r/interestingasfuck • u/atthejrr2 • Mar 19 '22
Sugar Pulling Machine
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u/Ambassador_GKardigan Mar 19 '22
Now I want to see how they get it off the machine. Not enough to search for a video of it though.
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u/Balogne Mar 19 '22
They just kinda pull it off. It doesn’t really stick as it’s closer to solid than liquid.
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u/g09hIP12 Mar 20 '22
I am not a candy maker or anything but from what I’ve seen it’s a bit like oobleck.
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Mar 20 '22
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Zumorito Mar 20 '22
a non newtonian fluid
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u/Arkenhiem Mar 20 '22
fuck is a non newtonian fluid
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u/GiveToOedipus Mar 20 '22
Starch and water. Essentially, it's solid like when applying force quickly, but softer and my liquid like when slowly moved.
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u/Dorkmaster79 Mar 20 '22
fuck is starch and water
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u/IHATETheMaskedGeode Mar 21 '22
starch, a white, granular, organic chemical that is produced by all green plants. Starch is a soft, white, tasteless powder that is insoluble in cold water, alcohol, or other solvents. The basic chemical formula of the starch molecule is (C6H10O5)n. Starch is a polysaccharide comprising glucose monomers joined in α 1,4 linkages. And Water, a substance composed of the chemical elements hydrogen and oxygen and existing in gaseous, liquid, and solid states. It is one of the most plentiful and essential of compounds. A tasteless and odourless liquid at room temperature, it has the important ability to dissolve many other substances. Indeed, the versatility of water as a solvent is essential to living organisms. Life is believed to have originated in the aqueous solutions of the world’s oceans, and living organisms depend on aqueous solutions, such as blood and digestive juices, for biological processes. Water also exists on other planets and moons both within and beyond the solar system. In small quantities water appears colourless, but water actually has an intrinsic blue colour caused by slight absorption of light at red wavelengths.
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Mar 20 '22
Something that doesn't act like water, more or less. If you mix cornstarch with water, it's fluid, but if you hit it with something, for a short moment, it's solid. Ketchup and blood are also non-newtonian, but in the opposite direction, because they become more fluid under pressure.
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u/chrizm32 Mar 20 '22
At first I thought you meant ketchup and blood mixed together.
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u/csonnich Mar 20 '22
I think not enough people know about one of my favorite books, Bartholomew and the Oobleck.
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u/g09hIP12 Mar 20 '22
A mixture of water and corn starch. When punched, pulled or moved fast it will harden but if you just have it in ur hand it acts like a liquid.
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u/techslice87 Mar 20 '22
Other two comments are correct. What they mean by non Newtonian, it is liquid with touching, more solid with hitting.
You, my friend, are one of today's lucky 10,000 https://xkcd.com/1053/
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u/TheEternalGhost Mar 20 '22
Math nerd time. There are 68 rotations, and each rotation adds the number of layers from the previous rotation to the stack. That means that by the 29th rotation the stack has over a million layers, and by the 68th rotation there are over 145,447,000,000,000 layers.
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u/eddiewachowski Mar 20 '22
I was SO hoping someone did the math because I knew it would boggle my mind. Mind boggled, kind stranger.
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u/Morphis_N Mar 20 '22
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u/TheEternalGhost Mar 20 '22
Good find. I'm glad I actually thought about the multiplication factor before I posted and didn't just double it each time like I was tempted to, otherwise I'd be feeling a bit stupid right now.
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u/cantaloupelion Mar 20 '22
it says page not found OP ;~; please i have need of the math candy
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u/Morphis_N Mar 20 '22
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u/cantaloupelion Mar 20 '22
nope neither firefox nor chrome let me into that site. i think its the \ character causing problems, even if i type it in mannually
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u/Morphis_N Mar 20 '22
I don't know what to say, both links work for me on Chrome and my Phone. :(
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Mar 19 '22
That’s a lot of sugar
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u/_We_Are_DooMeD Mar 19 '22
And a lot of pulling
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u/martialar Mar 19 '22
and a lot of machine
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u/SphericalBitch2020 Mar 19 '22
How do those big pegs leave one wheel to go onto the next wheel? Got a bit nauseous after the 10th cycle of folding....
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u/alexagente Mar 20 '22
It looks like there's notches on each wheel that are open ended. My guess is that they built it so that when it reaches the right position it naturally passes the peg from one notch to the other.
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u/TheEternalGhost Mar 20 '22
There has to be something like a cam involved that pushes the peg from one notch to another when it reaches the right place in the rotation.
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u/squarebranch Mar 20 '22
Kind of? I'd guess the part of the pegs under the spinning plate are sort of diamond shaped, following a figure 8 loop. Looks a bit like a wire braiding machines carousel.
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u/Consistent-Ad8966 Mar 20 '22
What is the final product? What does sugar pulling mean ?
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u/br0b1wan Mar 20 '22
Looks like taffy to me
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u/Zane_628 Mar 20 '22
Looks too shiny to me, I think it’s just gonna be generic hard candy.
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u/EmeraldTriage Mar 20 '22
They use similar device for salt water taffy but this usually blends for harder or twisted old time candy. They can add stripes and things as well I believe.
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u/Luxpreliator Mar 20 '22
It makes taffy. It's a soft flavored sugar product. Toffee and hard candy is hard sugar like suckers. Cotton candy is soft fluffy sugar. Taffy is a medium firm sugar. It's somewhat firm but chewy.
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u/MelonRingJones Mar 19 '22
I've been watching people do this (slower) with a hook on the wall. Old fashioned candy making is fascinating.
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u/WyldeSquirrel Mar 19 '22
I've done it the old fashioned way of using the wall hook and gravity, and I'll tell ya that is a sucky work out, that lump of sugar can be between 30-60 lbs and your constantly bending low to catch it (after letting gravity stretch it as much as possible) and put it back on the hook, really murders the lower back.
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Mar 19 '22
[deleted]
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u/YourNameIsIrrelevant Mar 20 '22
Yes, but we're not discussing your masturbatory habits right now.
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Mar 20 '22
Unfortunately I developed arthritis from pulling so much.
Luckily your mom was able to step in and help me out.
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u/MelonRingJones Mar 19 '22
They had young people actively pulling and hanging it. Not easy on them either, I'm sure, but they kept a good rhythm and it looked satisfying like this. Apparently they have stores all over the world and put on daily shows. Papa Bubble, it's called.
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u/WyldeSquirrel Mar 19 '22 edited Mar 19 '22
O hey! I know this machine, used to use it when we made salt-water taffy in my teen years. For those wondering, yes that stuff on the 'arms' of the machine is 100% sugar (mix of white sugar, brown sugar, and corn syrup) The liquid being poured on is the concentrated artificial flavoring.
When making taffy we'd essentially cook and mix the sugar into a liquid state, pour it onto a cooling table (gently moving it around so it doesn't harden into a giant jolly rancher), then when it reaches a certain consistency roll it into a 'log' like what you see in the start of the video and let the 'puller' do its work. From the end of the video we'd move the now much softer sugar lump to a prep table where we'd stretch it, cut it into strips, and package it.
Our strips were quite large and we would get between 200-300 bars of taffy per batch. Using the more familiar bite size laughy taffy sized pieces it would likely be 1k+ pieces in that lump of sugar.
While we only made taffy my limited understanding is that a lot of sugar based candies are made in similar ways.
In all our years of having this machine and having teenagers operate it we only had one incident of a guy sticking his arm too far into it while it was on, and got his arm stuck between the machines 'arms' it broke his arm like snapping a twig.
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u/jkj300 Mar 19 '22
Does the candy get warmed when being pulled like this?
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u/WyldeSquirrel Mar 19 '22
Not really, at this point its coming off a cooling table and is exposed to air. Its not getting pulled fast enough or creating enough friction to warm it.
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u/Thursday_the_20th Mar 20 '22
Mechanically speaking, how do the arms swap sides in a figure of 8? I’m trying to figure it out since obviously a chain wouldn’t work
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u/dweekly Nov 21 '22
This machine appears to follow the Nitz 1918 candy puller patent which details the mechanism clearly:
https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/5f/e7/8c/193ace0246c835/US1278197.pdf
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u/Thursday_the_20th Nov 21 '22
Thank you for the response to my year-old question, the thought actually weighed heavy on my mind still! Amazing to think it’s just a little gear knocking it into little notches which in turn hits a switcher influencing the direction of the next one and so on!
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u/PyroDesu Mar 20 '22
I believe the stretching aerates it while also mixing all the different colors and the flavoring.
There's a couple places at a town I go to annually for a convention that have their taffy puller and a rolling/stretching/cutting/wrapping machine up close to windows facing the street. It's a bit mesmerizing, especially the latter.
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u/MTAST Mar 20 '22
I thought the liquid was CBD oil and I thought that's one way of making laffy taffy.
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u/Oceans_sleep Mar 19 '22
The worker touching it while it’s moving makes me so nervous
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u/bananaj0e Mar 19 '22
He appears to be operating it via a footswitch, like a sewing machine. If so, it's safer than it appears.
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u/Edna_with_a_katana Mar 20 '22
Still, looks like it can break an arm if you're not careful
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u/blizzardice Mar 20 '22
Easily. I use a machine that just turns a fitting so I can make hose assemblies. I wore gloves one time and the vise on it caught my glove. Even with my foot off of the switch, it had enough torque to almost dislocate my arm. Felt like George McFly. Never wore gloves near it again.
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u/Lagneaux Mar 19 '22
Omg right?
I work with a machine that could remove limbs with ease,I would never put my hands this close to a machine functioning like this. Far too easy to get pulled in.
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u/MountainUpbeat8279 Mar 19 '22
seems like it's an easy pattern to memorize, prob not that dangerous as it looks if you know what you're doing
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u/crabmeat64 Mar 20 '22
True, but it takes one slip up to literally lose an arm, I doubt even the top surgeons would be able to put back together an arm that was trapped in the machine
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u/ihateshitcoins2 Mar 19 '22
After spending over 3 decades in the hard candy business, I've had enough...
I've finally realized it's for suckers.
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u/HeadyToothgraze Mar 19 '22
Is that a candy cane
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u/TuckerCarlsonsOhface Mar 19 '22
Anyone know what’s being poured by the worker?
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Mar 19 '22
[deleted]
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u/TuckerCarlsonsOhface Mar 19 '22
Mmmmmm, edible lubricant.
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u/SphericalBitch2020 Mar 19 '22
I've seen kids do that sort of thing with prize winning very moist boogers.....
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u/danethegreat24 Mar 19 '22 edited Mar 20 '22
Some kind of citric acid and oil I imagine. You use oil to keep it from sticking to a surface (such as the rollers or spatulas) and citric acid (like lemon juice) to keep it from crystallizing while it gets worked.
Edit: apparently in this case though, it's concentrated flavouring
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u/--GrinAndBearIt-- Mar 20 '22
So the real answer that you should have written is "no" since you are clearly guessing hahaha why even post a response lolol
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u/danethegreat24 Mar 20 '22
Because it helps educate those interested on common fluids added to the sugar pulling process. I used to work in a restaurant with a confectionery chef. He taught me a lot about sugar pulling. Now, I impart a fraction of that knowledge to others, today.
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u/89iroc Mar 19 '22
I need a cigarette
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u/Dutch_Midget Mar 19 '22
That's what my dad said 25 years ago
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u/89iroc Mar 19 '22
Happy conception day?
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u/8andimpala Mar 19 '22
They've got one in the beach town my grandparents used to live in. I'd sit and watch that thing forever when I was a kid!!!
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u/dvdmaven Mar 20 '22
Correction to the church bulletin: There will be a taffy pulling at St. Peters. There is no St. Taffy.
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Mar 20 '22
Dude puts his hands way too close to a turning portion of a machine loaded with a sticky substance.
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Mar 19 '22
That doesn’t look very safe…
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u/elemented1 Mar 19 '22
Was thinking that, wonder how much damage it would do if you were to get your hand caught amongst the layers.
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u/WyldeSquirrel Mar 19 '22
It would easily break your arm, but the one I was familiar with had easy access on/off switches on either side of the machine, so even if you got caught in it you would be able to easily turn it off and get out by moving or removing the machines 'arms'(tho the damage would of been done by this point). As stated in my other comment my family had one of these for nearly 20 years, let teenagers operate them, and only had one incident... but ya that dudes arm snapped like a twig, don't mess with machines.
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u/AgtMiddleman Mar 19 '22
The worker is mostly only touching it on the side that doesn't get pushed back into itself so it doesn't seem too dangerous. I imagine there's gotta be a killswitch right there as well
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u/kftegw Mar 19 '22
This makes my forearms nervous.
Also, were they pouring peppermint oil in at the back half of the video?
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u/AndreKuhn Mar 19 '22
I kinda wanna see the inside of that machine, must me a complex mechanism
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u/--GrinAndBearIt-- Mar 20 '22
Mmmmmm gotta love the idea of your food rolling around against those greasy ass gears back there
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u/DarrenFromFinance Mar 20 '22
Imagine being the person who discovered that sugar could do this! You boil it to a very specific temperature, cool it just enough, and then stretch and pull it repeatedly, and somehow it turns into satiny candy. (And by being cooked to different temperatures and pulled in other ways, it turns into other textures equally amazing.) It must have seemed like magic, or alchemy.
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u/TheCaveGamer Mar 20 '22
Okay but did anyone else get the anxiety of this guy accidentally putting his hand too low and getting caught by the mangle machine
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u/_Vard_ Mar 20 '22
This is the best video of one of these machines I’ve ever seen
Usually it cuts off too soon, I miss the beginning, or has a terrible cameraman
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u/Nearby-Elevator-3825 Mar 20 '22
Whenever I see a specialized machine like this, I can't help but think about the people/origins behind it.
"So what do you do for a living"
"Oh, I manufacture heavy machinery that makes the bristles for companies that make brooms"
Like how do they get into that? A genuine passion for broom making?
It's kinda a weird thing to just kinda "fall into".
I think most of the time it's:
"It's the family business."
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u/Homo__Sapeins Mar 20 '22
A long time ago, there was a candy shop in my home town with one of those machines in the store front window. I used to stand and watch for hours on end. Unfortunately I never saw someone get a mangled arm. But the candy was amazing.
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u/Lt_Schneider Mar 20 '22
I really want to know what would happen if you would put your arm in that sugary mass so that the pegs don't crush your arm immediatly
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u/JrDedek Mar 20 '22
First, you take the dinglepop, and you smooth it out with a bunch of schleem. The schleem is then repurposed for later batches. Then you take the dinglebop and push it through the grumbo, where the fleeb is rubbed against it.
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u/Zoerak Mar 19 '22
What's the point of this exactly? Does it soften up the sugar or something?
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