Premier Date: May 5, 2010
confirmed
In their small scale tests, the MythBusters compressed clay at 1x and 2x speeds. Their results showed that two objects hitting each other at 1x speed will cause 1x damage. In their full scale tests, the MythBusters crashed two cars into a wall at 50 and 100 mph as references. They then had two cars going at 50 mph collide into each other. After surveying the results, it was clear that the two cars suffered damage identical to the car that crashed into the wall at 50 mph. The MythBusters explained that was possible through Newton’s third law of motion. Although the total force was doubled by having two cars, that force also had to be divided between both cars during the crash.
partly confirmed
The Build Team tested various types of socks on both hairy and hairless legs to see which sock could be pulled off the easiest. The Build Team then concluded that a non-elastic woven wool sock on a hairless leg would be the best possible combination. They then built ballistic gel legs covered in lamb skin to simulate human legs. The Build Team tested several punches: the uppercut, the right hook, and the body blow. However, none of the punches managed to remove the socks, even with superhuman strength. In order to see what it would take to knock a person’s socks off, they hit Buster with a girder mounted on a moving truck. While the truck failed to knock Buster’s socks off at 40 mph (64 km/h), they saw on reviewed footage that the socks were sliding off; a second run at 65 mph (105 km/h) finally sent the socks flying off Buster’s feet. While the myth was confirmed, the Build Team pointed out that they had to use an astronomical amount of force in order to achieve it.
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