Mythbusters Recap: More Myths Revisited

Confederate Salami Rocket. The original Confederate Rocket segment (from the Confederate Rocket episode) has already been retested once - in the Myths Reopened episode. But in what I think is a first, the retest itself generated enough questions, that the retest is going to be retested.

The question raised is whether or not the salami actually ignited. Most people wrote in to suggest that the pressure of the nitrous oxide alone, without anything added by the salami, could have lifted the rocket to a height of twenty feet. So in an effort to test this, Adam and Jamie rig up a test bed in a shipping container and hook it all to a force gauge to see what happens. The end result is that the nox could very likely have done just that, so it's back to the drawing board.

By "choking down" the nozzle (putting on a smaller one), they get more pressure, and increase the opportunity for the salami to catch, and this in turn provides more thrust. I'm not completely sure that the salami catches fire, but it does boost the pressure from 20 pounds to nearly 1000 pounds, and salami shrapnel goes everywhere, so for the moment at least, it looks like a successful test. Confirmed.

Rough Road Driving: Bracing the Windshield. Grant and Tory tested the original myth during the Shattering Subwoofer episode, and there actually aren't any complaints about their methodology.

But now viewers want to know about an associated myth (though it really has nothing to do directly with rough roads) - if you are driving behind another vehicle and you happen to know that it is going to throw up a rock, so you brace the windshield with your hand, will it help to keep it from shattering?

First you should know that it probably won't shatter in the first place. Windshields in the US have been made with laminated glass for decades. Even in other countries, they've been using laminated glass for ten years or so. Because of this, Grant and Tory have some trouble getting the thing to shatter at all. Once they figure out the problem, they just turn their test car around, because the rear window has tempered glass - and when it gets hit, even with a BB, it shatters as needed.

So Grant pulls on the safety gear and puts his hand up against it, and they try again, and... it shatters again. It looks like this one is just a myth. Frankly, I'm not sure how you would even drive with your hand up against the windshield, or know that a rock was coming. Maybe you're just supposed to drive like that all the time. Thankfully it doesn't work, so it doesn't matter. Busted.

Tailgate Up or Down. This myth comes from the segment with the same name in the Seasickness - Kill or Cure episode, and again seems to satisfy viewers, at least as far as the test goes. But they want to know more!

So in the interest of providing as much information as possible, Adam and Jamie rig up a test with a hard (tonneau) cover, a mesh tailgate and no tailgate at all to see what the effect is on gas mileage. They also do so on a much shorter test track - running the test on the same 300 mile course as they did previously would be a nightmare.

After all is said and done, their original test results stand up (a good sign), but they find out that the mesh-style tailgate comes in first, with an improvement of nearly 5%. This seems to stem from the fact that you remove the tailgate (removing weight, presumably). However, removing the tailgate entirely, without the mesh, leaving the tailgate up and using the hard cover are all about the same. Leaving the tailgate down is the worst you can do.

What about those old camper shells? Can we run one more test?

Sword vs. Sword Machine Gun Barrel. I'm starting to wonder if they are running out of myths, because even this revisit segment isn't really revisiting - this is the third out of four that isn't rechecking a myth for accuracy, it's simply adding information to the original myth. Maybe the guys are just getting better.

In the Cutting a Sword segment from the Mega Movie Myths episode, the build team tries to determine if one sword can cut another. It was determined with reasonable certainty that it couldn't happen. A new twist has surfaced that seems to indicate that in World War II there were reports of swords instead being used to cut through the barrels of machine guns, so that's what they try and do here.

First, Tory builds a nice barbecue to heat the barrels (to simulate them just being fired). That does allow the sword to cut large cuts in the barrels, but nothing goes right through them - not even when Grant's cutting machine is cranked up to double speed. Next, the team heats the barrels and cools them in rapid succession, to simulate the process where a weapon would heat and cool, and that does produce a shattering effect, which may be responsible for the myth, but it's definitely not a slice (similar to the stress fracture in the first go-round).

Finally, they try a smaller barrel, and while the sword is able to bend the barrel, it doesn't cut through it. Busted.

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