Dropping a Giant 2-Ton Thor’s Hammer on Objects from 100 Feet

Remember that 2-ton Thor’s hammer the folks at YouTube channel Hacksmith built? Of course, you do. If you were a superhero, you would be The Memory Master. Well, now the fun-loving builders have taken that hammer and dropped it from 100 feet on various objects, including a minivan. The results are every bit as glorious as you’d expect, provided you expected very glorious.

They begin by crushing some everyday household objects like a refrigerator, dresser, and television, slowly working their way up to the big ticket items like a truck and minivan. They also nail a giant nail, destroy a kiddy pool, and wreck a cinder block castle. I only wish I’d been invited to witness the carnage.

The fun doesn’t come without its risk of serious injury, though, and the crew almost gets taken out by splintered 2 x 4’s when dropping the hammer Gallagher style on a pile of watermelons, and at one point, the decorative metal grating comes off the side of the hammer and almost hits a crew member. So yeah, if you’re going to try this yourself, definitely stand behind somebody.

Spray-On Coating Protects a Watermelon From a 150-Foot Drop

I bet you have wondered if those miracle sprays that promise to protect the liner of your pickup truck from damage actually work. However, you can’t trust anyone these days, so I totally understand your skepticism. But here is video proof that the material really works.

watermelon_drop_1zoom in


The amateur scientists at YouTube’s How Ridiculous set out to see if these sprays work. Their highly unscientific, yet still awesome test had them coat a watermelon in Line-X spray, then dropped it off a 150-feet tall tower.

Incredivly, the watermelon survived the fall, where you would have broken your melon. Not only did it survive, but it bounced on impact. The stuff works!

It was so durable, that they couldn’t even open it with an axe. When they ultimately cut the watermelon open afterwards with a miter saw, the insides had been reduced to mush. So did it really survive? I would call that watermelon brain damage at the very least. The impressive thing is that the rind was still completely intact. Awesome.

[via Sploid]

NASA completes successful parachute drop simulation for Orion spacecraft

NASA completes successful parachute drop simulation of Orion spacecraft

NASA has always used the desert as its own personal playground, and we'd imagine that its team had a blast in Arizona yesterday, as a mock parachute compartment of the Orion spacecraft was dropped from 25,000 feet above Earth. The dart-shaped object experienced free fall for 5,000 feet, at which point, drogue chutes were deployed at 20,000 feet. This was then followed by pilot chutes, which then activated the main chutes. As you'd imagine, these things are monsters: the main parachutes -- three in all -- each measure 116 feet wide and weigh more than 300 pounds. Better yet, the mission was successful.

Naturally, all of this is in preparation for Orion's first test flight -- currently scheduled for 2014 -- where the unmanned craft will travel 15 times further than the ISS and jam through space at 20,000 mph before returning to Earth. Yesterday's outing is merely one in a series of drop tests, and yes, it's important to remove any unknowns from the situation: eventually, humans will be along for the ride.

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NASA completes successful parachute drop simulation for Orion spacecraft originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 30 Aug 2012 07:45:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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PlayStation Vita Passes The Drop Test

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Sony’s latest handheld successor gets drop tested in this video from GizmoSlip.

It’s the last week of March. Meaning, the PlayStation Vita, Sony’s well-equipped gaming-dedicated device, is about a month removed from it’s Western launch… Actually, it’s more like three months if you consider the Japanese release was back on December ...
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