"Please don't try anything you're about to see us do at home." "Ever!" "NARRATOR:" "On this combustible episode of "Mythbusters"..." "Oh, that's pretty!" "NARRATOR:..." "Adam and Jamie try a little tenderness." "[ French accent ] Red meat and high explosives!" "NARRATOR:" "They're testing the myth that blasting the heck out of low-grade steak with high explosives makes it so much softer." "[ Normal voice ] That's awesome!" "I love results!" "NARRATOR:" "Then Kari gets to torture Grant and Tory..." "KARI:" "I knew that we were gonna make him angry, but I didn't realize he'd be this angry." "NARRATOR:... to see if stressed-out drivers really do use more gas." "Where did those rats go?" "!" "I didn't know -- l-l really " "NARRATOR:" "Who are the mythbusters?" "Adam Savage..." "Hail, people of Earth." "NARRATOR:" "...and Jamie Hyneman." "Mush." "NARRATOR:" "Between them, more than 30 years of special-effects experience." "These things are always catching on fire." "NARRATOR:" "Joining them " " Kari Byron..." "I feel so sci-fi." "NARRATOR:" "...Grant Imahara..." "Warning, warning!" "NARRATOR:" "...and Tory Belleci." "All right, release the hound." "NARRATOR:" "They don't just tell the myths." "They put them to the test." "Adam, I thought we talked about doing that while you're at work." "[ French accent ] Ha ha!" "Oh, Jamie, mon frÃ¨re, you know, many fans have written to us over the years and said," ""Mythbusters, is a hammer the best way to tenderize my steak?"" "Now thanks to a viewer submission, we may have a new technique, for we might replace this... avec this." "The question we'll be answering is " "Can you tenderize a steak with explosives?" "[ Laughs evilly ]" "Oh, it went out." "NARRATOR:" "Over the years, we've used explosives to answer all sorts of vital questions." "Can they clear a clogged-up cement truck?" "Can they help cushion a fall?" "And can they make a surfable wave?" "Now it's time to open the fridge on combustible condiments." "So, Adam, if we were using explosives on steaks, wouldn't it just blow up the steak?" "I'm going to go without the accent now, okay?" "lt's too hard." "Okay." "[ Normal voice ] No, it won't." "The technique we'll be testing involves putting the meat into a vacuum-sealed bag, putting that into a barrel of water, and then detonating a small amount of explosives in the water." "The theory is that the shock wave created by the explosive will actually tear apart microtissue fibers within the meat, rendering it a heck of a lot more tender." "NARRATOR:" "A steak's tenderness depends very much on where it's cut from the cow." "Meat from the short ribs is super soft." "Meat from the neck and the rump -- not so squishy." "It's all due to the strength of the connective tissue between muscle fibers." "The weaker the tissue, the softer the meat." "Two common ways to break those bonds are powdered-pineapple enzymes and a sound thrashing." "But the fans want to see this third method thoroughly investigated." "If you're gonna tenderize meat with explosives, it's not like you're just gonna throw a stick of dynamite on the steak and expect it to work." "You've got to put it in water because the water is actually gonna transmit the pressure of the blast wave a lot more effectively." "And you also don't want to contaminate the meat." "You've got to seal it in something." "So we're gonna vacuum-bag this meat in some really tough plastic." "NARRATOR:" "These crash-test steaks are all relatively low-grade select cuts." "So there's plenty of room for improvement." "They're sealed and delivered -- not to the kitchen, but the bomb range." "[ French accent ] By popular demand, today we are joining two of my favorite things -- red meat and high explosives!" "[ Laughs ]" "JAMIE:" "What we're creating here is a shock wave that is traveling at supersonic speeds, and it is just ripping apart all those little fibers that make up the muscle of the meat " " Hence, it's tender." "NARRATOR:" "As to how much explosive they need -- well, they'll find that out by trial and error." "Tenderizing steak with explosives in 3... 2... 1..." "ADAM:" "Whoa!" "JAMIE:" "[ Laughs ]" "Jamie, I think that was too much explosives." "NARRATOR:" "Some chefs add too much salt." "Some go nuts with the garlic." "But Frank's added way too much C-4." "What can you say?" "This recipe is just plain wrong." "Everything else is gone, but the steak is here..." "Sort of." "NARRATOR:" "So, while Adam and Jamie recalibrate, let's jump-start our second myth." "[ Growls ]" "Aah!" "Okay, I'm relaxed!" "What does a shoulder massage have to do with fuel efficiency?" "Well, according to this myth, the idea is that if you're driving and you're relaxed and you're happy, you'll save a lot more fuel than if you're angry and stressed out." "So, if you want save fuel, don't drive angry." "Precisely." "NARRATOR:" "It's a widely accepted fact that bad driving habits like stopping and starting abruptly result in less fuel efficiency." "But could the simple act of driving stressed turn an otherwise careful motorist into a gas-guzzler?" "You know, I really like the sound of this myth." "We get to relax, kick back, and then take a little drive." "You know, it's not gonna be all easy, though." "It sounds like we're gonna have to get stressed out, too." "In fact, I think it's gonna be dangerous." "So we're not gonna do this on the road." "We're gonna go to an abandoned neighborhood, and I'm gonna set up a course." "NARRATOR:" "And this is the test track -- a once-thriving California suburb that someone pulled the plug on." "TORY:" "This is Cypress Knolls." "It's an abandoned military-housing neighborhood, and the city of Marina has agreed to let us use it." "And there are plenty of neighborhood streets." "And we are gonna be tearing around these streets to see if you use more fuel when you drive stressed." "NARRATOR:" "These streets haven't seen traffic for 15 years." "So for the test car, we've gone retro-rusty." "This is the car that we're gonna use for our test." "Now, it's pretty old and it doesn't get great gas mileage, but that doesn't matter." "What we're trying to test here is whether or not driving stressed out or driving calm has a difference on whether or not you use more fuel." "NARRATOR:" "And to get a precise reading on fuel usage, they'll bypass the car's gas tank for a gas bag." "GRANT:" "What we're doing is measuring the fuel before and after, but not by volume, but actually by weight so that it's more precise." "NARRATOR:" "Now for a few practice laps, just to get a feel for the car and the old neighborhood." "All right, who goes first?" "BOTH:" "Rochambeau." "All right." "Dynamite." "[ Laughing ] There's no dynamite!" "You're pointing at me." "That means I go first." "NARRATOR:" "Kari's marked out a four-mile course that, like most racetracks, finally brings you back to where you started." "Grant's the first to try a test lap." "GPS:" "Approaching playground on right." "Playground on the right, then turn left." "[ Engine turns over ]" "NARRATOR:" "Then Tory tries cruising the cul-de-sacs." "It's like a modern-day ghost town." "Turn left on Lindsay Street, then arrive at smashed computers." "All right, looking for smashed computers." "Does this GPS sound condescending, or is it just me?" "Am I the only one that feels this way?" "Turn right on 4th Avenue." "And I'm the sole survivor, searching -- searching for a lone survivor." "Hopefully, it's a female so I can start procreating." "NARRATOR:" "That's enough of that, though it might surprise Tory to learn that a rather more wholesome fantasy awaits him just around the corner." "NARRATOR:" "Home, home on the bomb range." "ADAM:" "Whoa!" "NARRATOR:" "Adam and Jamie are testing a viewer myth that low-grade steaks can be tenderized with high explosives." "So far, it's a total bust." "ADAM:" "Now we're gonna pull it back in the other direction and detonate what is essentially an extra-large firecracker full of aluminized black powder, which is a fairly low-speed explosive, as opposed to what we just used." "It requires a fuse to light it." "Now, getting a fuse to light into water is not undoable, but it's a little finicky." "NARRATOR:" "Finicky for some, but for Jamie, it's just like shooting fish in a barrel." "That was a nice, little blast." "NARRATOR:" "It sure was." "The bucket's destroyed." "But more importantly, how's the steak?" "Well, that went perfect -- The explosion went off, and we didn't ruin our bag of meat." "Now, I can't tell anything specific just by touching this meat." "The proof in any improvement in texture is really gonna be in the cooking." "MAN:" "1, 2, 3." "NARRATOR:" "The bag's intact, so the steak's still good to eat." "Even better, they've tracked down someone at the Department of Agriculture who says he knows how to blast a steak to perfection." "And they say that we've got to put a steel plate at the bottom of the barrel, we have to suspend it in the air, and they gave us a precise amount of explosive we have to use." "So that's what we're gonna do." "[ French accent ] In a few minutes, we should have very tasty meat." "NARRATOR:" "And just for the record, this one goes back to using high explosives." "So, we've done Baby Bear, and we've done Papa Bear." "This is Goldilocks, right?" "This is the recommended recipe in 3.. .2... 1..." "JAMIE:" "Oh, look at that." "NARRATOR:" "Boom time for fans of exploding meat." "And just like last time, the steak is..." "ADAM:" "Not breached!" "NARRATOR:" "And that means it's time to get cooking." "As the sun goes down, the barbie fires up." "So, let's meet the meat." "Now, the first one is a low-grade steak." "It's not been altered or tenderized in any way." "The second one is that same low-grade steak, but we tenderized it with a low explosive." "The third one we've tenderized with a high explosive." "And the fourth one we've tenderized with a pineapple-enzyme commercial preparation." "Now, the last one is a prime steak that's been aged 28 days." "We're gonna test all of these and see which one is the most tender." "NARRATOR:" "And so as not to influence the results," "Adam adds a touch of color." "We have five different cuts of meat to cook and test." "Each of those cuts of meat has been assigned a color, which matches to these pans and our little taste-test bowls here." "NARRATOR:" "To ensure there's no bias from the barbie, steak chef Joe Kohn cooks all five cuts just the same." "And another celebrity chef has been invited to dine in the dirt." "ADAM:" "We're bringing in Ron Siegel, who's the chef at the Ritz-Carlton, and he is the only American ever to win" "Japanese "Iron Chef" program." "Ron, thanks for coming on to help us out." "Thanks for coming out to the bomb range." "Thank you." "NARRATOR:" "Let the chewing commence." "Steak's good." "Some of it is better than others." "[ Burps ]" "I'm done." "NARRATOR:" "So, drumroll, please." "[ Drumroll ]" "Three different tasters and three totally different results." "For this myth to be true, the order should be red, yellow, blue, pink, then green." "But no one agreed on anything, and that's got Adam worried." "Even though we had five different samples here, the main thing we wanted to see was that the green -- the high-explosive tenderized meat -- would be rated higher than the red, our control." "And even though I did that, neither Ron nor Jamie felt like that." "So, right now, it's not looking that good for this myth." "Let's get back to the shop and crunch the numbers." "I'm cold." "All right." "Is there any more steak left?" "[ Glugging ]" "NARRATOR:" "Here's a few simple rules for safe driving." "Don't do it drunk, distracted, or stressed." "Aside from the danger, driving under duress might add to your fuel bill." "And that's today's motoring myth." "Later on, we'll try to redline Grant and Tory's stress levels." "Oh, you suck!" "NARRATOR:" "But first, we need a nice, calm comparison test." "And Kari knows just how to put the boys into a mellow mood." "KARI:" "Grant, for you, we have puppies." "Tory, for you, we have the director's cut of "Blade Runner"..." "Yeah!" "...and all your favorite desserts." "I don't want to leave." "KARI:" "These are the fluffiest puppies we could find." "They're 8 weeks old." "TORY:" "Gosh." "KARI:" "Okay, I think we've found Grant's happy place." "[ Laughs ]" "NARRATOR:" "While Grant gets acquainted with his extra-fluffy puppies," "Tory slips next door for a pre-movie massage." "This is the best day of "Mythbusters" ever." "Tory's the first cab off this restricted rank with precisely 2,500 grams of gasoline." "Now, for the first of three nasty surprises, as he learns he's not alone out there." "Go, angry driver." "[ Horn honking ]" "[ Laughing maniacally ]" "KARI:" "Good job, angry driver." "Awesome!" "What was that guy's hurry?" "Whew!" "Cue slow driver." "Over." "Oh, look at this guy." "NARRATOR:" "Kari's added these distractions to simulate a typically frustrating day on the road." "[ Laughs ] He's overtaking the slow driver." "Man..." "That was annoying." "That doesn't seem very calm." "NARRATOR:" "Now let's see the response to one very annoying pedestrian." "[ Laughs sarcastically ]" "Aah..." "There you go." "[ Thud ]" "Nice San Francisco park." "I like the bumper bump." "That's why they call them "bumpers."" "Okay, well, now I'm gonna weigh your fuel and see how much you've actually used up, and then we'll have" "something to compare." "TORY:" "Cool." "KARI:" "So, Tory's used 924 grams of fuel." "Next step is to top this back off to exactly 2,500 and start the test again with Grant." "All right." "The birdie has flown the nest." "That means Grant's gone." "Do you make this stuff up, or is somebody writing it down for you?" "[ Chuckles ] There's a writers' strike in my head." "[ Horn honking ]" "Approaching the bush on right." "uhen turn right." "GRANT:" "[ Laughing ]" "KARI:" "Okay, that's angry driver." "Can you hear him honking?" "TORY:" "Oh, I can hear him honking." "NARRATOR:" "Grant takes both the angry..." "[ Engine revs ] ...and the slow drivers in his sedate stride." "[ Laughing ]" "NARRATOR:" "He's been told to stick to a safe speed, and that's no problem at all." "That... is... funny." "NARRATOR:" "Now for the parallel park." "Grant's so relaxed, it takes him a minute to find his inner rage." "TORY:" "This is attempt number 9." "Ohh." "This isn't fair!" "Now you're starting to [bleep] me off." "TORY:" "See, it's getting -- -[ Crash ]" "Ohh, yeah!" "That " " That was real smooth!" "[ Thud ]" "There you go!" "NARRATOR:" "Kari weighs Grant's remaining gasoline and comes up with a figure she wasn't expecting." "All right, Grant used 1 ,053 grams, which is actually quite a bit more than Tory." "But that's not what's important here." "They are testing against themselves." "So what is important is how much they use in their calm test versus how much they use in their stressed test." "NARRATOR:" "And how exactly does one go about turning two very relaxed dudes into quivering wrecks?" "Ooh, this is gonna be fun." "We're about to find out." "All right, guys, we know one of the most stressful things about driving is having to go to the bathroom and not being able to." "Sweet." "You're gonna have to drink caffeine all day, and the potty's off-limits." "NARRATOR:" "Here's the exploding-steak story so far." "Adam, Jamie, and one of America's best chefs can't agree on which steak is more tender -- the prime cut, the one sprinkled with pineapple enzymes, or those we've blasted to hell and back." "I don't know what to do with this one." "I'm dumbfounded." "We clearly have too many variables in the mix because we could run this test a dozen more times, and I don't think we'd come up with results that agreed with each other." "Yeah, I think having humans involved is the problem." "We need to have a mechanical, purely objective test." "And, for that matter, I was thinking about it, and there have got to be a lot of other ways that we can tenderize meat." "Like what?" "What say we fire it out of a cannon at a steel plate?" "That ought to tenderize it." "[ Laughs ]" "I love it!" "Let's do it." "NARRATOR:" "Jamie's got the plan, the hardware, and the real estate to build a cannon as long as a four-story building is high." "As a tenderizer, it's total overkill, and that's why we're doing it." "Today's target is simply meant to stop the steak cold." "uhat is our target." "It's a toughened steel plate Jamie calls the flower of death." "Now, this is going to be a very sturdy catching device for our steak tenderizing." "We're going to be shooting a Kevlar burrito full of meat at it." "And hopefully, this will help prevent it from just spraying all over the room." "NARRATOR:" "To get a fair comparison between unmodified meat and "cannon con carne,"" "Adam's cut each steak in two." "One half gets blasted, and the other control cut doesn't." "So, your very rational question might be, why go through all the trouble to make every steak its own control?" "See the white parts here?" "That's marbleization." "That's fat and connective tissue." "Now, while a good portion of this makes the steak delicious, it also makes it inconsistent." "That's why we're going steak to steak." "Every single steak is tested against itself for evidence of improvement." "NARRATOR:" "That testing will eventually be done by a highly sophisticated machine that promises indisputable results." "Meantime, we've got some steaks to shoot." "The four-cylinder air-pressure charge is set, and Jamie estimates the potential velocity at over 400 miles per hour." "Tenderizing meat when you're ready." "In 3.. .2... 1." "ADAM:" "Oh, shoot." "[ Laughs ]" "Well, this is actually through the other side." "There's your problem." "[ Laughs ]" "Some meat-soaked Kevlar on the other side." "This is only part of it." "I'm " " I'm missing some." "ADAM:" "[ Laughs ]" "NARRATOR:" "I think it seems prudent to recalibrate the pressure." "ADAM:" "What's the PSI you want to go to?" "I'm backing it down a third to 100 PSI." "It's not gonna make a single bit of difference." "I'm gonna bet you that it's not gonna make a single " "It's gonna obliterate it." "You want to bet?" "No." "$20 " " I got -- I got 20 bucks." "20 bucks?" "Anyone want to give me some action?" "NARRATOR:" "But Jamie made this cannon, and, hey, let's not forget who runs the joint." "So he calls the shots." "Totally not gonna work." "JAMIE:" "This time, we're using four times the Kevlar." "We've backed off the pressure about a third to 100 PSI." "We'll see what happens." "Firing in 3.. .2... 1." "Uh-oh." "Uh-oh." "Well, there's the outer layer." "[ Chuckles ] That's hard on that thing." "ADAM:" "Here's the inner layer." "Oh." "Oh!" "Oh!" "NARRATOR:" "Once again, this New York strip's been less tenderized than pulverized." "But there is hope amongst the carnage." "Here's its other half -- unmodified." "I'm gonna cook both of these, freeze them again, test them, and see if there's any improvement." "NARRATOR:" "First off, both cuts are cooked precisely." "ADAM:" "So, the magic temperature here is 70 degrees Celsius." "When it's 70 degrees at the middle of the steak," "I've reached the USDA standard for cooking a steak for testing." "NARRATOR:" "Once they're cooked, the steaks need to be cooled to 4 degrees Celsius." "Modified cooked." "Here's another steak for you, Jamie." "NARRATOR:" "Adam needs more than one sample, and Jamie's happy to fill the order." "Firing in 3.. .2... 1." "NARRATOR:" "At 340 miles per hour, it looks like we finally found our range." "It's totally intact." "NARRATOR:" "It's almost enough to inspire yet another change of career." "I can see it now." "I start a restaurant." "It's Jamie's cannon-fired steak." "You place your order, and then a few seconds later, there's this big whoosh!" "NARRATOR:" "There are several simple ways to tenderize a substandard steak." "But we want to find a way that's both effective and, well, unexpected." "For those with limited access to high explosives or 40-foot cannons, turn left at the kitchen and head for the laundry." "So, the first thing I thought of was a dryer because, you know, it's that kind of motion, and if you put a steak or anything you want to tenderize in there, sooner or later, it's got to loosen all those fibers up" "and make it nice and tender." "NARRATOR:" "Sounds straightforward." "But to make it work, the dryer needs some, uh, modifications." "JAMIE:" "Okay, so, that's the slit right there." "If we put that over that thing." "[ Chuckles ] This is dry ice, and this is gonna pour down into our dryer and hopefully keep the meat cold while it gets tumbled." "Yeah, let's do it." "NARRATOR:" "And to keep the meat company, a generous helping of tenderizing ball bearings." "To the chagrin of our sound guy, we're throwing it in the dryer -- a whole bunch of them -- and see that what that does to the meat overnight." "[ Loud clattering ]" "ADAM:" "[ Laughs ]" "[ Talking loudly ] So far, my neighbors think it's cool to be next to the "Mythbusters."" "That could change." "[ Clattering continues ]" "NARRATOR:" "Next morning, the dryer should still be running." "Uh, but it's not." "ADAM:" "Did you turn it off?" "JAMIE:" "I didn't turn it off." "I didn't turn it off." "That's not a good sign." "[ Laughing ] This is the color of the plastic bags that were in there." "[ Laughs ]" "JAMIE:" "It still kind of turns, but..." "ADAM:" "Something got messed up." "I think we might have burned out the motor." "How many did we put in there, four?" "ADAM:" "Four." "JAMIE:" "Four went in, and two sort of came out." "ADAM:" "[ Laughs ]" "NARRATOR:" "Adam now has a fridge full of tumbled and blasted meat to test for tenderness." "And he's got the perfect machine for an impartial appraisal." "Starting from the bottom up, we've got a plate in here, which the meat is placed on." "It's got a slot in it exactly the width that the USDA specs the slot in their machines should be." "Above that is a blade that is exactly the angle the USDA says it should be." "Above the blade is a pressure gauge, which, as the blade pushes through the meat, will read exactly the number of pounds of force required to push through that meat." "And what's pushing this down at a constant speed but a linear actuator, which I will power with a power supply." "This is exactly the way the government tests the tenderness of meat." "It ought to be good enough for us." "Oh!" "Wow!" "NARRATOR:" "Tory, Kari, and Grant are testing the myth that your mood affects your mileage." "The boys have already run the course in a state of supreme serenity." "[ Horn honking, Tory laughs ]" "[ Laughs ]" "NARRATOR:" "Now Kari has two short hours to turn these angels into deranged, distracted motorists." "Drink that." "Come on, come on." "We're on a time limit." "Seriously." "So, I've had nearly a liter of caffeinated energy drink." "TORY:" "Kari informed us we're not allowed to go to the bathroom from this point on." "And it's the thought that I can't go to the bathroom anymore that's starting to stress me out." "If you got to go to the bathroom, you got to go to the bathroom." "NARRATOR:" "But needing to tinkle in traffic might be the least of their problems." "In each of your drinks this morning, I put one of these." "That's why I took it from the car and you got them already opened." "TORY:" "Yes!" "Is it a laxative?" "KARI:" "This is a laxative." "Oh, you suck!" "Yes!" "Payback's a -- You know what it is." "You've got a few hours left, so enjoy." "NARRATOR:" "Pumped full of jumping juice, the boys are getting real antsy." "You mother -- [ Grunts ]" "I'm not stressed!" "I'm totally fine!" "NARRATOR:" "Kari responds by hemming them in." "KARI:" "This is your permissible area." "You cannot leave this area, sit in this area, or lay in this area." "You must stand within the lines." "No, I'm not going in the circle." "You can't keep me in the circle." "Man, if we had a football, we could be, like, chucking the football." "Whoo!" "Let's pretend like we got one." "Catch it!" "Yeah!" "He can't even catch it with his imagination." "[ Laughs ]" "NARRATOR:" "Leaving the boys on a slow simmer," "Kari sets about reverse-pimping their ride." "I have got so much stuff I'm really excited about." "I've got stink bombs that smell like sulfur, so they basically smell like flatulence." "Those are going to go in my scent-orator." "I've got some gross, slimy stuff that goes on the dashboard." "They won't know what it it is." "It looks like guts." "I've got stressful noises I'm going to put in the CD player." "I've got a seat cover that is filled with golf balls, so it's sticking in your back." "And the seat's gonna be at an uncomfortable angle." "I think I might make it wet." "And then the steering wheel's gonna be sticky because I'm gonna cover it in cola and then, like, gross melted candy bars." "So it'll not only be sticky but kind of slimy, and it'll just be, like, brown crap all over your hands." "NARRATOR:" "All this suffering is in the name of science, to see if the boys use any more gas when they've got their dander up." "Good news is you guys get to leave the circles." "No, I like my circle." "The bad news is it's not necessarily gonna be any better." "Are you ready?" "[ Laughs ]" "The anti-spa!" "Come on in." "MATT:" "Howdy!" "TORY:" "Oh, my God." "MATT:" "Come on in!" "Welcome to Mad Matt's Man Massage right here in the break-your-back shack." "I'm over this experiment." "How about you?" "Get on the table!" "TORY:" "Is this gonna hurt?" "MATT:" "Well, it depends on how you define "hurt."" "NARRATOR:" "While Tory gets pummeled..." "[ Groans ]" "NARRATOR:..." "Kari takes Grant to his own personal hell." "This has nothing to do with driving." "It's nothing to do with fuel efficiency." "This is all about torture." "Grant's torture is a goldfish foot bath, guaranteed to send his stress levels through the roof." "GRANT:" "The problem is that I really don't like any fish touching me." "It's just something -- It's a phobia that I have." "Aah!" "Now for our final stress-inducing condition." "There are two live rats in this box." "The reason we chose rats instead of, say, snakes or spiders, is because rats are self-aware." "They're not gonna run under the pedals." "NARRATOR:" "And the first angry man to slide his baleful butt behind the wheel is Tory." "Are you feeling stressed?" "A little." "Are you feeling angry?" "Yeah." "NARRATOR:" "Kari adds the rodents, and this stinking, sticky rat trap is ready to roll." "TORY:" "Buckle your seat belts, little fellas." "We're going for a ride." "[ Horns blaring ]" "KARI:" "I would say he's sufficiently angry." "NARRATOR:" "There's no mistaking the look on his face, but he is driving within the speed limit and at least trying to stick to the traffic rules." "Adding to his frustration, the racket from the CD means Tory can't hear the GPS." "TORY:" "You're not talking to me!" "[ Sirens wailing, buzzing ]" "KARI:" "Uh, Tory's actually skipping the course." "NARRATOR:" "He's totally missed a turn and now the slow driver gets burned off." "[ Beeping, blaring ]" "It worked." "You guys got me [bleep]" "You guys definitely did a great job." "I knew that we were gonna make him angry and stressed out, but I didn't realize he'd be this angry." "NARRATOR:" "Back on the H.Q. hilltop, they're all standing way back from the curb." "[ Blaring continues ]" "KARI:" "Wow, significant amount of stress, he still does a great parking job." "Well, I definitely saw a difference in the way I drove -- calm versus stressed out." "I think he's used more gas, but he did a third less of the course," "which is kind of crazy." "We've got 1 ,089." "You were so stressed out that you actually missed pretty much a third of the course." "You went right by it." "I did?" "Mm-hmm." "But you can't hear that GPS." "You still used more gas." "Are you serious?" "Shorter amount of time " "Your crazy driving that made me fear for your life actually made you use about a third more gas." "That is incredible." "NARRATOR:" "Time for Kari to top up the tank and fetch Grant from the torture tent." "How was the fish?" "Really sucky." "Why are you walking funny?" "I might have to go to the bathroom." "NARRATOR:" "And you've got to figure that a man who gets spooked by ornamental fish will not be a rat lover." "KARI:" "One more thing." "GRANT: [ Laughs ] No!" "KARI:" "There are two little live rats that are gonna go for the ride with you." "NARRATOR:" "Kari's turned a puppy kisser into a moving violation." "[ Beeping ]" "This time around, Grant's demeanor is less demure." "[ Horn honking ]" "KARI:" "Aw, crap!" "Grant almost missed the turn." "NARRATOR:" "Just like Tory," "Grant finds himself accelerating and braking much harder this time around." "And his steering's not nearly as smooth." "[ Siren blaring ]" "Where did those rats go?" "!" "Where did you go?" "!" "Hey!" "KARI:" "Crosswalker in position." "WOMAN:" "Crosswalker is ready." "[ Tires screech, engine revs ]" "NARRATOR:" "Thankfully Grant's at the end of his run." "KARI:" "Actually..." "TORY:" "He's doing better parking stressed out." "[ Grunting ] That's it!" "That's it!" "That's it!" "NARRATOR:" "At least he ran the full course." "And Kari's in no doubt that angry Grant used more juice than his calm counterpart." "KARI:" "Grant has 826 grams left, which means he used 1 ,674 grams." "Last time he used 1 ,053 grams." "NARRATOR:" "Grant's also used a third more fuel than on his calm drive." "The lesson is clear -- drive under stress, and it will cost you." "You both used a significant amount of fuel more when you were stressed than when you were relaxed." "Yeah, that seemed pretty obvious." "[ Chuckling ] Yeah." "Yeah, well, now we have the results to back it up." "Well, that's cool." "This one's confirmed." "Confirmed." "By the way, how are your stomachs doing?" "That wasn't laxative." "That was, um, a vitamin." "So you should be okay." "[ Laughs ]" "Placebo effect!" "Are you kidding me?" "!" "I'm gonna kill you!" "Number one." "ADAM:" "Number one." "NARRATOR:" "Back in our cowpoke kitchen, the boys are ready to test the cannon-fired meat for tenderness." "Each steak from each test is numbered so they can match those figures with the unblasted control halves." "2.5." "2. 1." "2.4." "[ Laughs ]" "Dude, you know, the readings are..." "[ Pops ] ...looking pretty consistent here." "NARRATOR:" "Now to test those modified meat missiles." "ADAM:" "Here's your moment of truth, Jamie." "Air-cannon testing." "[ Machine whirring ]" "No, nothing -- 0.0." "that could mean it's so tender it just fell apart, but let's try a second one." "NARRATOR:" "Test after test shows their "cannon con carne"" "is way softer than the steaks that sat this one out." "0.7." "Dude, the averages are in." "The controlled steaks were averaging a tenderness of about 1 .33." "The post-cannon-fired steaks -- average tenderness of about 0.4 pounds." "That's pretty tender." "There's a clear, clear improvement." "[ Laughs ]" "It just takes a 40-foot air cannon." "Yeah, and about 50 bucks' worth of Kevlar." "[ Both laugh ]" "[ Loud clattering ]" "NARRATOR:" "Now for that marbled mess that totaled the tumble dryer." "All right, this is the ball bearings." "[ Laughs ]" "And this steak -- who knows what we're gonna get out of this?" "NARRATOR:" "The very first slice sets the standard." "Zero." "And that seems like an honest zero to me, man." "This..." "There's, like, nothing here." "NARRATOR:" "And that calls for one more reading." "ADAM:" "Total zero." "That looks like it's falling apart in your hands." "But it does still look like meat." "It's not like it looks like hamburger." "So, this definitely showed some significant improvement, although the process itself also needs a little improvement." "Steak in a dryer with ball bearings actually did really tenderize the meat." "Of course, there were problems, because, it, like, tenderized the dryer itself, and it fell apart." "But if you get over that, you've got a tender steak." "NARRATOR:" "Two positive results confirming that meat really does benefit from a bashing." "Now that they found a reliable way to test for tenderness, it's back to the bomb range to bring this one home." "We began to look for, what's an empirical, nonsubjective test?" "And we went right to the USDA's testing procedures for grading meat." "2.5." "2. 1." "So, we are following all of their guidelines now with all of our steaks in order to gauge their tenderness." "NARRATOR:" "Adam and Jamie shape a lump of C-4 to the size of a pool ball." "They add a fuse, then wrap it inside a plastic glove." "There it is -- the blue hand of death." "Works for me." "Let's put it in." "NARRATOR:" "Following strict instructions, this handful of high explosive is dangled and secured a foot below the surface." "Well, there it is." "Let's blow it up." "Okay." "NARRATOR:" "The crane's deployed, and the boys retreat to the bunker." "Are we set?" "I think we're set." "Tenderizing meat with high explosives in 3.. .2... 1." "Oh, that's pretty!" "That's great!" "This one's breached." "I can see that, but these two are totally intact." "That's fantastic!" "JAMIE:" "And even that one looks like a usable sample." "ADAM:" "Yeah, completely." "NARRATOR:" "Back at M5," "Adam scrapes down the hot plate for the last time." "But Jamie's on tenterhooks." "So, what, does it feel any different?" "Like, tender?" "It doesn't feel that different." "All right, sample number 16." "NARRATOR:" "This final test should make or break the myth of tenderizing meat with high explosives." "70 degrees Celsius." "NARRATOR:" "After a quick chill, the unmodified meat is cored and sliced." "2.3." "[ British accent ] Nothing to sully our science." "[ Normal voice ] I'm getting good at this." "2.9." "All right, that's pretty good." "Let's just call that, and let's do the exploded ones." "NARRATOR:" "We're moments away from finding out if a high-powered shock wave through water really can make steak more digestible." "1 .8." "NARRATOR:" "And this time, thanks to modern mechanics, it's not personal." "ADAM:" "Another zero." "These two zeroes are accurate." "There's nothing here." "I mean, this is -- If you take a look at it..." "JAMIE:" "I would say so." "It's going towards the direction of the cannon or the ball bearing." "I think I know the results." "Tell me what the averages are." "Control was 2.82, and the exploded steak was 1. 16." "oh, that's so great!" "[ Laughs ]" "I'm exhausted " " All of this protocol to build the machine and to have it actually give us results..." "We were hoping to see something, and we got something." "Yeah, when you're chewing on it, you can't tell, but the machine won't lie." "That's awesome." "That's awesome!" "I love results!" "Don't we all?" "And against all expectations, it seems blasting a steak to kingdom come really does make it melt in the mouth." "Our core sampling from both the control and the exploded steaks is totally conclusive." "The high explosives absolutely have a marked effect on the tenderness of the steaks." "Tenderizing steak with explosives " " It works."