00:00This is the world's first ever actual pool of Jell-O and while it may look
00:06simple it's actually a very difficult engineering challenge to pull off. As
00:10proof if you google Jell-O pool you will either find bad CGI or a handful of
00:14videos of people who tried to do this but it really didn't work out. So today
00:18we're gonna answer possibly the longest-standing question from my
00:21childhood what would it be like to actually belly flop in a pool of Jell-O
00:25but before we do that I want to talk about what we actually had to go through
00:28for the past six months to pull this off. The idea of a Jell-O pool has been on my
00:33bucket list for over four years. In fact when Kevin from the backyard
00:36scientists and I made the 25 million Orbeez pool our first idea was to do a
00:41pool of Jell-O but it's really hard because if you've ever made Jell-O you
00:45might recall you first have to boil water then mix in the powder and then you have
00:49to refrigerate it for it to actually get firm and that's easy enough to do for a
00:53small dish but how do you boil and then refrigerate an entire pool? This seems
00:58like a very worthy engineering challenge. So last year Thanksgiving my
01:02brother and I came up with a plan and then in the middle of winter we started
01:05digging a hole in his backyard. Then over the course of two months we set up a
01:09bunch of small-scale experiments because we needed to answer questions like how
01:12much gelatin powder does it actually take to get to the ideal firmness and how
01:16hot and then cold does the mixture actually need to get for the Jell-O
01:20chemical reaction to take place so it will actually get firm. From our
01:24experiments we learned the Jell-O always got firm as long as the mixture got
01:27hotter than 160 degrees Fahrenheit so we decided we could scale this up by using
01:31six 55 gallon drums with a custom propane burner underneath and a spigot we
01:36welded to the sides but more on that later. So now we knew how we were going to
01:39heat it up but how do you refrigerate an entire pool? For that we teamed up with
01:44mother nature and just picked the perfect location and time of year. We
01:47installed a thermometer and starting in January we tracked the temperature in his
01:51backyard every night. We needed refrigerator temperatures at night but not
01:55freezer temperatures because that would freeze the Jell-O and our experiments
01:59showed that totally ruins it. And so after looking at our data plus historical
02:02temperature plots we knew we had about a three week sweet spot window towards the
02:07end of April to pull this off. Our goal was to have a Jell-O pool party in his
02:10backyard that would make even Phineas and Ferb jealous. So the plan was to start
02:14seven days before the party and fill the pool with an average of 10 barrels every day.
02:19That would give each layer a chance to get exposed to the cold night air to more
02:23efficiently get rid of the heat. And so with that, first thing Saturday, a full
02:27week before the party, we got to work.
02:35We didn't want to waste actual food so this is just water and gelatin powder and
02:40food coloring, but there's no sugar.
03:10We intentionally placed our barrels much higher than the pool so when we were
03:16ready we could use the potential energy to move the Jell-O from the barrels to the
03:20pool.
03:21We had to tackle about a thousand other issues that came up that I won't bore you
03:26with, but day by day and layer by layer the pool began to fill up. Because the
03:31Jell-O went in with so much heat energy we needed to remove before it could get
03:35firm, in addition to using the cold night air, my brother's neighbor Nick happened to
03:39have a spare swamp cooler in his shop, so we kept that running over the top of the
03:42pool pretty much the whole week. This gave us convection cooling. It's the
03:46equivalent of rolling down a car window for the pool, or like when you blow on
03:50the top of a hot cup of soup. This constantly replaces the boundary layer of
03:53air right at the surface with fresh cold air that will suck out the heat more
03:58efficiently. And so as we put in the final batch Friday night, with ominous
04:01weather threatening to ruin the whole effort, at this point we had done all we
04:05could. We were exhausted after a week, and I wasn't feeling super confident,
04:09because my specialty is more of mechanical things, and this project was
04:12more about chemistry and thermodynamics. And I didn't want that lame jelly-bop
04:16stuff people try and pass off as Jell-O, and so even if it didn't last long in
04:20the sun, I wanted to at least have the experience of seeing even a single belly
04:24flop on a smooth pool of actual Jell-O. If this was going to be a total failure, it
04:29wouldn't be from lack of effort. And so we woke up Saturday morning with a forecast for a
04:33warm sunny day, and we pulled off the tarp to find a pool filled with actual
04:38freaking Jell-O.
04:45By this point, word in the neighborhood had definitely spread around as to what
04:50we were up to, and my brother asked if some of their friends kids could have
04:53first dibs. And so with that, I'm happy to report this is what it looks like to
04:58a belly flop in a pool of Jell-O.
05:18Jell-O.
05:20Jell-O.
05:22I will be catching Pokemon in New York City
05:27I wanna live to life
05:30I will be catching Pokemon in New York City
05:38I wanna live to life
05:52I will be catching Pokemon in New York City
06:22I will be catching Pokemon in New York City
06:30I wanna live to life
06:33I will be catching Pokemon in New York City
06:40I wanna live to life
06:43I will be catching Pokemon in New York City
06:52When I first got in myself it was closer to the middle of the day
06:59And one of the things we discovered was that direct sunlight over time
07:03Had the effect of undoing some of the solidness of the lower layers
07:06When you go in it just like fills your nose and like ears
07:15It's a very surreal feeling of just being like
07:18It's kind of hard to move
07:20But it's just slimy and slippery
07:23It actually feels really cool
07:25We have some pool toys hidden underneath
07:28Got it!
07:32It's like swimming in snot if that makes any sense
07:39But like a good snot!
07:40To keep it solid for even longer if we were to do it again
07:43We might put in a heat exchanger pipe system beneath the surface
07:46Sort of like how they freeze indoor ice skating rinks
07:49And maybe use a little sugar
07:51That's disgusting!
07:52Now at this point you might be thinking
07:53Why would anyone spend the effort of six months of planning
07:56And then a solid week of back breaking effort
07:58Just to make a stupid pool of jello
08:00And to that I say
08:02Why do people go through the effort of climbing Mount Everest?
08:05Why did Neil Armstrong go through the effort of stepping on the moon?
08:09And why did Pam and Jim go through the effort of convincing Dwight that Jim had always been Asian?
08:14This is Jim!
08:16Sometimes you don't do a thing because you should
08:19But simply to prove that you can
08:21Now that my curiosity was fully satiated
08:23And in my ongoing quest to be the favorite uncle
08:25I told my nephews they could invite some of their friends over
08:28And my brother's family set up a neighborhood barbecue
08:30And at this point after a lot of hours of belly flops and bowling balls and direct sunlight
08:35The jello was pretty broken down
08:37But that didn't stop us from setting up a jello pool slip and slide
08:41And I loved their sense of adventure
08:56But it was a bit of an uncle fail moment
08:59Because apparently none of them have ever used a slip and slide
09:02And everybody starts to move
09:12As soon as partner project starts to play
09:15Woo!
09:17Woo!
09:18Woo!
09:19Woo!
09:20Woo!
09:21Woo!
09:22Woo!
09:23Woo!
09:25Woo!
09:26Woo!
09:27Woo!
09:28Woo!
09:29Woo!
09:30Woo!
09:31Woo!
09:32Woo!
09:33Woo Woo!
09:39Woo ...
09:42Yes we put any sugar in here
09:44So it's kind of disgusting
09:45So we've got some real jello
09:51Woo!
09:53Woo!
09:56Woo!
09:57Woo carved there
09:59Nice chocolate
10:00förstach
10:01paintings
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