[Captions by Y Translator] In today's video,
we are going to make some Prince Rupert's Drops,
and after that, we're going to see if we can make some in liquid nitrogen,
and if there's any difference.
[Music]
Guys, I'm Nate.
I'm Calli.
Today, we are going to be learning a little bit about Prince Rupert's Drops,
and Calli has done quite a bit of practicing and researching about those.
So she's going to be sharing what she has learned with us.
So here's the basic idea.
We're going to take molten glass,
and drip it into water to see if we can make some Prince Rupert's drops.
If we can succeed, we're going to put those through a series
of tests to test strength and durability.
After that, we'll try the same process with liquid nitrogen.
To start us off, what is a Prince Rupert's Drop?
So a Prince Rupert's drop is something that's kind of been
interesting scientists for hundreds of years now.
By taking a piece of molten glass and dripping it into cool water,
what happens is the outside of the glass cools faster than the inside,
causing an incredible internal pressure.
What that means is that the head of this drop
that looks like a tadpole is incredibly strong,
and can actually even survive bullet blast.
But one flick of the tail, and the entire thing shatters into dust.
So to get started, it's actually pretty simple.
This is a torch.
It is MAPP gas.
So this is something that you can pick up at a local hardware store.
But of course, adult supervision.
MAPP gas burns hotter than propane or butane,
and that's why we're using it here.
We really want to be able to heat up the glass really well,
and keep it at that temperature
until right when it goes into the water.
We have some glass rods here.
Also, very simple to find it a craft store,
lampworking glass for bead making,
and then, a pitcher of water.
We also have some Dollar Store glass, just because we wanted to test it.
So the best results that I found so far,
while there are many types of glass in the world,
is going to be soda-lime glass,
which is the most common, and usually used in lampworking,
bead making, and glass blowing.
Let's start with a pretty clear piece, just make it as easy on ourselves as we can.
So don't let your tank touch the water.
If you do when you move this,
it can cause ripples,
and those ripples can also disturb the tail.
You disturb the tail while it's cooling,
the whole thing will shatter.
Focus the heat on the bead of your glass, not the tail.
And there we go.
Our first drop of the day.
In your experience trying to make so many of these,
what is your approximate success percentage?
So I don't want to discourage anyone,
but it's usually about 3 out of 10 when it comes to the colored glasses,
and what I think that might be is from the impurities from the metal
oxides that are involved.
When it comes to the clear ones, almost an 80% success rate.
As another warning,
Prince Rupert's drop are, as we said, highly explosive.
Now, that sounds a little extreme,
but they do sometimes combust just on their own.
So I like to keep them in a container at least with walls.
That way, say if one does decide to break on us while we're making others,
your cleanup isn't so bad.
So you'll notice with the larger Prince Rupert's drops,
the tails are much more rigid.
With these ones,
you can kind of even see that it's got some bounce to it, some flexibility,
but down in this area, where it starts to get very rigid,
you snap that, this whole thing's gone.
[Music]
All right, so I've got five, which should be enough for some experiments.
Nate, you want to make some?
So, a couple of things to note while we're doing this.
I have Nate with his leg out to stabilize the glass rod as he's working.
The reason why is as the drop falls,
we don't want that tail disturbed as it hits the water.
Do not disturb the water.
If you do decide to try and make these at home,
if you hear a very slight noise as it hits the water,
like a hiss but nothing else,
it probably didn't take.
What you really want is a very awful popping noise
as soon as it hits the water,
that's usually the signal that you have a successful drop.
[Music]
It's super full of bubbles right now.
So that's the problem I was having with anything that was a red or gold color.
I don't think it likes the gold oxide.
Two successful, and more than two unsuccessful,
but those shattered so badly that they don't even have tails coming out.
But hey, you did it.
Okay, the glass rods, we got some pretty good results with.
These are all probably real Prince Rupert's drops.
We have a little bit of this glass we got from the dollar store.
Does this work?
So far, I have not got Dollar Store glass to work.
I'm not sure if it's because it's full of other impurities,
or if it's a different type of glass.
Or a silicates in particular,
which is normally you're cooking ware in your kitchen tends to shatter.
You can make a drop, but usually it won't break when you break the tail.
So it's not a true Prince Rupert's drop,
but I'm curious to see if we can at least try to make one with these.
So the first thing that we're going to do is get rid of this base here.
Now, in the past when I've attempted this,
it tends to shatter.
So we're going to do it over the fire pit.
[Music]
Maximum power!
Aha!
It's melting.
No break is this time.
Good.
I want to set of wine glasses that looks like that.
Modern Art made easy.
Is that not very very hot?
No.
If you get it hot, I might be able to just cut right through it.
There you go.
[Music]
Yeah.
Well, it's not much to work with, but let's try.
So the first thing that I'm noticing
is this is not reacting like our glass rods from before.
I'm not sure if this isn't soda-lime glass,
or if it's just really impure.
This is acting more like, I would assume a borosilicate would.
[Music]
Nope, not at all.
Just shattered on impact.
We've now had many successful Prince Rupert's drops just in the water,
but I know a ton of you want to see what happens
if we try and make them in liquid nitrogen.
So we've got liquid nitrogen.
We're going to see if we can make some Prince Rupert's drops in liquid nitrogen,
if they form the same way, if they look the same,
and if they behave the same way after they're formed.
If we can even get them to form at all.
Now, this is the piece of glass that we've had the most success with so far.
I'm pretty sure again that because of the lack of impurities in it.
So that's what we're going to try first
to hopefully make a successful Prince Rupert's drop in the liquid nitrogen.
[Music]
I yanked it.
[Music]
Moment of truth.
Yes.
Woo!
It's actually looks like it's shattered, but stayed in place.
So I don't think this one's gonna work very well.
But this is interesting.
I've seen videos online where people have dropped molten glass into liquid nitrogen.
The main difference that you see when you drip molten glass into the water
is that it forms a small bubble on the inside.
Normally, when they drop into liquid nitrogen,
you don't get that.
Now this one looks like it's full of bubbles.
So as Calli was handing this to me,
the tail broke off, kind of right where we were saying,
it looked like a separated.
But it didn't explode.
If that happens to a real Prince Rupert's drop,
I wouldn't be holding anything.
Or if I was holding anything, it would just be a pile of glass dust.
In this case, the tail broke off.
So clearly not a Prince Rupert's drop,
but we got something formed in liquid nitrogen.
Let's try a few more times.
[Music]
The winds picked up and that changes everything.
No!
We have a few.
Some failures.
This tail has nothing attached to it.
This was cool.
These were Cobalt a minute ago,
but you can actually watch the frost as it forms.
I don't know what is going on here.
I think one dripped and touch the other tails.
I think it did.
I think this was the last one,
and it's probably still like warm or something.
>> Yep. It's still warm. >> Yeah don't. Yeah.
It was in liquid nitrogen.
That's how hot molten glasses.
So you want to be really careful when you're making these.
That was in liquid nitrogen, still hot.
So at a glance, you can already see.
This is the drop that we put into water,
and there are a few tiny little bubbles in there.
But this is the drop that we put into liquid nitrogen.
No bubbles to be seen, and it's actually more of a uniform shape.
So here's another difference that I'm seeing.
This is one that we dripped into water,
and you can actually see again that deformation,
that's pretty common in Prince Rupert's drops.
But this one,
although it did shatter on impact in the liquid nitrogen,
it held together.
One of the defining characteristics of a Prince Rupert's drop
is that it's very tough on the head,
but if you clip the tail
anywhere where it's not flexible,
it will shatter,
and it doesn't just break into pieces,
it turns like to dust and almost instantaneously.
So that's what I'm going to do on this one.
[Music]
That went everywhere.
I think that shot glass dust for like 20 feet.
That shot the gazebo.
I felt it just like a shower of glass powder hitting my face.
So, and that happens so so quickly.
So now let's try Prince Rupert's drop from the liquid nitrogen,
and if you take a look at it,
absolutely no imperfections and no bubbles.
Clipping off the tail.
[Music]
Nothing.
The tail broke.
Try closer.
[Music]
So we have a drop of glass.
Yes, but we definitely don't have a Prince Rupert's drop.
It cooled down, it kept its drop shape and it's neat.
But with the real Prince Rupert's drops,
you clip the tail, they explode into dust.
The liquid nitrogen drops,
they just break wherever you break them.
I still want to know how this is going to handle a hammer blow.
>>Ready? >> Yep.
So that was a pretty light hit,
and it didn't shatter the whole thing.
But it broke a lot of pieces off of it.
I would say that this is probably regular glass,
maybe like a marble honestly.
This should be a real true Prince Rupert's drop.
There you go.
It explode so we much.
Okay, this little piece came from the liquid nitrogen so...
[Music]
Harder.
You broke it.
So the problem with this
is that there's actually only 10% of this drop that is incredibly strong.
Other than that,
there are these little tiny bubbles really close to the surface,
and these are the ones we dropped into water, so they are stronger.
[Music]
Did not absorb all the impact.
Tail still got crushed.
But you can see how fine of a dust that turns into.
It really caught most of the thing as it exploded.
We've tried smashing these with a hammer a few times,
and we've gotten some good hammer strikes,
but in the end there keeps being too much vibration on the tails.
So let's try putting these in our vice.
[Music]
You're so scared, aren't you?
I am terrified of this.
[Music]
Did it dent the vice?
I think it did, like the knurling on it.
I think that right there.
I mean, I'm sorry about the vice,
but that makes me so happy that they're that strong.
I also wonder if you had it a little bit lower.
So it was close to the tip as you can get it,
because that's where that 10% strength is.
[Music]
Okay.
I'm gonna like hang off of it.
[Music]
So you'll actually see that I've managed to dent the knurling.
Now, these are actually exploding fairly quickly,
and my only thought on that is it's probably
because there isn't even pressure all the time.
So I think that probably has something to do with the fact
these are shattering the way they are.
So what we've seen here with the bench vice
is that we can put as much pressure on these as possible.
I'm actually hanging off of this thing.
There's a couple of shots where we've got me like all of my weight,
and I'm hanging off of it.
But as soon as I let up the pressure,
not move it but let up the pressure,
that's when we're getting the...
It's not really a flashpoint, that's just when it starts to combust.
It just explodes as soon as the pressure changes on it.
That might be because there's lower pressure on it suddenly.
It might be that the inside of this vice has some sort of jagged knurling,
and as we let up on the pressure,
it shifts slightly until you know, a point is kind of
digging into the glass or scraping it sideways.
But it is interesting
because while we're putting constant pressure on it,
it pretty much doesn't explode
until we let go or try and release the pressure.
And if anybody's making this at home and wants to break them,
we've already got scratches on our glasses,
and a couple of nicks on our face.
So wear protection if you're doing this,
like be really really careful.
These things, when they shatter,
they shatter hard.
Hey guys, you've probably noticed that
since we introduced Calli in our Captain America shield video,
every new video has had secret codes, and graphic glitches,
and other secret elements hidden into it.
Keep track of what you see, and the timestamps of when you see it.
We've got some big prizes to give away,
and finding the codes might make you our next winner.