I want to make an unopenable jam jar - one that will resist the strongest grips.
What's the best way to achieve this?
I imagine that filling it up with boiling water, running a seam of superglue along the rim and thread then screwing the lid on tightly would get the best results.
Why the boiling water? Is that what you want it to be full of?
I recall doing something like this once - can't remember why. I used Araldite and left the jar+lid in a recently-heated oven for faster/ stronger setting.
It 'mostly' worked. But the Araldite didn't properly fully adhere to the glass and you could work the lid a little free. You might try something similar with epoxy resins designed for glass.
Ah, I remember now - I was experimenting with making a cheapskate 'moneybox'!
On Fri, 12 Dec 2008 08:58:11 +0000 someone who may be snipped-for-privacy@apple-juice.co.uk (D.M. Procida) wrote this:-
Do you want the contents, or the jar and the lid and the contents?
Has it already been opened?
If you only want the contents and a proper jar opener will not shift it then drill a hole in the lid. If the jar has not been opened this will release the vacuum. If necessary the hole can be enlarged to remove the lid.
Sounds like a Christmas trick to play on a brother or similar - "I bet I'm stronger than you", , sleight of hand to swap to identical looking jar, Pop!,
I'd be inclined to try hot-melt adhesive. If you use superglue or any other kind of hard setting glue there's a chance that the bond could be broken - or that it might not fully take to either the lid or the glass. Hot-melt adhesive has some give in it, it's not as brittle as a hard setting glue. Best bet would be to try it, and use a jar opener for extra leverage to test.
I want to use it to demonstrate a point about physiology and to show how
- when making strenuous efforts against resistant physical objects - we typically contort our bodies in inefficient ways. It will spoil my demonstration if the jar can be twisted open easily.
in which case you can forget the hot water vacuum thing and leave the original contents, also thus removing the contact between hot water and the araldite.
Mate of mine (Mark, also a magician) used to do something similar with a sharpie marker. He would remove the cap & apparently place it on the other end of the pen. What actually happened was that he palmed the cap, and on the other end of the pen was a duplicate cap super glued in place.
The unsuspecting punter would sign the playing card, then automatically try to replace the cap - which he couldn't. After a little humorous patter Mark would reverse the process and apparently re cap the pen. Very funny to watch :-)
You sound like the right sort of person to confirm or deny a pet theory of mine that's usually greeted with some scepticism. I believe that, all other things being equal, a left hander will find it easier to unscrew a difficult lid than a right hander. The body's geometry makes the right hand stronger turning clockwise[1], and the left hand stronger turning anticlockwise. Combine that with the left-hander having a stronger left hand due to greater use, and the result is clear.
Even if this theory isn't true, explaining it lessens the embarrassment when people see how easy it is for me (left handed, of course) to open the jar they've been struggling with.
[1] which is why the "right hand thread" became the norm, people attaching more importance to tightening than loosening
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