This past Thursday, i went back to karate after missing about a month. Naturally, the first time back is always quite difficult, but this time, i felt as if i had missed much more. During the lesson, we were told we could order 30 concrete bricks for 100 NIS. What a bargain (apparently, it really is)! But why? To smash with our bare hands, of course. Um...i thought that was for brown and black belts. Apparently, if we want to go up a level (i'm only a green), breaking bricks is going to become part of the testing. So, whilst we condition our hands and prepare, i thought that some videos about the science behind brick breaking might be reassuring.
The Stats
- 13 blocks of concrete were used as a test case
- The sledgehammer delivered 709 lbs. of force, breaking 8/13 blocks
- The elbow broke all of the blocks, delivering 2000 lbs. of force (triple the sledgehammer)
- 1000 Gs of acceleration at impact, with a speed of 21 m.p.h
If you want to know the reason behind the physics, watch these clips. This experiment starts at about 4:15 into the clip. Apologies for the video quality--the sound seems to be slightly ahead.
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