Episode 72: Underwater Car

Hey guys just a thought but when trying to breathe air from the tire. Would it help to try to trap the air bubbles with your hands and breathe the air from there? Love the show like watching you wreck cars and stuff.
c-ya

1  out of 1 found this valuable. Do you find this valuable? Do you?    

• Post reply

Show Last Reply

The test to see if the car window could be rolled down while under the pressure of the water was flawed. You used weights mounted on the glass which would exert not only pressure, but would also be held in place by friction. In the case of a car window having water pressure on the outside, first the pressure would be evenly distributed across the surface of the glass. Second, the water (the source of the pressure) would NOT exert friction on the window as you tried to open it. I would think that the window would easily open under water pressure or no pressure given the lack of friction. Perhaps a way of testing this outside of the water would be to mount the weights on a surface with ball bearings or rollers between the weights and the window. This would reduce the the friction.

Also, I agree with Lord Quinn that a good option would have been to go to the back of the car where the air would be available the longest (the upper corner of the rear windshield would have air for quite a bit of time. To get back there, one could first angle the seat backwards.

Another option would be to try to break the windshield with one's foot or to push it out. Windshields are made to be able to peel back under a reasonable amount of pressure.

Love the show! I watch the show whenever my wife and I visit family. (My wife and I don't have cable.)

I just thought that the test was flawed.

2  out of 2 found this valuable. Do you find this valuable? Do you?    

• Post reply

Ok... You tell us all the time about your expertise and experience in such stuff and how we at home should not try this. Well, this episode was going so well and the first I've seen in a while I had nothing to comment about other then how I was enjoying it and how scientific it appeared.

And then... you went on to experiment with the window-crushing tools, and the second i saw it, I was horrified! But still you went on to test the theory! LUCKILY, you were doing this in a pool and decided that you didn't want to leave shattered glass behind for the students - dangerous right? - and went with a substituting high-voltage elevator solution.

Well, did you ever concider the force that those pieces of glass will be flying back at anyone that attempted this mythbuster solution and crushed their door-window, possibly (ironically) fataly wounding themselves.

Please don't test the probability of death while attempting to flee a sinking car through a crushed window (dangerous all by itself) after shattering it against high pressure on the other side. just discourage people from doing this.

This method seems very "last option". I mean, if you are quick to react, just open the door - no point in crushing the window. Otherwise, crush the window too soon, you might get hurt really bad - I'm just recalling the scene where the water RUSHED into the car at a high pace after the high-voltage elevator snapped open the window. If you wait too long - you are dead or you are able to open the door.

My addition to the solutions is, open rear door window(s) (easier if they are electrically controlled). Water will fill up and pressure equalize more quickly. Hey, you might even be able to escape through there sooner if half of the car is already submerged before you start wondering how you got there in the first place!

anyhoo, that's my part... good luck!

fqa

2  out of 4 found this valuable. Do you find this valuable? Do you?    

• Post reply