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Wildlifewriter Founder member
Joined: 04 Aug 2005 Posts: 948 Location: Norn Iron
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Posted: Sun Nov 06, 2005 5:42 pm Post subject: Bouyancy |
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Every schoolboy has heard of Archimedes.
Archimedes was a Sicilian philosopher, mathematician, engineer and general all round smart-alec who lived during the second century BC, in a nice little apartment with full en suite facilities.
We know this, because Archie was fond of taking baths. During the course of one such bath, the savant leapt from his tub with a cry of "Eureka!" (which is Greek for "Why does the bloody phone always ring when I'm in the bath?"), spilling water over the floor and scattering rubber ducks all round the place.
(It was a desperate job, clearing up after Archimedes.)
By this method, and after a serious night on the drink, Archie discovered Archimedes' Principle, which states that the weight of water on the bathroom floor is equal to the volume of the skinny old git who was in the bath in the first place.
Many of Archie's writings were later lost, so we don't know if he ever hid a geocache on a lake shore or by the sea below the tide line, as some cachers in Ireland have done from time to time. If he had, you can be sure that he'd have borne his own Principle in mind.
Take a typical tab-lock box - say 20x15x10 cm. - and put it in a bath of water. It floats.
Weigh it down by placing an ordinary 2.5kg house brick on top, and what happens?
It still floats.
Geocaches are more bouyant that you would imagine.
And I think that Archimedes would have no difficulty in saying where this cache went.
-Wlw |
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Haggis Hunter Founder member
Joined: 29 Aug 2005 Posts: 2487 Location: The building site formally known as Edinburgh!
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Posted: Sun Nov 06, 2005 7:06 pm Post subject: |
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Hmmm, yes I wonder where it will turn up? Message in a bottle springs to mind. _________________ Let me know if I say anything that offends you
I might want to offend you again later |
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wuthered Founder member
Joined: 29 Aug 2005 Posts: 51 Location: Co Down
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Posted: Sun Nov 06, 2005 7:08 pm Post subject: |
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I suspect that it is floating side by side with This Cache from the other end of the Bann. |
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Billy Twigger Founder member
Joined: 30 Aug 2005 Posts: 352 Location: N55 51.686 W5 05.647
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Posted: Sun Nov 06, 2005 10:11 pm Post subject: |
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Seems to be an NI phenomenon? Waterhide
Looks like I didn't do much of a job relocating it either! |
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Wildlifewriter Founder member
Joined: 04 Aug 2005 Posts: 948 Location: Norn Iron
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Posted: Sun Nov 06, 2005 11:34 pm Post subject: |
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Billy Twigger wrote: | Seems to be an NI phenomenon? Waterhide |
Perhaps just an Irish phenomenon - but maybe not. I haven't done THAT many caches in England and Scotland, but of those few...
Threipmuir Shore in the Pentlands springs to mind - though it's a reservoir so perhaps the water level is regulated.
Court and Locked Up near Kidderminster is only a few feet above the surface.
No doubt there are plenty of others.
The example of Rowan Tree River quoted by Wuthered above, is a classic of the type: Hidden in summer beside a gently-trickling mountain stream, and only inches above its level - the cache owner (who should have known better) failed to consider what this same stream would be like after a typical winter thaw. And the cache...
... just floated away.
-Wlw |
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