MythBusters

Do not try what you're about to see at home.

We're what you call experts.

On this car-crazy episode of Mythbusters:

The obscenity begins!

Adam and Jamie think outside the box...

Well, there's your problem.

as they literally reinvent the wheel

Our lives have officially become a cartoon.

Testing the myth that square wheels

will give you a smooth ride...

provided you drive fast enough.

Meanwhile, Kari, Tory, and Grant

tackle a "Date Night" movie myth.

Well, there's something you don't see every day.

Can two cars stuck bumper to bumper...

Let's do it.

drive city streets...

I've got no steering! - Brakes! Brakes!

cut corners...

Can you believe we're getting paid to do this?

and even do a 180 spin?

So, yeah,

that was pretty much the best date I've ever been on.

Who are the mythbusters?

Adam Savage...

and Jamie Hyneman.

Things are gonna start to get a little crazy in here.

Between them, more than 30 years of special-effects experience.

Together with Grant Imahara...

Kari Byron...

Hi, Grant!

and Tory Belleci.

Hit it!

They don't just tell the myths,

they put them to the test.

Hey. What, uh -- whatcha doing?

Daydreaming.

What does a Hyneman daydream about?

Square wheels.

Like, what if you put square wheels on a truck?

I would imagine it would give you the roughest possible ride.

it would eventually smooth out, wouldn't it?

You're wondering how fast you have to drive with square wheels

in order to get a smooth ride?

Yeah. - That's great.

I think we should put it to the test.

It may have come from the Hyneman's mind,

but it's also going gangbusters on the fan site.

Because according to the myth, at a fast-enough speed,

the difference between square and round wheels would disappear.

But can this really be true?

Or is this a myth that's headed back to square one?

So, what's your plan for these square wheels?

Well, pretty much everything that we need for this

is gonna be really abused.

So the wheels we're gonna have to design

to be able to take all of the stress.

The truck's gonna have to be really heavy-duty.

It's gonna have to be four-wheel drive,

and have a big torque engine in it.

Super-beefy wheels, super-beefy truck.

I think we should also add in there

some nice, objective way

of measuring the smoothness of the ride we get.

Like, we compare it to a round-wheel drive,

and see how close we can get.

Instrumentation.

Precisely.

What I'm trying to figure out here is that

if we took a wheel like this,

and changed it into something shaped more like this, a square,

how fast would we have to go

to stay on the corners, like so,

and actually end up with a smooth ride?

Whether that's possible or not,

at what speed that occurs --

that's what we're trying to find out.

And first up comes the brainstorm --

how to design a square wheel in the first place.

How is this square wheel gonna look?

It's gonna be square.

All right.

Reinventing the wheel is no easy feat.

Obviously we're gonna go with steel for this.

What about something like,

you know, a straight box?

Well, I think that's a decent place to start.

Every single wheel rotation...

And then we spider out with some gussets.

could lead to a catastrophic collapse...

That'll start to look pretty sexy.

because of the 5,000-pound truck that they'll be carrying.

This is really, really bizarre.

But by thinking inside the square,

their idea gets into gear.

Cool.

Well, let's get to it.

The final four-sided design

has reinforcements at the center and corners,

making it incredibly strong,

but also, incredibly complex.

And with so many individual pieces of steel,

it'll need to be laser-cut.

And thanks to the wonders of television...

Our parts are here?

They're here.

Dude.

That takes no time at all.

That is gorgeous!

Man, those are so pretty.

Let's set one up. - Okay.

In order to keep our square wheels from each wing,

like, 200 pounds a piece,

we designed it all out of 3/16-inch steel.

Now, that may not seem like much,

but the design and the gussets

and the distribution of the forces

really ought to be able to take this.

But with steel this thin,

you can't just lay in these big, fat welding beads.

You actually have to stitch it carefully,

because the stuff, if it gets too hot,

can warp, and that's bad.

It's a laborious process,

but hopefully, it'll be worth it.

And once the mythbusters get their heads down,

their hubs are soon looking like the "wheel" deal.

Nice!

Want to grab a side? Let's put it on the ground.

Yeah. This is how the tire goes on, right?

Hopefully.

That has a satisfying ring to it, doesn't it?

It really does. It rings like a bell.

It's so pretty.

I'll be right back.

It's a square wheel!

Those two words shouldn't go together!

They shouldn't,

But this isn't quite up to shape yet...

Well, there's your problem.

because next, it's time for the rubber to meet the rim.

When you started this job,

did you ever imagine you'd be lubing a square tire

to fit a large piece of rubber on it?

That's been my lifelong dream.

In theory, the guide bars

should make levering on the tire easier.

Go ahead and get a clamp on that.

But trying to fit a square peg into a round hole

is just as difficult as it sounds.

My family's been fitting square wheels

for two centuries now.

No one's bought one, though.

I want my square wheels!

Even bringing in a 2,000-pound wrecking ball...

This is like how the Egyptians do it.

Behold, the Egyptian forklift.

doesn't get the tire onto the square.

So, Jamie has a solution.

Slightly bigger.

I hope it works.

How's it look?

Much better.

Dude!

I was able to just put it on by hand.

That is a square wheel.

That is, without a doubt, a square-frigging-wheel.

Thanks to their ingenuity and hard work,

the mythbusters have squared the circle.

Doing that makes me nervous.

Now, they just have to complete another three.

Next up, a conjoined car caper.

All right, so, we have another Hollywood myth,

and this one comes from the movie "Date Night,"

where two cars get into a head-on collision

and become conjoined.

Not only that, but they continue to drive around the city.

I know this one.

They actually get stuck together.

They go forward, backward, go around corners.

It's awesome.

A little demolition, a little stunt driving.

I love it.

It's a date night with a difference.

According to the movie, two cars crash together,

then speed down city streets, cut corners,

and even manage a 180 spin.

But could two conjoined cars even move,

let alone achieve these turbocharged tricks?

All right, so we're gonna test

whether these two conjoined cars

can drive all these crazy maneuvers, right?

But are we gonna test whether they can

become joined that way in the first place?

No, actually we don't have to test that.

I was talking to these guys at the crash-test facility,

and they were saying that this can happen.

Cars can become connected in a collision.

It's very rare, like, 1 in 100,000 chances.

But it can happen.