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Speaker 1: First things first, the U s Military has so much money.

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Speaker 1: It's only tangentially related to our episode today. But if

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Speaker 1: we're looking at a hard number. In Seen alone, the

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Speaker 1: US military's budget was around a little over six hudred

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Speaker 1: and ten billion dollars, then that can't be true. It's true. No,

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Speaker 1: it's true, and you have to wonder where all this

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Speaker 1: money goes. We have not been in the military ourselves

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Speaker 1: that we're aware of right now, but I think you've

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Speaker 1: spent some time around military type things. That's true in

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Speaker 1: my other life. And uh, our super producer, Casey Pegram

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Speaker 1: has also to our knowledge, not been involved in the

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Speaker 1: military or cannot admit to anything. He's more of a

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Speaker 1: sleeper agent type. You know. I always had impegged as

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Speaker 1: that as well, and I mean that as a compliment Casey.

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Speaker 1: Every time that we are looking into strange stories for

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Speaker 1: ridiculous history, we have a pretty high likelihood of running

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Speaker 1: into some shenanigan by one military or another. Because militaries

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Speaker 1: and governments drive a lot of technological innovation right there.

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Speaker 1: A lot of things that are now common in the

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Speaker 1: civilian world started out as military initiatives for the purposes

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Speaker 1: of waging war. It's right, and there's always kind of

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Speaker 1: a disconnect where you think, oh, that's like crazy future technology,

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Speaker 1: but turned out the military was doing it like twenty

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Speaker 1: years ago, and then it kind of gets when they're

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Speaker 1: like done with it, then it gets leaked out into

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Speaker 1: the public sphere and you can kind of you know,

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Speaker 1: get a thumb drive or like a PlayStation or whatever,

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Speaker 1: or a GPS system exactly. And this this is something

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Speaker 1: that's been on our collective minds for some time, both

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Speaker 1: in this show and other shows that we've done. So

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Speaker 1: we were over the moon when our good pal friend

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Speaker 1: of the show, Christopher Hasciotaes hit us up earlier and said, Hey,

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Speaker 1: what what do you guys think about weird military weapons

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Speaker 1: that never quite made it. We said something to the

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Speaker 1: effect of, holy smokes, will you please hang out with

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Speaker 1: us on air, and by golly by gum he agreed,

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Speaker 1: welcome back to the show, Ridiculous Historians. Christopher hasiotis, Hey,

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Speaker 1: thanks for having me, and then we all hugged, and

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Speaker 1: then we all hugged again and again and again. We've

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Speaker 1: been hugging this whole time and doing light handholds. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: so Christopher, of course, thank you for returning to the show.

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Speaker 1: If anyone listening through some gross miscarriage of cosmic justice

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Speaker 1: hasn't had the chance to check out your appearance on

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Speaker 1: our Louie Louis episode, I would say, I don't know

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Speaker 1: what you think. No, I would say, pause this episode

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Speaker 1: and listen to that. It's one of my personal favorite

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Speaker 1: episodes we've ever done. So, Christopher, what inspired you to

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Speaker 1: think about this topic? There are, as you mentioned, You know,

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Speaker 1: the military contribute so many things to society in terms

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Speaker 1: of technolological innovations, lots of great stuff that we've gotten

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Speaker 1: out of, you know, the minds behind military weaponry. But

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Speaker 1: to get to those successes, you know, sometimes you gotta

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Speaker 1: break a couple what nuclear bombs eggs to make to

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Speaker 1: make a We're gonna stretch this metaphor out to make

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Speaker 1: some sort of omelet of death and destruction, and yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I like that. But yeah, there are just a lot

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Speaker 1: of examples of really strange things out there where you

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Speaker 1: would think this is an Internet hoax the first time

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Speaker 1: you hear about it, or you would think surely someone

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Speaker 1: on some committee would have said, guys, wait a minute,

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Speaker 1: that's that's just not gonna work. But you probably a

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Speaker 1: lot of you out there listening have been in a

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Speaker 1: situation where you know your boss has an idea and

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Speaker 1: your boss really loves the idea, and you're thinking, I

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Speaker 1: know that's not a good idea, and everyone around here

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Speaker 1: knows that's not a good idea, but the boss really

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Speaker 1: wants to do this. And sometimes bosses like to throw

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Speaker 1: out big, wild ideas to justify their existence, you know,

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Speaker 1: in the hopes that it'll like be a big splash,

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Speaker 1: but a lot of time it just kind of fizzles.

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Speaker 1: And today we're gonna talk about some good fizzles, fizzles, splashes, kabooms. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: all the onomatopia out there, that's true. Yeah, And we

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Speaker 1: have we have compiled some of our favorites. We do

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Speaker 1: have to say from the beginning, we're not going to

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Speaker 1: get to every single spectacular, strange, hilarious failure. Now we're

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Speaker 1: gonna do to a piece. Yeah, we're going, We're gonna

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Speaker 1: we're gonna, maybe, if the winds at our back and

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Speaker 1: everything goes according to plan, hit up a total of six.

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Speaker 1: But we have curated these and we want to know

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Speaker 1: what you think. You know, what do you think about

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Speaker 1: this guy's Christopher centur Our guest today, would you like

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Speaker 1: to do the honors and kick off the first invention? Guys,

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Speaker 1: just sit right back and you'll hear a tale, a

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Speaker 1: tale of a fateful trip that departed from Russian ports

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Speaker 1: upon a rounded ship. Sailing man, I'm sorry, I can't

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Speaker 1: not do that. Yeah, I don't know what's Gilligan and Russian.

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Speaker 1: Comrade Ben, I know you've got a Russian accent cold.

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Speaker 1: I love it, I love it. Yeah. The first thing

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Speaker 1: I want to talk to you about are the round

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Speaker 1: ships of the Russian Navy. We're talking eighteen sixties technology.

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Speaker 1: Two ships, in particular, the v C. Admiral Popov and

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Speaker 1: the Novgorod. Now, these were coastal defense ships. You have

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Speaker 1: to think back to the time of the Russian War.

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Speaker 1: So Russia had just suffered some defe eats at the

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Speaker 1: hands of France and some of their allies, and they

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Speaker 1: had actually been banned from building and maintaining battleships in

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Speaker 1: the Black Sea. But Russia still needed to defend their

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Speaker 1: land and their sea, and specifically we're talking about the

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Speaker 1: Kirch Straight Now that's the if you think back to

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Speaker 1: your geography class, the part of the world right between

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Speaker 1: the Black sea and the Sea of asof So you've

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Speaker 1: got a little straight where ships passed through and they

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Speaker 1: need to defend it. And this task of creating a

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Speaker 1: defense was given to Vice Admiral pop Off. He said,

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Speaker 1: I'm gonna make you some ships to defend the waters.

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Speaker 1: He said, I'm gonna make you some round ships to

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Speaker 1: defend the waters. Degrees of protection, floating platforms, kind of

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Speaker 1: tank like, not not intended for quick fleet battle, but

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Speaker 1: just intended to defend. Yeah. So he came up with

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Speaker 1: this circular boat. He wanted to build ten of them,

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Speaker 1: but the Russian Navy said, let's let's go. Let's build too,

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Speaker 1: you know, uh, and then we'll talk about the rest.

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Speaker 1: So I want you to picture just a circular platform

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Speaker 1: a couple feet across, six propellers on the back, two

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Speaker 1: cannons on the top. Now let me ask you. Have

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Speaker 1: you guys been canoeing? Yes? Yeah, kayaking? Kayaking? Okay, So

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Speaker 1: have you ever been kayaking and just rode just on

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Speaker 1: one side you kind of go around in circles. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Now imagine you're just firing a cannon just on one

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Speaker 1: side and then it accelerates your spin. Yeah, and you're

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Speaker 1: a completely circular boat. So this wasn't moored in any

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Speaker 1: way to the sea floor. So this was a ship.

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Speaker 1: It was a monitor, which is a type of small

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Speaker 1: light warship defined by kind of oversized guns. So you've

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Speaker 1: got this round ship two guns on top, and anytime

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Speaker 1: one gun would fire, it would just spin the ship

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Speaker 1: around in a circle. And they tried and tried and

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Speaker 1: tried to figure out a way to counterbalance this. They

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Speaker 1: tried to run the propellers in the opposite direction of

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Speaker 1: the firing. Uh, it just didn't work. And it just

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Speaker 1: came down to a severe misunderstanding and or just just

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Speaker 1: playing ignoring the physics on the part of Admiral pop Off.

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Speaker 1: Isn't there a vodka named after him? I don't know

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Speaker 1: if it's named after him, but it is named that. Okay, well,

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Speaker 1: maybe maybe there was vodka vodka best Forgotten from the

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Speaker 1: it's no Mr Boston, you know, it's pretty low shelf.

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Speaker 1: But so maybe those were two big ideas. Round warships

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Speaker 1: and uh, you know low Well, he thought that if

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Speaker 1: you if you created a really shallow round broad boat,

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Speaker 1: it would float really well on the water. And it did.

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Speaker 1: It floated fine. But the problem is what makes boats

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Speaker 1: so successful is the shape. They're sort of long. They

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Speaker 1: cut through the water. Right. When you have a wide

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Speaker 1: broad boat with six propellers trying to push forward, you're

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Speaker 1: pushing the entire mass. There's a lot more drag. It

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Speaker 1: just does not work. And nobody said, hey, pop off,

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Speaker 1: let's not do this. So the ships were built. We're

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Speaker 1: talking eighteen seventy. They actually, despite their ridiculous nature, were

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Speaker 1: put into service, defended the straits. Uh, didn't do it

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Speaker 1: particularly well. So they did these embarrassing tests and they

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Speaker 1: tried to fix it, but they realized they couldn't, but

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Speaker 1: they just went ahead and forged on. Well, the thing is,

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Speaker 1: is the test themselves weren't that embarrassing. We're still in

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Speaker 1: early days of tank testing. And by tank I mean

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Speaker 1: a giant tank of water. You know, it takes a

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Speaker 1: lot to build a ship, and you don't want to

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Speaker 1: just put it out on the water and uh, because

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Speaker 1: then there you are. So they did models, right, Well,

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Speaker 1: they built a big tank of water, built some models,

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Speaker 1: and um, you know, these tanks were still water and

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Speaker 1: that's one of the things. These ships worked fine in

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Speaker 1: still water. But let me read you a little bit

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Speaker 1: about this ship. From the book World's Worst Warships, a

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Speaker 1: very specific book out in two thousand two from Anthony Preston.

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Speaker 1: He said the Vita Admiral pop Up and the Novgorod

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Speaker 1: were quote too slow to stem the current and proved

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Speaker 1: very difficult to steer. In practice, the discharge of even

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Speaker 1: one gun caused them to turn out of control and

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Speaker 1: even contra rotating. Some of the six repellers were unable

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Speaker 1: to keep the ship on correct heading. They were prone

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Speaker 1: to rapid rolling and pitching and anything more than a

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Speaker 1: flat calm, and could not aim or load their guns

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Speaker 1: under such circumstances. So wouldn't that throw off the trajectory

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Speaker 1: of the shot as well? Right, So it would not

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Speaker 1: only screw up the navigation of the boat in the direction,

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Speaker 1: it would like be completely impossible to aim. Yeah. I

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Speaker 1: think you would have to just be really lucky or

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Speaker 1: hit the broadside of a boat that's nearby, or try

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Speaker 1: to shoot it, I don't know, at the water as

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Speaker 1: a warning. Basically, these were insert These two boats were

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Speaker 1: in service for about three decades. They just kind of

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Speaker 1: floated there, they did their thing. Ultimately they were put

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Speaker 1: into storage and right before the First World War kicked off,

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Speaker 1: they were just scrapped because they figured they could use

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Speaker 1: the materials for something a little bit less cartoonishly ineffective,

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Speaker 1: or it was just wasting everyone's time. You know, you

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Speaker 1: have better things to do than to just keep a

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Speaker 1: giant round boat that honestly, it looks like a toy.

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Speaker 1: It looks like a child's toy that would float in

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Speaker 1: the bathtub. So it doesn't even look scary, No, it's

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Speaker 1: it looks perfect, perfect circle. Yeah. Yeah, and we've got

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Speaker 1: some photos we can share on ridiculous historians. What's the

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Speaker 1: logic though, what is it? What is this pop off

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Speaker 1: fellow thinking, like, is he trying to cut corners? Literally

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Speaker 1: cut all the corners? He really did just want to

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Speaker 1: come up with a really smart idea, you know, it's

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Speaker 1: the kind of thing you want to be the one

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Speaker 1: who solves the problem, and he just didn't. Uh. There

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Speaker 1: were other round boat proponents at the time. Uh, there's

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Speaker 1: a guy in England in the eighteen fifties who was

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Speaker 1: really all about the round hall. People thought it would

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Speaker 1: add stability to the ship, and it added stability in

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Speaker 1: certain circumstances, but in rain and wind, in choppy waters,

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Speaker 1: you know the kind of things that happened when you're

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Speaker 1: at sea, no dice. So one important note for everyone

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Speaker 1: listening who's thinking maybe the same thing I initially thought,

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Speaker 1: which is, well, okay, sure, this ship rotates wildly anytime

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Speaker 1: the gun is fired. The guns are fired. Rather, why

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Speaker 1: don't they just make these weapons of absolute chaos and

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Speaker 1: have the guns fire quickly? So this stuff is just

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Speaker 1: sort of spinning Tasmanian Devil style firing on all sides.

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Speaker 1: The problem, I believe is the loading time right, because

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Speaker 1: every shot was so these were right type round. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: this is still e seventies, eighteen eighties, so we don't

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Speaker 1: have machine gun technology on a boat like this, and

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Speaker 1: they can't load it while it's spinning. Yeah, exactly. So

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Speaker 1: I would be very curious to find out how long

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Speaker 1: it took them to shoot, get back to a calm,

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Speaker 1: stable state, and then reload and shooting it. I guess

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Speaker 1: in theory, if you fired both cannons that precisely the

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Speaker 1: right time, it would stabilize itself. But that seems so

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Speaker 1: so unlikely, and it was a wasting a shot because

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Speaker 1: obviously your targets only gonna be on one side or

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Speaker 1: the other. Chances are so you gotta coordinate and be like,

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Speaker 1: all right, guys, we gotta three to one. Go. Oh yeah,

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Speaker 1: this is comical. Yeah. I mean, in Popoff's defense, he

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Speaker 1: was trying to solve problems and gnoring the problems generated

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Speaker 1: by his supposed solutions. The ships that were round like

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Speaker 1: this could be much more heavily armored so they could

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Speaker 1: withstand more attacks. So he did solve that problem, but

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Speaker 1: it just kind of ignored with the failings. All right,

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Speaker 1: I think we can definitely call that a military fail. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: As it was known the type of ship they would,

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Speaker 1: they named it after him, to his glory and Ora

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Speaker 1: maybe in glory. Yeah, yeah, what's next? Do I get

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Speaker 1: to go? Do you want to go? I do, because

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Speaker 1: I really want to say these two words. Yeah, go

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Speaker 1: for rocket bullets? Yes, okay, rocket bullets. That's fun, right, Yeah.

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Speaker 1: So one of the first questions would be aren't all

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Speaker 1: bullets propelled? What makes these different? Well? These these are

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Speaker 1: propelled using rocket fuel? Nice or jet fuel. Let's let's

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Speaker 1: let's be fair. Um. Yeah, so this is uh, this

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Speaker 1: might sound like something out of a James Bond movie,

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Speaker 1: and as it turns out, it act really is. Um.

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Speaker 1: This weapon called the gyro jet made by two gentlemen

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Speaker 1: named Robert Mainhardt and Arthur T. Biale who started a company,

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Speaker 1: an arms company called MBA, which was short for Manheart

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Speaker 1: and Ble Associates. Um. They decided they wanted regular guns

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Speaker 1: just weren't cutting it for them. They want to do

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Speaker 1: something a little more futuristic because this is the time

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Speaker 1: when we wanted to rocket size everything. And so that

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Speaker 1: their company was NBA, right, yeah, NBA, and I should

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Speaker 1: have been like Magic Bullet Association or something. Thank you,

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Speaker 1: thank you. Um. So the first thing they worked on

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Speaker 1: was something called the fin Jet, which shot these tiny

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Speaker 1: little needle type rocket bullets out of this weapon. And

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Speaker 1: the thing that was cool about rocket bullets, so I'm

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Speaker 1: gonna keep calling them um, is they were self propelling.

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Speaker 1: They didn't need that much complicated mechanisms in the gun

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Speaker 1: itself because these bullets literally had a rod of jet

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Speaker 1: fuel running through them and a little element that could

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Speaker 1: get hit by the hammer. Didn't even need a firing pin,

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Speaker 1: and then it would propel itself out of the muzzle.

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Speaker 1: And I actually saw a really great video where some

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Speaker 1: guys with the YouTube channel got ahold of one of these,

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Speaker 1: um the gyro Jet model and you can see they

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Speaker 1: did slow motion photography where the bullet exits the muzzle

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Speaker 1: and then a little ways out it gets rocket sized,

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Speaker 1: so when it comes out initially, it's actually going quite slow.

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Speaker 1: So one of the issues with this gun was it

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Speaker 1: didn't work very well at point blank range because you know,

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Speaker 1: people would joke that you could stop it with your hand,

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Speaker 1: and you know, it might break some bones in your hand,

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Speaker 1: but it certainly would not penetrate your skin. If you

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Speaker 1: fired a bullet that's moving not slowly, it's trajectory wouldn't

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Speaker 1: stay constant. That's the thing about it. It used a

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Speaker 1: technology called spin stabilization, which I'm a little foggy on

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Speaker 1: the exact because I'm not like a ballistic specialist or anything.

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Speaker 1: But the bullets had these three holes drilled in the

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Speaker 1: back of them that when it would cause them to

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Speaker 1: rotate really really fast, and they would achieve such an

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Speaker 1: incredible speed once they actually got to their max velocity.

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Speaker 1: And a lot of that had to do with the

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Speaker 1: fact that they came out of the barrel like spinning,

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Speaker 1: sort of like a rifling technology exactly like that, but

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Speaker 1: not because the barrels were smooth. They didn't actually have that.

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Speaker 1: That's what a regular gun has board out kind of

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Speaker 1: like little whatever you call it, um markings or kind

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Speaker 1: of grooves exactly that causes the bullet to do that,

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Speaker 1: because otherwise it would just go wild and not be

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Speaker 1: accurate at all. It turns out it still wasn't very

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Speaker 1: accurate because of the fact that this rocket fuel would

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Speaker 1: burn at pretty unpredictable rates and you could never quite

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Speaker 1: predict what it was gonna do. So this video that

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Speaker 1: I saw, which is really really worth checking out. If

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Speaker 1: you just searched testing gyro jet rocket guns, why were

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Speaker 1: they a commercial failure? On YouTube, you can find these

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Speaker 1: guys that do this amazing test of this. You can't

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Speaker 1: find these anymore because the parts don't exist. Yeah, I

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Speaker 1: imagine that they look kind of like a like a

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Speaker 1: bottle rocket, you know, where they just sort of spin

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Speaker 1: off wildly. You can't quite know they were. They were

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Speaker 1: much more stable than that, but they certainly were not

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Speaker 1: as stable as a traditional gun. They did some tests

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Speaker 1: where they measured, how, you know, how accurate they were

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Speaker 1: compared to a regular gun, and it wasn't insane, but

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Speaker 1: it was just very unpredictable. And there's one part where

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Speaker 1: um it just kind of like went up all of

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Speaker 1: a sudden and like shot the GoPro camera off of

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Speaker 1: the dummy that they were firing at. So um, but

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Speaker 1: they had other models. They had a more of a

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Speaker 1: rifle with a scope on it, and they had something

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Speaker 1: that kind of looks like a machine gun um carbine,

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Speaker 1: but these were they loaded one bullet at a time,

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Speaker 1: and it was semi automatic, so you could fire one

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Speaker 1: after the other, but it certainly wasn't fully automatic. And

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Speaker 1: this is pretty neat um. In order to keep the

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Speaker 1: rocket fuel from like leaking out or to keep it

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Speaker 1: contained properly, these guys were super innovative. They figured out

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Speaker 1: that titanium oxide was the best chemical for containing this

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Speaker 1: stuff so it didn't accidentally ignite, just like in the

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Speaker 1: casing um, and they just went down to the local

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Speaker 1: paint store and bought the white paint that had the

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Speaker 1: most titanium oxide content. And so you can actually see

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Speaker 1: they got these rocket fuel rods in these long kind

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Speaker 1: of like almost like big thick pencil lead and then

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Speaker 1: they laced it on a like an actual lathe to

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Speaker 1: get it cut down to the right size to fit

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Speaker 1: these bullets, and then they spray painted them white on

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Speaker 1: the outside and then put them in the casing and

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Speaker 1: it did not discharge a shell. It shot the whole

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Speaker 1: thing out. So that's what made him different to um questions, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: how much did these costs and did the cost play

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Speaker 1: a role in their failure other than they're completely hilarious? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: lack of reliability and this maybe is a very good

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Speaker 1: military one because it doesn't feel like they were developed

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Speaker 1: for the military, but it was too good of like

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Speaker 1: a weaponry failed to not throw in here and especially

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Speaker 1: the fact that it was very much featured in You

340
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Speaker 1: Only Live Twice, the James Bond movie. Um, because of

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Speaker 1: the fact that you look at them, they look like

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Speaker 1: a cool, like, uh spy gun. Yeah, yeah, absolutely that.

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Speaker 1: I mean, given that it's full of rocket fuel, I

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Speaker 1: wouldn't want to carry that around in my pocket, but

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Speaker 1: it's a it's a cool looking gun. It is a

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Speaker 1: cool looking gun. To mention that, apparently they could engineer

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Speaker 1: the bullets so that they would dissolve in the human body.

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Speaker 1: Cool and that was a big part of it, I

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Speaker 1: believe in the Bond film because that way you would

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Speaker 1: leave no trace and there would be no forensic evidence

351
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Speaker 1: to uh tie anybody to the to the bullets exactly.

352
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Speaker 1: But I think that they did at least get tested

353
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Speaker 1: by the U. S. Army, if not specifically this brand

354
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Speaker 1: of rocket bullets, something something like this. They had. Gyro

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Speaker 1: Jet had an assault rifle that the Army tested briefly. Yeah,

356
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Speaker 1: I I didn't run across that myself. It was a

357
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Speaker 1: very a bit, a bit of a blip in the

358
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Speaker 1: history of this these weapons. But I mean, the Army

359
00:19:40,800 --> 00:19:43,480
Speaker 1: is going to get wind of any new fangled device.

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Speaker 1: They'll give it a go. They'll for a little money

361
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Speaker 1: at it. And if you're going to miniaturize something, I

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00:19:47,280 --> 00:19:49,360
Speaker 1: mean you might. You could. You could load that thing

363
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Speaker 1: with little tiny explosives in the tip. You have like

364
00:19:52,200 --> 00:19:56,760
Speaker 1: a tiny little ballistic missile. And it's interesting. The weapons

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00:19:56,800 --> 00:19:59,800
Speaker 1: failed because of largely they were expensive and they were

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Speaker 1: a pine to make because to drill those holes I

367
00:20:02,160 --> 00:20:04,520
Speaker 1: was talking about that that creative the spin, they had

368
00:20:04,560 --> 00:20:07,159
Speaker 1: to have these tapered drill bits which had to be

369
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Speaker 1: custom machine themselves, and they would always break. So to

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00:20:10,520 --> 00:20:13,560
Speaker 1: make that the ammunition was very expensive because again the

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00:20:13,600 --> 00:20:16,880
Speaker 1: guns themselves only really had a hammer and the firing

372
00:20:16,920 --> 00:20:19,960
Speaker 1: pin was fixed because it actually would push the hammer

373
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Speaker 1: would push it backwards, and then the firing pin would

374
00:20:22,920 --> 00:20:25,840
Speaker 1: pierce the little primer that would then set off the

375
00:20:25,920 --> 00:20:28,159
Speaker 1: chain reaction that would like the rocket fuel, but you

376
00:20:28,160 --> 00:20:29,680
Speaker 1: would see it come out of the gun and it

377
00:20:29,720 --> 00:20:31,800
Speaker 1: wouldn't start shooting a little rocket tail out of it

378
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Speaker 1: until it was about halfway to the target. So, I mean,

379
00:20:34,440 --> 00:20:37,360
Speaker 1: it's it's pretty fascinating. But the company n b A

380
00:20:37,359 --> 00:20:41,040
Speaker 1: Actually went on to make a lot of non lethal

381
00:20:41,400 --> 00:20:44,960
Speaker 1: ammunition like bean bag shot and um they made little

382
00:20:45,000 --> 00:20:48,359
Speaker 1: pen guns like little pen projectile things that were that

383
00:20:48,400 --> 00:20:52,639
Speaker 1: were used in in the military. So pretty cool, right, Yeah,

384
00:20:53,040 --> 00:20:55,680
Speaker 1: it's ridiculous. I don't know. I think it's more interesting.

385
00:20:55,720 --> 00:20:58,560
Speaker 1: But it's just a very roundabout way of doing something

386
00:20:58,600 --> 00:21:00,479
Speaker 1: that was already done pretty well. It's sort of like

387
00:21:00,520 --> 00:21:02,960
Speaker 1: but but but but but these use rocket fuel. Please

388
00:21:03,000 --> 00:21:05,520
Speaker 1: use rocket fuel, guys, have you heard about rocket fuel?

389
00:21:06,080 --> 00:21:08,639
Speaker 1: I like to think in the future when humanity is

390
00:21:08,720 --> 00:21:12,680
Speaker 1: gone and the world is overtaken by let's say, mice, uh,

391
00:21:12,720 --> 00:21:17,200
Speaker 1: super smart intelligent mice. Yeah, absolutely, they're going to find

392
00:21:17,200 --> 00:21:19,639
Speaker 1: these guns and these will act like giant bazookas or

393
00:21:19,640 --> 00:21:23,159
Speaker 1: missile launchers. I'm just picturing a cute little mouse holding

394
00:21:23,160 --> 00:21:26,240
Speaker 1: one of these guns on its shoulder launching rockets. Uh at,

395
00:21:26,320 --> 00:21:29,080
Speaker 1: you know, cats, I love that image. The last thing

396
00:21:29,119 --> 00:21:30,639
Speaker 1: I do want to say that in the video that

397
00:21:30,680 --> 00:21:34,440
Speaker 1: I saw, um, the the ammunition they had was was very,

398
00:21:34,520 --> 00:21:37,240
Speaker 1: very old and it all worked, you know. And I

399
00:21:37,240 --> 00:21:39,879
Speaker 1: would have thought that the fuel would have degraded or

400
00:21:40,119 --> 00:21:42,399
Speaker 1: something would have happened to make it not function properly,

401
00:21:42,480 --> 00:21:44,080
Speaker 1: or it would just explode in the gun and not

402
00:21:44,160 --> 00:21:45,800
Speaker 1: do what it was supposed to do. And it wasn't

403
00:21:45,800 --> 00:21:48,960
Speaker 1: perfectly accurate, but it definitely reached the target every time

404
00:21:49,240 --> 00:21:52,119
Speaker 1: and didn't just like zoom off somewhere else entirely. It

405
00:21:52,119 --> 00:21:54,000
Speaker 1: just didn't, you know, keep a perfect bead, you know

406
00:21:54,000 --> 00:21:55,560
Speaker 1: what I mean? Well, you know what the answer is

407
00:21:55,600 --> 00:22:02,160
Speaker 1: tall this that the the expensive boring tips and all that. Lasers, lasers, las. Yeah.

408
00:22:02,160 --> 00:22:04,280
Speaker 1: I am not a scientist, I'm not a ballistics expert,

409
00:22:04,640 --> 00:22:07,280
Speaker 1: but as with all things in life, the answer is

410
00:22:07,280 --> 00:22:10,080
Speaker 1: probably just lasers. And you are. You are a well

411
00:22:10,119 --> 00:22:13,240
Speaker 1: known laser enthusiast. Why not. It's one of the first

412
00:22:13,280 --> 00:22:16,240
Speaker 1: things people told me about you when we started working together.

413
00:22:16,280 --> 00:22:20,240
Speaker 1: They're just neat, They're great. Oh man. We used to

414
00:22:20,280 --> 00:22:24,560
Speaker 1: have a very like an industrial class laser at the

415
00:22:24,680 --> 00:22:28,840
Speaker 1: office years and years ago and mysteriously disappeared. I wouldn't

416
00:22:28,840 --> 00:22:31,000
Speaker 1: make a cool laser sound like in the really cheesy

417
00:22:31,119 --> 00:22:34,240
Speaker 1: Technico songs. I feel like every time we played around

418
00:22:34,320 --> 00:22:36,440
Speaker 1: with it and we were literally just playing with a

419
00:22:36,520 --> 00:22:40,840
Speaker 1: dangerous laser, one of us was making sound making because

420
00:22:40,840 --> 00:22:42,720
Speaker 1: it was better than the click click Why did you

421
00:22:42,760 --> 00:22:44,639
Speaker 1: Why did you have this too? What was it? What

422
00:22:44,760 --> 00:22:47,480
Speaker 1: was it for? You know, just to learn about stuff?

423
00:22:47,680 --> 00:22:52,359
Speaker 1: Lasers are cool. Yeah, it wasn't powerful enough to physically

424
00:22:52,400 --> 00:22:55,119
Speaker 1: cut things, but it was one of those lasers that

425
00:22:55,240 --> 00:22:58,359
Speaker 1: would do permanent damage to your eye and shot it

426
00:22:58,640 --> 00:23:01,560
Speaker 1: towards someone's eye when some good for kids, good for

427
00:23:01,840 --> 00:23:04,760
Speaker 1: great for children. I was at a Black Crow's concert

428
00:23:04,800 --> 00:23:06,560
Speaker 1: once and someone how when I those laser pointers and

429
00:23:06,600 --> 00:23:08,840
Speaker 1: was shooting them at the singer guy, and he got

430
00:23:09,000 --> 00:23:11,480
Speaker 1: very upset. He threatened to uh to take it away

431
00:23:11,520 --> 00:23:16,080
Speaker 1: from him and put it someplace like, uh, pick keepsie

432
00:23:16,160 --> 00:23:19,680
Speaker 1: in his pocket. Oh yeah, he's gonna confiscated, not give

433
00:23:19,720 --> 00:23:29,920
Speaker 1: it back. So it's very substitute teacher vibe there. So

434
00:23:30,920 --> 00:23:36,320
Speaker 1: we've talked about an amazing ship. We've talked about some, uh, some,

435
00:23:36,400 --> 00:23:39,480
Speaker 1: I would say, very innovative bullets. Both of those things

436
00:23:39,520 --> 00:23:42,560
Speaker 1: on the offset seemed like they are worth investigating, right,

437
00:23:43,480 --> 00:23:45,320
Speaker 1: I'd like to give you one that I'm on the

438
00:23:45,359 --> 00:23:49,760
Speaker 1: fence about, especially because in my past life hosting car stuff,

439
00:23:49,840 --> 00:23:54,000
Speaker 1: I learned to love ridiculous vehicles. Have you ever looked

440
00:23:54,040 --> 00:23:58,040
Speaker 1: at a jeep and thought I would get one of

441
00:23:58,080 --> 00:24:01,920
Speaker 1: these if it was also to a helicopter, Because if

442
00:24:01,960 --> 00:24:05,040
Speaker 1: you have been thinking about this, I want to introduce

443
00:24:05,119 --> 00:24:09,520
Speaker 1: everyone to the Haffner Rota Buggy. It is a British

444
00:24:09,560 --> 00:24:13,840
Speaker 1: experimental aircraft that looks kind of doofy, so it looks

445
00:24:14,040 --> 00:24:17,400
Speaker 1: like exactly what you said, it looks like a helicopter.

446
00:24:18,240 --> 00:24:22,680
Speaker 1: And what's ridiculous to me is there's having the rotors

447
00:24:23,080 --> 00:24:26,719
Speaker 1: and the wheels. It's sort of transit wise. It's kind

448
00:24:26,720 --> 00:24:30,000
Speaker 1: of like wearing in Paris suspenders and a belt. So

449
00:24:30,560 --> 00:24:34,399
Speaker 1: the rotor Buggy came about as as a solution to

450
00:24:35,400 --> 00:24:39,520
Speaker 1: the problem of air dropping off road vehicles, and a

451
00:24:39,520 --> 00:24:44,840
Speaker 1: guy named Raoul Haffner of the Airborne Forces Experimental Establishment

452
00:24:45,480 --> 00:24:51,000
Speaker 1: created this after they had an earlier invention that had

453
00:24:51,080 --> 00:24:55,160
Speaker 1: some success, which was the rotor shoot. They took this

454
00:24:55,560 --> 00:24:59,159
Speaker 1: rotor thing and ran with it. It was an experimental

455
00:24:59,600 --> 00:25:04,639
Speaker 1: one person kite rotor thing. Wow. So it's kind of

456
00:25:04,680 --> 00:25:08,800
Speaker 1: like a helicopter that you sit on that is sort

457
00:25:08,840 --> 00:25:12,840
Speaker 1: of like a segue with blades. It just seems that

458
00:25:12,880 --> 00:25:15,720
Speaker 1: seems dangerous. It looks like a wind sock or something. Yeah,

459
00:25:15,720 --> 00:25:18,320
Speaker 1: it's hovering behind this like is it is it tethered

460
00:25:18,359 --> 00:25:20,959
Speaker 1: to that truck? But it is tethered. They they they

461
00:25:20,960 --> 00:25:24,560
Speaker 1: would probably be picking up speed and then the air

462
00:25:24,640 --> 00:25:28,720
Speaker 1: would catch Here, it's a kite essentially with it. It's

463
00:25:28,760 --> 00:25:30,960
Speaker 1: like a giant kite or like a big rudder that

464
00:25:31,119 --> 00:25:34,240
Speaker 1: flies behind your back, but also you have helicopter blades

465
00:25:34,280 --> 00:25:37,160
Speaker 1: on your head. I think the emphasis was to look

466
00:25:37,200 --> 00:25:41,399
Speaker 1: whimsical in this, but it enjoyed some, as you said,

467
00:25:41,480 --> 00:25:45,280
Speaker 1: some success, which led to the creation of the road

468
00:25:45,320 --> 00:25:47,960
Speaker 1: of buggy. I I think similar to what you feel

469
00:25:47,960 --> 00:25:50,440
Speaker 1: about rocket bullets. No, I think I just like saying

470
00:25:50,520 --> 00:25:52,560
Speaker 1: road a buggy buggies fun. But Ben, do you think

471
00:25:52,600 --> 00:25:54,359
Speaker 1: they were trying to strike fear into the hearts of

472
00:25:54,400 --> 00:25:57,040
Speaker 1: their enemies with whimsy? I think they were trying to

473
00:25:57,080 --> 00:25:59,879
Speaker 1: strike whimsy into their heart and their enemies. Yeah, So

474
00:26:00,400 --> 00:26:04,440
Speaker 1: here's the crazy thing. It's so unerodynamic, looks so poorly

475
00:26:04,480 --> 00:26:09,600
Speaker 1: designed because jeeps and helicopters have two very different ways

476
00:26:09,640 --> 00:26:14,159
Speaker 1: of transporting people and uh, two very different footprints design wise.

477
00:26:15,000 --> 00:26:19,760
Speaker 1: But their initial test, we're we're pretty promising because they

478
00:26:19,800 --> 00:26:23,359
Speaker 1: weren't testing it stem to stern, soup to nuts, an

479
00:26:23,520 --> 00:26:26,240
Speaker 1: entire operation. They were testing aspects of an operation. They

480
00:26:26,240 --> 00:26:30,840
Speaker 1: started by dropping it from around eight feet or so,

481
00:26:30,920 --> 00:26:32,760
Speaker 1: and then they say, okay, well it can just drop

482
00:26:32,840 --> 00:26:36,919
Speaker 1: eight feet it will be fine. And things didn't really

483
00:26:36,960 --> 00:26:41,960
Speaker 1: go wrong until November when they tried to tow it

484
00:26:42,200 --> 00:26:45,000
Speaker 1: to get enough speed to get the Rodo buggy into

485
00:26:45,000 --> 00:26:48,160
Speaker 1: the air. It didn't. It didn't work the first time

486
00:26:48,160 --> 00:26:50,080
Speaker 1: on the sixteenth of November, and it wasn't till the

487
00:26:50,080 --> 00:26:54,399
Speaker 1: twe of November that they got a Bentley auto to

488
00:26:54,520 --> 00:26:59,200
Speaker 1: pull it and this unwieldy machine was able to become

489
00:26:59,320 --> 00:27:03,280
Speaker 1: airborne and it reached gliding speeds of forty five miles

490
00:27:03,280 --> 00:27:06,960
Speaker 1: an hour, which is surprisingly good for, you know, for

491
00:27:06,960 --> 00:27:10,480
Speaker 1: for a totally not aerodynamic object, a jeep with a helicopter.

492
00:27:10,560 --> 00:27:13,520
Speaker 1: But yeah, but okay, so what when did it all

493
00:27:13,560 --> 00:27:17,679
Speaker 1: go south? Batman? That all go south? So would you

494
00:27:17,680 --> 00:27:19,880
Speaker 1: believe me if I told you in the parking lot

495
00:27:19,880 --> 00:27:22,240
Speaker 1: of our office. Now I'm kidding, I wish I could

496
00:27:22,280 --> 00:27:24,880
Speaker 1: take us out of road a buggy ride it went,

497
00:27:25,280 --> 00:27:29,600
Speaker 1: It went severely south. Um. As they continued testing, there

498
00:27:29,640 --> 00:27:35,800
Speaker 1: were huge problems with vibration and speed and uh, you know, instability,

499
00:27:36,040 --> 00:27:39,359
Speaker 1: and they kept improving it. They got it to a

500
00:27:39,400 --> 00:27:42,359
Speaker 1: flight speed of seventy miles an hour or a hundred

501
00:27:42,400 --> 00:27:48,119
Speaker 1: and thirteen kilometers, and the last flight on September of

502
00:27:48,200 --> 00:27:52,159
Speaker 1: nineteen UM it broke a record for itself. It was

503
00:27:52,240 --> 00:27:55,880
Speaker 1: able to fly for ten minutes and it was described

504
00:27:55,920 --> 00:27:59,760
Speaker 1: as highly satisfactory. And the thing is that the British

505
00:27:59,840 --> 00:28:02,800
Speaker 1: arm you probably would have continued trying to make road

506
00:28:02,840 --> 00:28:06,280
Speaker 1: of buggies if it were not for the introduction of

507
00:28:06,720 --> 00:28:12,080
Speaker 1: large gliders that could carry vehicles. So gliders like the

508
00:28:12,160 --> 00:28:16,840
Speaker 1: airspeed horsa which are just they look like planes, but

509
00:28:16,880 --> 00:28:19,960
Speaker 1: they're gliders. These things, if you see the picture, can

510
00:28:20,000 --> 00:28:23,840
Speaker 1: carry vehicles. So it's the kind of situation where whoever

511
00:28:23,840 --> 00:28:26,440
Speaker 1: came up with the road a buggy solved a problem

512
00:28:26,480 --> 00:28:28,920
Speaker 1: pretty well, but as they were doing that, someone else

513
00:28:29,000 --> 00:28:31,960
Speaker 1: is working on the same problem and just totally surpasses that.

514
00:28:32,080 --> 00:28:35,159
Speaker 1: The laser disc conundrum. Yeah, I mean, but can't you

515
00:28:35,240 --> 00:28:37,159
Speaker 1: just drive a jeep out of the back of an

516
00:28:37,160 --> 00:28:40,400
Speaker 1: airplane and having like like a jeep parachute like and

517
00:28:40,520 --> 00:28:44,160
Speaker 1: fastened and furious one would one would think. I guess

518
00:28:44,200 --> 00:28:47,760
Speaker 1: what they were grappling with was a failure of material

519
00:28:47,840 --> 00:28:50,320
Speaker 1: science at the time too, because then you would have

520
00:28:50,400 --> 00:28:53,280
Speaker 1: to build a fabric strong enough and resilient enough not

521
00:28:53,320 --> 00:28:56,160
Speaker 1: to just break. That's true. And maybe this this, uh,

522
00:28:56,360 --> 00:29:00,840
Speaker 1: this jeapicopter could then speed up and take off again

523
00:29:00,960 --> 00:29:03,480
Speaker 1: and return. So like let's say you were attacking a

524
00:29:03,520 --> 00:29:06,200
Speaker 1: little island, you could drop them all off, they could

525
00:29:06,240 --> 00:29:08,320
Speaker 1: come back. You could have a cheap acopter for a while.

526
00:29:08,400 --> 00:29:13,040
Speaker 1: It does sound like fun, take a cheapicopter ride see

527
00:29:13,040 --> 00:29:16,200
Speaker 1: the grand can see the world. It sounds like a

528
00:29:16,440 --> 00:29:19,240
Speaker 1: like a nice whimsical holiday thing. I would just prefer though,

529
00:29:19,280 --> 00:29:21,680
Speaker 1: if like the blades like folded up like in a

530
00:29:21,720 --> 00:29:24,360
Speaker 1: really cool way with like a sound effect like you're

531
00:29:24,360 --> 00:29:26,760
Speaker 1: talking about transformers. Yeah, that's exactly what I'm talking about.

532
00:29:26,760 --> 00:29:29,600
Speaker 1: You know a lot of flying cars do that now,

533
00:29:29,800 --> 00:29:32,200
Speaker 1: or flying car prototypes. This was in a minute. We

534
00:29:32,240 --> 00:29:36,360
Speaker 1: have flying we have flying car prototypes, as in like

535
00:29:36,440 --> 00:29:39,680
Speaker 1: one to two copies of something like Terrafugias, like Finally

536
00:29:39,720 --> 00:29:43,160
Speaker 1: in the future. It's weird. So we're all good friends

537
00:29:43,320 --> 00:29:49,080
Speaker 1: with our pal Scott Benjamin. He's a wonderful, brilliant aerodype man,

538
00:29:49,720 --> 00:29:53,960
Speaker 1: but he hates flying cars, and for the better part

539
00:29:54,000 --> 00:29:55,880
Speaker 1: of the last six years he and I have been

540
00:29:56,000 --> 00:29:59,000
Speaker 1: very beefed up about this. Look. I get that they're dangerous.

541
00:29:59,080 --> 00:30:01,640
Speaker 1: I understand that. I get there it would be disastrous

542
00:30:01,640 --> 00:30:05,360
Speaker 1: to have flying cars, But I don't want everyone to

543
00:30:05,400 --> 00:30:08,479
Speaker 1: have flying cars. I just want one because as long

544
00:30:08,560 --> 00:30:11,560
Speaker 1: as there's only one, things are going to be relatively fine.

545
00:30:11,840 --> 00:30:13,760
Speaker 1: You guys are cool. Would you guys want one? I

546
00:30:13,760 --> 00:30:16,280
Speaker 1: think we could get the number up to four without

547
00:30:16,640 --> 00:30:19,320
Speaker 1: we just wouldn't. There's a whole conundrum that goes into

548
00:30:19,360 --> 00:30:21,640
Speaker 1: flying cars. I mean, you ever heard of airplanes. We

549
00:30:21,640 --> 00:30:24,040
Speaker 1: have to have a whole system of air traffic controllers

550
00:30:24,120 --> 00:30:27,280
Speaker 1: and you know, coordinated takeoffs and landings, and if they

551
00:30:27,280 --> 00:30:30,040
Speaker 1: were flying cars just willy nilly, there would be a

552
00:30:30,040 --> 00:30:32,640
Speaker 1: lot of air mid air collisions. I think, yeah, but

553
00:30:32,680 --> 00:30:35,600
Speaker 1: we figured it out right. I mean, I imagine there's

554
00:30:35,640 --> 00:30:39,959
Speaker 1: a podcast from the late eighteen hundreds on whatever format

555
00:30:40,000 --> 00:30:43,080
Speaker 1: the podcasted in back then saying would you have an

556
00:30:43,120 --> 00:30:47,520
Speaker 1: automobile horses? You know what, what would happen if you

557
00:30:47,560 --> 00:30:49,960
Speaker 1: had ten people in a town with a car. That

558
00:30:50,000 --> 00:30:52,560
Speaker 1: would be madness. I think they just etched podcasts right

559
00:30:52,560 --> 00:30:58,080
Speaker 1: into wax cylinders. Yes, absolutely so, there we are the

560
00:30:58,200 --> 00:31:01,400
Speaker 1: Road of Buggy. I I get if you are rhada

561
00:31:01,480 --> 00:31:04,400
Speaker 1: bugged that you have missed this period in history, do

562
00:31:04,480 --> 00:31:06,800
Speaker 1: not despair. The last thing you'll say about it is

563
00:31:06,840 --> 00:31:09,360
Speaker 1: you can go to a town with an amazing name.

564
00:31:09,400 --> 00:31:13,040
Speaker 1: You're gonna love this noole Middle Wallop. And in the

565
00:31:13,320 --> 00:31:16,959
Speaker 1: Middle Wallop there is a museum of Army Flying that

566
00:31:17,040 --> 00:31:19,840
Speaker 1: has a replica of a road of buggy, as well

567
00:31:19,880 --> 00:31:22,560
Speaker 1: as a road a tank, which is the same thing,

568
00:31:22,600 --> 00:31:24,800
Speaker 1: but a tank that seems like you would need much

569
00:31:24,800 --> 00:31:27,040
Speaker 1: bigger blades to keep a tankle off. Yeah, it was

570
00:31:27,080 --> 00:31:28,800
Speaker 1: a weird idea, but this is the kind of thing

571
00:31:28,840 --> 00:31:31,680
Speaker 1: where if if any ridiculous historians are listening at home,

572
00:31:31,840 --> 00:31:35,000
Speaker 1: and you're enjoying the show with your who knows you know,

573
00:31:35,080 --> 00:31:37,479
Speaker 1: your your daughters, your sons, you could make a little

574
00:31:37,520 --> 00:31:39,840
Speaker 1: toy road a buggy. You know, just go buy a

575
00:31:39,920 --> 00:31:44,240
Speaker 1: toy helicopter, snap off the blades. That's called a transformer. No, no, no,

576
00:31:44,280 --> 00:31:47,280
Speaker 1: I'm taking it by two things, gloom together, make your

577
00:31:47,280 --> 00:31:50,800
Speaker 1: own toys, have a little Roada Buggy warfare thing going

578
00:31:50,840 --> 00:31:55,440
Speaker 1: on at home, toy mash up. I like, so, what's

579
00:31:55,520 --> 00:31:59,760
Speaker 1: what's next, Christopher? Well, I started off with with with

580
00:31:59,800 --> 00:32:04,760
Speaker 1: some wildly propulsive cannons, and that is where we're headed again,

581
00:32:04,880 --> 00:32:07,800
Speaker 1: but this time we're staying stateside. We're not going to Russia.

582
00:32:08,200 --> 00:32:10,720
Speaker 1: We're in the United States. Wow, let me correct that

583
00:32:11,280 --> 00:32:14,400
Speaker 1: we're in the Confederate States of America or in the

584
00:32:14,480 --> 00:32:16,800
Speaker 1: lead up to what would become that. You've seen a

585
00:32:16,800 --> 00:32:20,640
Speaker 1: double barreled cannon. I feel as if I can picture

586
00:32:20,680 --> 00:32:24,800
Speaker 1: it in my mind, popped words. Yeah, double barreled cannon. Right,

587
00:32:24,840 --> 00:32:28,480
Speaker 1: you've got think of a shotgun, double barrel shotgun shots

588
00:32:28,520 --> 00:32:31,480
Speaker 1: out twice as much shot. But can't you unloaded one

589
00:32:31,480 --> 00:32:34,280
Speaker 1: barrel at a time as well? You can't, Yeah, because

590
00:32:34,280 --> 00:32:37,800
Speaker 1: there's like a little compound trigger, right, Yeah, but you

591
00:32:37,800 --> 00:32:39,280
Speaker 1: don't want to do that with a double barrel cannon,

592
00:32:39,480 --> 00:32:41,960
Speaker 1: was wondering. Yeah, So the double barrel canon we're going

593
00:32:42,040 --> 00:32:44,240
Speaker 1: to talk about is from the American Civil War, but

594
00:32:44,320 --> 00:32:47,959
Speaker 1: it's not a purely American invention. The idea of this

595
00:32:48,000 --> 00:32:53,040
Speaker 1: goes back to two so Renaissance Italy, Florence in particular,

596
00:32:53,120 --> 00:32:56,160
Speaker 1: and there was an inventor named Antonio Petrini who came

597
00:32:56,240 --> 00:32:58,800
Speaker 1: up with the idea of a double barrel canon. It

598
00:32:58,880 --> 00:33:01,719
Speaker 1: was put into action though, in eighteen sixty two by

599
00:33:01,760 --> 00:33:05,160
Speaker 1: a man named John Gilliland. Now Galleland was a mechanic

600
00:33:05,200 --> 00:33:09,960
Speaker 1: and dentist living in Athens, Georgia. All yeah, not too

601
00:33:09,960 --> 00:33:12,000
Speaker 1: far from where we are. We're here in Atlanta recording.

602
00:33:12,080 --> 00:33:14,080
Speaker 1: So about an hour and a half up the road,

603
00:33:14,480 --> 00:33:18,280
Speaker 1: Galiland said, I'm gonna take two cannons, put them together

604
00:33:18,960 --> 00:33:22,640
Speaker 1: in one sort of one molded entity. They've got two

605
00:33:22,680 --> 00:33:25,480
Speaker 1: side by side boars in a three in diameter, and

606
00:33:25,520 --> 00:33:28,680
Speaker 1: you've got these two six pound balls next to one another.

607
00:33:29,360 --> 00:33:32,480
Speaker 1: But that's not it. You've also got a ten foot

608
00:33:32,640 --> 00:33:35,680
Speaker 1: chain connecting the two balls. I have heard of this.

609
00:33:36,600 --> 00:33:40,760
Speaker 1: That sounds dangerous. Well, you know, think of the what

610
00:33:40,800 --> 00:33:43,640
Speaker 1: are they called the yeah bolos that that gauchos in

611
00:33:43,680 --> 00:33:46,760
Speaker 1: South America used to capture birds or horses or whatever.

612
00:33:47,040 --> 00:33:49,720
Speaker 1: So you've got these two balls connected by a chain

613
00:33:50,120 --> 00:33:53,920
Speaker 1: propelled from a cannon. Think of the destruction possible. These

614
00:33:53,960 --> 00:33:57,360
Speaker 1: spinning balls of death a chain in between them. It's

615
00:33:57,400 --> 00:34:00,720
Speaker 1: just gonna tear through the Union soldiers right, cut your

616
00:34:00,800 --> 00:34:03,400
Speaker 1: right in half, you would you would think, yeah, you

617
00:34:03,480 --> 00:34:07,360
Speaker 1: think so, it's not quite what happened. Now. Galiland was

618
00:34:07,400 --> 00:34:10,640
Speaker 1: passionate about this idea. He actually put out a subscription

619
00:34:10,719 --> 00:34:14,400
Speaker 1: service to raise funds to develop the prototype. He raised

620
00:34:14,400 --> 00:34:17,160
Speaker 1: about three and fifty dollars. I don't know if those

621
00:34:17,160 --> 00:34:20,680
Speaker 1: were Confederate or Union dollars. And he built it, he

622
00:34:20,800 --> 00:34:24,360
Speaker 1: tested it, and reports from the time say they blasted

623
00:34:24,360 --> 00:34:28,120
Speaker 1: the cannon two balls a chain. It tore through a

624
00:34:28,200 --> 00:34:31,560
Speaker 1: cornfield and knocked down a chimney. It killed a cow.

625
00:34:31,920 --> 00:34:35,160
Speaker 1: But it was just so wild and uncontrollable that the

626
00:34:35,200 --> 00:34:37,560
Speaker 1: Confederate Army said, no, no, no, this is ridiculous. We

627
00:34:37,640 --> 00:34:40,200
Speaker 1: do not want this. In terms of accuracy, yeah, you

628
00:34:40,239 --> 00:34:44,280
Speaker 1: would have to fire both cannons simultaneously because they're they're

629
00:34:44,320 --> 00:34:48,200
Speaker 1: sitting parallel to one another, but slightly splayed, a slight

630
00:34:48,320 --> 00:34:50,799
Speaker 1: degree of difference in in the direction in which they

631
00:34:50,800 --> 00:34:54,520
Speaker 1: propel the ball. And that's so that the two cannonballs

632
00:34:54,520 --> 00:34:56,520
Speaker 1: that sit next to one another when they fly out

633
00:34:56,520 --> 00:34:59,839
Speaker 1: of the cannon will spread out and kind of pull

634
00:35:00,040 --> 00:35:03,759
Speaker 1: the chain between them. But getting that exactly right with

635
00:35:03,800 --> 00:35:07,320
Speaker 1: the eighteen sixties technology, you can't. You can't be that precise.

636
00:35:07,760 --> 00:35:10,480
Speaker 1: And so what happens is even a split second of

637
00:35:10,600 --> 00:35:13,120
Speaker 1: timing difference in firing one or the other side of

638
00:35:13,120 --> 00:35:16,279
Speaker 1: the cannon, or a little bit of wind or a

639
00:35:16,320 --> 00:35:18,920
Speaker 1: little bit of who knows, some material in the barrel

640
00:35:19,120 --> 00:35:22,200
Speaker 1: will just send one ball slightly faster than the other,

641
00:35:22,239 --> 00:35:23,719
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden you get something that's sort

642
00:35:23,760 --> 00:35:26,719
Speaker 1: of rip sawing through the terrain, going in completely the

643
00:35:26,719 --> 00:35:29,799
Speaker 1: wrong direction. Now that could be destructive. It tore down

644
00:35:29,840 --> 00:35:33,080
Speaker 1: some trees, but yeah, it's just too risky to bring

645
00:35:33,080 --> 00:35:35,919
Speaker 1: into warfare. I got a good idea, what's your idea?

646
00:35:36,000 --> 00:35:40,640
Speaker 1: Bigger cannons, bigger balls, bigger balls, longer chains. Well, no,

647
00:35:40,760 --> 00:35:44,160
Speaker 1: not even just one, just one barrel, one barrel bigger,

648
00:35:44,760 --> 00:35:49,080
Speaker 1: So a big big cannons, big cannons. That's that's interesting

649
00:35:49,080 --> 00:35:52,440
Speaker 1: because I heard about the ball and change stuff before.

650
00:35:52,560 --> 00:35:55,200
Speaker 1: But I always thought to your point, you know know all,

651
00:35:55,239 --> 00:35:57,759
Speaker 1: I always thought that the it was a situation where

652
00:35:57,800 --> 00:36:01,080
Speaker 1: there was a single cannon and they loaded the balls

653
00:36:01,080 --> 00:36:04,080
Speaker 1: sort of atop each other, with the chain hanging out

654
00:36:04,200 --> 00:36:06,080
Speaker 1: and then shot it out that. Yeah, that seems like

655
00:36:06,120 --> 00:36:09,400
Speaker 1: that would make more sense than having two sources of propulsion.

656
00:36:09,719 --> 00:36:13,040
Speaker 1: Let's double down. What did anybody try, like a triple

657
00:36:13,080 --> 00:36:15,799
Speaker 1: barreled cannon. I think they have that at Burger King, right.

658
00:36:16,760 --> 00:36:19,920
Speaker 1: It comes with comes with cheese, yes, but there's a

659
00:36:19,920 --> 00:36:23,560
Speaker 1: special sauce. But yeah, So this cannon, it was just

660
00:36:23,640 --> 00:36:27,920
Speaker 1: a total failure. But Galenland believed so passionately in his invention.

661
00:36:28,000 --> 00:36:30,200
Speaker 1: He kept trying to make the case to the Confederate army.

662
00:36:30,480 --> 00:36:33,640
Speaker 1: The cannon was shipped from Athens, Georgia to Augusta, where

663
00:36:33,640 --> 00:36:36,640
Speaker 1: it was put into more testing because he really really

664
00:36:36,680 --> 00:36:40,200
Speaker 1: thought it would work. Ultimately, no, no, no, is what

665
00:36:40,239 --> 00:36:43,239
Speaker 1: the Confederate said. It was sent back to Athens. It

666
00:36:43,360 --> 00:36:46,520
Speaker 1: was used in battle, but just as a signal, so

667
00:36:46,640 --> 00:36:49,400
Speaker 1: kind of a warning shot to let let the Confederates

668
00:36:49,400 --> 00:36:52,880
Speaker 1: know that the U. S. Troops were arriving. So you know,

669
00:36:52,920 --> 00:36:55,440
Speaker 1: as as cannons are used. And you can see that

670
00:36:55,480 --> 00:36:57,880
Speaker 1: cannon today. It still sits in Athens, Georgia. It was

671
00:36:57,920 --> 00:37:00,839
Speaker 1: sold by the city for a while, luckily was not

672
00:37:00,920 --> 00:37:02,880
Speaker 1: scrapped or anything, and the city bought it again and

673
00:37:02,920 --> 00:37:06,520
Speaker 1: it now sits atop a hill in Athens, Georgia, right

674
00:37:06,560 --> 00:37:08,759
Speaker 1: next to city Hall. There's a little plaque. You can

675
00:37:08,840 --> 00:37:10,799
Speaker 1: kind of go look at it and say, that's weird.

676
00:37:11,000 --> 00:37:13,160
Speaker 1: Have you seen it? I have seen it. Yeah, see

677
00:37:13,200 --> 00:37:14,719
Speaker 1: I used to live in Athens and and this is

678
00:37:14,760 --> 00:37:16,839
Speaker 1: this is all ringing a bell when you were talking

679
00:37:16,840 --> 00:37:19,919
Speaker 1: about it, and I feel like I've I've seen it before. Yeah,

680
00:37:19,920 --> 00:37:22,959
Speaker 1: it's at the corner of College Avenue and uh what

681
00:37:23,360 --> 00:37:25,840
Speaker 1: not West Washington. I think corner of Clayton Street. I

682
00:37:25,880 --> 00:37:28,080
Speaker 1: think that's right. Yeah, and it's it's it's on the

683
00:37:28,120 --> 00:37:34,840
Speaker 1: northeastern corner, pointed straight up at the Yankees. Not that

684
00:37:34,880 --> 00:37:36,600
Speaker 1: it's a threat or anything. It doesn't work, and it

685
00:37:36,640 --> 00:37:39,839
Speaker 1: never worked, but you know, you might as well. Might

686
00:37:39,920 --> 00:37:43,520
Speaker 1: as well have the impotent rage represented in his statue.

687
00:37:44,360 --> 00:37:46,759
Speaker 1: Oh good, Christopher. Yeah, that's a great one. Yeah, if

688
00:37:46,760 --> 00:37:48,080
Speaker 1: you guys want to take a field trip, we'll just

689
00:37:48,120 --> 00:37:50,279
Speaker 1: hop on over to Athens. Let's go. I'm all about

690
00:37:50,280 --> 00:37:52,360
Speaker 1: I haven't been back in too long. It's a good place,

691
00:37:57,880 --> 00:38:01,359
Speaker 1: all right. Well, Um, I guess I'm gonna stick with

692
00:38:01,520 --> 00:38:05,520
Speaker 1: kind of retro futuristic kind of ones. Um, this one

693
00:38:05,719 --> 00:38:09,120
Speaker 1: is I'm just gonna call it the the hoverboard. Heard

694
00:38:09,160 --> 00:38:12,160
Speaker 1: of it? Yes, yes, yes, yeah. It turns out it

695
00:38:12,200 --> 00:38:13,960
Speaker 1: was real. So I feel like a lot of what

696
00:38:13,960 --> 00:38:15,960
Speaker 1: we're talking about, at least what you guys are talking about,

697
00:38:16,200 --> 00:38:17,839
Speaker 1: could come straight out of the Back to the Future movies.

698
00:38:17,880 --> 00:38:22,640
Speaker 1: You've got the flying cars, You've got a hoverboard, rocket bullets. Yeah, okay,

699
00:38:22,760 --> 00:38:24,839
Speaker 1: it's a hoverboard is a bit of a misnomer. It's

700
00:38:24,880 --> 00:38:29,160
Speaker 1: really more like a helicopter platform. Okay. So this is

701
00:38:29,239 --> 00:38:33,200
Speaker 1: something that was designed by the Hiller Company for the

702
00:38:33,320 --> 00:38:36,400
Speaker 1: US Navy. Originally it was called the v Z one

703
00:38:36,440 --> 00:38:41,320
Speaker 1: Pawnee and it's basically a disc um with fans underneath it.

704
00:38:41,360 --> 00:38:45,479
Speaker 1: And it used something called rotor duct technology. So here's

705
00:38:45,480 --> 00:38:48,080
Speaker 1: the interesting part about it. I also used something called

706
00:38:48,160 --> 00:38:50,440
Speaker 1: kinn esthetic control. Can you guys guess what that is?

707
00:38:51,200 --> 00:38:54,120
Speaker 1: Controlling by moving your body, That's right, Which is why

708
00:38:53,760 --> 00:38:57,520
Speaker 1: I think of the hoverboard. Um. So yeah, literally, a

709
00:38:57,600 --> 00:39:00,600
Speaker 1: person manning one of these things, or um piloting one

710
00:39:00,600 --> 00:39:03,920
Speaker 1: of these things rather would be standing atop the strange

711
00:39:03,960 --> 00:39:07,080
Speaker 1: little disk uh in kind of like a cage with

712
00:39:07,200 --> 00:39:10,319
Speaker 1: no controls except for a throttle. So all they had

713
00:39:10,320 --> 00:39:15,480
Speaker 1: control over was altitude. With an actual device uh. To navigate,

714
00:39:15,520 --> 00:39:17,440
Speaker 1: they have to lean to the left, lean to the right,

715
00:39:17,520 --> 00:39:20,080
Speaker 1: lean forward, lean backward, UM. And so it's almost like

716
00:39:20,080 --> 00:39:23,480
Speaker 1: a segue in that in that respect. UM. So they

717
00:39:23,560 --> 00:39:26,719
Speaker 1: definitely tested these. They had a prototype which was much

718
00:39:26,760 --> 00:39:29,719
Speaker 1: smaller than the second one. They kind of made the

719
00:39:29,760 --> 00:39:32,640
Speaker 1: whole thing a little bigger, added a little bit more stability.

720
00:39:32,680 --> 00:39:35,440
Speaker 1: And then the third one is massive, and it was

721
00:39:35,480 --> 00:39:38,120
Speaker 1: so massive that it wouldn't even allow you to do

722
00:39:38,160 --> 00:39:41,440
Speaker 1: the kinesthetic controls because it was just so unwieldy. A

723
00:39:41,480 --> 00:39:46,640
Speaker 1: group of guys exact exactly now, come back center go.

724
00:39:47,400 --> 00:39:48,920
Speaker 1: So they added a seat in to this one in

725
00:39:49,000 --> 00:39:52,520
Speaker 1: more traditional helicopter type controls, So there were actually some

726
00:39:52,880 --> 00:39:56,239
Speaker 1: steering capabilities on this third one. UM. So this was

727
00:39:56,320 --> 00:40:00,080
Speaker 1: in nineteen fifty three. The U. S. Navy's Office of

728
00:40:00,200 --> 00:40:06,840
Speaker 1: Naval Research essentially gave this company, Hiller Helicopters UM, a

729
00:40:07,040 --> 00:40:10,880
Speaker 1: contract to develop one of these. It was like twin

730
00:40:11,120 --> 00:40:15,359
Speaker 1: engine DUC did fan v t o L, which I

731
00:40:15,400 --> 00:40:18,640
Speaker 1: think we all agree stands for vertical takeoff and landing

732
00:40:20,480 --> 00:40:23,520
Speaker 1: no runway required. That's that's the one positive thing about

733
00:40:23,520 --> 00:40:27,560
Speaker 1: this this device. Well, also I imagined inspired a lot

734
00:40:27,560 --> 00:40:29,320
Speaker 1: of mega man villains and to me it sounds like

735
00:40:29,360 --> 00:40:31,920
Speaker 1: a kind of thing. It's right out of a Nighties

736
00:40:32,040 --> 00:40:37,200
Speaker 1: video game, which is like bad Guys fun flying platforms exactly. Unfortunately,

737
00:40:37,560 --> 00:40:41,240
Speaker 1: these things were very slow and they couldn't really figure

738
00:40:41,280 --> 00:40:44,680
Speaker 1: out like any kind of real practical use for it

739
00:40:44,719 --> 00:40:47,520
Speaker 1: in battle. UM there is in fact a video though.

740
00:40:47,800 --> 00:40:50,000
Speaker 1: I'd like to play a clip from UM of one

741
00:40:50,040 --> 00:40:57,239
Speaker 1: of the first flight tests of this thing. Oh, this

742
00:40:57,320 --> 00:40:59,120
Speaker 1: is quite a machine you have here. I suppose you

743
00:40:59,160 --> 00:41:02,160
Speaker 1: have come as close as anyone to operating a flying carpet.

744
00:41:02,239 --> 00:41:04,880
Speaker 1: How does it feel? Well, it feels fine. And the

745
00:41:04,960 --> 00:41:07,759
Speaker 1: nice thing about it's very easy to fly. What do

746
00:41:07,800 --> 00:41:11,760
Speaker 1: you think, phil is a truly revolutionary characteristic of this machine. Well,

747
00:41:11,800 --> 00:41:14,080
Speaker 1: I mentioned earlier it was so easy to fly. We

748
00:41:14,160 --> 00:41:15,800
Speaker 1: do it by shifting our weight, is the way we

749
00:41:15,840 --> 00:41:18,200
Speaker 1: control the aircraft. I say, but that you mean you

750
00:41:18,200 --> 00:41:21,640
Speaker 1: don't have any uh, mechanical controls that we normally think

751
00:41:21,640 --> 00:41:23,480
Speaker 1: of them in an aeroplane, such as a stick in

752
00:41:23,520 --> 00:41:26,600
Speaker 1: the rudder. Oh, we have a throttle, which all aircraft have,

753
00:41:27,400 --> 00:41:32,080
Speaker 1: but we control it by shifting our weight using our feet.

754
00:41:32,280 --> 00:41:34,880
Speaker 1: So yeah, again, he even says the interviewer, like, I

755
00:41:34,920 --> 00:41:37,720
Speaker 1: guess it is because close anyone's coming to the flying carpet.

756
00:41:37,880 --> 00:41:40,000
Speaker 1: It's all about the future, you know, it's all about

757
00:41:40,080 --> 00:41:43,839
Speaker 1: magic and technology. It's great, um, but yeah, they don't

758
00:41:43,880 --> 00:41:46,440
Speaker 1: go very high. They seem a little The guy keeps

759
00:41:46,440 --> 00:41:49,239
Speaker 1: talking about how easy it is to fly, but it

760
00:41:49,320 --> 00:41:51,759
Speaker 1: just doesn't seem like you could really get it to

761
00:41:51,840 --> 00:41:55,400
Speaker 1: go forward very quickly at all, or be very precise

762
00:41:55,480 --> 00:41:57,319
Speaker 1: in your movements on it, you know. Yeah, And it

763
00:41:57,360 --> 00:41:59,080
Speaker 1: seems like the kind of thing where if as you're

764
00:41:59,120 --> 00:42:01,440
Speaker 1: training people to use it, you would just break a

765
00:42:01,440 --> 00:42:04,000
Speaker 1: lot of them. And I also wonder what the point

766
00:42:04,040 --> 00:42:06,279
Speaker 1: of it is. I mean, if it doesn't go that high,

767
00:42:06,280 --> 00:42:10,000
Speaker 1: it can't be used for reconnaissance. If it moves as

768
00:42:10,040 --> 00:42:13,200
Speaker 1: you move, you probably can't use it like a heavy rifle,

769
00:42:13,239 --> 00:42:15,640
Speaker 1: because then you might, you know, throw yourself off and

770
00:42:15,680 --> 00:42:18,479
Speaker 1: it'll be like your round ship. Yeah exactly. You could

771
00:42:18,520 --> 00:42:22,879
Speaker 1: even sneeze, yeah, and just crash. So maybe it's more

772
00:42:23,040 --> 00:42:27,400
Speaker 1: of a proof of concept because one would imagine there

773
00:42:27,440 --> 00:42:33,000
Speaker 1: surely there would be ways to mitigate those issues. Even

774
00:42:33,040 --> 00:42:35,880
Speaker 1: just fixing one of those issues would make it a

775
00:42:35,960 --> 00:42:39,239
Speaker 1: more worthwhile investment by military, that's right, And of course

776
00:42:39,400 --> 00:42:42,759
Speaker 1: they did take them out of commission entirely by nine three,

777
00:42:42,880 --> 00:42:47,280
Speaker 1: but it did offer some pretty valuable information of research

778
00:42:47,360 --> 00:42:51,400
Speaker 1: wise for technology they would later use for more practical

779
00:42:51,640 --> 00:42:53,680
Speaker 1: vertical takeoff and landing planks, which which are a thing

780
00:42:54,680 --> 00:42:56,799
Speaker 1: I don't thought that was kind of cool. I agree, Yeah,

781
00:42:56,840 --> 00:42:58,560
Speaker 1: it's the kind of thing that reminds me too of

782
00:42:58,880 --> 00:43:03,040
Speaker 1: technology you supposedly coming from Project Bluebook and that investigation

783
00:43:03,080 --> 00:43:07,480
Speaker 1: into alien technology and area. This beard flying saucer stuff,

784
00:43:08,239 --> 00:43:09,960
Speaker 1: it kind of makes me think of that, and I

785
00:43:10,040 --> 00:43:12,600
Speaker 1: know it's not real, but I wish I had done

786
00:43:12,600 --> 00:43:16,520
Speaker 1: that could be. I was having such a tough time

787
00:43:17,400 --> 00:43:21,919
Speaker 1: off the air preparing for this episode because there's an

788
00:43:21,920 --> 00:43:29,080
Speaker 1: extensive list of ridiculous experiments but also very promising, somewhat

789
00:43:29,160 --> 00:43:33,600
Speaker 1: space age stuff that militarys have gotten up to in secret,

790
00:43:34,160 --> 00:43:37,400
Speaker 1: and I wanted to find one of the dumbest ideas,

791
00:43:38,000 --> 00:43:41,560
Speaker 1: not one that that has some promise, not one that's innovative.

792
00:43:41,680 --> 00:43:46,600
Speaker 1: Let's try something new. The dumbest, dumbest idea that I

793
00:43:46,680 --> 00:43:52,960
Speaker 1: found is the ball tank. The ball Tank tell me more,

794
00:43:53,440 --> 00:43:57,520
Speaker 1: it's just we are a family show. It's it's it's

795
00:43:57,520 --> 00:44:02,000
Speaker 1: a tank. It's been known alternately as the Cougle Banza

796
00:44:02,320 --> 00:44:06,640
Speaker 1: or the tumbleweed tank. The thing about this is we'll

797
00:44:06,640 --> 00:44:08,919
Speaker 1: start with one story. We'll start with the tumbleweed tank.

798
00:44:09,400 --> 00:44:13,040
Speaker 1: There's an inventor in Texas. His name is A. J. Richardson,

799
00:44:13,440 --> 00:44:17,359
Speaker 1: and in nineteen thirty six he he says, you know

800
00:44:17,920 --> 00:44:20,840
Speaker 1: the First World War, which they just called the World

801
00:44:20,840 --> 00:44:24,799
Speaker 1: War at that time. Yeah, can you imagine calling the

802
00:44:24,880 --> 00:44:29,319
Speaker 1: First World War back then? It was? He said it was. Well,

803
00:44:29,480 --> 00:44:34,040
Speaker 1: he was haunted frankly by the sheer mass of human

804
00:44:34,120 --> 00:44:39,000
Speaker 1: suffering and carnage and death that occurred. And in his estimation,

805
00:44:39,680 --> 00:44:42,680
Speaker 1: one of the reasons so many people died in World

806
00:44:42,680 --> 00:44:48,040
Speaker 1: War One was because of trench warfare. People couldn't aim

807
00:44:48,560 --> 00:44:51,920
Speaker 1: very well. They could just blindly throw mortars towards the

808
00:44:52,040 --> 00:44:55,319
Speaker 1: enemies trench and hope they hit someone who is a

809
00:44:55,320 --> 00:44:58,800
Speaker 1: soldier rather than a civilian, rather than a medical personnel

810
00:44:58,840 --> 00:45:01,480
Speaker 1: and all this other stuff. So he said, the best

811
00:45:01,520 --> 00:45:08,120
Speaker 1: idea would be too send heavily armored motorized bunkers across

812
00:45:08,200 --> 00:45:11,480
Speaker 1: that no man's land that kills zone between the trenches,

813
00:45:12,360 --> 00:45:15,240
Speaker 1: because again, I just want to emphasize this is important.

814
00:45:15,320 --> 00:45:18,440
Speaker 1: Later he thought the main problem was that you couldn't

815
00:45:18,520 --> 00:45:22,640
Speaker 1: really see who you were firing at. And so he

816
00:45:22,840 --> 00:45:26,000
Speaker 1: decided that he would invent this thing called the tumbleweed tank.

817
00:45:26,360 --> 00:45:29,640
Speaker 1: It is a sphere. It has room for three people.

818
00:45:30,280 --> 00:45:34,000
Speaker 1: It has each of the three people are manning one gun.

819
00:45:34,600 --> 00:45:38,400
Speaker 1: I would like to show you, gentlemen, a picture of

820
00:45:38,480 --> 00:45:42,680
Speaker 1: this of this design. I want you to get a

821
00:45:42,719 --> 00:45:47,040
Speaker 1: look at it because the guns you see, the guns

822
00:45:47,080 --> 00:45:51,439
Speaker 1: you see have a lot of random placement. There's one

823
00:45:51,520 --> 00:45:54,360
Speaker 1: pointing toward the air, there's one pointing towards the ground,

824
00:45:54,600 --> 00:45:56,439
Speaker 1: and then there's one just out there on the right,

825
00:45:56,760 --> 00:45:58,400
Speaker 1: and the one on the right can swivel. By the

826
00:45:58,440 --> 00:46:03,400
Speaker 1: way ours in the newer Jurassic Park movies, I guess

827
00:46:03,400 --> 00:46:06,360
Speaker 1: it is. Yeah, yeah, because those are two seaters two seaters,

828
00:46:06,360 --> 00:46:10,600
Speaker 1: so this one is an uncomfortable three seater. And just

829
00:46:10,719 --> 00:46:13,920
Speaker 1: from that initial picture you guys saw, the tumble we

830
00:46:14,040 --> 00:46:16,600
Speaker 1: tank has some problems. Yeah. This is the kind of

831
00:46:16,600 --> 00:46:19,919
Speaker 1: thing that should just be drawn and then immediately torn

832
00:46:20,040 --> 00:46:24,880
Speaker 1: up to roll. If there's random guns poking out every

833
00:46:24,880 --> 00:46:28,279
Speaker 1: which way, do they collapse. It has a ring it

834
00:46:28,400 --> 00:46:32,880
Speaker 1: is propelled by, so it only goes forward and back.

835
00:46:33,440 --> 00:46:36,880
Speaker 1: It doesn't roll in like, not even degrees. But the

836
00:46:37,040 --> 00:46:41,000
Speaker 1: entire spherical gyroscopic motion. It just goes straight and back

837
00:46:41,000 --> 00:46:43,960
Speaker 1: and forward. Let me let me correct myself there in

838
00:46:44,000 --> 00:46:48,560
Speaker 1: the diagram from what we understand the actual the sphere

839
00:46:48,560 --> 00:46:53,400
Speaker 1: wherein the soldiers are located, that is enclosed within two

840
00:46:53,560 --> 00:46:57,520
Speaker 1: rotating outer shells that are each like bowls around the thing.

841
00:46:58,160 --> 00:47:02,440
Speaker 1: So it can it can turn a little bit in theory.

842
00:47:02,520 --> 00:47:05,399
Speaker 1: So it's sort of like a deadly gerbil ball kind

843
00:47:05,440 --> 00:47:10,919
Speaker 1: of hamster mechanism with guns and men. And it had

844
00:47:11,000 --> 00:47:13,359
Speaker 1: some it had some good points. It could be very

845
00:47:13,400 --> 00:47:17,960
Speaker 1: easily sealed against poison gas attacks. And Richardson also thought

846
00:47:18,000 --> 00:47:21,160
Speaker 1: it would present a much smaller target for enemy shells

847
00:47:21,600 --> 00:47:24,200
Speaker 1: and that they would glance off of the curved sides.

848
00:47:24,760 --> 00:47:29,040
Speaker 1: But remember how we mentioned the part where his primary

849
00:47:29,080 --> 00:47:32,120
Speaker 1: beef with World War One was that people were just

850
00:47:32,160 --> 00:47:36,440
Speaker 1: blindly throwing You couldn't see people. So this was his

851
00:47:36,480 --> 00:47:40,480
Speaker 1: way around that somehow. So the guys sealed inside this tank,

852
00:47:40,680 --> 00:47:46,120
Speaker 1: Christopher frantically firing guns in all directions I could not

853
00:47:46,239 --> 00:47:49,600
Speaker 1: see outside. They had no idea what was going on.

854
00:47:50,480 --> 00:47:53,480
Speaker 1: So so it would maybe work if you could somehow

855
00:47:53,600 --> 00:47:56,239
Speaker 1: catapult one of these balls into the middle of your

856
00:47:56,360 --> 00:48:00,920
Speaker 1: enemy and just shoot in willy nilly directions. This just

857
00:48:00,960 --> 00:48:04,080
Speaker 1: sounds like a terrible, terrible idea. I mean, imagine, Yeah,

858
00:48:04,200 --> 00:48:07,239
Speaker 1: terrible is the right word. Imagine how terrifying this is

859
00:48:07,280 --> 00:48:10,680
Speaker 1: for the operators they can't see outside. How terrifying it

860
00:48:10,760 --> 00:48:13,400
Speaker 1: is for the enemy, what the hell is that? Are

861
00:48:13,480 --> 00:48:16,000
Speaker 1: they even aiming for us? How terrifying it is for

862
00:48:16,280 --> 00:48:20,319
Speaker 1: nearby troops who are like, hey, whoa, whoa, I'm on

863
00:48:20,360 --> 00:48:22,640
Speaker 1: your side. The only way I could imagine this would

864
00:48:22,640 --> 00:48:25,120
Speaker 1: be worse is if instead of a track, they all

865
00:48:25,120 --> 00:48:27,200
Speaker 1: had to run inside to make it going, you know,

866
00:48:27,280 --> 00:48:30,040
Speaker 1: like those big kind of translucent plastic balls you see

867
00:48:30,040 --> 00:48:32,960
Speaker 1: on America's Funny some videos or whatever. Orders orbing, that's

868
00:48:33,000 --> 00:48:36,720
Speaker 1: what what zorbeing zero are? What do you think that like? Furries?

869
00:48:37,360 --> 00:48:41,719
Speaker 1: Zorbean zero R B I n G. It's where you

870
00:48:41,760 --> 00:48:44,920
Speaker 1: get inside that giant plastic ball orbing zorbean? Is that

871
00:48:45,000 --> 00:48:48,919
Speaker 1: an acronym? And then they fight? Uh yeah they fight? Yeah, Yeah,

872
00:48:49,040 --> 00:48:51,959
Speaker 1: they've they've fight. I don't know if it's I don't

873
00:48:52,000 --> 00:48:55,120
Speaker 1: know if it's n acronym. I know it's it's meant

874
00:48:55,160 --> 00:48:58,239
Speaker 1: to cite the fact that you're rolling downhill in an

875
00:48:58,360 --> 00:49:03,439
Speaker 1: orb so like maybe zero gravity or I think there's

876
00:49:03,440 --> 00:49:08,239
Speaker 1: but I think there's proper gravity. Well neither. I've also

877
00:49:08,320 --> 00:49:11,439
Speaker 1: seen them on water. Yes, you can get inside those

878
00:49:11,480 --> 00:49:15,839
Speaker 1: on on water and just roll them around, but like that,

879
00:49:16,080 --> 00:49:18,719
Speaker 1: but you can see through those, which I think is

880
00:49:18,800 --> 00:49:25,920
Speaker 1: key here. So aquas orbing, rhodocopter, battle rocket ship, bullet failure,

881
00:49:26,040 --> 00:49:29,319
Speaker 1: disaster war. That's what we're talking here, That's what we're talking.

882
00:49:29,320 --> 00:49:32,919
Speaker 1: Oh there's one other point. We do know that there

883
00:49:32,960 --> 00:49:35,680
Speaker 1: was at least one other group of people who thought

884
00:49:35,800 --> 00:49:39,440
Speaker 1: this ball tank idea was just the top notch military

885
00:49:39,440 --> 00:49:42,840
Speaker 1: concept of the time. It was Germany. We know that

886
00:49:42,960 --> 00:49:49,279
Speaker 1: during World War Two Germany designed that google pounds or

887
00:49:49,640 --> 00:49:53,160
Speaker 1: the ball tank, and we don't know what they meant

888
00:49:53,160 --> 00:49:57,120
Speaker 1: to do with it. We don't know how often it

889
00:49:57,239 --> 00:50:00,040
Speaker 1: was used, clearly not that much, but we haven't on

890
00:50:00,120 --> 00:50:03,080
Speaker 1: any plans or documents about it. Only one survived the war,

891
00:50:03,239 --> 00:50:07,520
Speaker 1: was captured in Manchuria. You can go see it in

892
00:50:07,560 --> 00:50:12,799
Speaker 1: the Kubinka Museum's collection of German vehicles. It was apparently

893
00:50:12,920 --> 00:50:19,000
Speaker 1: used by some unfortunate German and the Germans, in their part,

894
00:50:19,120 --> 00:50:22,680
Speaker 1: did include a small visor or a small slit so

895
00:50:22,800 --> 00:50:27,680
Speaker 1: the operator could see what they were. Yeah, they learned

896
00:50:27,680 --> 00:50:29,920
Speaker 1: from the tumbleweed tank, and that's what they learned is

897
00:50:30,239 --> 00:50:33,799
Speaker 1: just let let them look outside. Just it feels like

898
00:50:33,840 --> 00:50:36,239
Speaker 1: there's a lot more lessons to be learned from the

899
00:50:36,280 --> 00:50:40,120
Speaker 1: ball tank. This was such a cool idea for an episode.

900
00:50:40,200 --> 00:50:43,480
Speaker 1: Thank you for bringing this to us. Yeah, always a

901
00:50:43,520 --> 00:50:45,319
Speaker 1: pleasure to have you in the studio and kind of

902
00:50:45,440 --> 00:50:51,080
Speaker 1: kick the ball tank around. So, speaking of kicking, if

903
00:50:51,120 --> 00:50:54,160
Speaker 1: any ridiculous historians want to kick it with me over

904
00:50:54,239 --> 00:50:56,719
Speaker 1: on another show this week, you guys, Okay, if I

905
00:50:56,719 --> 00:51:00,759
Speaker 1: plug something, please plug away, So ridiculous historians, If you're

906
00:51:00,760 --> 00:51:02,960
Speaker 1: listening to this show, I know you like learning about

907
00:51:03,000 --> 00:51:07,520
Speaker 1: stuff in the way back, So point your podcast machines

908
00:51:07,560 --> 00:51:10,200
Speaker 1: over to this day in History Class. It's one of

909
00:51:10,200 --> 00:51:12,800
Speaker 1: our sister podcasts here on the House Stuff Works Network.

910
00:51:13,040 --> 00:51:17,080
Speaker 1: It's a daily history show, just really quick, five minute

911
00:51:17,080 --> 00:51:21,239
Speaker 1: tidbits of one thing that happened that day in history. Now.

912
00:51:21,320 --> 00:51:24,160
Speaker 1: Normally the host is Tracy V. Wilson, who you probably

913
00:51:24,160 --> 00:51:26,480
Speaker 1: know from stuff you missed in history class. She's out

914
00:51:26,520 --> 00:51:29,000
Speaker 1: this week. So the week that you are listening to

915
00:51:29,080 --> 00:51:31,480
Speaker 1: this in your podcast machine, I'm going to be guest

916
00:51:31,520 --> 00:51:34,120
Speaker 1: hosting over on this day in history class, So head

917
00:51:34,160 --> 00:51:36,080
Speaker 1: over that way and you can find all sorts of cool,

918
00:51:36,120 --> 00:51:39,120
Speaker 1: weird things that happened every single day of the year,

919
00:51:39,560 --> 00:51:43,600
Speaker 1: day by day. Awesome, congratulations, and we are definitely going

920
00:51:43,640 --> 00:51:46,320
Speaker 1: to check it out. We we can also go ahead

921
00:51:46,320 --> 00:51:50,239
Speaker 1: and maybe post a link to that Ridiculous Historians. Yeah,

922
00:51:50,280 --> 00:51:53,000
Speaker 1: we'll share that on the Facebook page. Ridiculous Historians will

923
00:51:53,000 --> 00:51:55,439
Speaker 1: point you in that direction. It's a great show. I'm

924
00:51:55,440 --> 00:51:57,120
Speaker 1: only on it for a week, but you should definitely

925
00:51:57,160 --> 00:51:59,520
Speaker 1: take a listen. It'll be going through some cool changes

926
00:51:59,520 --> 00:52:00,960
Speaker 1: in the coming or two. I think we're going to

927
00:52:01,000 --> 00:52:03,400
Speaker 1: be getting a little more creative, but still a daily

928
00:52:03,440 --> 00:52:06,080
Speaker 1: podcast kind of updating you just on the things you

929
00:52:06,120 --> 00:52:07,920
Speaker 1: need to know about what's happened in the past and

930
00:52:08,040 --> 00:52:11,160
Speaker 1: how that affects our days today. Awesome, and thank you

931
00:52:11,440 --> 00:52:14,600
Speaker 1: so much for coming on this show. This is going

932
00:52:14,640 --> 00:52:18,680
Speaker 1: to be one of a number of recurring appearances. Yeah,

933
00:52:18,760 --> 00:52:22,279
Speaker 1: we're gonna mean there's a regular thing. I'll be around. Fantastic. Well,

934
00:52:22,400 --> 00:52:26,239
Speaker 1: let's as always thank our super producer, Casey pegram Um.

935
00:52:26,280 --> 00:52:29,120
Speaker 1: I think we've already thanked Christopher enough, but I'm gonna

936
00:52:29,160 --> 00:52:31,200
Speaker 1: do it one more time. Feel mere. Thank you Christopher

937
00:52:33,400 --> 00:52:36,960
Speaker 1: going sorb? Now do I have a choice. It doesn't

938
00:52:36,960 --> 00:52:39,960
Speaker 1: sound like an Alien Overlord character. There is a zorb

939
00:52:39,960 --> 00:52:45,640
Speaker 1: of the great I think, Oh wait, this works out

940
00:52:45,680 --> 00:52:48,759
Speaker 1: with you? It does? Yeah, Thanks to you as well,

941
00:52:48,800 --> 00:52:51,600
Speaker 1: Ben Hey, Thanks to you looking dapper as ever today, sir,

942
00:52:51,880 --> 00:52:56,080
Speaker 1: and thanks to Alex Williams who composed our track. Thank

943
00:52:56,120 --> 00:52:59,000
Speaker 1: you for checking out the show. We hope that you

944
00:52:59,120 --> 00:53:01,640
Speaker 1: enjoyed it, and we hope that this is kindled a

945
00:53:01,719 --> 00:53:06,799
Speaker 1: spark of inspiration. Let us know what strange military contraptions

946
00:53:06,800 --> 00:53:12,120
Speaker 1: were otherwise ridiculous inventions you have run across. We will

947
00:53:12,200 --> 00:53:14,720
Speaker 1: be all ears. We would love to hear this stuff.

948
00:53:14,719 --> 00:53:16,839
Speaker 1: And you know we're of course that you go out

949
00:53:16,880 --> 00:53:20,440
Speaker 1: saying we're not. We're not really picking on these inventors.

950
00:53:20,480 --> 00:53:23,799
Speaker 1: A lot of these ideas seem very promising and the

951
00:53:23,840 --> 00:53:26,000
Speaker 1: only way you can learn whether or not they're feasible

952
00:53:26,440 --> 00:53:28,960
Speaker 1: is to test them, you know what I mean. Rocket

953
00:53:28,960 --> 00:53:32,240
Speaker 1: Bullets sounds like a tremendous idea. It sounds really cool

954
00:53:32,320 --> 00:53:34,359
Speaker 1: and one of my favorite bands and one of your

955
00:53:34,360 --> 00:53:39,560
Speaker 1: favorite bands, Rocket Bullets. If they don't exist yet, they

956
00:53:39,760 --> 00:53:43,040
Speaker 1: absolutely need to, um so please come and hang out

957
00:53:43,080 --> 00:53:47,400
Speaker 1: with us next time when we talk about flowers as currency,

958
00:53:47,600 --> 00:53:51,960
Speaker 1: or you know, some sort of like bitcoin bubble. We'll

959
00:53:51,960 --> 00:53:52,399
Speaker 1: see you then