Dare-Yo-Slow-Mo is a cross between a yo-yo and a bungy jump. It's called Dare-Yo-Slow-Mo because only the most daring will submit to its subtle terror.
The apparatus involved is quite simple, and consists of a large yo-yo, with a place for locating a person in the central part of the "spool'. Naturally they are prevented from being flung out, as Dare-Yo-Slow-Mo descends and ascends on its relentless yo-yo journey.
A strong cable is wrapped many times around the inner spool containing the volunteer Dare-Yo-Slow-Mo participant. This cable terminates in a winding arm that allows the Dare-Yo-Slow-Mo to free-fall descend, but can also jerk it up and down to maintain the motion. A very tall platform acting as the launching pad completes the arrangement.
Now off you go! Try not to eat too much before your Dare-Yo-Slow-Mo session.-- xenzag, Mar 06 2015 Is your body wedged along the axis of spin, or is it spread-eagled across one of the disk faces?-- pertinax, Mar 06 2015 Spread out like an X. I was going to go for totally "loose" inside a cage, but I think that's too extreme, even for me.-- xenzag, Mar 06 2015 Someone needs to compute the max rate of spin at the bottom of the cable, and the G-forces experienced then. It might be too much for the body to tolerate.-- Vernon, Mar 06 2015 If the barrel is 1m in diameter, and is flung off a 20m bridge, it would reach a speed in the region of 40mph before reaching the 'apex'. If you assume no friction, and have the barrel spinning at 18.6m/s (roughly 40mph) then it must be spinning at 18.6/Pi = 5.9 revolutions per second - which is approx 360 rpm. The G forces experienced at the circumference at this point would be around 144G - trained fighter pilots tend to black-out and die around 9G. Suddenly reversing the direction of the spin in the opposite direction at the bottom of the jump should temporarily double these forces to 288G.
A typical bungee jump is around 75m.
Perhaps we should rebrand this as some form of cruel and unusual capital punishment?-- zen_tom, Mar 06 2015 Now you know why it's called a halfbaked idea. With a freely rotating centre, the person would stay in the same orientation, and only experience a type of slow motion bungee jump.-- xenzag, Mar 06 2015 The direction of spin does not reverse at the bottom. But the velocity of the device's centre of mass does reverse direction extremely suddenly, from +xmph to -xmph in the distance of the radius of the drum.
And it's not freefall since gravity has to accelerate the device rotationally as well as vertically, as the cable unspools.-- pocmloc, Mar 06 2015 name edit-- xenzag, Mar 06 2015 //If the barrel is 1m in diameter, and is flung off a 20m bridge, it would reach a speed in the region of 40mph before reaching the 'apex'.//
No. First of all, by "apex" you mean "nadir".
But even so, your calculations are wrong because they assume that the barrel has no angular momentum.
A barrel unwinding on a yo-yo rope will fall more slowly than a barrel just dropped. In the same way, a normal yo-yo does not descend at the same speed it would if it were just dropped.-- MaxwellBuchanan, Mar 06 2015 Exactly. Some of the gravitational force is bled off to spinning a body with some initial rotational inertia.-- RayfordSteele, Mar 06 2015 //subtle terror// nothing subtle about projectile vomiting.-- FlyingToaster, Mar 06 2015 Man that is a bad name.-- tatterdemalion, Mar 06 2015 I actually don't think this would be that bad. In fact it could be quite relaxing and not stomach churning at all. Drat!-- xenzag, Mar 06 2015 random, halfbakery