[ExI] mythbusters follow-on

[spike at rainier66.com]

For those of us who loved Mythbusters and still miss it now that there are no more new ones, they influenced others to make analogous videos.

 

This is the best one I have seen to date, Smarter Every Day.

 

When I was taking mechanical engineering in college, my most interesting class was shock mechanics.  The math was crazy complicated, and even after all that, the equations described propagation of shock mechanics way better than what the shock waves would do upon interaction with stuff.

 

In this video at about 10 minute mark they are showing what happens when a baseball is fired into a jar of cup-cake sprinkles at a speed of M1.5.  The equations predict a shock wave would propagate radially from the point of first impact and secondary shock waves would go everywhere, but I wasn’t aware that it could be captured on video.  The best view of that gorgeous shock wave can be seen in the bit at 10 minutes 30 seconds.

 

What I didn’t know and surprised me is that after impact, individual sprinkles shattered.  I knew shock waves do weird things, but that one surprised me.

 

Check it out:

 

What does a Gong Sound Like when Hit with a 1189mph Baseball? - Smarter Every Day 267 - YouTube <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=at-xZA5U1ps> 

 

I salute the legacy of Mythbusters and the whole attitude behind it: equations are our friends, but the best way to find out for sure is to set it up and try it.

 

spike

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