Braingle: 'Overhanging Bricks' Brain Teaser

Overhanging Bricks

Science brain teasers require understanding of the physical or biological world and the laws that govern it.

Puzzle ID:	#16699
Fun:	(2.24)
Difficulty:	(2.49)
Category:	Science
Submitted By:	Jake

What is the maximum overhang that you can create with an infinite supply of bricks?

You cannot use any mortar or attach the bricks to each other or anything else in any way. The bricks are simply dry stacked on level ground and jut out over a ledge.

Assume that you have an infinite amount of space to work with and that a brick is 22x10x6 cm in dimension and weighs 5kg. Also assume that we are on earth.

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Comments

dcameron999 Feb 23, 2004	Actually, you can only create an overhang that approaches 1 full brick length. You can theoretically use an infinite number of bricks but the overhang, according to your formula, will never total greater than or equal to 1 brick length.
thamaturge Feb 23, 2004	I thought that the answer was infinite because by using a pyramidal shape as long as the base is increased the top may go higher. The math i didn,t catch.
(user deleted) Feb 24, 2004	I sooo did not get this one...
od-1 Feb 27, 2004	HEY JAKE this is the first teaser of yours I've seen. Good one I hope we shall see more
Bulletthrudahed Mar 02, 2004	if the tower or whatever was equal on both sides it could be an infinite amount of overhang but where are you going to find all these builders to build it???
Bulletthrudahed Mar 02, 2004	no i don't get the formula either
jimbo Mar 03, 2004	The center of mass a(n) of the nth brick approaches 1 brick length. However, the brick overhangs its centre of mass by half of its length. Therefore the answer is one and a half brick lengths is the maximum overhang. In other words 33 cm (if your centre of mass formula is correct).
dcameron999 Mar 03, 2004	I think 1 1/2 is wrong. You can't get more than 1 brick length overhang. The first brick can go out 1/2, the second, 1/4, the third 1/8, etc... Add all of these up and you approach 1, not 1 1/2.
dcameron999 Mar 03, 2004	Never mind my stupid comments earlier. Thought I was soooooo smart but I was way off. Original answer is correct. Can get more info at... http://mathforum.org/advanced/robertd/harmonic.html
dcameron999 Mar 03, 2004	It turns out that the overhangs are related to the harmonic numbers Hn, which are defined as 1 + 1/2 + 1/3 + ... + 1/n: the maximum overhang possible for n bricks is Hn/2.
(user deleted) May 05, 2004	I said 6...
hersheykiss8908 Jun 27, 2004	whoa! TOO COMPLICATED!
bookworm91 Nov 10, 2005	whoa, that went WHOOSH rite over my head. i believe your answer.
achnid Nov 21, 2005	you would end up with an overhang goping up at an angle. If yopu had infinate bricks you would be able to keep going until the bottom ones broke from the weight not infinate. There would be probably 10-20 bricks in place to hold eahc one that goes out every time just to hold that 1 brick in place.
stil Dec 20, 2006	Of course there is no real answer to this teaser, because as vast as the earth is, when it comes to plains that are infinite planes, the earth is a half-vast place. I wish Jake had spelled out the size of the overhang for the first four or five layers of brick. I picture an infinitely high brick wall with all staggers at 50%. The working edge is unfinished, so every second brick overhangs the one below it. Repeatedly fill the gaps starting just above the bottom most overhang. Each 'column' added increases the overhang by one-half brick. and is adequately counterbalanced until infinity is reached (which it can't be.) And the bottom rows are eventually crushed by those above.
vg674 Apr 17, 2008	That is true stil, but by the way the problem is worded, take it abstractly. With an infinite plane, it this problem is valid, but in the real world, there is limited possibilty here.
bob45424 Jul 27, 2008	Wait. If I have the center of mass past the first brick, won't everything fall? Brick 1 is supporting ALL OTHER BRICKS, not just brick 2. So isn't it the same from the perspective of brick 1 if the other bricks are a giant, strange brick? And doesn't that brick fall? The infinite analysis works if and ONLY if each brick is FIRMLY supported. The overall center of mass above a brick cannot be past it. So, the center of mass for all bricks above the first is over the first. So, the overhang cannot be infinite (which leads to all collections being unsupported). BTW, an overhang is the length in the air that is not over the first brick, so a right-side-up pyramid has no overhang.
ttam007 Feb 11, 2009	http://math.dartmouth.edu/ ~pw/papers/sodaproc2.pdf Everything you wanted to know about overhanging bricks. If you are going to post a science teaser, please do your research first. A simple google search pulled this up as the first link.