top 200 commentsshow 500

[–]outoftouch49 9869 points9870 points 3 (263 children)

It's called a flip-flop winch and it's a very handy piece of knowledge to keep in your memory banks.


[–]GuyWithRealFacts 8121 points8122 points 34 (187 children)

All throughout history these types of devices were used to move heavy objects with minimal effort - possibly including a similar setup for Stonehenge!

There are old scars in the standing rocks that indicate that a rope was used and they were dragged for a brief distance. Some of the larger stones in the ground also show signs that a large object was dragged across them. The actual tools are long gone so it’s nothing more than really likely speculation.

Still it was the genius of human ingenuity that saved us as a species. The aliens who tasked humans with building Stonehenge did it under the threat of taking over the planet if we couldn’t do such a simple task after they built the pyramids for us. They watched in awe as humans moved those giant rocks with only a few men and with a tip of their caps they flew off to mars and wiped those Martian idiots out after they could barely even carve a crappy face.

[–]DedlySpyder 759 points760 points  (26 children)

Reading 1st half: Ya this sounds reasonable.

Start to read 2nd half: Oh this is a /u/GuyWithRealFacts comment, isn't it?

[–]StopReadingMyUser 240 points241 points  (8 children)

I have this image on standby for when I encounter this guy...

[–]andesajf 71 points72 points  (4 children)

I thought that link was going to be the "had us in the first half" guy.

[–]AbsolutelyUnlikely 18 points19 points  (3 children)

I thought it was going to just be a penis

[–]RivRise 10 points11 points  (0 children)

That's fair.

[–]sevillada 30 points31 points  (2 children)

He's a guy with facts, not a guy with only facts, there's a big difference

[–]tyrmidden 4 points5 points  (1 child)

Also not necessarily reliable facts.

[–]Zarrakh 1238 points1239 points  (55 children)

I love you.

[–]agree-with-you 415 points416 points  (44 children)

I love you both

[–]SwifferWetJets 305 points306 points  (38 children)

I used to be in love once...

[–]Quirky_Koala 790 points791 points  (17 children)

Perhaps your lever wasn't long enough

[–]The-doctore 101 points102 points  (1 child)

I mean if his shoes are anything to go by...

[–]jooes 84 points85 points  (8 children)

They always blame the lever and never the fulcrum, smh...

[–]liveslowdiesoft 22 points23 points  (7 children)

[–]Azurenightsky 12 points13 points  (4 children)

Does that make the furthest part of the universe simultaneously an incel far removed from all universal pussy but also brutally and necessarily a male energy going it's own way?

[–]grantrules 11 points12 points  (8 children)

I wanna know what love is

[–]Tonedefff 9 points10 points  (4 children)

I want you to show me

[–]dirtymikentheboyss 6 points7 points  (1 child)

I wanna feel what love is

I know you can show me

Edit: tried to improve on perfection . Fucked it

[–]naoife 5 points6 points  (0 children)

No "and" man. Dont add words to perfection

[–]LordBalderdash 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Love is wanting to be loved.

[–]midgetman303 3 points4 points  (1 child)

Then I took an arrow to the knee

[–]iroxnoah 32 points33 points  (2 children)

I have you tagged as notorious liar in all caps. I have no idea why, this all checks out.

[–]vizz1 22 points23 points  (1 child)

“Show me what you gottttt.”

[–]degelia 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I’m going to worship the giant head in the sky if that’s ok with you

[–]GazaSpartaTing 17 points18 points  (3 children)

Can confirm these are facts. (I listen to JRE)

[–]Halfwombat 5 points6 points  (2 children)

It's entirely possible

[–]eperezrubio1 2 points3 points  (1 child)

Name a more iconic duo than Jamie and pulling that up.

[–]championplaya64 8 points9 points  (0 children)

God mother fucking damn it, I got about halfway before I decided to check your username

[–]Checksout4D 13 points14 points  (2 children)

He had us in the first half I’m not going to lie.

[–]daimposter 2 points3 points  (0 children)

and with a tip of their fedoras


[–]somethingnew_orelse 18 points19 points  (18 children)

stonhenge was rebuilt in the 1900s with machines and concrete

[–]JJAB91 24 points25 points  (14 children)

Tomatoes didn't exist until the 1960's when Big Veg needed a new product to sell to the unsuspecting populace.

[–]3x3x7x13x23x37 7 points8 points  (11 children)

Wait i thought this was corn

[–]3x3x7x13x23x37 12 points13 points  (6 children)

Oh my bad, corn was brought along by the aliens when they built the pyramids,but not the ones in Egypt, the ones in Central America, which is why corn comes from there

[–]ryanhedden1 17 points18 points  (2 children)

Aliens were invented in the late 40s to give area 51 gas stations cool memorabilia to sell

[–]Tootsgaloots 7 points8 points  (0 children)

The original pyramid schemers

[–]somethingnew_orelse 2 points3 points  (0 children)

yeah alright but the stonehenge thing is legit

[–]Demonweed 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Corn is just a clever disguise worn by cob infiltrators. If cobs just started sprouting up all over the place, we would know what to do about the problem. Covering themselves in edible grains has us literally planting field after field of cobs, providing them with fertilizer, and protecting them from pests. They're already in control and we never even fired a shot!

[–]RovingRaft 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Big Veg genetically modified the plant that the potato was derived from to create tomatoes

But the plant is poisonous, they're trying to hide that fact, Big Veg plans our deaths

[–]Summerie 281 points282 points  (24 children)

The only thing that scares me a bit is how much tension is on that line. I’ve spent a lot of time as a deckhand, and have seen a line snap. It releases with a ton of force, like it was shot out of a gun. With a motorized winch of course you can stand back and let the machine do the work, but with this one, you are part of the machine, so you have to get right in there.

Definitely a great thing to know if you are in an emergency situation, but maybe don’t get out there and try it for fun, and make sure you don’t have an old weathered rope that you’re working with.

[–]skeuser 148 points149 points  (8 children)

Easy fix for that. Drape a jacket or a pair of jeans over the line. When it snaps, the weight will dampen the whip of the rope. It’s common practice in the 4x4 community and they make weighted ‘blankets’ just for that purpose.

[–]Summerie 64 points65 points  (3 children)

A line damper might help, depending on where the breaking point is on the line.

Keep in mind that this is a bit different than a regular winch situation. When you are 4x4ing and get stuck, you tie the cable to a solid anchor tree, which comes from the winch on the front of your vehicle, and you pull yourself out. A line damper goes between the halfway point and the tree, so that it holds the line back from snapping back at the vehicle. Only the person who operates the winch on the vehicle needs protection, because everyone else can stay safely out of the way.

With the system OP posted, there is at least one person at the halfway point, flipping logs. The line could snap either near the tree or near the vehicle, and there is a person right there in the middle. The line could snap right next to the person in the middle point, and snap them on the way out.

I wouldn’t call it an “easy fix” in this situation, because there are more variables. In this situation, the tension and the person who needs protection are right in the very center of the action.

[–]zoomski 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Goddamn the things I learn from Reddit.

[–]p_saw 29 points30 points  (9 children)

Ropes won't fuck you up like an actual cable will. These guys are fine.

That's why synthetic ropes have become more common on winches, because they aren't as dangerous or prone to corrosion like steel cables.

[–]Summerie 29 points30 points  (8 children)

Synthetic ropes are less likely to corrode, but they also stretch, which means the snapback will be greater if it lets go. There are training videos the navy uses, that use crash test dummies to show you the force of the snapback from a common 3 strand poly rope. It can definitely do some serious damage.

Cable of course terrible if it snaps, but it probably wouldn’t be able to be used in this two log method anyway.

[–]x445xb 8 points9 points  (1 child)

The synthetic ropes used in winches are Dyneema/Spectra which is very light for it's strength and doesn't stretch much. The recoil force is relatively low if they do snap. Definitely lower than steel cable, polyester or nylon ropes.

[–]Herkentyu_cico 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Yup. Nearly forgot this!

[–]outoftouch49 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Saw that in the Navy, it's a real danger.

[–]waitingtodiesoon 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I saw die hard 3 and Ghost Ship. High tense wires snapping is scary

[–]work_account42 32 points33 points  (0 children)

Thank you fr the link. That was great & ingenious. Never heard of that before.

[–]wowlolcat 53 points54 points  (2 children)


[–]kyoorius 4 points5 points  (5 children)

Wondering what kind of unfamiliar bird call that was. Where we this video taken?

[–]jhenry922 5 points6 points  (2 children)

I moved a 700 lb slab of stone on a pair of sawhorses on to some cinder block and reinforced concrete piers I built for them a total of 6 feet

[–]King_ofthe_Yeti 6 points7 points  (1 child)

I am understanding your words independently from the sentence but I am getting lost in the context. You moved a 700lb slab to cinder blocks & reinforced piers that you built up to 6ft. What doesn’t that mean? I have zero landscaping or construction experience.

[–]tobinoxdz 2225 points2226 points  (14 children)

My dumbass was wondering how that’s gonna move all those rocks

[–]ninjaplatapus94 596 points597 points  (3 children)

I sat watching for a looooong time before I even noticed the truck

[–]siccoblue 153 points154 points  (0 children)

Oh thank fucking God it wasn't just me, was sitting there like "well those sticks don't seem so hard to move, how is this impressive?"

Then I realized and remembered what an absolute idiot I am

[–]Loripie 76 points77 points  (0 children)

Me too!! I’m embarrassed at how long it took me for figure out there was a rope....or a truck.

[–]cptutorow 28 points29 points  (2 children)

I was convinced it was one of those gifs that are on a loop to fool the user into watching a for real 15 second gif for a minute+. As soon as I was about to scroll I saw the truck and truly felt stupid 😂😂

[–]send_me_your_traps 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I thought they were moving the sticks...

[–]XanteBoone 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I thought they were using a really complex method to wrap the poles in rope... For some reason that I can't explain 😂

[–]ok123jump 1001 points1002 points  (53 children)

Wow! This might be one of the most brilliant things I’ve seen in a long time. It’s simple and can be done in many places. Wow.

This belongs in /r/LifeHacks

Edit: corrected subreddit.

[–]regnad__kcin 400 points401 points  (30 children)

if you left me stranded for a year I'd never come up with something this clever. man my ancestors would be so damn disappointed in me.

[–]SheriffBartholomew 154 points155 points  (12 children)

The mother of all invention is necessity.

[–]emptyrowboat 62 points63 points  (3 children)

what if the thing I need most is to stop being a terrible inventor

[–]wait_what_how_do_I 13 points14 points  (0 children)

You just need to invent a mother.

[–]Realtrain 17 points18 points  (2 children)

And the father is laziness.

[–]pacman529 2 points3 points  (0 children)

When I was thinking about joining the military, my dad, who served in the Navy in Vietnam, gave me a piece of advice. He said something to the effect of "Son, if you go to basic, find the laziest man in your platoon, and become his best friend. Because he will be the guy who figures out the easiest way to do the shit tasks they give you." I didn't end up joining up, and years later I came to the realization that I might have been that guy.

[–]grummun 2 points3 points  (1 child)

Got damn it bothers me that you decided to put your own spin on the syntax

[–]Water-Ninja 30 points31 points  (10 children)

Don’t be so sure

[–]EveningTechnology 28 points29 points  (7 children)

Lets test it out. Where should we leave him?

[–]jchabotte 3 points4 points  (0 children)

“Take him to Detroit.”

[–]WhoWantsPizzza 3 points4 points  (1 child)

Damn, You're right. Even if I had 2 years, I wouldn't come up with something this clever.

[–]VerneAsimov 4 points5 points  (1 child)

Something to be said that you live in a world where this is extremely rare to happen. We have tools 100s of times better.

[–]anonymouspurveyor 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Don't be so hard on yourself.

Your ancestors could have been just as not clever as you too! It was probably like Newton's ancestors that made this shit.

[–]NetSage 2 points3 points  (0 children)

We're social creatures for a reason. You only need one person to not be a complete idiot to save a tribe.

[–]FreudsPoorAnus 17 points18 points  (3 children)

i would really like subreddit that has stuff like this. lpt is cool and all, but...i'd like practical 'hey you're on your own' tips. this is for sure a helpful video for an emergency, i'd like to see more similar to it.

[–]happyman91 10 points11 points  (2 children)

/r/lifeprotips is for giving advice to people who are scared of literally every social situation

[–]PioneerStandard 651 points652 points  (17 children)

Upvote for physics.

[–]SucreBrun 133 points134 points  (4 children)

Upvote for psychics (I saw that coming).

[–]plagueisthedumb 38 points39 points  (2 children)

I bet you dont buy small shirts, only shirts for Mediums.

[–]SucreBrun 13 points14 points  (1 child)

And that's precisely how you find the happy medium.

[–]7165015874 2 points3 points  (0 children)

as all things should be

[–]toth42 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Have you seen this guy? He places and raises 20ton pillars upright by himself: https://youtu.be/E5pZ7uR6v8c

[–]JeffCarr 146 points147 points  (1 child)

Give me a lever long enough, and a place to stand, and I will break my lever --Tom Weller

[–]solzhen 259 points260 points  (49 children)

That’s some Eagle Scout shit.

[–]LonelyMolecule 96 points97 points  (45 children)

I think it's beyond eagle scout. My classmate just got eagle scout and all they do is build chairs, tables, paint for the community. haha not to downgrade eagle scouts. They're amazing. But not everything that they do are practical. Put them in a farm in asia. We'll see how they do. Farm work is very taxing tbh. Especially in the summer.

[–]Hawxchampion 113 points114 points  (18 children)

Eagle Scout here, it varies vastly from troop to troop. The troop I was in placed a lot of importance in knots, lashings, etc and part of my project was to build a set of natural stone stairs up a short dirt hill. I learned plenty of practical skills, it just depends on the troop's leadership. Every year we went on a survival campout where we were in a group of 3 and had to build a shelter by cutting down trees and using branches and leaves, cooking our food with a fire we build, stuff like that.

Many scouts take the easy route getting their Eagle, like painting a school or building furniture for a school. Not meaning to devalue their projects or anything, but it's partly the attitude of the scout and partly the troop's encouragement of more involved projects.

[–]gcso 61 points62 points  (6 children)

My only skill is I’m really good at starting fires. So, every time we camp with new people I start the fire really fast and get it going pretty good. Someone always comments on it and I love telling them I’m an Eagle Scout and watching their eyes light up. Then I tell them I’m really not and then they go back to being disappointed in me.

[–]Thrifticted 5 points6 points  (6 children)

I build things like that for work. What were your requirements, materials? Sounds like a really fun eagle scout project!

[–]Hawxchampion 6 points7 points  (5 children)

It was fun to plan, it took a lot of time and outside consultation to plan out everything though.

I acquired the natural stone from a friend of my troop that had scraps that I could have for free. We dug a hole where the steps would be and used gravel and concrete to secure the steps. The base step had postholes dug below it with rebar and concrete connecting it to the step. It took two days to complete I believe, I don't remember all the details because this was 4 years ago.

[–]TheDarkMusician 2 points3 points  (1 child)

I think you should give a little more credit to the less laborious projects, all depending on their attitude. My project was just an instrument drive to collect musical instruments for poor students. It may not have been a survival based thing or a laborious task, but I now have the mindset to know how to lead, organize a massive project step by step, and carry it out.
Now compare that to someone who got handed the project and all the details? Yeah, they didn’t learn much.

[–]gibbaroo 11 points12 points  (4 children)

2014 Eagle Scout here. I’d die left alone in the wilderness for a week or more, all these other guys must have been through much more thorough programs than me.

But I do want to reiterate what another poster said, these days it’s more about public service and how they approach it rather than learning a specific rigid set of skills beyond the general merit badges.

[–]yuccamoth 7 points8 points  (0 children)

That’s not at all what they do. As u/Raice19 said, those projects are not about what they actually are, they are to give leadership. Sure, most people do stuff like that for their Eagle Scout project, but I think you have the wrong idea of exactly how much work an Eagle Scout has to do.

[–]Raice19 37 points38 points  (9 children)

uh no, that is nowhere near what Eagle is capable of. what you describe is merely a leadership project required as part of the rank to demonstrate leadership and planning skills. there is a good amount of work that goes into that alone. Eagle Scouts are proficient in first aid/lifesaving, camping/survival skills, basic life skills, and the list goes on and on.

you can see through the requirements for all ranks here.

as someone who is on the cusp of becoming Eagle, it did strike a bit of a nerve to read that

[–]abeardancing 22 points23 points  (3 children)

I still remember most of the important bits I learned in Boy Scouts and that was well over 30 years ago.

Finish strong! Not many make it to Eagle and it's a HELL of a life accomplishment.

[–]Scout_it_Out 6 points7 points  (0 children)

To this day, every time I catch myself using a knife incorrectly I say a little silent sorry to my totin' chip.

[–]Raice19 6 points7 points  (1 child)

honestly I could care less whether I get the rank or not, what I've learned and gotten to experience is any day more valuable than some badge and a cool name

i still want it tho

[–]abeardancing 9 points10 points  (0 children)

You do care and you should care! It's a manifestation of all that hard work and is something you can take absolute pride in for the rest of your life!

[–]DeepSeaDynamo 8 points9 points  (0 children)

I bet you really love all the kids whos parents pretty much do most of the real work for them, after seeing 3 of those get it I lost all my drive to even try because I would have had to do it all myself.

[–]Bojangly7 2 points3 points  (1 child)

This is not true at all haha. Either that or your classmate had as bad troop.

I'm an eagle scout and we learned a lot of survival skills. Knots, lashings, fire making, fishing, life saving, first aid. Pretty much every skill you need to survive in the wild is taught through scouts

[–]LonelyMolecule 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Prolly. My classmate comes late, does not dress appropriately. He doesn't finish classwork and projects. My teacher would grade him higher because she doesn't want a student to fail under her. He would be always on the phone in class.

Tbh I don't know what he learned in his troop. I never had the chance to be a scout but I wanted to. In a way, living in a third world country is like being a boy scout 24/7.

I lived in a small town where we helped each other. Walk two minutes east and that's the pacific ocean. I learned team work and leadership at school. I volunteered in the church. We would go house to house carroling and give street children food and gifts.

Blackouts happen frequently. Hurricane season is bad but was soothing to me. I remember one hurricane destroyed a lot. Water everywhere. No electricity for a month. Tap water was scarce because they had to fix some pipes etc.

When I came to america three times ago. Boy that was hard. I lived an hour from school. We were almost homeless. I would wake up at 5 am to catch the bus at 6. 7:15. School. Class starts at 8. I would read before class. Then at 2:30 out. I would work 3:30 to 7:30. Then i would catch the 8 pm bus. At 9:15 i would go out of the bus. In the winter I sometimes forget my jacket. I would walk half a mile with just a tshirt. Haha. Fun times. Sometimes I would be so tired that I would sleep the whole way and the driver would bring me up. I have to walk an hour to get home.

No parties. No sport events. I ate alone for lunch. No prom. No gradnight. No party from graduation.

Nothing. It was required by my circumstance and I did my work. I may not be a boy scout but I know life skills. My dad taught me knots cause he was a seaman. My mom taught me how to cook and bake. And my classmates taught me communication skills as well as presentation skills. Taught me how to work in a group efficiently. I remember we went to a state finals for competitive newspaper team where we would go to a conference and complete a newspaper in less than 6 hours.

We were taught how to write a legit research paper. I learned a lot. We had math canps, science camps,, etc.

In a third world country, education is very important if you don't want to get stuck.

Again, I'm not saying eagle scout is a joke. Boy scouts are amazing. Maybe it was just my classmate who did the bare minimum. Imagine if what is taught in boy scouts is taught in school. What if schools taught life skills. How to do your taxes. How to raise a child. How to have self control. How to live.

I may be a naive little boy. I'm just 19. Im still stupid and immature but I want to change and I am changing. Replace one bad habit at a time.

It's just that kids in america and first world countries don't know how lucky they are. They fon't see that. And they have the fucking audacity to complain. Hmmm.

I wish kids my age mature faster. I wish their perspective widens faster. Because life will hit them like a truck once they have responsibilities.

I consider myself one of the lucky ones who learned what a dollar's worth at a young age. In that way, i invest not spend.

I gain an appreciation for all the hardworking people.

So yeah. I repeat. Boy scouts are amazing. My classmate was probably an outlier.

[–]AnonymousKingAndy 40 points41 points  (11 children)

Is this the method we believe was used in building the Pyramids?

[–]Aidanlv 76 points77 points  (10 children)

Probably not.

10 people pulling on this van would have moved it more than 5 times faster than these two dudes did.

If you have enough people working, having them just straight up pull a massive weight is more efficient than having them split up and pull multiple weights at once. You only need to do this type of thing if you have limited people.

[–]AnonymousKingAndy 17 points18 points  (1 child)

Cool. Good to know. Thank you.

[–]borkula 5 points6 points  (0 children)

You can do this with one person, just keep switching poles.

[–]blackmirror101 9 points10 points  (2 children)

But the van is much lighter than the pyramid stones. Isn’t the big mystery how they could move stones so massive? So X number of people may not have been able to pull them, but could have used this method.

(I don’t actually know anything about this, this is just the first thought that popped in my head.)

[–]KenshawAidda 91 points92 points  (84 children)

What the actuall fuck?

(Need some good redditor explaining)

[–]monkeyleg18 212 points213 points  (53 children)

TLDR: Distance makes your effort less.

So this is a class 2 lever.

The "fulcrum" is the ground, the load is the rope which is attached to the truck, and the man is the input force.

FO = String/Truck weight

FI = Man Pushing

dO = Distance from ground(fulcrum) to load

dI = Distance from ground to man's hands.

So making some assumptions on our variables and their values. The truck is providing a load of 2500N.

So FO = 2500N

The distance from the ground to the string looks to be about 1/3m so dO = 0.33m

The distance from the ground to the mans hands changes while he operates his device, but on average we'll call it 2m.

So our unknown is what the man is providing in force.

Our equation, from the linked site, is FO / FI = dO / dI .

Time for plug and chug!

(2500N / FI ) = (0.33m / 2m ) Thanks /u/InvalidFileInput, I definitely effed that up!

(2500N / FI ) = (2m / 0.33m )

(2500N / FI ) = (6.06)

FI = (2500N / 6.06)

FI = 412.5 N

kg = N/9.81

kg = 412.5N / 9.81

kg = 42 kg

So our man has to push with 412N of force which is equivalent to ≈ 42 kg.

Still strenuous, but nowhere near as difficult as pulling the truck out with his bare hands.

EDIT: Redid some math based on a fuckup. Value changed from 425N to 412N

Edit2: Thanks for the silver anon, give your money to charity!

[–]black_cat19 156 points157 points  (19 children)

This shit right here is why people tune out math classes in school.

[–]LiberatedCapsicum 47 points48 points  (3 children)

These things look more intimidating because of the superscripts, greek letters, etc.. In reality, in math, we are just in a constant struggle to decide what letter best represents something. F obviously means force but we have multiple forces, so he used superscripts to tell them apart.

[–]hapaxgraphomenon 2 points3 points  (2 children)

Greek here, the idea of our letters being intimidating actually made me chuckle

[–]Seeders 18 points19 points  (2 children)

Dude that is literally a magic spell. Show some respect.

[–]Tonedefff 4 points5 points  (1 child)

Truckgardium Leverosaaahh!

[–]monkeyleg18 2 points3 points  (0 children)

:'( i tried to be simple... then... it snowballed because I wanted to be thorough.

[–]pureluxss 6 points7 points  (4 children)

So how big a lever would you need to move the earth by a man using the same distance from the rope to the ground?

And how thick a rope would you need that could withstand this force?

[–]semiURBAN 2 points3 points  (2 children)

The earth is constantly moving unlike this truck lol the amount of variables involved in that hypothetical is infinity

[–]quiereslapipa 2 points3 points  (1 child)

i mean, assume a frictionless plane upon which the earth rests and it'd get a lot easier

[–]InvalidFileInput 4 points5 points  (1 child)

Wait, isn't the third step in your plug and chug incorrect? It should be FI = 2500N / 0.17 shouldn't it? Making FI = 14706 N

[–]Darth_Valdr 3 points4 points  (4 children)

I'm being pedantic, but the fulcrum is the center of the log (axis of rotation), not the ground. And the reason the force required changes as the log rotates isn't because the distance from the ground changes, it's because the angle between the force and the load change as the log rotates.

[–]BRBean 66 points67 points  (16 children)

Basically, the longer a lever arm the less force you need (at once) to push it. This is because it increases the distance it takes to push it, and since to do an action you will always need the same amount of force regardless of distance, so if the distance is increased, less force will be needed at any one time since it will be spread out over a longer distance. This even confused me to explain so anyone else feel free to respond and op please ask me whatever questions you have. Thanks

[–]duroo 33 points34 points  (9 children)

What you are describing is the formula for work

Work = force * change in distance

They are inversely proportional, meaning if you increase one, the other decreases, and vice versa. So if you increase the distance, the force required decreases to a manageable level for a human. You still end up doing the same amount of work however. Actually, you do a little more than before because no simple machine is 100% efficient, but the increase is negligible.

[–]BRBean 12 points13 points  (1 child)

Yeah it’s only been a couple months since my ap mechanics class, but I’ve forgotten nearly everything except f=ma lol

[–]gradies 7 points8 points  (1 child)

Y'all did a decent job of explaining "mechanical advantage", which applies to ramps, certain pulley configurations, levers, gear ratios, hydraulics, etc. However, the setup in this video is also a clever application of axis flipping.

One lever is pulling the car with mechanical advantage. The other lever is flipping the axis, so that you are pulling the car when you move the lever toward the car and also when you move it away from the car.

[–]KenshawAidda 2 points3 points  (3 children)

My man

[–]BRBean 5 points6 points  (2 children)

Thanks, could you understand it?

[–]MartensCedric 16 points17 points  (1 child)

This is basically the same principle why you can balance an adult and a toddler on a seesaw if the adult stands closer to the center

[–]KenshawAidda 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Hmm.. perfect

[–]Terr_ 15 points16 points  (1 child)


  1. The rope tied between the vehicle and something else that is stationary, like a big tree.

  2. They're slowly twisting those logs up into the rope, wrapping it around them, making the span shorter and tighter.

  3. They use two logs and switch positions so that they can do the twisting in easy half-turn chunks... And to avoid the chance that everything might uncontrollably unwind into a spinny dance of skull-crushing death.

  4. As the rope gets tighter, the car is pulled toward the fixed end.

I think a lot of people are confused because they don't notice the other end of the rope, which makes it look as if the men are planting the log in the ground as a simple(r) lever.

[–]gnrc 12 points13 points  (3 children)

The sticks and rope did the thing.

[–]FlyByPC 26 points27 points  (6 children)

Dude going side to side has it figured out. The other guy ends up doing most of the work, and he basically just folds the wire over to set up the next pull. Genius.

[–]yellowzealot 48 points49 points  (1 child)

“Give me a long enough lever and a place to rest it or I shall kill one hostage each hour my demands are not met” - Evil Archimedes.

[–]Usernumber43 2 points3 points  (0 children)

As always, /r/relevantxkcd, xkcd.com/857/

[–]wakowjakow 19 points20 points  (3 children)

New Dr Stone episode looks good

[–]2ndRoundEuroStash 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Was looking for this comment. Show is so damn good man.

[–]Crazy_ManMan 17 points18 points  (3 children)

I think it is definitely worth learning all of the ways to single handedly move large and heavy things many times bigger than oneself. I did a bunch of research about moving and work large stones single handedly and these may be of interest if on likes this video.

Moving Stones: https://youtu.be/E5pZ7uR6v8c (20 ton blocks by hand)
https://youtu.be/ZqMLccin1JQ (moving large boulders)
https://youtu.be/Ek3mxmNroGQ (moving heavy stones counterweight)
https://youtu.be/0WHR5JuYCgQ (moving large stones uphill)
https://youtu.be/p2REZWx_f2Y (moving large stones by hand rolling pipe method)
https://youtu.be/ptd_QTYGglw (how to safely move a boulder)
https://youtu.be/vIRipXeqrn8 (moving 7 ton boulder by hand)
Crystal Castle method: https://youtu.be/nOoCuDnmtyM

Edit: also pulley systems and other physics tricks are not bad ideas to look into. The better you understand physics the more powerful you become. Also a side note: Gears are basically leavers all put into a wheel. This makes them very powerful tools, since levers are crazy powerful when one knows how to use them.

Edit2: also be sure to be safe. The bigger the thing you are moving the higher chances of injury, especially be careful with your back when lifting and make sure you are lifting properly as to not injure yourself. When working with ropes and cables that can break put something like a tarp over them so they do not whip as hard when they break, and think carefully about where they will go if they break so that that does not end up being your face.

[–]SwansonHOPS 87 points88 points  (36 children)

Archimedes didn't know about relativity. At a certain length, the rod stops being rigid. If this weren't the case, you could transfer information faster than the speed of light.

[–]Aidanlv 77 points78 points  (31 children)

figuring out that movement in a rod propagates at the speed of sound instead of instantaneously blew my little preteen mind.

[–]SwansonHOPS 22 points23 points  (19 children)

What blew my mind the most in physics so far was the thin man paradox.

A man runs over a grate at near the speed of light relative to an observer who is stationary relative to the grate. From the perspective of the man running, the space between the bars in the grate is length contracted, and so he runs over it no problem.

But from the perspective of the man standing by the grate, the running man is length contracted to be thinner than the space between the bars, and so he should fall through.

So, which is it? Does he fall through or run over it? The answer lies in the relativity if rigidity. From the perspective of the man by the grate, the running man is not rigid, and so he can pass over the grate without completely falling through.

(at least I think that's the resolution)

[–]snarko_rubio 15 points16 points  (6 children)

I honestly don’t understand what you’re saying. Key words that are confusing me: “grate”, “relative to grate”, “contracted”.

[–]zweimal 7 points8 points  (2 children)

I think it has something to do with how we think of the man/grate as a single point, when in fact you could think of the front of the man/grate and the back of the man/grate as having different view points. Due to the way time and space dilate at relativistic speeds, none of the four viewpoints (front of grate, back of grate, front of man, back of man) will observe the entirety of the man being withing the entirety grate at a particular time. Youtube clip which explains it better: https://youtu.be/kGsbBw1I0Rg

[–]Wetmelon 3 points4 points  (3 children)

An easier example to understand is a jet flying through a barn near the speed of light.

From the perspective of a person seeing this, the aircraft fully fits inside the barn. From the pilot’s perspective, the barn is too short to fit the aircraft.

[–]AlekBalderdash 2 points3 points  (0 children)

That almost made sense. Ow, my head.

I'll have to come back to this later :)

[–]123instantname 13 points14 points  (3 children)

the speed of sound in a metal rod is much greater than the speed of sound in air due to greater density which is part of what causes rigidness. I'd imagine if a rod were rigid enough to still hold together at relativistic lengths, it would propagate at the speed of light.

[–]raduannassar 2 points3 points  (2 children)

I'm too lazy to do the math right now, but the speed of sound in a very compact solid, even a theoretical one, is a fraction of the speed of light by many orders of magnitude, so I think you are wrong

[–]Wetmelon 5 points6 points  (1 child)

Speed of sound in titanium (a very stiff material) is 6100m/s.

Only slightly slower than light. By 5 orders of magnitude lol.

[–]br0adband 14 points15 points  (1 child)

This is fucking awesome, period.

[–]ClintonLiesTroopsDie 9 points10 points  (9 children)

is this russia? it feels like a very russian video

[–]InsomniacOrca 6 points7 points  (2 children)

The car is an UAZ. indestructible Russian made car, used everywhere in (central) Asia.

[–]0x2a 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Exactly. Specifically looks like an UAZ-452 which is still in production since 1965. They are the most viable cars to get around in countries with mandatory off-roading like Kazakhstan or Mongolia. If you're lucky you'll enjoy the 2011 model which was the first one with futuristic safety features like seat belts and ABS.

[–]Electr0bear 2 points3 points  (0 children)

That's UAZ, as mentioned before.

We lovely call it Buhanka (a Loaf), because it resembles a loaf of bread. ;)

[–]My_Kairosclerosis 7 points8 points  (0 children)

That little tug at the end makes it look like the thing weighs about 5 pounds.

[–]bbrosen 7 points8 points  (0 children)

bush winch, very handy piece of knowledge


[–]guccitaint 6 points7 points  (0 children)

This is the kind of ingenuity that built the pyramids. Instead, we have episodes of “Ancient Aliens” and refuse to think that people were smart back then.

[–]odraencoded 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Is that Dr. Stone?

[–]nsto 6 points7 points  (1 child)

That's very clever, I'm surprised I've never seen something like this before.

[–]Lendord 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Well that's clever. Good for the guys.

[–]Nfrizzle 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I watched for like 25 seconds without realizing why they were doing it

[–]hatheaded 3 points4 points  (0 children)

That's quite ingenious, actually.

[–]Vigorating 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Do they just not look the happiest that they thought of this lol

[–]Rungi500 2 points3 points  (1 child)

Need this to be a little faster with Benny Hill music please!

[–]Gnostromo 2 points3 points  (0 children)

And a big van full of floozies

[–]RovingRaft 2 points3 points  (0 children)


[–]Jabsly 2 points3 points  (0 children)

"wEll NAmE onE tHinG YOu'Re GoING tO NeED tHE FucKin' RoPE FOr!!"

[–]draamaa_queen 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I stared at the logs for so long trying to figure out what was being accomplished before I noticed the truck moving ing the background

[–]1qax2wsx 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I hope I remember this next time I'm stuck instead of panicking about not having a winch!

[–]_bowlerhat 2 points3 points  (0 children)

we should have these as r/topgearlifehacks or something

[–]Paige_the_Duck_Lord 2 points3 points  (0 children)


It's filthy in there...

[–]Stormrycon 2 points3 points  (0 children)

How did that even WORK

Please explain

[–]Buffthebaldy 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Holy cow, that's brilliant!

Keeping that in the ol' noggin just incase!

[–]Terok42 2 points3 points  (0 children)

If you like this, you should see the movie, "The Gods must be crazy." Basically most of the movie is a guy thing to get his car out of jams like this.

[–]bebesiege[S] 30 points31 points  (7 children)

quite smart..