 00:06:46,000 --> 00:06:50,000 So, is it already time to go full-scale? 78 00:06:50,000 --> 00:06:54,000 Jamie came here with a goal to flatten the car. 79 00:06:54,000 --> 00:06:59,000 And for my money, it looks like he achieved it on the very first try, but he's here at the bomb range, 80 00:06:59,000 --> 00:07:03,000 he's got a bunch of analogs. My guess is, I don't know, maybe he's going to start stacking them 81 00:07:03,000 --> 00:07:08,000 and trying to see optimal relationships between weight and explosives, 82 00:07:08,000 --> 00:07:12,000 or maybe we're all just going to go home. I'm actually not sure at this point. 83 00:07:12,000 --> 00:07:14,000 Oh, we're not going home. I can tell you that much. 84 00:07:14,000 --> 00:07:15,000 Oh, come on! 85 00:07:15,000 --> 00:07:21,000 This was a lovely first attempt, but when we scale this up to a full-sized car, 86 00:07:21,000 --> 00:07:26,000 it's going to be a lot bigger of an experiment, a lot more time and difficulty. 87 00:07:26,000 --> 00:07:31,000 So, I want to learn everything I can about the dynamics of what happened here before we go there. 88 00:07:31,000 --> 00:07:35,000 In other words, small scale's not over yet. 89 00:07:35,000 --> 00:07:38,000 Whoa! I don't think they've landed yet. 90 00:07:39,000 --> 00:07:45,000 But first, it's time for Adam's destructive denouement. 91 00:07:45,000 --> 00:07:51,000 It's a nice little bit of symmetry in this episode, and you're happy trying to make a car as low into the ground as possible, and in my half... 92 00:07:51,000 --> 00:07:53,000 You're trying to lift a car up as high as possible. 93 00:07:53,000 --> 00:07:54,000 Exactly. 94 00:07:54,000 --> 00:07:55,000 With a vacuum. 95 00:07:55,000 --> 00:08:02,000 Yes. Now, I figure that the trick to this is to make the mother of all attachments to increase the surface area of the vacuum cleaner's input 96 00:08:02,000 --> 00:08:07,000 so that the amount of such an eye create exceeds the weight of the car, and thus I can get it off the ground. 97 00:08:07,000 --> 00:08:12,000 So, what you're trying to say is that as far as the attachment goes, size matters. 98 00:08:12,000 --> 00:08:13,000 Indeed it does. 99 00:08:15,000 --> 00:08:23,000 Throughout Mythbusters history, vacuum cleaners have been blown up, turned into jet engines, 100 00:08:23,000 --> 00:08:28,000 didn't really jet across the room, and had the chance to bite back. 101 00:08:28,000 --> 00:08:29,000 I got this! 102 00:08:29,000 --> 00:08:30,000 You guys are suck-bleeding. 103 00:08:30,000 --> 00:08:35,000 But can a single vacuum really have enough suck to lift a car? 104 00:08:35,000 --> 00:08:38,000 Yeah! 105 00:08:39,000 --> 00:08:45,000 To find out if this impossible-sounding tall tail can be true, the guys are starting small... 106 00:08:45,000 --> 00:08:50,000 ...with a standard vacuum and hose trying to lift a five-pound weight. 107 00:08:50,000 --> 00:08:54,000 Which, eventually, it does. 108 00:08:54,000 --> 00:08:58,000 Okay, so that's just barely enough to hold on to that five-pound. 109 00:08:58,000 --> 00:08:59,000 It is. 110 00:08:59,000 --> 00:09:04,000 We just shown that this common vacuum cleaner is able to lift a five-pound weight on the end of its hose. 111 00:09:04,000 --> 00:09:08,000 Now, the surface area on the end of the hose is 1.75 inches. 112 00:09:08,000 --> 00:09:14,000 So, doing the math, that means that it's pulling about 2.8 pounds per square inch. 113 00:09:14,000 --> 00:09:18,000 So, how are we going to lift a car that weighs 2,600 pounds? 114 00:09:18,000 --> 00:09:20,000 Well, all you need is more square inches. 115 00:09:20,000 --> 00:09:29,000 In fact, if we have up to about a thousand square inches of suction area on the car, we should be able to lift it, in theory. 116 00:09:30,000 --> 00:09:37,000 The mythbusters are banking on the idea that the relationship between lift and surface area is linear. 117 00:09:37,000 --> 00:09:48,000 Meaning if one square inch can lift 2.8 pounds, a single vacuum with a 1,000 square inch footprint should be able to lift a car. 118 00:09:48,000 --> 00:09:53,000 But to test that crazy concept, the guys must next up the ante... 119 00:09:53,000 --> 00:09:57,000 ...by building a larger-than-life vacuum attachment. 120 00:09:57,000 --> 00:09:59,000 This is one of the stranger things we've built. 121 00:09:59,000 --> 00:10:04,000 At eight inches in diameter, it should put their previous test in the shade. 122 00:10:04,000 --> 00:10:06,000 I hope that works. 123 00:10:06,000 --> 00:10:11,000 But so that it still fits the vacuum cleaner, Janie is building a manifold. 124 00:10:11,000 --> 00:10:12,000 There we go. 125 00:10:12,000 --> 00:10:16,000 That will link the cleaner to the cup with no loss of suction. 126 00:10:16,000 --> 00:10:18,000 All right, do it. 127 00:10:18,000 --> 00:10:21,000 The question is, will it work? 128 00:10:21,000 --> 00:10:23,000 All right, so here is a proof of concept. 129 00:10:23,000 --> 00:10:29,000 This is the PVC pipe cap that we put a gasket on, and here is the hose through which we'll be pulling our vacuum. 130 00:10:29,000 --> 00:10:36,000 Ah, the vacuum here is the household vacuum that we are going to use in order to adapt from this to this. 131 00:10:36,000 --> 00:10:42,000 Janie has built a manifold, so the manifold is going to go in there, and then that goes in there. 132 00:10:42,000 --> 00:10:48,000 And I've got a 50-pound weight to try and lift. 133 00:10:50,000 --> 00:10:52,000 Let's see if this works. 134 00:10:53,000 --> 00:10:55,000 Hey! 135 00:10:56,000 --> 00:10:58,000 Nice! 136 00:10:58,000 --> 00:11:03,000 In theory, I think this should be able to hold more than twice that. 137 00:11:03,000 --> 00:11:05,000 That's a lot of force. Don't feel it. 138 00:11:05,000 --> 00:11:10,000 Incredibly, their vacuum rig is lifting the 50 pounds with room to spare. 139 00:11:10,000 --> 00:11:11,000 That is awesome! 140 00:11:11,000 --> 00:11:14,000 At least until they pull the plug. 141 00:11:18,000 --> 00:11:19,000 So what's next? 142 00:11:19,000 --> 00:11:27,000 So, Jamie and I did a proof of concept, 8-inch PVC cup, and it works so well, this is going to be our method for lifting the car. 143 00:11:27,000 --> 00:11:28,000 Why reinvent the wheel? 144 00:11:28,000 --> 00:11:30,000 So, graphics, help me out. 145 00:11:30,000 --> 00:11:32,000 First up, give me a car. 146 00:11:32,000 --> 00:11:36,000 So our plan is to build 40 more suction cups just like the one we just made. 147 00:11:36,000 --> 00:11:39,000 We'll position them on the roof, the trunk, and the hood. 148 00:11:39,000 --> 00:11:45,000 From each one, we'll come a tube that will join to a kind of mega-manifold that will be attached directly to our single vacuum cleaner. 149 00:11:45,000 --> 00:11:51,000 Also from each cup will be a piece of threaded steel rod that will link to a support structure that will hang above it. 150 00:11:51,000 --> 00:11:58,000 We'll turn the vacuum on, then we'll lift up the steel structure with the crane, and either the car will lift up or pop, pop, pop, pop. 151 00:11:58,000 --> 00:12:02,000 The suction cups will all decouple, and the car will not get off the ground. 152 00:12:02,000 --> 00:12:05,000 The one thing I can tell you for sure is that this ain't gonna suck. 153 00:12:05,000 --> 00:12:07,000 Get it? Ain't gonna suck? 154 00:12:09,000 --> 00:12:12,000 Coming up, pancake car goes large. 155 00:12:13,000 --> 00:12:17,000 And car lift goes bad. 156 00:12:17,000 --> 00:12:19,000 Rats, rats, rats. 157 00:12:25,000 --> 00:12:27,000 Oh my God! 158 00:12:29,000 --> 00:12:34,000 Since 2002, the mythbusters have become connoisseurs of car crashes. 159 00:12:36,000 --> 00:12:39,000 A concept Jamie's about to take to the max. 160 00:12:39,000 --> 00:12:41,000 What can you say? 161 00:12:42,000 --> 00:12:49,000 He's testing whether full-on explosives can ever flatten a full-sized car. 162 00:12:50,000 --> 00:12:53,000 But after a stellar small-scale start... 163 00:12:55,000 --> 00:12:57,000 Mr. Heidemann is laughing, that's a good thing. 164 00:12:57,000 --> 00:13:00,000 Jamie's not ramping up right away. 165 00:13:00,000 --> 00:13:02,000 A little speechless. 166 00:13:02,000 --> 00:13:07,000 Because he wants to try to compress a second small-scale car even more. 167 00:13:08,000 --> 00:13:13,000 For this next shot, we're gonna have a sheet of steel underneath the car like we did before. 168 00:13:13,000 --> 00:13:18,000 The car, another sheet of steel like we did before with the data sheet on top. 169 00:13:18,000 --> 00:13:22,000 But then three sheets of steel on top of the explosive. 170 00:13:22,000 --> 00:13:26,000 And so we'll see whether we get any more aggressive compression of the car. 171 00:13:26,000 --> 00:13:28,000 Looks good to me. 172 00:13:28,000 --> 00:13:32,000 The theory is that the top layers of steel will provide extra resistance 173 00:13:32,000 --> 00:13:35,000 that will force more of the blast wave into the car. 174 00:13:35,000 --> 00:13:38,000 But there's an added risk to this test. 175 00:13:39,000 --> 00:13:44,000 On this blast, we're likely to get some plates of steel flying very, very high in the sky. 176 00:13:44,000 --> 00:13:46,000 Hopefully straight up. 177 00:13:50,000 --> 00:13:52,000 Okay, three plates of steel on top. 178 00:13:52,000 --> 00:13:57,000 And three, two, one. 179 00:13:59,000 --> 00:14:00,000 Whoa! 180 00:14:00,000 --> 00:14:04,000 I don't think they've landed yet. 181 00:14:11,000 --> 00:14:13,000 There, one of them just landed. 182 00:14:13,000 --> 00:14:14,000 Oh my gosh. 183 00:14:14,000 --> 00:14:16,000 It landed up on the hill there. 184 00:14:21,000 --> 00:14:24,000 With all the steel safely returned to earth, 185 00:14:24,000 --> 00:14:28,000 the guys go in for a closer look to find a car that is flatter. 186 00:14:28,000 --> 00:14:31,000 But isn't what the Heinemann had hoped for. 187 00:14:32,000 --> 00:14:34,000 That right there is the engine. 188 00:14:34,000 --> 00:14:39,000 That used to be about a three inch long heavy-walled aluminum tube. 189 00:14:39,000 --> 00:14:42,000 And now it's not just been flattened. 190 00:14:42,000 --> 00:14:44,000 It's been melted. 191 00:14:44,000 --> 00:14:46,000 I gotta say, I think it's too much. 192 00:14:46,000 --> 00:14:48,000 It's almost like it burned it. 193 00:14:49,000 --> 00:14:53,000 Test 2's extra downforce did crush the car more than test 1. 194 00:14:53,000 --> 00:14:57,000 But because it also caused more breakage, Jamie's not satisfied. 195 00:15:01,000 --> 00:15:04,000 Hey Jamie, I found the plates. They're right here. 196 00:15:05,000 --> 00:15:06,000 Cool. 197 00:15:07,000 --> 00:15:12,000 So next, Jamie sets up his sandwich with dead ashit on both sides of the steel 198 00:15:12,000 --> 00:15:15,000 to pancake it in both directions. 199 00:15:15,000 --> 00:15:16,000 Oh yeah, that's perfect. 200 00:15:16,000 --> 00:15:18,000 Okay, going for the glory. 201 00:15:18,000 --> 00:15:22,000 Double-sided shot in three, two, one. 202 00:15:24,000 --> 00:15:25,000 Whoa. 203 00:15:29,000 --> 00:15:30,000 Whoa is right. 204 00:15:32,000 --> 00:15:38,000 As this test gives the worst result of all, with the car neither flat nor whole. 205 00:15:38,000 --> 00:15:43,000 Pretty interesting, sort of a shape, but that wasn't a successful shot at all. 206 00:15:47,000 --> 00:15:49,000 So, what's next? 207 00:15:50,000 --> 00:15:52,000 Well, sometimes simpler is better. 208 00:15:52,000 --> 00:15:54,000 And the very first shot that we did was the simplest. 209 00:15:54,000 --> 00:15:59,000 It just had the car, the plate on top of it, and explosives on top of that. 210 00:15:59,000 --> 00:16:03,000 And the way I see it, we can run the test again. 211 00:16:03,000 --> 00:16:05,000 We put a little more explosives on the top. 212 00:16:05,000 --> 00:16:07,000 We should get a little bit more crush. 213 00:16:08,000 --> 00:16:09,000 Maybe. 214 00:16:09,000 --> 00:16:15,000 Yep, Jamie's coming full circle with a repeat of test 1, but with 50% more explosive. 215 00:16:15,000 --> 00:16:16,000 How's that look? 216 00:16:16,000 --> 00:16:19,000 Will this finally give him the crush he's craving? 217 00:16:20,000 --> 00:16:26,000 Six mil on top of the plate in three, two, one. 218 00:16:28,000 --> 00:16:29,000 Yeah. 219 00:16:33,000 --> 00:16:34,000 Let's go see what we got. 220 00:16:36,000 --> 00:16:38,000 It's the biggest thud of the day. 221 00:16:41,000 --> 00:16:42,000 But did it work? 222 00:16:47,000 --> 00:16:51,000 I'm kind of liking this. 223 00:16:51,000 --> 00:16:56,000 It certainly got squashed a lot more aggressively than the first shot. 224 00:16:56,000 --> 00:17:04,000 It has completely collapsed the engine block of the car, but then it's in place, which I like. 225 00:17:04,000 --> 00:17:07,000 It's kind of fused that to the rest of the body. 226 00:17:07,000 --> 00:17:09,000 So, I think it's going to work. 227 00:17:09,000 --> 00:17:16,000 It's been a blast, but finally we have not just a happy Heinemann, but a plan for full scale. 228 00:17:16,000 --> 00:17:21,000 A real car sandwich with a monster load of explosives on top. 229 00:17:21,000 --> 00:17:22,000 Well, that was fun. 230 00:17:22,000 --> 00:17:24,000 Have you got all the information you need? 231 00:17:24,000 --> 00:17:26,000 Yeah, I think we're ready to scale it up. 232 00:17:26,000 --> 00:17:27,000 Let's go to the big time. 233 00:17:27,000 --> 00:17:29,000 What could possibly go wrong? 234 00:17:34,000 --> 00:17:38,000 Meanwhile, back at the car, we're going to be able to see the car. 235 00:17:38,000 --> 00:17:47,000 Meanwhile, back at car lift HQ, Adam and Jamie are halfway through one of the strangest builds of this final season. 236 00:17:47,000 --> 00:17:49,000 That ought to work nicely. 237 00:17:49,000 --> 00:17:58,000 They're constructing a Dr. Octopus style vacuum cleaner to find out if a single household vacuum with 48 inch suction cups 238 00:17:58,000 --> 00:18:04,000 cruising right along can suck enough to lift a car clean off the ground. 239 00:18:04,000 --> 00:18:08,000 And while it's not all been plain sailing, that one looks... 240 00:18:08,000 --> 00:18:09,000 Oh! 241 00:18:09,000 --> 00:18:10,000 Bleep! 242 00:18:11,000 --> 00:18:12,000 Broke it! 243 00:18:12,000 --> 00:18:15,000 It's not long before they're ready to head for the hills. 244 00:18:15,000 --> 00:18:16,000 Nice. 245 00:18:18,000 --> 00:18:23,000 This is where we are going to raise our car with a vacuum, theoretically. 246 00:18:23,000 --> 00:18:26,000 I'm standing on Treasure Island in San Francisco Bay. 247 00:18:26,000 --> 00:18:28,000 We have done many myths out here. 248 00:18:28,000 --> 00:18:30,000 We've jumped off of buildings. 249 00:18:31,000 --> 00:18:33,000 We've driven through glass. 250 00:18:33,000 --> 00:18:35,000 Oh, it's about to happen! 251 00:18:36,000 --> 00:18:39,000 Heck, we've even sailed a duct tape boat right out here. 252 00:18:39,000 --> 00:18:40,000 Yeehaw! 253 00:18:40,000 --> 00:18:47,000 Today, we're going to attach a whole bunch of suction cups to a car and try and lift it with a single vacuum cleaner. 254 00:18:48,000 --> 00:18:52,000 To do that, the guys must first reassemble their rig. 255 00:18:53,000 --> 00:18:54,000 It's going to take a while. 256 00:18:54,000 --> 00:19:00,000 Step one, one down, is for Adam to attach the 40 suction cups to the steel frame. 257 00:19:01,000 --> 00:19:02,000 Yeehaw! 258 00:19:02,000 --> 00:19:03,000 Like that. 259 00:19:03,000 --> 00:19:04,000 That's going to be great. 260 00:19:04,000 --> 00:19:07,000 Then they secure the vacuum cleaner itself. 261 00:19:07,000 --> 00:19:08,000 That's what you had in mind? 262 00:19:08,000 --> 00:19:09,000 Yeah, something like that. 263 00:19:10,000 --> 00:19:13,000 Before wiring in 400 feet of hosing. 264 00:19:13,000 --> 00:19:17,000 It's spaghetti, man. 265 00:19:17,000 --> 00:19:20,000 Next comes the midpoint recap. 266 00:19:20,000 --> 00:19:25,000 This vacuum cleaner right here, powered by 110 volts of AC, is the nerve center of our operation. 267 00:19:25,000 --> 00:19:28,000 It starts out by distributing its suck through this hose. 268 00:19:28,000 --> 00:19:30,000 Which connects to this manifold. 269 00:19:30,000 --> 00:19:34,000 It distributes out through these yellow spaghetti hoses to all 40 of our cups, 270 00:19:34,000 --> 00:19:38,000 hopefully distributing enough vacuum power to lift our car. 271 00:19:38,000 --> 00:19:40,000 What could possibly go wrong? 272 00:19:41,000 --> 00:19:44,000 Next, the guys bring in their 2600 pound car. 273 00:19:44,000 --> 00:19:47,000 Never has Mythbusters attempted to suck so hard. 274 00:19:48,000 --> 00:19:51,000 And lower the suction cup system directly on top. 275 00:19:51,000 --> 00:19:53,000 Can we have some dramatic music, please? 276 00:19:59,000 --> 00:20:01,000 It was much better, thank you. 277 00:20:02,000 --> 00:20:04,000 Yeah, a little bit more. 278 00:20:04,000 --> 00:20:06,000 Stop. 279 00:20:07,000 --> 00:20:10,000 Last but not least is the crane. 280 00:20:10,000 --> 00:20:13,000 And then, it's go time. 281 00:20:13,000 --> 00:20:16,000 Alright, you ready to turn it on and do this thing for real? 282 00:20:16,000 --> 00:20:18,000 There we go. 283 00:20:18,000 --> 00:20:21,000 Alright, let's get them all sucked down. 284 00:20:21,000 --> 00:20:25,000 Remember, it's the crane that will be lifting the steel cradle. 285 00:20:25,000 --> 00:20:27,000 It's all good. 286 00:20:27,000 --> 00:20:28,000 The trunk's good. 287 00:20:28,000 --> 00:20:31,000 But it's the vacuum that will be sucking the cradle to the car. 288 00:20:31,000 --> 00:20:33,000 Gently up, let's go. 289 00:20:38,000 --> 00:20:40,000 Come on, baby. 290 00:20:40,000 --> 00:20:42,000 Come on. 291 00:20:46,000 --> 00:20:48,000 Ah! 292 00:20:48,000 --> 00:20:50,000 Rats, rats, rats! 293 00:20:50,000 --> 00:20:53,000 So near yet so far. 294 00:20:53,000 --> 00:20:58,000 It looked like they were going to get lift until a conscious uncoupling occurred. 295 00:20:58,000 --> 00:21:00,000 And Adam knows why. 296 00:21:00,000 --> 00:21:07,000 Alright, we've run into a snag and it seems to be that our hood is buckling too much for our suction cups to maintain their hold. 297 00:21:07,000 --> 00:21:10,000 So we're going to reduce the number of suction cups on the hood. 298 00:21:10,000 --> 00:21:15,000 We have great suction on all 15 on the top of the car and all 9 on the rear of the car. 299 00:21:15,000 --> 00:21:20,000 With those plus 4 or 5 on the hood, we're still in the zone of liftability. 300 00:21:20,000 --> 00:21:21,000 We're going to keep going. 301 00:21:21,000 --> 00:21:23,000 Still to come. 302 00:21:23,000 --> 00:21:24,000 Car lift. 303 00:21:24,000 --> 00:21:25,000 Come on, baby. 304 00:21:25,000 --> 00:21:27,000 Goes from bad to worse. 305 00:21:27,000 --> 00:21:28,000 Oh! 306 00:21:28,000 --> 00:21:29,000 It's that hood. 307 00:21:29,000 --> 00:21:31,000 The hood is boning us. 308 00:21:31,000 --> 00:21:33,000 And pancake car goes. 309 00:21:42,000 --> 00:21:47,000 To find out if a humble vacuum cleaner really has enough suck to lift a car, 310 00:21:47,000 --> 00:21:52,000 Adam and Jamie have created a 40 suction cup contraption. 311 00:21:52,000 --> 00:21:53,000 Come on. 312 00:21:53,000 --> 00:21:58,000 Which completely failed to fly. 313 00:21:58,000 --> 00:22:00,000 Rats, rats, rats! 314 00:22:02,000 --> 00:22:06,000 So for test 2, they're realigning the cups on the hood. 315 00:22:06,000 --> 00:22:09,000 Okay, so 4 across this part of the hood. 316 00:22:09,000 --> 00:22:13,000 To hopefully give them a better seal and more lift. 317 00:22:13,000 --> 00:22:15,000 Moment of truth again. 318 00:22:15,000 --> 00:22:16,000 Let's do it. 319 00:22:16,000 --> 00:22:19,000 Go, go, go, go, go, go! 320 00:22:21,000 --> 00:22:22,000 Looking good. 321 00:22:22,000 --> 00:22:24,000 Come on, baby. 322 00:22:27,000 --> 00:22:28,000 It's that hood. 323 00:22:28,000 --> 00:22:30,000 The hood is boning us. 324 00:22:31,000 --> 00:22:32,000 Yep. 325 00:22:32,000 --> 00:22:36,000 Like last time, the thin sheet metal of the hood is buckling under the pressure. 326 00:22:36,000 --> 00:22:40,000 And that movement causes the cups to break their seal. 327 00:22:40,000 --> 00:22:43,000 But the guys have a planned scene. 328 00:22:43,000 --> 00:22:45,000 Alright, here's the problem. 329 00:22:45,000 --> 00:22:49,000 We have what we think is enough suction in our vacuum cup machine, 330 00:22:49,000 --> 00:22:54,000 but we don't have enough structural integrity in the flimsy sheet metal hood of our car. 331 00:22:54,000 --> 00:22:55,000 Our solution? 332 00:22:55,000 --> 00:22:59,000 Cut that hood out and replace it with a piece of sheet steel. 333 00:22:59,000 --> 00:23:01,000 Wait a minute, I hear you saying, 334 00:23:01,000 --> 00:23:03,000 that's cheating, you're changing the structure of the car. 335 00:23:03,000 --> 00:23:09,000 But I remind you that the myth is that there's enough power within a normal single vacuum to lift a car. 336 00:23:09,000 --> 00:23:11,000 And that is still the myth we're testing. 337 00:23:11,000 --> 00:23:13,000 We're just adding a little bit of structure. 338 00:23:13,000 --> 00:23:15,000 So it's out with the old... 339 00:23:15,000 --> 00:23:17,000 Alright, let's take it over here to this piece of steel. 340 00:23:17,000 --> 00:23:19,000 And in with the new... 341 00:23:23,000 --> 00:23:27,000 A buckle-proof hood that should allow for a super seal. 342 00:23:27,000 --> 00:23:29,000 Not how to do it. 343 00:23:30,000 --> 00:23:33,000 Once lined up with the rig, first impressions are good. 344 00:23:33,000 --> 00:23:36,000 Look, I don't want to get overly confident here. 345 00:23:36,000 --> 00:23:41,000 But right away, the replacement of the hood with a flat piece of sheet steel is working magnificently. 346 00:23:41,000 --> 00:23:45,000 I've got grab on 15 suction cups up here, man. 347 00:23:45,000 --> 00:23:46,000 That's a lot. 348 00:23:47,000 --> 00:23:51,000 Confidence has been raised, but will the car follow suit? 349 00:23:51,000 --> 00:23:52,000 Dude, you ready? 350 00:23:52,000 --> 00:23:53,000 Yeah. 351 00:23:53,000 --> 00:23:55,000 How many tries have we had at this? 352 00:23:55,000 --> 00:23:56,000 I don't know, I lost count. 353 00:23:56,000 --> 00:23:57,000 Yeah, me too. 354 00:23:57,000 --> 00:23:58,000 Alright, let's take it up. 355 00:23:58,000 --> 00:23:59,000 Okay. 356 00:23:59,000 --> 00:24:06,000 For hopefully the last time, a single vacuum lifting an entire car. 357 00:24:07,000 --> 00:24:08,000 Come on, baby. 358 00:24:09,000 --> 00:24:10,000 Come on, baby. 359 00:24:12,000 --> 00:24:15,000 Hey! Hey, I think it's off the ground. 360 00:24:16,000 --> 00:24:17,000 There it comes. 361 00:24:17,000 --> 00:24:20,000 This is going to work. It's going to work. 362 00:24:21,000 --> 00:24:22,000 Come on, baby. 363 00:24:23,000 --> 00:24:24,000 Come on, yes! 364 00:24:24,000 --> 00:24:25,000 Ah! 365 00:24:25,000 --> 00:24:27,000 What, what, what, what, what? 366 00:24:28,000 --> 00:24:30,000 It was an inch. 367 00:24:30,000 --> 00:24:31,000 It was an inch? 368 00:24:31,000 --> 00:24:32,000 On the front wheel. 369 00:24:32,000 --> 00:24:34,000 On the front wheel, before failure. 370 00:24:35,000 --> 00:24:39,000 Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! 371 00:24:39,000 --> 00:24:41,000 I'm calling it. 372 00:24:41,000 --> 00:24:43,000 I'm like, it lifted the car off the ground. 373 00:24:43,000 --> 00:24:44,000 One inch? 374 00:24:44,000 --> 00:24:45,000 Yeah. 375 00:24:45,000 --> 00:24:46,000 Okay. 376 00:24:46,000 --> 00:24:48,000 Maybe not stably, but yeah. 377 00:24:49,000 --> 00:24:50,000 Come on, yes! 378 00:24:50,000 --> 00:24:51,000 Ah! 379 00:24:52,000 --> 00:24:58,000 Our last attempt with the octopus was the one that Jamie and I felt strongest had the highest chance for success. 380 00:24:58,000 --> 00:25:02,000 We know from our math that we have enough suction to lift this car. 381 00:25:02,000 --> 00:25:04,000 In theory, it's possible. 382 00:25:04,000 --> 00:25:09,000 In practice, it turned out not to be possible. 383 00:25:11,000 --> 00:25:13,000 Nope, I think that the octopus is dead. 384 00:25:13,000 --> 00:25:16,000 We have proven that this cannot work. 385 00:25:16,000 --> 00:25:21,000 We need to implement some other solution to distribute the vacuum spower and lift this car. 386 00:25:21,000 --> 00:25:24,000 After some spectacular small scale tests... 387 00:25:29,000 --> 00:25:34,000 Pancake car is going supersized. 388 00:25:39,000 --> 00:25:41,000 Absolutely beautiful. 389 00:25:42,000 --> 00:25:46,000 For pancaking a car, we're going to need a lot of explosives. 390 00:25:46,000 --> 00:25:47,000 I mean, a lot. 391 00:25:47,000 --> 00:25:49,000 And that's where this place comes in. 392 00:25:49,000 --> 00:25:55,000 I'm standing up on the mountain at New Mexico Tech, one of our all-time favorite Mythbuster partnerships. 393 00:25:55,000 --> 00:25:57,000 They have everything we need. 394 00:25:57,000 --> 00:26:00,000 This is our pancake car, one-stop shop. 395 00:26:02,000 --> 00:26:04,000 When it comes to spectacular destruction, 396 00:26:05,000 --> 00:26:07,000 NMT is second to none. 397 00:26:07,000 --> 00:26:11,000 In three, two, one. 398 00:26:15,000 --> 00:26:16,000 Wow! 399 00:26:16,000 --> 00:26:18,000 But to see if explosives can crush a car, 400 00:26:20,000 --> 00:26:22,000 Jamie's got his wheels ready to go. 401 00:26:24,000 --> 00:26:26,000 This is the car we're going to use. 402 00:26:26,000 --> 00:26:29,000 Now, normally, I appreciate and respect Russian engineering 403 00:26:29,000 --> 00:26:32,000 because it tends to be simple, rugged, and dependable. 404 00:26:32,000 --> 00:26:35,000 This is not an example of that kind of engineering. 405 00:26:35,000 --> 00:26:38,000 Quite possibly one of the worst cars ever manufactured. 406 00:26:38,000 --> 00:26:40,000 It's going to be with a certain amount of glee 407 00:26:40,000 --> 00:26:43,000 that I remove this car permanently from the road. 408 00:26:45,000 --> 00:26:48,000 The car may look decrepit, but it is in full working order. 409 00:26:50,000 --> 00:26:53,000 All it lacks is a Mythbuster's paint job. 410 00:26:55,000 --> 00:26:57,000 Look, I recognize it's not pretty, 411 00:26:57,000 --> 00:27:01,000 but then nothing that's about to happen to this car is going to be pretty. 412 00:27:05,000 --> 00:27:08,000 Now, the goal here is to turn our car into a perfectly flat plate, 413 00:27:08,000 --> 00:27:10,000 just like we did in our small-scale experiments. 414 00:27:10,000 --> 00:27:13,000 And to do that, we've got two massive steel plates, 415 00:27:13,000 --> 00:27:15,000 one that's embedded in the ground, 416 00:27:15,000 --> 00:27:18,000 one that is suspended overhead off of this gantry. 417 00:27:18,000 --> 00:27:20,000 It weighs 7,000 pounds, 418 00:27:20,000 --> 00:27:22,000 and we're going to put explosives on top of that. 419 00:27:22,000 --> 00:27:26,000 It's going to come down on our unsuspecting car like a freight train. 420 00:27:27,000 --> 00:27:29,000 That's the theory. 421 00:27:30,000 --> 00:27:34,000 And before long, the 7,000-pound plate is up and running. 422 00:27:35,000 --> 00:27:37,000 That's a beautiful thing. 423 00:27:37,000 --> 00:27:41,000 Secure it to the gantry, courtesy of six breakaway straps. 424 00:27:43,000 --> 00:27:46,000 Okay, now you can sort of see how this is all coming together. 425 00:27:46,000 --> 00:27:48,000 We've got our plate in place. 426 00:27:48,000 --> 00:27:50,000 We've got the car that's going to go underneath. 427 00:27:50,000 --> 00:27:52,000 Explosives on top. 428 00:27:52,000 --> 00:27:54,000 Bob's your uncle. 429 00:27:54,000 --> 00:27:56,000 With that, it's time to position the car. 430 00:27:56,000 --> 00:27:58,000 First, with a forklift. 431 00:27:58,000 --> 00:28:00,000 Like a surgeon. 432 00:28:00,000 --> 00:28:01,000 Now, don't scratch it. 433 00:28:01,000 --> 00:28:03,000 And then, by hand. 434 00:28:04,000 --> 00:28:06,000 How's that? 435 00:28:06,000 --> 00:28:07,000 A little bit more. 436 00:28:07,000 --> 00:28:08,000 All right. 437 00:28:10,000 --> 00:28:12,000 There we go. Cool. 438 00:28:15,000 --> 00:28:18,000 That just leaves the explosives. 439 00:28:18,000 --> 00:28:21,000 All 1,000 pounds of it. 440 00:28:21,000 --> 00:28:24,000 That is a lot of boom. 441 00:28:28,000 --> 00:28:30,000 Gently up. Let's go. 442 00:28:30,000 --> 00:28:31,000 At Treasure Island. 443 00:28:31,000 --> 00:28:32,000 Come on, baby. 444 00:28:32,000 --> 00:28:37,000 Adam and Jamie's lift-a-car suction rig has sucked. 445 00:28:37,000 --> 00:28:40,000 Press. What happened? 446 00:28:40,000 --> 00:28:44,000 So it's back to the shop and back to the drawing board. 447 00:28:44,000 --> 00:28:47,000 So, just to recap, and you saw this, 448 00:28:47,000 --> 00:28:50,000 our previous method was what we call the octopus arm method 449 00:28:50,000 --> 00:28:55,000 and involved many different caps distributed across the whole of the car. 450 00:28:55,000 --> 00:28:59,000 And that turned out to be completely 100% wrong. 451 00:28:59,000 --> 00:29:02,000 So, now we are going with a method we call the box method. 452 00:29:02,000 --> 00:29:04,000 I don't know how do we come up with these names, 453 00:29:04,000 --> 00:29:07,000 but it's just a gift we have. 454 00:29:07,000 --> 00:29:10,000 Instead of 40 points of failure, we now have three. 455 00:29:10,000 --> 00:29:14,000 Three big, sturdy wooden boxes made out of plywood, 456 00:29:14,000 --> 00:29:17,000 sealed with a gasket between them and the car. 457 00:29:17,000 --> 00:29:20,000 We pull a vacuum from them with a manifold. 458 00:29:20,000 --> 00:29:22,000 I think this is going to work. 459 00:29:22,000 --> 00:29:23,000 We're going to build some boxes. 460 00:29:23,000 --> 00:29:25,000 We're going to lift this car. 461 00:29:25,000 --> 00:29:28,000 So, it's out with the octopus. 462 00:29:28,000 --> 00:29:33,000 And in with three boxes that will still be powered by a single vacuum cleaner. 463 00:29:33,000 --> 00:29:37,000 This plywood right here is one of my favorite building materials. 464 00:29:37,000 --> 00:29:40,000 We refer to it as fin ply because it's made in Finland. 465 00:29:40,000 --> 00:29:45,000 And it's a birch ply that has many more laminations than normal plywood. 466 00:29:45,000 --> 00:29:50,000 It's about twice as heavy and twice as strong. 467 00:29:50,000 --> 00:29:52,000 To give this design the best chance, 468 00:29:52,000 --> 00:29:56,000 Jamie's making each box as big as possible. 469 00:29:56,000 --> 00:29:57,000 Let's start. 470 00:29:57,000 --> 00:30:01,000 He's also contouring them to precisely fit the car's shape. 471 00:30:01,000 --> 00:30:02,000 Looks good. 472 00:30:02,000 --> 00:30:06,000 And last but not least, he's laying in a rubber gasket 473 00:30:06,000 --> 00:30:08,000 that should form a leak-proof seal. 474 00:30:08,000 --> 00:30:10,000 That all looks just about perfect. 475 00:30:10,000 --> 00:30:14,000 And once the seal is set, the guys double check the fit. 476 00:30:14,000 --> 00:30:15,000 Lovely. 477 00:30:15,000 --> 00:30:18,000 And their confidence is back with a bang. 478 00:30:18,000 --> 00:30:24,000 These boxes are best to be thought of as the workers we are using to lift the car. 479 00:30:24,000 --> 00:30:26,000 So far here, all three boxes are saying, 480 00:30:26,000 --> 00:30:28,000 hell yeah, I can lift that car. 481 00:30:28,000 --> 00:30:30,000 But we've been here before. 482 00:30:30,000 --> 00:30:33,000 All 40 of our suction cups were all like, totally easy, man. 483 00:30:33,000 --> 00:30:34,000 We can lift that car. 484 00:30:34,000 --> 00:30:35,000 And they totally couldn't. 485 00:30:35,000 --> 00:30:38,000 So even though the math says that these are working beautifully 486 00:30:38,000 --> 00:30:41,000 and they should lift the car, 487 00:30:41,000 --> 00:30:44,000 I still see many ways in which this could go south. 488 00:30:44,000 --> 00:30:50,000 Well, to find out, it's back to Treasure Island for some predictable preparation. 489 00:30:50,000 --> 00:30:52,000 Looks really nice. 490 00:30:52,000 --> 00:30:55,000 First, the guys position the steel cradle above the car. 491 00:30:55,000 --> 00:30:57,000 I think that looks good. 492 00:30:57,000 --> 00:30:59,000 It's right over the rear view mirror. 493 00:30:59,000 --> 00:31:01,000 Then they add the boxes to the trunk. 494 00:31:01,000 --> 00:31:02,000 A little more. 495 00:31:02,000 --> 00:31:03,000 Perfect. 496 00:31:03,000 --> 00:31:04,000 Roof. 497 00:31:04,000 --> 00:31:06,000 Yeah, that's tight. 498 00:31:06,000 --> 00:31:07,000 Add hood. 499 00:31:07,000 --> 00:31:08,000 Nice. 500 00:31:08,000 --> 00:31:11,000 Next, they secure the boxes to the cradle. 501 00:31:11,000 --> 00:31:13,000 I think we're good. 502 00:31:13,000 --> 00:31:15,000 With that, the guys bring in the crane. 503 00:31:15,000 --> 00:31:17,000 That's good. 504 00:31:17,000 --> 00:31:21,000 Before Adam adds the vital ingredient, the vacuum cleaner. 505 00:31:21,000 --> 00:31:25,000 It's time to bring the vacuum back into this equation. 506 00:31:25,000 --> 00:31:28,000 I think that's a lovely place for it, don't you? 507 00:31:28,000 --> 00:31:31,000 The boxes are the crucial change to this test. 508 00:31:31,000 --> 00:31:33,000 I think we're really close. 509 00:31:33,000 --> 00:31:37,000 But to help see if they're working, the guys have added pressure gauges 510 00:31:37,000 --> 00:31:41,000 to assess the suction before the crane starts to lift. 511 00:31:41,000 --> 00:31:43,000 So is this going to work? 512 00:31:43,000 --> 00:31:47,000 Well, our three boxes have a total surface area of 4,000 square inches. 513 00:31:47,000 --> 00:31:52,000 We've shown that the vacuum cleaner can lift 2.8 pounds with one square inch. 514 00:31:52,000 --> 00:31:57,000 Now, that gives us a total theoretical lifting capability of 11,000 pounds. 515 00:31:57,000 --> 00:32:00,000 That's over four times the weight of our car. 516 00:32:00,000 --> 00:32:04,000 But as we showed earlier, it may not all be just about the math. 517 00:32:04,000 --> 00:32:10,000 No, it's also about the rig, the seals, and that crumpling metal of the car. 518 00:32:10,000 --> 00:32:15,000 Starting the vacuum in three, two, one. 519 00:32:15,000 --> 00:32:19,000 But with the vacuum on, the news is good. 520 00:32:19,000 --> 00:32:20,000 It's climbing. 521 00:32:20,000 --> 00:32:21,000 It's climbing? 522 00:32:21,000 --> 00:32:22,000 Yeah. 523 00:32:22,000 --> 00:32:23,000 Yes! 524 00:32:23,000 --> 00:32:25,000 Oh, yeah, baby! 525 00:32:25,000 --> 00:32:29,000 All gauges show the boxes are sucking down with the vacuum pressure 526 00:32:29,000 --> 00:32:32,000 greater than six inches of mercury. 527 00:32:32,000 --> 00:32:36,000 And that means it's time to try to raise the roof. 528 00:32:36,000 --> 00:32:37,000 Let's do this. 529 00:32:37,000 --> 00:32:39,000 All right, let's take it up 18 inches. 530 00:32:39,000 --> 00:32:40,000 Okay. 531 00:32:40,000 --> 00:32:45,000 That was the hood popping. 532 00:32:45,000 --> 00:32:46,000 That's cool. 533 00:32:46,000 --> 00:32:48,000 We got pressure. 534 00:32:48,000 --> 00:32:52,000 It's a bumpy start, but as the crane takes up the slack... 535 00:32:52,000 --> 00:32:55,000 Come on, baby. 536 00:32:55,000 --> 00:32:58,000 Hold on to this car. 537 00:32:58,000 --> 00:33:00,000 The car does start to rise. 538 00:33:00,000 --> 00:33:03,000 Yes, it's off the ground. 539 00:33:03,000 --> 00:33:06,000 This freaking car is off the ground! 540 00:33:06,000 --> 00:33:08,000 Oh, man. 541 00:33:08,000 --> 00:33:12,000 That is freaking awesome! 542 00:33:12,000 --> 00:33:20,000 This is amazing. 543 00:33:20,000 --> 00:33:22,000 Oh, dude! 544 00:33:22,000 --> 00:33:26,000 We are lifting a car with nothing but a single vacuum. 545 00:33:26,000 --> 00:33:29,000 But the Mythbusters ain't going to leave it there. 546 00:33:29,000 --> 00:33:34,000 Dude, I hear squealing, but I say let this puppy squeal. 547 00:33:34,000 --> 00:33:36,000 He's going up whether he likes it or not. 548 00:33:36,000 --> 00:33:39,000 Because they're taking the car to the top. 549 00:33:39,000 --> 00:33:40,000 I know. 550 00:33:40,000 --> 00:33:42,000 This is freaking me out. 551 00:33:42,000 --> 00:33:45,000 Remember, the crane is lifting the steel cradle. 552 00:33:45,000 --> 00:33:48,000 Holy f***ing balls. 553 00:33:48,000 --> 00:33:49,000 There you go. 554 00:33:49,000 --> 00:33:51,000 That's about how we're feeling here. 555 00:33:51,000 --> 00:33:54,000 But it's the vacuum cleaner on its own. 556 00:33:54,000 --> 00:33:55,000 This is everybody's satisfying. 557 00:33:55,000 --> 00:33:57,000 This is how I was hoping it would be. 558 00:33:57,000 --> 00:33:59,000 That's sucking the cradle to the car. 559 00:33:59,000 --> 00:34:03,000 That is freaking awesome! 560 00:34:03,000 --> 00:34:06,000 And to prove just that, once the car is maxed out, 561 00:34:06,000 --> 00:34:09,000 Jamie's going to pull the plug on the cleaner, 562 00:34:09,000 --> 00:34:13,000 which should result in the car destruction this episode needs. 563 00:34:13,000 --> 00:34:19,000 Three, two, one. 564 00:34:19,000 --> 00:34:26,000 Oh! 565 00:34:26,000 --> 00:34:35,000 That was very satisfying. 566 00:34:35,000 --> 00:34:37,000 That was awesome. 567 00:34:37,000 --> 00:34:42,000 So, if anyone needs to lift a car with a vacuum, don't call us. 568 00:34:42,000 --> 00:34:43,000 We've done it once. 569 00:34:43,000 --> 00:34:45,000 We don't want to do it again. 570 00:34:45,000 --> 00:34:48,000 Yep, once the vacuum cleaner was switched off, 571 00:34:48,000 --> 00:34:51,000 gravity brought this myth back to earth. 572 00:34:51,000 --> 00:34:54,000 This time around, it was like clockwork. 573 00:34:54,000 --> 00:34:57,000 The boxes held, their seals held. 574 00:34:57,000 --> 00:35:00,000 The simple fact was that during the math, 575 00:35:00,000 --> 00:35:04,000 there was over 11,000 pounds of suction on that car. 576 00:35:04,000 --> 00:35:08,000 So, it was going up, at least until we pulled the plug. 577 00:35:08,000 --> 00:35:12,000 Something that you should know about me is that I love, love, 578 00:35:12,000 --> 00:35:14,000 love the car myths on Mythbusters. 579 00:35:14,000 --> 00:35:18,000 But this is my all-time favorite Mythbuster car myth. 580 00:35:18,000 --> 00:35:21,000 We actually lifted this thing with nothing but the power 581 00:35:21,000 --> 00:35:22,000 of a single vacuum cleaner. 582 00:35:22,000 --> 00:35:25,000 Next time someone tells you that Mythbusters sucks, 583 00:35:25,000 --> 00:35:27,000 tell them damn straight. 584 00:35:27,000 --> 00:35:29,000 That was beautiful. Nice work, sir. 585 00:35:29,000 --> 00:35:30,000 You too. 586 00:35:30,000 --> 00:35:31,000 Let's get out of here. 587 00:35:31,000 --> 00:35:34,000 Who would think a vacuum cleaner was hiding so much suction power? 588 00:35:34,000 --> 00:35:36,000 I know. Cool story. 589 00:35:36,000 --> 00:35:37,000 Thanks. 590 00:35:37,000 --> 00:35:43,000 Still to come. 591 00:35:43,000 --> 00:35:47,000 Pancake car gets cooked. 592 00:35:47,000 --> 00:35:51,000 Three, two, one. 593 00:35:51,000 --> 00:35:53,000 Whoa! 594 00:35:58,000 --> 00:36:03,000 After 14 years of car carnage, here's the destructive stats. 595 00:36:05,000 --> 00:36:11,000 Since 2002, the Mythbusters have destroyed almost 280 cars. 596 00:36:11,000 --> 00:36:14,000 This is why we can't have nice things. 597 00:36:14,000 --> 00:36:16,000 They've thrown 10 off of cliffs, 598 00:36:16,000 --> 00:36:20,000 crashed over 100, 599 00:36:20,000 --> 00:36:27,000 and made 48 go bye-bye with a boom. 600 00:36:27,000 --> 00:36:33,000 They've even reinvented the wheel not once. 601 00:36:33,000 --> 00:36:35,000 That actually corners fairly well. 602 00:36:35,000 --> 00:36:37,000 It does, but twice. 603 00:36:37,000 --> 00:36:41,000 Yeah! Yeah! That's it! Come on! 604 00:36:47,000 --> 00:36:54,000 Deep in the heart of the New Mexican desert, 605 00:36:54,000 --> 00:36:58,000 a dud of a car is about to get bombed. 606 00:36:58,000 --> 00:37:01,000 But will it go pancake flat? 607 00:37:01,000 --> 00:37:04,000 In our small-scale testing, we showed that a single piece of data sheet 608 00:37:04,000 --> 00:37:06,000 gave us the best result. 609 00:37:08,000 --> 00:37:10,000 I'm kind of liking this. 610 00:37:10,000 --> 00:37:12,000 Now, we're going to take a similar approach here, 611 00:37:12,000 --> 00:37:15,000 but instead of data sheet, we're going to be using Ampo. 612 00:37:15,000 --> 00:37:19,000 The reason we're using Ampo is it's actually better for performing this kind of task. 613 00:37:19,000 --> 00:37:23,000 It's a slower-moving explosive, and it pushes things better 614 00:37:23,000 --> 00:37:26,000 instead of breaking them apart, which is what we want. 615 00:37:26,000 --> 00:37:29,000 Ampo is definitely the best choice of a boom. 616 00:37:29,000 --> 00:37:34,000 And to accurately scale up, that is a lot of boom. 617 00:37:34,000 --> 00:37:37,000 Jamie's using a thousand pounds of it. 618 00:37:37,000 --> 00:37:40,000 Currently, Jamie is arranging 1,000 pounds of Ampo. 619 00:37:40,000 --> 00:37:44,000 That's 20 bags that weigh 50 pounds each on top of the trench plate. 620 00:37:44,000 --> 00:37:48,000 Now, the pattern that he's using is one that is invented 621 00:37:48,000 --> 00:37:53,000 so that the pulse from the explosion provides a totally universal push 622 00:37:53,000 --> 00:37:55,000 on that trench plate into the car. 623 00:37:55,000 --> 00:37:57,000 That's the theory. 624 00:37:57,000 --> 00:38:02,000 And with the last bag in place, this one-shot deal is ready to rumble. 625 00:38:02,000 --> 00:38:05,000 You know, those little bags of ketchup that you step on in the sidewalk, 626 00:38:05,000 --> 00:38:07,000 and they just go, pfft. 627 00:38:07,000 --> 00:38:10,000 That's what's going to happen here. 628 00:38:11,000 --> 00:38:15,000 Yep, it's going to be some kind of catastrophe. 629 00:38:15,000 --> 00:38:19,000 But to find out what kind, the guys head underground 630 00:38:19,000 --> 00:38:23,000 into a bomb-proof bunker, and then it's go time. 631 00:38:28,000 --> 00:38:31,000 Okay, this is pancake car. 632 00:38:31,000 --> 00:38:33,000 Full-scale test. 633 00:38:33,000 --> 00:38:39,000 Flattening a terrible car in five, four, three, two, one. 634 00:38:40,000 --> 00:38:42,000 Whoa! 635 00:38:42,000 --> 00:38:44,000 That was, uh... 636 00:38:44,000 --> 00:38:46,000 Whoo-hoo! 637 00:38:46,000 --> 00:38:48,000 That was very intense. 638 00:38:48,000 --> 00:38:49,000 That was energetic. 639 00:38:49,000 --> 00:38:50,000 Yeah. 640 00:38:50,000 --> 00:38:52,000 Oh, that's a piece of the frame. 641 00:38:52,000 --> 00:38:54,000 Wow, stuff is still falling. 642 00:38:54,000 --> 00:38:56,000 Whoo-hoo! 643 00:38:56,000 --> 00:39:00,000 Without doubt, the Anfo packed a serious punch, 644 00:39:00,000 --> 00:39:05,000 sending the three-ton steel gantry over 500 feet. 645 00:39:05,000 --> 00:39:10,000 Something that's worth seeing again, and again, and again. 646 00:39:15,000 --> 00:39:18,000 But amidst the final season spectacle, 647 00:39:18,000 --> 00:39:21,000 what's happened to the car? 648 00:39:26,000 --> 00:39:28,000 No way. 649 00:39:28,000 --> 00:39:30,000 I don't know. 650 00:39:30,000 --> 00:39:32,000 I don't know. 651 00:39:33,000 --> 00:39:36,000 No way. 652 00:39:36,000 --> 00:39:38,000 The car is gone. 653 00:39:38,000 --> 00:39:41,000 The car is gone, but that is the exact pattern 654 00:39:41,000 --> 00:39:43,000 in which you laid out the Anfo. 655 00:39:43,000 --> 00:39:44,000 Yeah. 656 00:39:44,000 --> 00:39:48,000 So it went through the top plate, through the car, 657 00:39:48,000 --> 00:39:51,000 and made a car-sized dent in the bottom. 658 00:39:51,000 --> 00:39:54,000 Well, I guess it's back to the drawing there. 659 00:39:56,000 --> 00:39:59,000 You knocked yourself out, champ. 660 00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:04,000 So we rushed up to Ground Zero hoping to find a pancake car, 661 00:40:04,000 --> 00:40:08,000 and instead found no car whatsoever. 662 00:40:08,000 --> 00:40:11,000 What seems to have happened is when we pushed the button, 663 00:40:11,000 --> 00:40:15,000 the Anfo didn't cleanly push our steel plate down and into the car. 664 00:40:15,000 --> 00:40:18,000 It punched a perfect hole through that steel plate, 665 00:40:18,000 --> 00:40:20,000 sending chunks flying hundreds of feet, 666 00:40:20,000 --> 00:40:22,000 and effectively vaporizing the car. 667 00:40:22,000 --> 00:40:26,000 The one thing it did not do was flatten the car. 668 00:40:26,000 --> 00:40:27,000 Yep. 669 00:40:27,000 --> 00:40:30,000 Instead of being a flat piece of furniture, 670 00:40:30,000 --> 00:40:33,000 the car was blown to kingdom come, 671 00:40:33,000 --> 00:40:36,000 ripped apart by the immense blast pressure 672 00:40:36,000 --> 00:40:38,000 and the top steel plate, 673 00:40:38,000 --> 00:40:41,000 which itself turned to lethal shrapnel. 674 00:40:43,000 --> 00:40:48,000 So much so that their U-Go wasn't the only car that took a hit. 675 00:40:48,000 --> 00:40:50,000 This is one of our rental cars, 676 00:40:50,000 --> 00:40:52,000 and it was parked behind our bunker, 677 00:40:52,000 --> 00:40:55,000 which is under a mountain of dirt. 678 00:40:55,000 --> 00:41:01,000 And the shockwave was enough to crack this windshield just from that. 679 00:41:01,000 --> 00:41:03,000 It was too much. 680 00:41:03,000 --> 00:41:06,000 This window, however, was not broken by a shockwave. 681 00:41:06,000 --> 00:41:08,000 It was broken by shrapnel. 682 00:41:08,000 --> 00:41:14,000 Specifically this 40-pound piece of inch-and-a-half thick steel, 683 00:41:14,000 --> 00:41:20,000 which flew probably 750, 800 feet to get here and cause this destruction. 684 00:41:25,000 --> 00:41:27,000 Clearly there's carnage inside and out, 685 00:41:27,000 --> 00:41:31,000 as the power of the boom took everyone by surprise. 686 00:41:31,000 --> 00:41:35,000 So how does that leave Jamie's car destruction dossier? 687 00:41:37,000 --> 00:41:41,000 Now we could have used a thicker plate, let's say a 12-inch thick one, 688 00:41:41,000 --> 00:41:46,000 but here's the thing, a plate that size is going to weigh 84,000 pounds. 689 00:41:46,000 --> 00:41:49,000 Just dropping that in the car by itself would crush the car really nicely, 690 00:41:49,000 --> 00:41:51,000 but that's not the point. 691 00:41:51,000 --> 00:41:54,000 The point was to do it with explosives. 692 00:41:54,000 --> 00:41:57,000 Now if somewhere out there there might be the right combination of steel thickness 693 00:41:57,000 --> 00:42:00,000 and quantity of explosives that would do it right, 694 00:42:00,000 --> 00:42:04,000 but at this point our best guess just didn't work at all. 695 00:42:10,000 --> 00:42:16,000 Well I tell you what, this is without a doubt the most impressive piece of shrapnel we've ever made. 696 00:42:16,000 --> 00:42:18,000 Yep, and to boot, we never have to look at that car again. 697 00:42:18,000 --> 00:42:20,000 It is done. 698 00:42:20,000 --> 00:42:22,000 Yeah, let's get out of here.