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  • this is fake, archimedes' death ray didnt burn down the boats, they blended them so they crashed gf

  • take the screen off a big flat screen t.v. and remove the middle screen. It's a magnifier and mirror in one. Boils water in seconds.

  • Awwww! Was hoping to see more of this. Too bad it's not available.

  • dan rojas reminds me of the late steve irwin.

  • Comment removed

  •  You guys are great. I really like your videos, You do a very good job. please keep them coming.

  • denese is so hot i wont my toung in her butt

  • Apollo's grace whahahaha

  • B.s it would have just been easier for him to fire (fire) arrows, it is more likely he used mirrors to blind the crew on the ship, and used fire/cannons to set the ships on fire not the sun.

  • Awesome video guys, well done. Looks like fun too :D

  • @SlimBoyArcadeFire

    Not according to history. Ships moved very slow back then and you had lots of time to blast them with light.

  • 6 people don't like true science.

  • which is better mirror or metal?

  • Before modern times, everything on a ship was tar coated and highly flamable.

  • arkimedes the romans are attacking. arkimedes: perfect, now prepare my death beam. but sir, its clody to day. arkimedes: FFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUU

  • @gooddarkjedi

    Uh... they did do damage even with cloud cover. Besides you could just blind the people (if you can catch the ship on fire just imagine what it would do to eyes.) Still a very useful weapon.

  • The myth is still busted..

    ONE:) Archimedes did not have the ability or technology to make parabolic mirrors of any kind...

    TWO) Archimedes did not have silverplated mirrors available. Polished bronzeplates was the best he could do.. And in all the tests it was proven that polished bronze did not have the ability to reflect heat and light which modern mirrors does.

    THREE:) What you are doing is simply showing what would be NEEDED to make a deathray... And busting the myth to bits..

  • @Budoshi

    How do you know? Where you there? Its impossible to bust any myths about history. We can only see what is plausible and this video does an excellent job of showing that the "myth" is plausible.

    One: they addressed that in the video. yes they did have the technology

    2: Actually according to the Mythbusters bronze would have been extremely effective and more of the better substances to use.

    3: Uh... of course that's what they are doing. So?

  • @DavidUmstattd How do I know? SIMPLE... RESEARCH....

    I hope you understand that concept.. Silverplated mirrors didn't come about before WAY after Archimedes died, Parabolic mirrors weren't constructed in his days either. Bronze simply don't have the capacity to reflect light and heat as silver has..

  • solo quisiera saber donde conseguir un espejo parabolico o como construir uno.

  • I feel like everybody forgets that these ships were sealed with an oil based tar that, once initially ignited, would have become an inferno....

  • Mythbusters just got busted.

  • @Bfrankenbergful Mythbusters most recent video used longer mirrors with 500 students, they leaned the mirrors on the ground causing them to flex into a mild concave shape. The optimal focal point of each mirror was about 20 feet, beyond that the diffuse to infinity. They were actually only using about 15% of the potential.

  • @GREENPOWERSCIENCE THANKYOU, THANKYOU, i am starting to HATE how mythbusters is doing things, the thing with the mirror and the hand, they swore it went straight down into the car when it actually crashed it with a head on collision, also did they not think that maybe the mirrors had to be parabolic for more focus. Sheesh.

    YOU GUYS ROCKED IT HERE. i hope what i'm seeing here is true though, but the idea behind it i do not doubt, I KNOW it's possible.

  • @GREENPOWERSCIENCE Oh i also just noticed that in the video i asked you guys that had the chinese song, i just noticed that too was your channel. LOL.

  • YEAH MYTHBUSTERS are idiots.

  • I seriously doubt Archimedes employed individually adjustable mirrors, not because he could not have conceived it, but because it would have been difficult to explain on short notice. A few(or a few dozen) of his disciples who understood the principles would have provided the soldiers with something to aim for. For advancing troops the beam could widen because less heat is needed to dispatch a man, than to burn a vessel. About 200 degrees less. This principle also works with microwaves.

  • theres a REALL DEATH RAY in las vegas you should check it out awsome video!!!

  • I inadvertantly caused tiny holes to be burned in a wooden end table in our living room by leaving a clear glass paperweight there. The sun did its work while everone was away from the house - fortunately, nothing else was burnt!

  • Maybe you could concentrate the mirrors on a extra large sterling engine and actually manage to hook it up to produce some juice

  • how do you prevent burning stuff when working with those type of temps do you have any videos on what not to do if you planning on moding your house with tech of basic princpal

  • how do you prevent burning stuff when working with those type of temps

  • @Twistedspike Hi,

    The focal area is very tight and because of the Earth rotation the sun is always on the move. With house installs good idea to go for warm not blazing hot. With lenses and parabolic mirrors your project should be in a safe area away from pets and kids. Of all the stuff we own, this shaving mirror caused the most trouble watch?v=cFxTynm8p2Q Easy to forget because it is a consumer product

    destroyed 9 wind bottles

    almost burned seat thru van window

    PVC trough ripped in half

  • @GREENPOWERSCIENCE Thanks for taking the time to reply to my question i been watching many of your videos i live in northen ireland and with everything been the way it is with the economy i was looking for ways to save some extra cash and when i looked into solar enery i found you on youtube when it comes to all of it i dont really know jack about this type of stuff but it interests me that this type of energy has been around for years but it still not a standard issuse feature on houses

  • @Twistedspike do it at fullmoon or use metal & steam ;)

  • Hey Dan, looks like you got some sun!!

  • @water2gashawaii I got a lot of sun, even sun block is impossible, you sweat so much (90% humidity) it runs down into your eyes and burns like crazy. I usually have a hooded sweatshirt when I work in the sun. Would rather sweat a lot than get sun exposure or mosquito buffet, but looks silly when doing videos. So this was a rare one week outdoor project.

  • Great video. Thanks. U guys have entirely too much fun. :o)

  • You put mythbusters to shame guys! Ha,ha!

  • Good stuff!

  • coulda used the ray-array to soften the ship up, before blasting it with a catapult, or ramming it.

  • I stand by what i said before.

  • "The Archimedes" would be a great name for a solar-concentrating war ship in a video game :)

  • Sailors know how to put out fires, then and now ,If it is a cloudy day it won't matter anyway. If fire is so dreaded and your right ,then they would have put fires out before this, lightning strikes are common out at sea and, they would know how to deal with it .

  • @dwarf2 I don't know any sailors who can do much of anything when their skin is 500 degrees, then or now.

  • Look at solar ovens.. I like them because it is direct solar applicance.. Why cant McDonalds and Burger King use solar ovens to fix burgers and FF? I have yet to see a solar oven with automatic sun tracker mechansim like we had with telescopes.. We are not connecting dots at all..Simplify solar energy! Solar energy can go much further by displacing tradtional dependence on natural gas or fuel oil, or electricity used in our furnaces than to convert it into electricty or steam ?? Nonsense!

  • It is also funny that the solar industry is still so focused on converting sunlight into electiricty only to end up using it to heat homes.. Why not heat homes directly with cheap mirrors?? Why are they watering down the power of solar energy .. Also why bother to mess with heating water for swimming pools through piping etc.. Why cant we direct concentrate sunlight directly at the water surface in swimming pools?? It would work faster with much less heat loss through piping..

  • it is funny there is so many experimenting with solar power liek yours yet America has yet to have its first gigawatt in electricity production annually! I suppose we already have enough of our solar fools to generate 100 gigawatts annually at youtubve.com!! hahahah

  • I am having a hard time finding manufacturers for ball sockets used in rear view mirrors. Guess I have to ask the carmakers where their suppliers are...I would ask the supplier to sell me the ball socket only Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz! you are toasty!@ One of my readers comment about using one to eliminate his neighbor's rooster early sunrise crowing!!

  • I am having a hard time finding manufacturers for ball sockets used in rear view mirrors. Guess I have to ask the carmakers where their suppliers are...I would ask the supplier to sell me the ball socket only Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz! you are toasty!@

  • I am having a hard time finding manufacturers for ball sockets used in rear view mirrors. Guess I have to ask the carmakers where their suppliers are...I would ask the supplier to sell me the ball socket only

  • I like the broken rear view mirrors the best because they are the easiest to adjust to focus sunlight toward the target and it hold by itself like you know in your own car.. Sometimes it droop hahah

  • I like the broken rear view mirrors the best because they are the easiest to adjust to focus sunlight toward the target and it hold by itself like you know in your own car..

  • You can gather ball sockets from broken rear view mirrors at auto wreckers. I tried calling them but they are uncooperative. The only way you can get a lot of them is through grapevine of friends for free.There is a lot of broken rear view mirrors being discarded everywhere. Why ?? Why didi the autowreckers discard broken rear view mirrors and keep good used ones for sale?? Why give to the recyclers for remelting . The broken rear view mirrors still has useful ball sockets that is critical !

  • You can gather ball sockets from broken rear view mirrors at auto wreckers. I tried calling them but they are uncooperative. The only way you can get a lot of them is through grapevine of friends for free.There is a lot of broken rear view mirrors being discarded everywhere. Why ??

  • Get a glass cutter and cut mirrors into 500 or more smaller squares maybe one inch or two inch and assemble them all on a special constructed board with adjusting screws or ram mounts (ball socket) for each tiny mirror so you can have a powerful smaller portable death ray board. What is more , you can make more copies of them . See what 10 death ray boards can do to a target. You can probably burn a 2000-3000 degree F hole through a steel plate one quarter inch thick . I saw them.

  • Maybe the ray was intended for the occupants?!

  • not practical no sun light no weapon.. Ships of that day would have to know how to put a fire out . Lightning is common and this weapon would have been easy to deal with .Nice vid i really like this stuff.

  • @dwarf2

    Fire is one of the most dreaded dangers at sea. It always has been. Everything is so dry, and it spreads so fast.

    If they set fire to the sail, the ship has a problem: it can't move, and is a sitting duck. If the sailors drop the sail, they're a sitting duck. If they wet the sail, they might be okay, but can they wet the top of the sail?

    If the beam is focused on inside the boat, and in response they fill the boat with water, they go pretty slowly...

  • I think the guys on deck are "the bbq pit boys" :D No flame/smoke/heat can hurt them!

  • You always have such interesting videos. I think MIT and Myth Busters tried this and although MIT found it to be potentially feasible, it was highly impractical for a moving target.

    Who really cares though; you put on an interesting demo.

  • I think your pirates died of smoke inhalation long before their ship caught fire.

    The narration sounds almost like Denise was reading it from a script. LOL.

  • Great video. One question. A mirror does not reflect 100% of the light that strikes it (disclaimer: I can not state this as a fact.) Did you consider this or care to comment on this?

  • @Bob06460 The glass absorbs some of the light, that is why first surface metal mentioned at 2:10 closes the gap between mirrors Archimedes may have used vs glass mirrors used in many recent tests. Most glass mirrors are 90% or less reflective depending on glass used and thickness. I shot a section explaining how glass mirrors are made but the video was getting too long.

  • I WANT SOME OF WHATEVER THOSE PIRATES ARE ON. SHIP BURNING AND HIGH HEAT EXPOSURE AND STILL SMILIN' JACK!!!

    MUDDy

  • Why are pirates called pirates? "Cause they arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr"

  • Also Bronze has more "flex" than glass so it would be easier to focus......... Love your channel btw!

  • The MythBusters have already revisited this, But You should submit this to them.....You are ABSOLUTELY right!!! this is definitely a realistic weapon .....Even if the ships didn't burst into flames, It would have been unbearable for the deck hands....No deck hands, no way to control the vessel. If you haven't already, I suggest you submit to myth busters!!

  • where is the BBQ :P

  • You two are AWESOME!

  • mythbusters tested the sail on water which is constantly moving, if a ship stood still for a long time with no waves or anything this could work.. it would be more viable from a balcony against oncomers

  • why is it taking so long?

  • Bad ass dude. That is amazing. What is more amazing how some knuckleheads think boats are soaking wet. They have dry areas. You can follow anything with a mirror, even a car, boats are slow or stopped. Also RELIGION in those days, having that would be like seeing their God or something. They would crap their pants. Love the pirates. Denise, your shirt is the same color as the sail, nice touch.

  • and about 75-80 degrees centigrade will burn a person, sailor badly

  • @Films4You Finally someone brings this point up. If anyone happened to get near that focal point, they would get burned quite badly, and back then, getting burned by something intangible would freak an army out, for sure.

    ~Dustin

  • @DHarms07 Also that they could not see to fire guns at Archimedes side, ( a type od defence ), leaving the attackers even more vulnerable.

    This would not require a high levels of Sun and be only needed for very, very short times. Try shining a torch in your eyes, from a distance, and the switching it off... It takes quite a while for th eyes to readjust before you can see anything. Time for Archimedes side, to take other actions.

  • Not only burning but dazzling causing confusion and ship crashing, etc...

  • Of course the reason this weapon didn't expand everywhere was it's dependance on the right sunshine. One thing though was when this is tested it is important to the testers it destroys or starts fires. Not so. I would think the sailors would have got out of Dodge as soon as the heat started cooking hem like baked chicken. That;s why the NWO has microwave crowd control machines like this one; search, HEAT-RAY CROWD-BUSTER on youtube

  • @ericstrattendgtmy As above

    Also that they could not see to fire guns at Archimedes side, ( a type od defence ), leaving the attackers even more vulnerable.

    This would not require a high levels of Sun and be only needed for very, very short times. Try shining a torch in your eyes, from a distance, and the switching it off... It takes quite a while for th eyes to readjust before you can see anything. Time for Archimedes side, to take other actions.

  • @Films4You Yes, good points.

  • Aside from burning the ship, think how it would have effected the crew on these ships! Great video!!!!!!!!!!!

  • @nicpetrykowskis Yep, cause being in water would keep the sail from catching on fire right?

  • all ways A+

  • you guys rock:)

  • QUICK! Aim it at the plane!

  • I think the movement of the ships would have presented a lot of difficulties. If they were becalmed it could have been made to work. Does that sort of weather pattern happen in and near Syracuse though? Also they probably would have focused on the sales since they would have been much easier targets to hit and equally easy to ignite.

  • You guys remind me of the NeverGetBusted couple.

  • Yeah!

    GREENPOWERSCIENCE bust Mythbusters.

  • Lol I wish I was your neighbor.

  • Denise is so purty, it could have been her presence that ignited the ship.

    Just sayin....

    Thumbs up, guys!

  • MYTHBUSTERS, EAT YOUR HEART OUT!!!! Dan you are the man! =-)

  • Imagine hundreds of soldiers reflecting at once...quite hot...cool video.

  • Alot better than Mythbusters!

    And they had a big budget!

  • Awesome display of sun power. Although I doubt Archimedes heat ray would have worked. Not because he didn't have the skills or know how, but because the ships are constantly moving on the water. It would have been near impossible to hold a concentrated beam of light on a small area, much less the amount of beams needed to ignite it. I'm not saying it's impossible. I'm saying it's unlikely. Nice video :)

  • You guys rock:

    GPS: 1, Mythbusters: 0

  • I think mythbusters tried this and failed but i do believe then went about it the wrong way

    perhaps someone should point them to this video

    and they might add it to that one episode they do a year in which they revisit old myths they busted to approach from different ideas

    who knows they proven there original busting wrong before

    only ounce of twice to my knowledge but im shore there's bean more

  • You guys should totally do your own school science video series. You blow away Bill Nye from back when I was in school.

    Imagine having a set of Green Power Science videos in grade schools, middle schools, and high schools around the country?

    you already have the major parts done:

    1. Good content

    2. Informative dialog

    3. Hot co-star (Dan's wife is goood looking)

    You just need a video deal now.

  • a green way to destroy my enemies :)

    or give them some sunburn

  • I think myth busters did something on the roman death ray @ sea

  • Im sure its possible. You got to know that Archimedes had probably hundreds of soldiers to help, so if Dan and Denise alone with fev mirrors burned small woden ship even in few hours. Im sure that hundreds of soldiers could burn more than one roman ship in fev minutes. Fire spreads fast and if it grow bigger than spreads faster. About mirrors im sure that it was possible to make them efficient enough. People in those time wosnt less smart they had only less knowledge.

  • This video shows that mirrors and sun light can be used as weapons against ships. They also show the weakness of the weapon - it only works during the day with a cloudless sky and at short range. At short range the soldiers would climb out of the ships and stab you. These practical limitations means that such a weapon would only get used once.

  • Dan you like like you have one heck of a tan.

  • stupid youtube popup bars!!

  • This probably would have messed up the sailors on the deck before the ships, you could easily cause intense pain to someone with that or even blind them.

  • Dan, you're getting too much sun, please be careful.

  • I can see Romans with buckets of salt water trying to drown out the flames. Your ship was static too. You've proved it can work in ideal conditions, now try it in less than ideal conditions. Archimedes would be proud.

  • ROFL! I would be terrified to be your neighbor. I'd be afraid I would come home one day to find my house, garage, or tree had been burned down hahaha

  • the bigger problem with the archimedes heat ray thing is that his location faced entirely the wrong direction for such a device

  • @kitrana What do you mean that Archimedes' location faced the wrong direction for a heat ray device? As long as the sun is out, you can reflect it back in any desired direction.

  • @hughtub mmmm yes and no as i recall the hardbor for the city where he lived had natural cliffs surounding it so there were certain times of the day when this device would be utterly useless like dawn when invading ships would be more probable to attack

  • denise you are super hot!!!!

  • At 3:25 did you see the orb flying by? Archimedes would be proud of you guys. Be well.

  • Great Job!

    

  • Use it to heat a boiler,and make steam to power a generator.

  • Even without flames and smoke, the light and heat could blind and incapacitate the enemy while other forces strike. If one thousand soldiers simultaneously directed sunlight reflecting shields onto the approaching enemy while another thousand just aimed their arrows at the bright spot.....yeah.. you bet I'd call that a death ray.

  • Even if it couldn't burn the whole ship down, it would certainly burn anyone who it focused on, imaging trying to run across a deck that is searing hot!

  • Mythbusters are busted!

  • Great, now try it on a target that's covered in ocean spray, moving forward as well as up and down with the ocean. Also consider, a 200 ton ship with at least 100 crew on board, you'd find at least find one guy with a bucket of water.

  • Also if you firing at a ship full of people they are going to have the sun in their eyes - talk about painful.

  • ghost ghost! 0.16

  • Archimedes was a bright guy. He invented a hook on a swing arm to hook enemy ships as they try to dock that would simply pull one side of the ship up until the lower side swamped and sank the ship. He also invented a long screw water pump, they used to pumped the water to tanks above the docks. In an emergency, these tanks were designed so they could be turned over to swamp ships trying to attack the docks.

  • Could you do a how-to on your framed mirrors?

  • cool vid. thanks for making it. cheers

  • Imagine a thousand highly polished shields/mirrors. Totally possible an ancient laser dazer device.

  • Do you know if the Mythbusters have been following these videos? I'm sure they'd be as impressed as I am. Great project, fantastic videos! I've told a lot of my friends about you. Thanks again, awesome job.

  • 27 frame mirrors? You could run a serious Sterling Engine with those.

  • The soldiers could have used the focus to blind the other soldiers and to set the sail reducing the speed in which the ships could arrive increasing the time for the ships to sit there and bake. I think it is entire plauseable. Focus the framed mirrors on a pipe filled with oil drive a turbine.

  • I really stgill do not buy it

  • They had way more mirrors and got a fraction of the results. LOL

    GREAT JOB

  • proof of concept

  • Nice, I like the Mythbusters but honestly thought they were suffering burnout during their Archimedes video. I like how its made. They can polish bronze to a perfect mirror. Gold was polished to mirrors back then. Two things that inspire technology WAR and GREED. So I think it would be possible

  • I've seen the military pay for less obvious weapons then this.

  • Very cool video. You guys rock and Archimedes was the sh!t.

  • You need to target this at those planes that keep flying over :>

  • good job! ,You can set up the death ray to cook dinner now.

  • Nice series of videos Dan and Denise. I learned two things here:

    1. GreenPowerScience is hot.

    2. Pirates are tough. ;o)

  • I remember an episode of "Survivor Man" where he said that to aim a reflection toward something like a plane, for the purposes of signaling it, you should hold your hand out in front of you with a "peace" sign and shine the light between your fingers with the plane or object in the distance between your fingers too. I'm sure a group of soldiers could do the same thing or even build a scope on their mirrors back in the day.

  • Nice work! but you should have let it burn longer. That way you would have been left with a small pile of ship to deal with.

  • Aim for the gun powder kegs, and/or whoever is steering!

  • well weather or not he actually sunk ships using this method there is another great effect it would have had. you could blind / cook the crew making the ship worthless

  • It certainly looks like a ship could have been ignited by this method, and I'm thinking it could have been a pretty effective anti-personnel weapon too.

    I wouldn't have wanted to be on an invading ship with those mirrors turned on me.

    Great video as always!

  • Was that Anodised Aluminum. 3M used to make a good reflective film.

  • I seen in another video where it cant be explained how an ancient wall/fort made of granite was partially melted, some think it was concentrated sun energy. Odds are that if it worked then it would of had extensive use throughout history, and we havent heard much about it anymore than a myth or legend.  I'm sure Archimedes at least tested his idea using a small mirror array on some models and probably for some solar cooking and melting of objects.

  • HA!. take that mythbusters!

  • Thumbs up guys... As for the 27 mirrors... What about the bedroom ceiling? ;o)

    Mind out for a burnt butt though... Smokin'!

  • didn't mythbusters bust this?

  • @andruha11234 Thats the point of this video:-)

  • @GREENPOWERSCIENCE Now you just have to get a real boat to not move up and down with the waves and to stay a fixed distance from the mirrors for an hour or so and you have a working weapon... Myth Busted :)

  • @GREENPOWERSCIENCE

    it could work but come on if you wanted to kill the enimy there were better options at the time... not saying it wouldnt work but its very impractical..

  • @andruha11234

    because mythbuster was more accurate, the greek does not have such a flawless mirror, they have bronze shield and that didn't relect to well, back in the days they used people instead of stuff... also trygetting 50 people to cordinate on hitting 1 ship amoungst the other 50 or so ships.

    so yes it is possible, but mythbusters proved it wasn't back in the days of greek

  • @andruha11234 didnt idiot busters bust mythbusters.

    Time to turn off the t.v i think, if not mythbusters.

  • @crimberland

    Mythbusters is probably about the most scientific show that the mainstream will watch. As well as being an informative show, it helps the overwhelmingly scientifically illiterate masses get a bit of education. Such is a feat that should be applauded.

  • @Paradox3121 we must be talking about a different show, because the ones i see get it wrong a lot, or dont do the experiments correctly. That is not good for science or the masses. I'll do my own experiments the same as dan. Not worth relying on what the masses think anyway. Most is utter crap.

    Can you think of one that is worth really worth watching for the sake of humanity or education.

  • @andruha11234 They did "bust" this but GreenPowerScience just CONFIRMED it. How did Mythbusters screw that up? There probably kicking themselves.

  • @surfjacobson1 this wouldn't work in real life... boats tend to not stay in one place and move up, down, and in a direction... also, how are you gonna get 20 feet away from a boat and not have people on the other boat trow stuff to break the mirrors...

  • @andruha11234 I'm sure they'll be calling Dan and Denisse to ask them how to do it.

  • @andruha11234 - The point of the Mythbusters version is to demonstrate that while it WAS possible to concentrate solar rays enough to burn wood, it was not effective as a weapon because the target needs to (a) stand still for a long time, and (b) stay vulnerable for a long enough time that the solar concentrator can burn it sufficiently to take it out of the fight.

    On surface-area physics alone, this video confirms it's OK for starting a campfire but useless for burning giant Roman ships.

  • @crimsonhalo13

    How much damage you think instantaneous 400f would do to the enemy sailors/soldiers eyes?

    Eyes are soft, vulnerable target which is both temporarily and permanently damaged easily. You don't need to burn down the ship to disable the enemy army. You just need to scorch a decent number of warriors eyes and face. Then they are useless.

  • @andruha11234 - Mythbusters merely busted the myth that it could be used as a practical weapon of war...

  • @andruha11234 if you watched the mythbuster show with this you'd see they messed it all up. They way over thought it and didnt do a good job.

  • @woodburyadpost they did do a good job. in this video they were pretty close to the target... and i doubt you be able to get that close to an enemy ship without them destroying your set up

  • Wow, impressive stuff!

    I saw a documentary on TV a while ago, where a group of "experts" tried to accomplish this but very little happened.

  • i thought the original legend was that he had the soldiers polish the inside of their shields, which would have been concave metal surfaces.

  • @furroy2 The concave would have needed to be almost 100% flat.

  • @GREENPOWERSCIENCE If I were Archimedes, I would have shrouded my Incinerate-O-Ray Mirrors to look like... well, not highly specialized Incinerate-O-Ray Mirrors. If word ever spread to opposing forces; they would be on a wild goose chase... or "shield chase" wondering why their shields weren't awesome. Archimedes was very intelligent. I don't think it would be too charitable to assume he would have that kind of forethought, and may be the reason why we still don't know exactly how he did this.

  • @GREENPOWERSCIENCE Yeah, unless your target is 2 feet away.

  • @furroy2

    That was the legend. He could have found the approximate focal length of a more or less standard shields, or even had each soldier's shield sighted in, and then each soldier positioned around the target site accordingly. They surely had some spot picked out where a ship would anchor. Mirror drills for precision targeting!

    Imagine the grumbling as these soldiers were ordered to do that amount of bronze(?) polishing!

  • Great work guys! I've long thought that Archimedes might have been a little bit smarter than various busters and debunkers.