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F#%$ing Bead-Chains, How Do They Work?!

A very sweet video involving a rather ordinary object –a chain of metal beads– that seems to behave in a quite unordinary manner.

I just love the expression of the guy holding the glass jar, as if half expecting a leprechaun jumping out of it by the end of the experiment.

[H/T io9]

  1. Taking the Piss When You’d Much Rather Not!
    RPJ when I first started watching this the downward moving section of beads instantly reminded me of water leaving a tap especially as viewed in slow motion.

    Then it hit me the upward moving section reminded of this terrible knack I have if I don’t concentrate for taking a leak or in some other way causing a stream of liquid to hit another area of liquid’s surface and immediately have this third impossible jet of liquid arise out the sink or toilet bowl and hit me dead in the eye.

    It’s amazing how many times it’s happened to me and it becomes particularly unforgettable when the last bugger who used it forgot to flush.

    But when our hero finally lifted the glass of beads even higher that reminded me of all those legendary and disputed accounts you read about huge walls of water spontaneously rising up out the sea to heights of a hundred feet or more.

    Of course the similarity to water becomes even more apparent when you realise water’s molecules’re weakly magnetic.

    But is it possible those huge waves have some sort of electrostatic component to them which under certain conditions momentarily aligns and locks those weakly magnetic water molecules as if they were so many rows of chained together beads preventing them from dispersing as normal forcing them to use their collective kinetic energy to begin ascending to a height of a hundred or more feet up until they either topple over or simply collapse under their own weight?

    Just a thought…

    …which someone’s probably already had.

        1. ‘Splaining to do
          Newtonian physics are of little use at 6 o’clock in the morning. When you have a hangover, you’re more likely to blame it on witchcraft 😛

          1. I’m guessing for the effect
            I’m guessing for the effect to work the chain has to have a certain minimum radius of curvature or maybe no radius, while the beads transfer shock waves in pulses related somehow to the radius and diameter of the beads, i.e. not just any beaded chain will work. The beads have to be a certain diameter related to the weight of the metal alloy, and the beads have to have a certain bounce for their size, and even the glass jar has to have a certain resonance. I wonder if there is any information on how they worked these relationships out and if there was a lot of trial and error.

          2. Diameter & weight
            I do think there’s something of a diameter-to-weight ratio that allows the effect.

            As for the glass jar, I don’t know. I’d assume it’s a mere container. Even a bucket might have sufficed, but it wouldn’t have allowed the camera to see the movement of the beads in such great detail.

  2. ima brag now…
    …cuz I knows the direct descendant of the man who invented the “bead chain” as a tool before it was used for this or as a necklace. And that man (inventor) was her grandfather. that is all.

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