"Please, don't try anything that you're about to see us do at home." "Ever!" "NARRATOR:" "On this episode of "Mythbusters"..." "Ba-da-da-da!" "Ba-da-da!" "NARRATOR:..." "Doctors Hyneman and Savage raid the "Ark"-hives for a movie myth about a bike flip." "[ Laughter ]" "If you poke a pole in the front spokes, will it really flip out?" "[ Laughter ]" "The timing was perfect." "lf you say so, Junior." "[ Laughs ]" "NARRATOR:" "And Kari, Grant, and Tory are breaking bad..." "I'm bustin' out of here, see?" "NARRATOR:... to test tall tales of prison breaks." "They want to know if you can rappel to freedom using bedsheets, toilet paper..." "Freedom!" "NARRATOR:... and hair?" "[Bleep]" "Oh!" "Oh!" "Ow!" "NARRATOR:" "Who are the Mythbusters?" "Adam Savage..." "That's 100 % wacky right there." "NARRATOR:... and Jamie Hyneman." "Pain is your friend." "NARRATOR:" "Between them, more than 30 years of special-effects experience." "Joining them " " Kari Byron..." "Let's do it." "NARRATOR:..." "Grant Imahara..." "Danger!" "Warning!" "Warning!" "NARRATOR:" "...and Tory Belleci." "Okay, you want to play rough, little gopher?" "NARRATOR:" "They don't just tell the myths." "They put them to the test." "Let me guess." "Indiana Jones?" "Yes." "Cast your mind back to "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade."" "Indy and his father are racing away from the Nazis on a motorcycle." "Nazis come up alongside them and are about to get them, but Indy doesn't have a weapon." "Quickly thinking, he grabs a flagpole, jams it in the front spokes of the Nazi motorcycle and..." "The motorcycle flips up in the air, end over end." "Bad time for the Nazi." "Exactly." "That is our movie myth." "NARRATOR:" "It's a classic scene from the silver screen." "The Doctors Jones, Junior and Senior, are being chased by the Third Reich on bikes." "But a flagpole in the front wheel of the nearest Nazi, and a motorcycle flip-out sees our hero escape with a trademark cheesy grin." "This one's really interesting from a physics sense." "Because when I look at that scene, it doesn't seem awkward or out of place." "But it does beg the question, is it really that easy to redirect all the energy that's going this way to going that way?" "I'm thinking that we break it down to its constituent components, test each one, and then put them all back together for a full-sized finale." "This will be fun." "It's been years since I've been on a motorcycle." "Ever since that -- that gang, right?" "[ Horn honking ]" "NARRATOR:" "So, first things first." "It's a motorcycle myth, and we'll be needing a..." "JAMIE:" "That's a bike." "NARRATOR:" "Exactly." "ADAM:" "Aw, it's lovely." "Actually, we rode across the country in one of these things." "No way." "I'm just reeling from learning something about you" "I didn't know." "It seems that there's a never-ending supply of those." "NARRATOR:" "Okay, it may be old-fashioned, but the movie bikes are vintage World War I I." "ADAM:" "I know what you're saying." "You're saying this really doesn't look like a vintage World War I I era motorcycle, and it isn't." "In fact, it's from 1981, but it is the exact model of bike used by the stunt men to perform their stunts for "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade,"" "which means that it, and not some vintage bike, is the perfect test platform for us for this for this myth." "NARRATOR:" "Now that that's sorted, let's kick things off as Adam and Jamie focus on the first aspect of the myth." "ADAM:" "Since this myth is all about the poking of a flagpole into the spokes of a motorcycle, one of the things we want to know is, how fast can we poke a flagpole?" "NARRATOR:" "Because once they know the speed of a human flagpole poke..." "ADAM:" "Nice, tiger." "NARRATOR:... they can calibrate their remaining tests to just that." "Just plain funny to watch you exert yourself like that." "I don't know why, exactly." "It just is." "High comedy." "Whatever floats your goat." "[ Laughs ]" "NARRATOR:" "And the high comedy on the high speed reveals the magic number to be 30 miles per hour." "Cue part two of the experiment -- a remote-control flagpole thruster." "You might remember this puppy right here from "Birds on a Truck" because this was our pigeon catcher." "NARRATOR:" "Yep, it's not a prop from "Mad Max."" "It really is a pigeon catcher." "ADAM: [ Laughs ]" "NARRATOR:" "Not that it caught any pigeons." "JAMIE:" "It has an air reservoir." "It has a valve." "It has everything we need to shoot the stick into the wheels of the motorcycle." "In 3, 2, 1..." "[ Laughs ]" "NARRATOR:" "Yeah, that looked a tad faster than 30 miles an hour to me." "But let's see what Adam thinks." "ADAM:" "One." "[ Wood rattling ]" "[ Laughs ]" "That might be a little too fast." "NARRATOR:" "Hmm." "That's what I said." "Is everybody okay?" "JAMIE:" "That's dangerous." "Yeah, we might have to tune that one back." "I'm not gonna get tired of that." "NARRATOR:" "And so, to get the speed they need -- around 30 miles per hour..." "ADAM:" "This is an exceedingly weird operation." "NARRATOR:... they add some hose to decrease the pressure." "Firing in 3, 2, 1." "That might be it." "ADAM:" "That's it." "That's the butter zone." "12 p.s. i., we get 28 1/2 miles per hour." "That's perfect." "NARRATOR:" "As odd as this sounds, after destroying their wooden backstop, they finally got the ex-pigeon catcher throwing a flagpole" "at a realistic speed." "TORY:" "I'm free!" "This might sound crazy, but a lot of the fans are saying that you can actually make rope out of toilet paper, and it'll be strong enough that you could scale down a jail wall and escape." "Toilet paper?" "Are you serious?" "GRANT:" "Well, if we're gonna do that," "I think we should do the all-time classic -- making a rope out of bedsheets." "I know it's kind of out there, but let's also do the "Rapunzel" version of this, where you make a rope out of hair." "Ew." "lck" "NARRATOR:" "Any prison break worth its place in urban folklore involves a death-defying descent from a great height including these fan-site fables." "Desperate convicts eager to be ex-convicts have escaped jail with the apparent aid of cell-made ropes of toilet paper and bedsheets." "And if you include Rapunzel's luscious locks, that's three harebrained escape plans to test." "So, how are we gonna test this?" "Why don't we each take one of the materials, make our ropes, and see which one of us makes it down the side of the building?" "And may the best rope win." "Wait, wait." "I want bedsheets, then." "Too late." "NARRATOR:" "Yes, in a vertigo-inducing finale..." "KARI:" "Aah!" "Oh, my God." "I want to throw up." "NARRATOR:... our fun-loving criminals will find out for real if the ropes made from their mythical materials will aid and abet their jailbreak." "Stupidest idea ever." "NARRATOR:" "Or send them plummeting to their doom." "Ow!" "NARRATOR:" "But before all that, let's take you back to the beginning where Kari's plan for a braided escape is giving her a bad hair day." "KARI:" "Is this not the most disgusting thing you've ever seen -- an entire box of just hair?" "NARRATOR:" "Yes, coming in at number one on the weirdest raw-material chart are 50 human-hair ponytails." "KARI:" "We have to break out of a building that's 14 stories high, so I have to make a rope that is 140 feet long." "I think the difficulty here is not gonna necessarily be the strength of the hair, 'cause this feels really strong." "I think it's gonna be where the hair splices together." "I have to come up with some sort of knotting or braiding system that it won't slide apart and, you know, 100 feet down," "I'm not just gonna plummet to the earth." "And it's gross." "NARRATOR:" "Meanwhile, Grant's mythical method is a little more conventional and a film-fugitive favorite." "GRANT:" "In order to make sure we have maximum authenticity here, we've gotten these bedsheets from our friends in Alameda County, and they're actual county-jail linens." "NARRATOR:" "And finally Tory, who has some serious tensile strength issues with his authentic one-ply prison-issue tissue." "[ Metal rattling ]" "There you have it." "It's not strong enough." "NARRATOR:" "But he's a man with a plan." "TORY:" "If you look at the toilet paper, it's perforated for your convenience of pulling off one sheet at a time." "Already it's got this built-in weak link." "So I think twisting it, rolling it will give me the extra strength that I need." "Look at that." "The same amount of toilet paper just wrapped up is strong enough to now hold the three kilos." "So this is the way I'm gonna make my toilet-paper rope." "MAN:" "Fire!" "Go!" "NARRATOR:" "Adam and Jamie's past crusade to hold Hollywood to scientific account..." "Whoo!" "ADAM:" "Oh, that's great!" "NARRATOR:... has given the team some memorable moments of movie mayhem." "MAN:" "Buster's on the ground." "NARRATOR:" "But on this last crusade, the team are tackling the tall tale that a stick between the spokes can cause a head-over-handlebars flip." "So far they've got their bike and rigged a remote-control flagpole thruster." "So, what's next?" "JAMIE:" "When this bike is moving at highway speeds, the spokes are going so fast, you can hardly see them." "So what we need to find out is whether it's possible for a human to thrust a stick into those spokes fast enough to get them cleanly through there, and then, once that occurs, what happens to the wheel." "NARRATOR:" "And to get the wheel spinning at chasing speeds -- 50 miles per hour -- Adam whips up a dynamometer." "And now it's time for the old spoke-and-poke test." "NARRATOR:" "So with the bike secured, this test is all about the space between the spokes and not the full flip." "This is gonna be cool." "NARRATOR:" "Will a flagpole thrust at realistic speed actually penetrate the wheel?" "3, 2, 1." "NARRATOR:" "Apparently not." "Well, that was a bit of a letdown." "NARRATOR:" "Yes, the stick just bounced right back out." "And after a second test under the same conditions produces a similar result, the guys decide they are missing the point." "Firing, 3, 2, 1." "NARRATOR:" "Perfect." "Penetration." "Wheel stoppage." "And, as a bonus, some controlled mayhem." "We broke some stuff." "JAMIE:" "We successfully stopped the wheel with the stick, and that's great." "That's 15 pounds coming to a dead stop from 50 miles an hour." "But this was a stationary test." "When we go out on the road with this, there are hundreds of pounds in this bike, plus the rider, that want to keep on going." "And that's where the real fun is gonna start." "NARRATOR:" "So it's full scale ahead, and the plan in the can looks a lot like this." "At the push of a button, the bike and Buster will begin freewheeling." "That, in turn, will trigger the flagpole flinger and jam the stick into the spokes." "And to get things rolling in the right direction," "Adam's reinventing the wheel." "ADAM:" "Well, the first problem I think we've got to solve is exemplified by taking a look at this footage again." "Yeah." "See that?" "Okay." "The hubbed spoked wheel is not really ideal for us to shove a stick into 'cause those spokes are not gonna stay put." "We need a wheel that can stay put under continued abuse for repeated tests, and we're gonna use steel plate to do it." "We've had two of these plasma-cut out of quarter-inch steel plate." "We're gonna bolt them to one of the motorcycle rims, have a tire put back on it and a couple of flange-mounted pillow blocks on the axle, and that ought to hold up to everything we can throw at it." "[ Laughs ]" "The Road Warrior would be proud." "This thing is absolutely as solid as a rock." "It's perfect." "[ Tires screeching ]" "NARRATOR:" "For the prison-break parable..." "This place can't hold me!" "NARRATOR:" "...Grant "Iron Man" Imahara..." "I'm bustin' out of here, see?" "NARRATOR:" "...Kari "Knuckles" Byron..." "MAN:" "Come on." "I was framed!" "NARRATOR:... and "Don" Salvatore Belleci..." "Framed, I tell you!" "NARRATOR:" "...are pretending to be put away in order to break out." "Prisoners, step in." "Lockdown." "NARRATOR:" "They're going to find out if you can effect an escape with ropes made of bedsheets, toilet paper, and hair." "KARI:" "My collection of hair gathered from the shower and all the rattails I've been stealing..." "Aah!" "...I will have no problem making a rope and getting out of here." "NARRATOR:" "But despite being forced to use authentic cell-made materials..." "Warden, I got diarrhea." "I need more toilet paper." "NARRATOR:... the guys won't really have to prepare their escape in their cells." "They get to do that back at the shop, where Tory has worked out that if he twists one-ply prison-issue tissue, it becomes less fragile." "TORY:" "As you can see, I'm twisting the toilet paper into little strings." "Once I have enough strings, I'll weave it into a rope, and hopefully that will be strong enough to hold my weight, and that will be my ticket out of this joint." "And this process is taking a long time, but, let's face it, I'm in jail." "I got nothing but time." "Someday I'll be free" "Bing" "NARRATOR:" "It may be time-consuming, but before modern manufacturing techniques, this is exactly how real rope was made." "Fibers of material were twisted into yarns." "A few of these yarns were twisted in the opposite direction to form threads, and, again, several of these were counter-twisted to form rope." "So it might sound crazy, but Tory could be on to something." "[ Laughs ] I'm gonna get out of jail in no time." "NARRATOR:" "Meanwhile, Kari's about to find out if her plan for a braided escape is even viable." "KARI:" "I'm a little nervous about the strength of the hair, so I've got a knotted piece here that I was actually just gonna try my weight on." "I'm really kind of nervous about this because of..." "[Bleep] ...that factor." "Maybe I need to find some inmates with some less healthy, slippery hair -- some good, fried-out, bleached-blond inmates." "NARRATOR:" "Yeah, or maybe, just like a conventional rope, you could braid a number of those single strands together." "KARI:" "I'm gonna take three braids and tie them all into one braid so that it's sort of how rope works, where one fails, it has two more to kind of depend on." "And hopefully that can give it more strength." "Unfortunately, I'm getting claw hand from, like, all the braiding." "Ugh." "NARRATOR:" "And that just leaves Grant, who got lucky, with the least labor-intensive material." "GRANT:" "The bedsheet is beautiful because you can go to the prison laundry, steal as many as you need." "You don't need a hundred years to make your bedsheet rope." "You need about, I don't know, maybe two hours, and you're climbing your way to freedom." "NARRATOR:" "However, the toilet-paper plan is taking a lot, lot longer." "I need to spread my wings and fly." "NARRATOR:" "So, to speed things up, our crafty criminal uses his mastermind to good effect by twisting multiple strands at once and cheating." "TORY:" "So, I've taken five sheets of toilet paper, twisted them together to create this." "Now I'm gonna take three of these, wrap them together, and then take that and wrap that together and hopefully create a rope that's gonna be strong enough to hold up my weight." "NARRATOR:" "Meanwhile, over in Grant's cell, he's testing to see if the sheets can take the strain." "GRANT:" "So, what we have here is a single standard" "Alameda County bedsheet with a knot tied at the top, threaded through 150 pounds of weight, which is equivalent to my body weight." "And as you can see, it's actually doing quite well so far." "NARRATOR:" "Outside in the exercise yard," "Tory is also ready for a strength test." "This might work!" "NARRATOR:" "Kari, however, is still desperately braiding and plaiting." "She's more concerned about the hair's joints and splices than its tensile strength." "After all, keratin, the major protein component of hair, is as hard as nails -- literally." "It's also the stuff that forms horns, claws, and hooves." "The question is, will it also make rope?" "Jamie and Adam are flipping out..." "That might be a little too fast." "Firing." "NARRATOR:" "...testing the movie myth that jamming a stick between the spokes will cause a motorcycle flip-out." "But they've got a tough build ahead." "In order to go full scale with this, we need to both be able to hold this bike and let go of it" "at very precise timing." "So we're gonna start by building a trailer that holds it upright, that, on the push of a button, releases it, and then, once it's released, will fire a stick right through those front spokes." "NARRATOR:" "In engineering terms, there's a mountain to climb." "And what better way to show the passage of time than a montage?" "And a cross-dissolve later, the rig is ready to roll." "But before the cameras do, the team needs a change of scenery." "Ready?" "Yep." "Let's go." "[ Tires screeching ]" "NARRATOR:" "And the location they've chosen is, surprise, the disused runway at Alameda." "ADAM:" "It's a good day for a motorcycle accident." "JAMIE:" "I think so." "Let's make a few." "NARRATOR:" "Unlikely to have a motorcycle accident is Jamie, our very own cross-country motorbiking Mythbuster." "But Adam?" "ADAM:" "Let's trade." "NARRATOR:" "Well, that's a different story." "[ Engine revs ]" "How do you undo this?" "I'm not so sure this is a good idea." "Adam on a motorcycle?" "Even with seat belts, I worry about Adam." "Are you done yet?" "We got some work to do." "Let's get busy." "All right." "Let's do it." "[ Engine stalls ]" "Oh!" "Aw." "NARRATOR:" "So while Jamie reassembles the trailer and release rig," "Adam brightens up the bike for its big scene." "And with Buster's ride secured to the trailer he's ready for a test run." "ADAM:" "This may look pretty straightforward, but, actually, it's a pretty complicated rig, and there's a lot of little things which we're not sure exactly how they might react to getting up to speed." "So that's the first thing we're gonna do -- get the whole rig up to speed and just see how it runs." "NARRATOR:" "And with the truck easing up to 25 miles per hour..." "JAMIE:" "I don't see any problem with that." "NARRATOR:" "...Buster stays upright and has no problems keeping in line." "Now it's time to start the mayhem." "Start the mayhem!" "Yeah!" "[ Growls ]" "NARRATOR:" "Jailed for science," "Kari, Grant, and Tory are going a little stir crazy." "Man, I got to get out of here." "If only we could figure out a way to escape." "If only we had a rope or something." "NARRATOR:" "Yes, they're putting three mythical rope-making materials to the test." "The hair's been braided, the toilet paper twisted, and the sheets rolled and knotted, which means our ingenious inmates are ready to become outmates." "And the coop they'll be flying from is the Alameda County Courthouse Jail." "They have to rappel from the roof using only their cell-made ropes." "[ Creaking ]" "[ Laughing ] Not bad." "All right, you guys." "This is the moment of truth for our prison-escape ropes." "We've got 100 % human hair, toilet-paper rope, and the old-school classic, bedsheet." "Well, since yours is probably the most likely to work, maybe you should go first to show us how it's done." "And then this way, we can test out the SWAT team safety mechanism." "[ Laughs ]" "Fine." "I will." "Good luck, man." "All right." "Freedom!" "KARI:" "Good idea." "Him going first." "I like that." "NARRATOR:" "So Grant, the nominated human guinea pig, is first up." "But rest assured, he's in safe hands." "Jack Tucker and Mike Norton are SWAT team rappel masters, and they've rigged a harness and rope system that will allow Grant to climb unassisted... unless he falls." "Well, that certainly gets the juices flowing." "Um... yeah." "It's a little bit different perspective up here." "[ Dramatic music plays ]" "Okay." "I can do this." "NARRATOR:" "With every inch of that terrifying drop playing on his mind, Grant forces himself to focus on prepping for the climb." "GRANT:" "So this is the moment of truth for my bedsheet rope." "Can you actually escape using a bedsheet and not have it break?" "[ Laughing nervously ]" "Okay." "It's long enough." "Okay." "[ Wind whistling ]" "So careful observers may note that I'm wearing, in addition to my standard prison garb, a safety harness." "Now, the important thing is that the safety harness is only in case the rope breaks or there's some other problem." "Okay, you guys." "I'm ready to go." "The bedsheet will be holding my entire weight the whole time." "Here I go." "NARRATOR:" "Grant's first careful steps are onto a convenient ledge just over the edge." "Holy sheets!" "That's high!" "NARRATOR:" "But from here on in, it's down to Grant and those knotted bedsheets." "All right." "You guys ready?" "KARI:" "Ready!" "TORY:" "Yeah!" "Here we go with the, uh, old-school bedsheet." "Be careful, little buddy!" "NARRATOR:" "Despite the concern below, the early signs are good." "KARI:" "He's doing the walk-down-the-wall thing." "TORY:" "Oh." "It looks like he's done this before." "You've broken out of jail before?" "KARI:" "Wow." "Those are holding up." "NARRATOR:" "The bedsheets are holding up." "[ Chuckling ] He's getting tired." "KARI:" "Oh, man." "NARRATOR:" "The question now is, can Grant hold himself up?" "Ugh." "Oh [bleep]" "KARI:" "Oh, God." "He's just hanging!" "He's just hanging!" "TORY:" "Hang on, buddy!" "Don't let go!" "You're almost free!" "Attaboy!" "This sucks." "KARI:" "You can do it." "GRANT:" "I've got climbing experience." "But there's nothing to hold on to up there except for the rope." "TORY:" "Pretend like your life depends on it." "'Cause it kind of does." "GRANT:" "So I just thank God I got those big knots in there, 'cause if I didn't have that, I'd be done." "KARI:" "Oh, Grant." "You're doing so good." "TORY:" "You're almost there, dude." "You're halfway there!" "KARI:" "The sheets are totally holding you up." "GRANT:" "There were a couple places where I couldn't quite get a foothold, and the rope just slipped through my hands, and that's where I got these hideous rope burns, which are really, really hurting." "TORY:" "Look at the pain in his face." "Freedom's like 20 feet away." "KARI:" "Yeah!" "GRANT:" "Ow." "Ow!" "KARI:" "Oh, yes!" "Yes, yes, yes!" "Yeah!" "TORY:" "Let go!" "You're there, dude!" "Yeah!" "Yeah!" "You're free!" "GRANT:" "I'm free!" "I'm free!" "KARI:" "Confirmed!" "Ow!" "NARRATOR:" "Freedom!" "But with a bad case of rope burns." "You did it!" "The good news is, I can totally see why they put this in movies." "Because the entire time, the bedsheet was solid." "There was no ripping, no tearing, no giving way of the bedsheet." "That was solid." "And, you know, if I had been in a little bit better physical condition," "I probably would have gotten down that no problem." "NARRATOR:" "And what that means is that scaling the jailhouse wall with a bedsheet rope is confirmed." "I'm free!" "For those playing along at home, here's where we stand so far in the myth that jamming a flagpole into the front spokes of a motorcycle will cause it to flip up in the air." "We've gotten the motorcycle wheel up to 50 miles an hour and found out that yes, a human is totally capable of jamming a flagpole into that front wheel and stopping it." "We broke some stuff." "The question now is, if you're doing that to a motorcycle that's moving, will it have the effect that the myth states?" "The bike immediately stops and starts to cartwheel while going up in the air." "Now we're gonna see what happens for real." "NARRATOR:" "And with the crowd expectant, the teams set up and step up for the first test at 25 miles per hour." "You know what I hope?" "What?" "I hope it works." "Me too." "All right." "Let's start it." "NARRATOR:" "Buster, looking every inch a crash-test biker, tailgates the truck, ready for his moment of glory." "WILL:" "20 miles per hour." "NARRATOR:" "And once the team are at test speed..." "25." "NARRATOR:..." "Adam calls it." "Firing in 3, 2, 1." "JAMIE:" "Ah, it went through." "It stopped the wheel." "Okay, Will, stop." "ADAM:" "Slow down and stop." "NARRATOR:" "It all happened pretty fast." "But a quick look at the high speed confirms the Rube Goldberg-esque rig worked like a dream." "Jamie hit the switch." "Buster was released." "ADAM:" "Oh, I see it clicking the switch." "NARRATOR:" "The cannon fired, and the flagpole was jammed into the spokes..." "ADAM:" "Dude!" "The timing was just dead-on." "NARRATOR:... giving Buster a taste of asphalt." "How you doing, buddy?" "NARRATOR:" "But there was no sign of the mythical flip." "ADAM:" "It couldn't be better." "But I didn't see no bike-o flip-o." "NARRATOR:" "Yep, no bike-o flip-o." "More of a bike-o topple-o." "So, what's next?" "JAMIE:" "The next thing we're gonna do is ramp the speed up a little bit so that the bike will tend to want to stay upright for longer, and we'll probably get a little more energy in the process," "which means a bigger flip if we're gonna get one at all." "NARRATOR:" "So it's take two." "ADAM:" "Holding up well." "NARRATOR:" "And this time, they take the truck to 40." "WILL:" "40 miles per hour." "Okay, firing in 3, 2, 1, go." "Oh!" "[ Laughs ]" "JAMIE:" "Okay, he can stop." "Tell him to stop." "[ Laughing ] Stop." "NARRATOR:" "So, the additional momentum didn't help the bike get airborne." "Instead, that extra energy was used to snap the flagpole in half." "You know what?" "That right there is the test." "You know, that's the test." "Yeah." "And it didn't work." "It broke the stick." "ADAM:" "I think that was the circumstances of the myth there." "We got the bike going at 40 miles per hour." "We got the stick firing perfectly into the spokes." "It didn't stop the bike." "It didn't flip the bike." "And it broke the stick." "JAMIE:" "So, what's next?" "Stronger stick." "That was the circumstances." "Let's try and get the results with a big, fat, steel stick." "Steel it is." "Mm-hmm." "NARRATOR:" "Yep, just like Buster, the myth is down, but not quite out." "Kari, Tory, and Grant have had success with the first of their rappel-to-freedom tests." "KARI:" "Yeah!" "You're free!" "GRANT:" "I'm free!" "I'm free!" "This myth is absolutely confirmed, and I love it when myths are confirmed." "The rope did not break." "You can make a bedsheet rope and escape from jail." "Let's not air this in the prisons." "NARRATOR:" "That's one down -- literally." "I'm free!" "NARRATOR:" "With two to go." "KARI:" "I'm not afraid of heights, but I am really afraid of falling, and I'm not a mountain climber." "This will be the first time I really will have done anything remotely like this, so yeah, I'm nervous." "Oh, my God." "I want to throw up." "[ Laughs ]" "NARRATOR:" "And no wonder she's nervous." "It's clear hair isn't exactly an ideal rope-making material." "GRANT:" "I was watching her form the rope, and there were many times where she had to take it apart because she would test it and it would just go "fwshh!"" "She's got multiple strands, you know, forming a big, thick rope of hair, but I don't know." "At this point, my confidence isn't especially high." "NARRATOR:" "And neither is Kari's." "Whose hair-ball idea is this?" "NARRATOR:" "Well, it's a "hair"-brain plan, for sure, but it's too late to turn back now." "We're about to find out if that hairy lifeline will cut it." "TORY:" "Man." "Oh." "GRANT:" "It's looking pretty good so far, actually." "TORY:" "Well, the hair is -- It's holding up." "GRANT:" "That's great." "TORY:" "It's incredible how strong it is." "Whoa!" "GRANT:" "Whoa!" "NARRATOR:" "It defies belief, but Kari's descent is being supported by nothing more than a 1 40-feet-long triple-braided ponytail." "How's it going, Kari?" "KARI:" "I see split ends." "TORY:" "You should have used conditioner." "KARI:" "There's split ends!" "NARRATOR:" "Hair-care issues aside," "Kari's descent is going spectacularly well." "TORY:" "You're almost free!" "NARRATOR:" "And her technique of sliding instead of climbing is just perfect." "Yeah!" "You're free!" "GRANT:" "You did it!" "The hair didn't break." "I've got to say, I'm totally amazed." "My hands -- little jacked." "This rope is composed of hair that's braided." "And if you look at it, it's actually kind of springy, which is just crazy." "It's effective." "Disgusting, but effective." "Yeah!" "Oh, my God!" "That was so scary!" "Yeah?" "And the hair didn't break." "I can't believe it didn't break." "KARI:" "It was like I'd slide, grab a knot, slide, grab a knot." "But the whole time, I was just like, "It's coming undone, it's coming undone, it's coming undone, it's coming undone!"" "When I was right close to the ground, I had about a foot." "Then I kind of dropped a little bit." "That's the only time I actually felt the rope kind of -- the belay -- was the last foot." "The whole time, that was sheer human hair strength." "NARRATOR:" "Incredible, but true." "But unlike the bedsheets, the guys are reluctant to call this one confirmed." "TORY:" "The hair worked, and it didn't break." "I mean, it's not the most practical technique, but if you can get that amount of hair and braid it together, you can make rope and escape." "NARRATOR:" "Yeah, unless your name's Rapunzel, getting that amount of hair could be an issue." "But as a mythical rope-making material, it does actually work." "ADAM: 3..." "NARRATOR:" "On the motorcycle movie myth," "Adam and Jamie are having a flipping good time." "I didn't see no bike-o flip-o." "NARRATOR:" "But so far there's been no sign of the mythical head-over-handlebars flip." "JAMIE:" "Okay, you can stop." "NARRATOR:" "So they decided to beef things up a bit." "So, at 40 miles an hour, hickory didn't really cut it." "So this time, we're gonna use a steel pipe." "This is about eight times as heavy, and it's gonna do something pretty violent." "ADAM:" "Hopefully, this is the "it" shot." "This is either going to flip this motorcycle or prove once and for all that it's totally not possible." "I hope this works." "What's not to work?" "[ Both laugh ]" "Oh, so many things." "NARRATOR:" "But if it goes according to plan," "Buster will soon be taking a short, dizzying flight with a mandatory crash landing." "Okay." "Pull in 3, 2, 1." "Go!" "Oh!" "[ Laughs ]" "Give me five there!" "NARRATOR:" "Another smooth execution by the rig, and you could say the guys are pleased." "Well, that seemed to work just beautifully." "It doesn't get any prettier than that." "JAMIE:" "No." "It was flawless." "And the bike did not flip." "JAMIE:" "No." "The tires skidded." "You know, that's it." "That's the perfect test." "ADAM:" "It's forward momentum." "It doesn't transfer immediately to vertical momentum." "It makes all the sense in the world now that I've seen it happen." "JAMIE:" "You know, you could stop the bad guy that way if you happen to have a steel pipe, but it's not getting airborne." "It won't happen." "It's gonna do exactly that." "ADAM:" "Dude, that totally worked." "Freakin' "A."" "The most important thing to keep in mind about this test is the traction between this wheel and the road surface." "Nice work, Buster!" "If you bring the wheel to a dead stop like you will if you put a stick between the spokes, it's gonna skid." "You're gonna lose control." "It'll slip out from under the bike, and it's all over." "It will not get it airborne like it did in the movie." "Oh!" "So satisfying." "NARRATOR:" "So, no bike-o flip-o even with the mayo." "ADAM:" "You know what we have to do now." "We have to finish on a bike that's... doing a flip." "Hook or by crook, we have to finish with that." "Physics, one, movies, zero." "NARRATOR:" "And so it's back to the shop to square the account and find out the physics of film effects." "[ Horn beeping ]" "Dude, check this out." "It looks like this whole scene is just a trick of editing." "You can see that when the bike takes off, it's totally stationary, and if I frame forward a couple frames," "you can see a small explosion underneath." "That's a classic Hollywood sleight of hand." "Yeah, it's pretty clear if we're gonna do this Hollywood-style, we're gonna need some explosives to get that bike in the air." "We need a boom." "Exactly." "NARRATOR:" "Yep, so the key is TNT." "And with that in mind, our special-effects specialists get back to work." "JAMIE:" "This is what is known as a mortar." "Now, this is what is going to make the bike do what we couldn't do with a stick through the spokes." "We're gonna fill this with gunpowder." "We're gonna put it underneath the bike, and it's gonna fire a bunch of black powder, shooting the bike way up in the air and spinning while it does it." "NARRATOR:" "To survive that black-powder-powered flight, the bike gets a once-over from Adam." "ADAM:" "I reinforced its skeletal structure so that it can be punched from behind the engine and fly up in the air to glory." "NARRATOR:" "Sounds great, unless your name happens to be Buster." "To get to the, uh, bottom of the toilet-paper jailbreak..." "Oh, this prison food's killing me!" "[ Farts ]" "You need to put more fiber in the damn food!" "NARRATOR:..." "Tory has taken a swipe at making a rope from genuine one-ply perforated prison poop paper." "So my toilet-paper rope is done." "It's taken me a long time, and it looks like rope." "However, it's still only toilet paper." "I'm hoping it's gonna be strong enough to hold up my weight." "KARI: [ High-pitched voice ] His chances are made of paper." "GRANT:" "His escape technique's paper-thin!" "[ Normal voice ] We better get out of here, or they're gonna put us in the loony bin." "Toilet-paper rope escape is probably the stupidest idea ever." "It's not that stupid." "You've had stupider ideas." "I'm gonna kick your butt if I survive, Grant." "Watch that first step." "She's a doozy." "NARRATOR:" "And that first step is also the crucial moment when nothing but toilet paper is taking Tory's weight." "KARI: [ Laughing ] Oh, my God!" "[Bleep]" "NARRATOR:" "But, incredibly, a few expletives aside, it's all going according to plan -- sort of." "TORY:" "Toilet paper is used to wipe your butt, not climb down a building." "NARRATOR:" "It seems the real issue with the tissue is finding a firm grip." "Oh!" "Oh!" "TORY: [ Grunts ]" "I'm off -- [ Grunts ]" "[Bleep]" "[ Groans ] [Bleep]" "Are you okay?" "[ Weakly ] Yeah." "NARRATOR:" "And that right there is why we hired the SWAT team." "Tory slipped." "KARI Oh!" "TORY: [ Grunts ] [Bleep]" "NARRATOR:" "And if it wasn't for the safety harness, he was a goner." "But aside from that sudden and terrifying drop..." "GRANT:" "Yeah, dude, you're almost there!" "NARRATOR:..." "Tory and the toilet paper hold firm and make it safely to terra firma." "GRANT: [ Laughs ]" "Freedom!" "GRANT:" "Yeah!" "You did it!" "How's those hands?" "They're numb!" "Who would've thought toilet paper works to escape prison?" "!" "I'm amazed." "I'm amazed that the toilet paper did not break." "Freedom!" "At least while he was making his way down." "I'm free." "I can't walk, but I'm free." "NARRATOR:" "Yeah, it broke, but it didn't break during the test." "And so Tory gives toilet paper his seal of approval." "TORY:" "Oh [bleep]" "I'm totally convinced that toilet paper used as a rope is a plausible way to escape from prison." "You saw it." "It didn't break." "It stretched a lot, but it didn't break." "It was incredible." "Toilet paper." "It worked!" "We're free!" "That was amazing!" "Two plausibles and a confirmed!" "Hair, toilet paper, and bedsheets!" "All right." "I'll see you guys in Mexico in a month." "Welcome back." "Here's where we stand." "We have already busted the myth that if you jam a flagpole into the spokes of a motorcycle at speed, that it will flip end over end." "Totally not possible within the laws of physics." "Now Jamie and I are gonna do it Hollywood-style with our favorite tool -- explosives." "In Hollywood, also, geeky television-show hosts get to dress up like their favorite movie heroes..." "[ Whip cracks ]" "That's the only crack I know." "I can't... crack like that." "Ow." "...pretend to be in one of their favorite movies." "[ Whip cracking ]" "All right." "Let's get to filming." "NARRATOR:" "And to make sure this silver scene re-creation is spot-on, the bike and Buster get a makeover by the wardrobe department." "ADAM:" "It looks good." "NARRATOR:" "And Buster is given no choice about his participation in the upcoming stunt." "That's how the old Hollywood stunt men used to do it." ""Wire me in!" they'd scream." "[ Chuckles ]" "Buster's old-school." "NARRATOR:" "With our very own member of the Third Reich on his bike, the guys, with the help of Matt the pyro, prepare the mortar that will send Buster into the air." "JAMIE:" "We've got this mortar with the plate right on top of it." "That plate is welded to the bottom of the motorcycle." "It's very secure." "When that gunpowder goes off, the plate is gonna go up, and that's all there is to it." "NARRATOR:" "With Jamie applying the finishing touches," "Adam takes delivery of the final piece of the puzzle." "Dude, I totally want one of these." "NARRATOR:" "So now Adam's got the ride to go with the outfit." "Awesome." "Look." "It's got a seat for Jamie and everything." "Ba-da-da-da!" "Ba-da-da!" "NARRATOR:" "And with that out of his system, it's stunt time." "ADAM:" "It's like nerd fantasy camp." "Okay, so, here's how the Mythbusters' big-budget movie shot is gonna break down." "Jamie and I will start the motorcycle and sidecar about 100 feet behind our stunt cycle." "We're gonna drive right past it." "When we get 100 feet ahead of it, the pyro's gonna detonate the charge in this." "Our stunt Buster is gonna fly up in the air end over end, and the long lens that we're shooting it from is gonna make it look like we're a lot closer to the explosion than we actually are." "[ Horn beeping ]" "You ready, old man?" "You got a taste for adventure?" "[ Chuckling ] Okay." "Here we go." "[ Engine revving ]" "NARRATOR:" "So everyone, including Buster, is all set." "Adam and Jamie roll up to speed, and Matt waits with his finger on the detonator." "To get the shot, the timing, camera angle, and flight of the bike has to be just so." "And that couldn't have gone better." "[ Laughs ] Well, the timing was perfect." "If you say so, Junior." "[ Laughs ]" "NARRATOR:" "Well, let's check the footage." "The mortar exploded as Adam and Jamie hit their mark, and Buster, the chasing Nazi with a stick in the spokes, goes head over handlebars." "ADAM: [ Laughs ]" "Oh, that's awesome." "JAMIE:" "I'm seeing it go ass over teakettle." "ADAM:" "That's exactly what it looks like in the movie." "NARRATOR:" "Yep, as a quick comparison confirms, the guys got the shot." "ADAM:" "It's beautiful." "You may watch this and still think," ""I think it could happen to the motorcycle under the right conditions."" "Let me point out this stick in the wheel made the motorcycle skid." "How much energy did it take to make the bike go completely vertical?" "Enough energy to crush this 3/8-inch-thick steel plate and crack the frame in like 19 different places." "That's a hell of a lot more energy than you can generate with a wooden stick." "Myth busted." "And now, Buster, for doing such a good job, gets his reward." "He really likes it this way." "Nice work, Buster!" "Nice work!"