# Gumballs vs. empty soda can



## JTslinger (Jan 26, 2015)

After shooting some gumballs at full and empty beer cans last week with a friend down by the river (next to a burned out RV), I was wondering what a gumball would do to an empty can at a closer range. When we were shooting at about 30', the gumballs didn't do much damage as they are really light weight and hollow.

I did a short video of 10 shots at a can I hit once before with a gumball to see how they would do. I was surprised at how hard they were hitting, although I was at a pretty close distance.

My next goal is to cut the can with nothing but gumballs.


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## Chuck Daehler (Mar 17, 2015)

Do the gum balls get chewed up when they hit the can? (Pun intended). Pretty cool video amigo! And if one misses and doesn't lose its coating, you can still chew it. Chew on that one.

Have a great weekend!


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## JTslinger (Jan 26, 2015)

I was very suprised at how resistant to damage the little gumballs have been. While shooting them last week, most shattered when they hit the rocks, even at distance. I have only had one break up while shooting at a can from a relatively close range.


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## Charles (Aug 26, 2010)

Nice demo ...

Cheers ..... Charles


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## Chuck Daehler (Mar 17, 2015)

Interesting for sure. A new use for Ford gum balls. I've been out of the states so long I doubt I could put a penny in a gum ball machine and get a gum ball now. Likely $1. Remember those days, Charles? A Saturday all afternoon movie matinee for five hours for 20cents for kids (I'd go with my older cousins Connie, Carole, Rick, Johnny and Susy, and with Walt Disney cartoons, a movie, more cartoons, another movie, and of course interspersed with old WWII newsreels still playing after the war. A double popsicle or a Nihi grape soda for 10cents. Gasoline for dad's tractor 25cents/gallon. And pebbles for slingshot ammo.

Ford gum balls bring back more memories. We had a pump on the kitchen sink, the well was under the house..my job was to pump water for mom so she could do the dishes. I earned 5 cents a week for feeding and watering the chickens and weeding the garden. My high time of the week was when mom and dad would take me to the city (20 minutes away, a little industrial and ag town in southern Ohio on the Ohio River across from Kentucky) on Friday night to "see the lights"..all the neon signs were fascinating to me. Sunday was waffle day and the two german shepherds Vach and Shane (Shon) got the first two off the waffle iron.

Red was my favorite flavor of Ford gum balls...it was cinnamon. Hot. The old barrel coal stove in the middle of the living room was our only heat, dad would have to load it at 2AM and again at 7AM to keep us warm and cozy. It used to snow in December before the climate changed...always a white Christmas. Our black (no other color choice) telephone was a party line, about 12 other families were on it, it had no dial, you picked up the receiver and an operator would say, "Number please" and you gave the number or the name...the operators knew where to insert our plug to connect to whomever on the switch board. In the late summer, all the apple trees were full of apples, I'd throw the ground fallen ones over the barbed wire fence to the cows, they followed me from tree to tree religiously. Mom made oodles of canned apple sauce and apple crisp with whipped cream on top. Dad and I would pull up small sassafrass trees and wash the roots and cut the root bark off for sassafrass tea, it was like root beer.

I can remember it all like yesterday. The radio was our unique entertainment and finally we got a TV I think in 1952, I was five and a half, I was about to enter 2nd grade that fall, the screen was sort of roundish and there was only one channel and it was not clear. We watched new tech...Elizabeth was crowned a young queen, a new under sea cable transmitted still pictures of the event about 1 per minute. We were amazed at the technology. I watched the first Superman edition of the famed series. That fed yet more my young thirst for the study of sciences and astronomy and my early fascination with extra terrestrial life.






It's been a wonderful life, and what a wonderful planet on which to enjoy it.

Have a great weekend all! (Hurray! No school tomorrow! It's tomato soup and toasted cheese sandwiches for lunch tomorrow..mom's pat Saturday lunch.)

BTW, note Superman's "grin"...


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