Half a croissant, on a plate, with a sign in front of it saying '50c'
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Pumpkin compressing conveyor belt.

Conveyor belt which drags pumpkins deep into the ocean and back.
  (+19, -2)(+19, -2)
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The pumpkin is dragged to depths where the pressure is around 6 tons per square inch, then back again. Of course you could lower them to different depths and get pumpkins the size of apples or grapes.

Boiling a compressed pumpkin will soften it and make it edible.

0_owaffleo_0, Jan 20 2005

The effects of deep sea pressure on polystyrene http://oceanexplore...ad_cupafter_600.jpg
[DrCurry, Jan 21 2005]

(???) Been there, done that..... http://www.bubblesb...Pumpkin/pumpkin.htm
.....ok, without the conveyer belt [normzone, Jan 21 2005]

A potential customer http://www.howarddi...ages/show_king2.jpg
[robinism, Jan 22 2005]

World Championship Punkin Chunkin Association http://www.punkinchunkin.com/
Which class do you prefer? Compressed Air, Centrifugal, Catapult, Trebuchet or Human Powered? [Gamma48, Jun 20 2009]


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Annotation:







       You are a genius, this is an extremely economical way to compress pumpkins. If you get a copyright for this and a column in the times magazine, you will probably revolutionise the pumpkin industry and bring enjoyment and prosperity to many.
0_owaffleo_0, Jan 20 2005
  

       Undersea pumpkin compactors have been done so many times...   

       But that boiling part, now that's original.
robinism, Jan 20 2005
  

       Won't they just expand when you bring them back up again?
Detly, Jan 20 2005
  

       Am I the only one who doesn't know why you'd want to compress a pumpkin?
5th Earth, Jan 20 2005
  

       how would you prevent witches in scuba gear stealing them in the dead of night?
benfrost, Jan 20 2005
  

       Ha, ha, ha, I want to be a aquatic pumpkineer!
skinflaps, Jan 20 2005
  

       No, [5th].
david_scothern, Jan 20 2005
  

       Shrunken heads sideline.
FarmerJohn, Jan 20 2005
  

       Anyone who treats a pumpkin this way is out of his gourd.
robinism, Jan 21 2005
  

       Wouldn't the conveyor belt be equaly shrinked at that pressure? Oh right, that doesn't matter -- with this pumpkins shinked too. Never mind. Sorry.
jstf, Jan 21 2005
  

       I think I'd prefer a conveyor that went into space, and exploded the pumpkins in a vacuum.
DrCurry, Jan 21 2005
  

       I've taken first place in an underwater pumpkin carving contest.....a conveyer belt would have been handy. If you get careless for a moment, the damn thing takes off for the surface.
normzone, Jan 21 2005
  

       This is a significant improvement over conventional methods of pumpkin compression.
Laughs Last, Jan 21 2005
  

       My nuclear pumpkin compressor will own you all.
Detly, Jan 21 2005
  

       I think you would need to fill the pumpkin with styrofoam of the same density as pumpkin parenchyma. This will get a nice uniform shrinkage. Otherwise the pumpkin will cave in, as the interior is mostly air.
bungston, Jan 21 2005
  

       You could inject the middle with expanding foam, but then it would cease to be edible.
wagster, Jan 21 2005
  

       Sadly they would, more or less. On the ascent, the inside would decompress to equalise with the outside pressure and swell. I would still go down to the bottom of the conveyor belt in a bathyscaphe to see a tiny pumpkin.
wagster, Jan 21 2005
  

       Build apparatus to throw them at people - Shrunken Sunken Punkin Chunkin.
david_scothern, Jan 21 2005
  

       Or bob for them at Halloween. Shrunken Sunken Punkin Dunkin'
Worldgineer, Jan 21 2005
  

       Perfect for people with grotesquely enlarged pumpkins (see link).
robinism, Jan 22 2005
  

       Wow! That punkin's sumthin!
wagster, Jan 22 2005
  

       Why, thank you! :-)
robinism, Jan 22 2005
  

       I already pointed that out, [Ian].
Detly, Jan 22 2005
  

       Has anyone seen Peter's wife lately?   

       Don't worry, she's doing fine. (We just had to go shopping for needlepoints, to beat the storm.)
DrCurry, Jan 22 2005
  

       1 question. Why?
DesertFox, Jul 22 2005
  

       Who? Robinism?
wagster, Jul 22 2005
  

       Okay...   

       Formula for a bun in my mind:   

       Strange visual images= bun!
froglet, Jul 22 2005
  

       For the answer to the question "Why?" I suppose it doesn't matter whether the pumpkin remains tiny, or if it returns to its original size - what really matters is that having deformed from big to small to big again the internals will have been squished in such a way as to make them softer, and I presume yummier for all.   

       I wonder what would happen to other air-happy foods such as sugar-puffs, wotsits, bread, pop-corn or aeros.
zen_tom, Nov 25 2008
  

       // Why? //   

       Peter, Peter, pumpkin-eater, Had a wife and couldn't keep her; So he put her in a pumpkin shell, And there he kept her very well,
theGem, Nov 25 2008
  

       //Why?//

Because.
DrBob, Nov 25 2008
  

       // Because. //   

       I said so!
theGem, Nov 25 2008
  

       The important thing is whether the pumpkin re-enlarges back to it's original size on return from the depths.   

       If they do, maybe you could poik a little hole in them when they're at the bottom, so the expanding air can escape as they rise.
Loris, Jun 20 2009
  


 

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