Lava vs Lasers - Which Is More Destructive?

Which has more destructive power.

Lava or lasers?

Well, today we're going to answer that age old question

with a bit of a scientific Face-Off

by testing each against seven objects

including a row of glass bottles,

a bunch of popcorn kernels

a metal maze

a can of beans

a bunch of matches

a canister of highly flammable butane

and finally an actual boat.

Ohhhh

WHAT!

And since lava won the last showdown between acid versus lava,

your questionable safety method practicing,

Hawaiian shirted reigning champion is back.

Kevin, the backyard scientist

and his laser wielding opponent in this match up

will be a former middle school science teacher

and a man who has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live!

Possibly more than Jimmy Kimmel himself.

Science Bob Pflugfelder

But once again, I'm not just going to be watching from the sidelines

because each of the seven objects

will have to face my X factor method of destruction.

That will be different for each object.

So, for example, that highly flammable cannister of butane gas

might be dropping into the path of two katanas

spinning at 1500 rpm

in a small room filled with open flames.

And as expected, the nerd trash talk commenced immediately.

I love Kevin's cute little backyard builds

You're going down, Bob.

Don't go sleeping on the X factor.

You got another excavator hiding outside?

I'm basically Oprah here because the winner of today's competition gets a boat.

Last time you said I'd win a car and we ended up burning all the cars

Did you win a car?

Technically, but

Well with that wee can com–

William!

Will’s back!

It smells like farts in here, Mark. Somebody farted.

I'll get you out, Will

AHHH

William

yeah

Don't you have better things to do?

Yeah, I do.

I've been planning Open Sauce,

the world's greatest science and engineering event

featuring over 150 of your favorite YouTube creators

you can meet in person.

June 15th and 16th are the dates

and you're supposed to fill out your form.

That's why I'm here.

Did you just advertise on my channel?

Yes.

So here is...

So here is... money

worth it

so in exchange for once again crashing the party

I sent William off

to find the official CrunchLabs bin of spare referee uniforms.

I forgot about that thing.

It was time to commence our seven item showdown of destruction.

Starting first with the row of glass bottles.

What I have in my hand is a 3000 watt, water cooled, high powered laser.

This thing gets hotter than lava, Kevin.

Only in a tiny spot.

That's all we need

I'm not even going to wear my glasses

You have to wear your glasses

Okay, I'm sorry.

Here we go.

Oh my goodness

Whoa

Whoa, it's like a mini volcano.

KEVIN: It’s... smoking WILL: Holy moley

Bob slowly worked his laser

through every bottle, setting them up

Oh

So he could breezily knock them down.

awww

That's a good way to cut a glass in half.

Which was fair enough.

But could lava do better?

Let's do it.

Nice.

And by the way, if you've ever wondered how to make lava,

all you got to do is stick some rocks in a graphite crucible

and then heat them up to 3000°F

so that the rocks just literally melt and turn into a liquid form.

Look at that.

Wow

That's actually hot!

Hot lava!

Whoa

Whoa

Whoa

Oh, you still got one.

Fill up their–

Whoa

Oh

BOB: That was... horrifying and amazing. KEVIN: That was awesome!

MARK: For Lava... KEVIN: That was also

a lot faster than Bob’s

Can't argue with that.

And with the flames safely doused

it was now my turn

I would say Kevin wins.

Hey I– I haven’t gone yet!

KEVIN: I think I won that one right, Will?

MARK: Wait! KEVIN: I think I won that one right, Will?

And they would soon live to regret

ever discounting the X factor.

Because what they didn't know

is when it comes to oversize, quadruple banded trigger locked slingshots.

I'm a bit of a sharpshooter. Mark: Three, Two. one

Darn it.

DARN IT!

This is harder than it looks, alright?

Frst try...

KEVIN & WILL: Whoa Mark: Yes!

And uhh, yeah, my slingshot

eventually handled all of them.

Mark, you made this easy

It's Kevin.

Let's go

Next round.

So lava put the first points on the board as we moved into the second event of the day

to see which of us could most effectively

pop some popcorn.

How did no one think of using a laser to pop popcorn?

Cause it’s a no brainer.

Just like you!

Don’t insult a guy with a military grade laser.

Three

two

one.

Wow!

Oh, I see a kernel.

Look!

Are they popping?

Yes!

What?

Oh I may have set it on fire.

This looks repulsive.

You haven't tasted it yet.

It's like a little bit burnt.

See?

Oh

are you–

OH! HEY! WHOA!

It just needs more time.

But Bob's time was up.

Do you have a plan, Kevin?

No.

First...

MARK: Ohhh KEVIN: Just like this

WILL: Oh man dude BOB: Looks delicious

MARK: That’s clever WILL: That’s Guy Fieri right there

And then, here we go. Popcorn.

Popcorn on top

Whoa

Oh, you really went for it.

Oh, yeah.

Oh wow. Look at the smoke.

Is it off gassing and then burning?

Whoa

MARK: That is cool!

WILL: That’s one of the craziest things I've ever seen in my life.

I think it’s flammable

WHOA

we got some popcorn.

Kevin’s popcorn was the clear winner in quantity.

I think–

Whoa ho ho ho ho

Taste test.

But how was the quality?

Oh it's chewy.

Huh

Oh, no. That's not good

Wow. Oh.

Lacking.

Blah!

Severely lacking.

Oh, just tastes like smoke.

That's horrible.

Ugh!

Which brought us to the X factor

And this odd looking contraption.

Okay

now I just turn.

This should make popcorn really, really fast.

Basically, the way it works is you put the kernels

in the top of this mini chamber

and then you lock it closed

and heat it up over a small fire

which causes the air pressure

to rise really high

because the air can't expand out like it wants to.

As it heats up

this new pressure then pushes back on each kernel,

squeezing them in all around like a weighted blanket

to keep their kernel shape, even though they're now

totally hot enough to pop into popcorn.

So after putting a liberal amount of butter and salt into this bag here,

and then prying off the lid to the chamber.

Three

Two

One.

You instantly pop a thousand pieces of popcorn

as they're free to expand now, without all the extra air pushing them in.

Wowww!

Whoa!

And after a quick shake.

I'll be the judge.

That’s pretty good

That’s really good, actually

If mine was covered in salt and butter, it tastes good, too.

Yeah let's test it.

Okay. Wait. No.

Winner is Mark.

Yes!

The underdog X factor was tied with lava

as we moved into round three, the Metal Maze

And Science Bob's plan was to use a series of mirrors

to send his beam through the maze

straight to a balloon filled with flammable gas.

Ooo balloon!

Fastest way to solve the maze is to use the speed of light.

Three

Two

One

Powering.

And while it instantly got through the maze,

all of the mirrors did too much to weaken the intensity of the beam.

Bob, it didn't light your flash paper.

Can we just do it manually?

Only barely being salvaged

Whoa!

by the explosive ending

and Kevin's take on the maze

was to turn it on its head.

You have to follow your own path in life.

Don't listen to the walls society puts up for you.

You take the maze and you just melt it down and then–

Oh gosh, get him his lava.

WILL: Gosh! It's something... MARK: Wow it’s beautiful!

It already went through?

And the lava wasted no time

in just melting its way through every wall.

Whoa oh whoa hahaha

Wooow!

I might burn through this side, too.

I can solve the maze ten different ways.

But one was more than enough.

I think that was really cool, Kevin

That's beautiful, Kevin.

Thank you.

I also think you didn’t solve the maze at all. Yeah

My submission for X Factor on Maze

should be arriving...

now

Right on time.

This.

Well, there's no way she's fitting in that maze

is my adorable niece, Kaylee

And Kaylee

What do we have in this box?

We have my pet, Squeaky.

You think squeaky can do the maze?

Yes

So we put a little motivation at the end of the maze

and let Squeaky get to work.

And Squeaky wasted no time in leaving the competition

in the dust.

Come on, now

Come on, Squeaky...

MARK: Come on, Squeaky! WILL: Turn around, turn around Squeaky. KEVIN: Squeaky turn around!

Why can’t you turn Squeaky?

I can't believe this worked.

Oh...

MARK: NO! KEVIN: YES!

Oh, that's so embarrassing for you Mark

squeaky

SQUEAKY!

This is so bad.

Kaylee, can you tell him to go to the finish line?

I can, but I don't want to

Wait.

What?

Come on.

There’s something wrong with this mouse.

Mhm

Okay, okay. Okay, okay.

Yes.

MARK: That counts WILL: Full body out

Full body out

Close

and...

Science Bob attempted to console me with a scientific explanation

for Squeaky’s cold feet.

Mammals don't like being out in the open because that's where predators are.

So right now it's probably feeling a little more protection.

So, knowing this,

we gave squeaky a nice protected VIP line straight to the cheese.

And soon enough.

Oh that's it.

That's a win

Go into science Bob’s clothes

That would be nice.

Yes, yes.

YES! YES!

Do it, DO IT!

YES!

I sent my adorable niece Kaylee off to wait.

it's your call

how you want to play this

While we all waited

for William's final call.

I will say she cries easy.

And while the judge deliberates his final decision,

Judge.

you might have noticed my backyard has once again sprung up in Crunch Labs.

And that's because to help fight summer brain drain

and make this your least boring summer ever

by popular demand

we're bringing back Camp CrunchLabs.

And this year, not only have we triple reinforced the roof,

but we've also added the Fort Nuts Treehouse.

Now, just like last year, it's a 12 week virtual summer camp

featuring all new, way bigger mega experiments

that I do that look sort of like this.

And then super challenges you do at home

that looks sort of like this.

And the best at home super challenge submission of the whole summer

gets a platinum ticket to come out right here with me

to be in the twelfth and final summer episode.

On top of that

usually the CrunchLabs build box

is where we build a really fun toy together

where I teach you all the juicy physics of how they work

comes every month.

But to coincide with the weekly Camp CrunchLabs, videos and challenges

we can ship them to you every week.

So if you want a 12 week summer camp where you can learn to think like an engineer

with 0% chance of bug bites and poison ivy

just head to CampCrunchLabs.com, where you can reserve one of the limited spots

and I'll see you at camp.

Now where were we

I think it's time to make a call, William

Easy choice to make

One second

Make eye contact with Kaylee first.

Okay, fine. Everybody wins.

You're a winner.

You're a winner. The points are negated.

No one gets any points.

Which was perhaps deservedly

a way to call us all losers on that round

as we moved on to the tastiest round yet

Beans.

Welcome to the Crunch Labs kitchen, chef.

Chef, yes Chef!

Here we go.

Warm them up gently, and then they will be delicious.

It looks like he's welding beans

Once they're warmed up gently.

But Science Bob, you’re leaking beans everywhere.

This is a crime against beans.

Just like grandma makes it

smells like grandma

Mm

Tastes like mildly room temperature beans.

Five stars.

So all Kevin's lava had to do was room temperature beans

This is going to be way better than your laser beans.

Kevin, you look like a chef from the future.

Thank you.

Whoa.

Oh

Oh.

Oh there. Dude it’s like

Oh

Get away from it Kevin

Okay, okay.

Cool Kevin!

I have never seen that happen before.

It’s like a alien egg omelet.

You are a futuristic chef. Look at that.

Look at that.

But to be kind.

And the floor is lava.

We gave him the mulligan.

Oh, the power of a volcano versus these beans.

Oh ho ho ho ho ho ho ho!

My gosh, dude

Wait. That can of beans is going to explode.

That's what I'm kind of worried about.

Wait.

Is it gonna explo–

Kevin, Kevin I would put that down and get away from the beans.

WILL: Get away get away get away get away get away BOB: Step away

KEVIN: Is that getting bigger? BOB: ...from the Beans

KEVIN: Is that getting BIGGER? WILL: Kevin, get AWAY from the beans

Kevin! Join us!

IT’S GETTING BIGGER?

It's going to explode, bro.

Well I know, I want to get covered in beans.

Don’t get cooked

So we waited to see if these truly

were some ticking time beans.

Dude, this is horrifying.

The second I let my guard down, it's going to explode.

You look like a muppet.

Whoa?

Is that it? oh ok.

It punctured

I knew you wouldn't do it

And with these beans

being more bust than boom

we had to grab a can opener

seeing as how Kevin's lava–

Whoa!

Never mind.

Were we rolling?

MY CEILING!

They'll come back down any minute now.

That is quite possibly the biggest and loudest explosion

We’ve ever had at CrunchLabs

And we've had a lot

dude the floor is slippery

Dude

There’s no beans!

Wait...

There’s no more beans

What?

Fortunately we found just enough for a taste test

It’s good

before moving on to the X factor.

There's more than one way

to boil a can of beans.

With a twist they never saw coming.

Because that clear container is actually a vacuum chamber.

And by sucking out the air on the chamber, I would lower the pressure on the beans,

causing them to boil.

You might have noticed this effect when you're higher elevation

in the mountains, where the air pressure is lower

and it takes longer for something like your ramen noodles to become soft,

even though the water is boiling

with less air pressure,

the boiling point of water is as much as ten degrees lower,

so the water just can't get as hot before it turns to steam.

Oh, yes

They're like, rising out with the foam.

This is disgusting, Mark.

It looks like a root beer float.

Wait till you taste it.

And once it had been given enough time to really boil,

I switched off the vacuum, letting the air rush back in

as I prepared to plate.

Wow. Oh my gosh!

Judge?

They're colder than room temperature.

Do you get negative points because you made the beans colder?

There's only one of these that was memorable

and it was Kevin's bean bomb

Yes!

So Kevin pulled ahead by one point, but it was still

anybody's game going into the matches round.

All right.

Arguably the most expensive way to light a match.

Oh my gosh.

Wow!

The laser worked great,

although thanks to Bob's Protective Eyewear.

You've basically missed the entire back half.

It’s so hard to see. Don't tell. I'm sorry.

Don’t tell him, don’t tell him

Or I mean, you're doing great, Bob

And even with his helmet handicap

Bob got the rest quickly.

Wow

And now for Kevin's contraption,

a spaghetti pot with slots he had cut in the bottom

and then drilled it onto a router motor,

hoping the centripetal force would fire the rapidly spinning lava

into the matches.

Three.

Two.

One.

Yeah, nice

OH!

My gosh

Nice.

Oh my gosh.

It was quick and beautiful

and left a ton of flames.

I can’t believe it

Unfortunately for Kevin

the flames just weren't on the matches.

Noooo

Oh you’re burning it with the crucible that’s not even lava anymore

Kevin: No! Will: It got kind of sad.

Here we go.

I filled a squirt gun with acid

in the hopes it would create an exothermic reaction on the match heads

causing them to ignite.

I can have the minions bring you some lava.

I don't need your dang lava.

Oh! Yeah!

FIRE!

Chemistry!

What’s up!

I think you need a time lapse instead of high speed, Mark

That’s nerd trash talk right there

And so we did put it to a time lapse,

and we found out that if we gave it enough time.

it still burnt out

Science Bob had the most effective method of lighting it on fire

Wooo laser!

No way.

So Science Bob was finally on the board as we moved into the flammable butane cans

We've been trying to answer some important science questions here,

and the world wants to know what happens

if we hit a laser on a can of highly flammable butane.

What happens?

Oh, I don't know, so we're gonna find out.

Oh

Three

Two

One

Oh there it is

Oh okay

Going down. Going down.

Whoa.

Hey, I didn’t think that was going to work

Not what I was expecting

Now that's how you laser.

It was a strong start for laser.

And now it was over to lava to see if it could be topped.

Kevin, I see we need bunker protection for this.

Oh, why?

Because it's going to be so good?

Cause it's gonna be dangerous.

Wow!

Whoa

that means it's good.

Despite my best judgment

I allowed Kevin to continue

as he attempted to ignite a butane canister

by dumping a bunch of lava on it.

Oh here we go

And the result was actually gorgeous.

Oh

As the venting butane

forced the viscous flow of lava

streaming back up into the air

Whoa!

and when it was finally through,

Look at the bubble on the floor.

it left so much to see.

Whoa! Look at the lava spike on that.

obsidian dagger.

And a lot to hear.

That's

WHOA

OHHH

Wah!

It's like lava ASMR

And even some stuff to wear.

I think we officially have the world's

most dangerous contact lens.

But I could beat all that.

Gentlemen, you'll find your butane can

attached to the ceiling here

with an electromagnet.

If I push this button,

it drops.

Drops on to what?

Well, it drops on to this helicopter that spins these little arms.

They're not wooden arms.

They are...

They are... Swords.

Those are katanas, I believe.

Then what?

Sterno flames all around in the container to ignite the butane

So you took two swords and bolted them to a motor

1500 rpm motor.

They're going to stay on it

in theory.

I lit the candles as I prepared to say hello to victory...

And potentially goodbye to CrunchLabs.

Mwah!

Here we go.

Spin her up!

Oh!

Oh! Oh, sorry.

Is that as fast as it can go?

No

oh no...

You shouldn’t say stuff like that Kevin

Ooooo

what

Okay!

I’m good there

KEVIN: Oh my... MARK: Here we go!

KEVIN: Mark this is terrifying MARK: Three!

Two

One

Oh whoa whoa hahaha

Yes!

YES!

Oh my gosh

That was so cool.

WE’RE ALIVE!

yes!

Look.

Perfect slice.

I feel like the X factor finally brought something interesting to the table.

Which put the scores here

headed into the final two point showdown.

All right, gentlemen, what do you think?

That one kind of looks like me.

Yeah, that's by design.

Uh oh

I'm guessing this is not a race

Yeah, your goal is to sink a boat.

The lake had three boats in it,

each filled with a self-portrait mannequin

and a few gas cans

to make things more interesting.

Quite simply

first to sink a boat wins