Challenge — can you get these cups unstuck?

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Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/10/27/challenge-can-you-get-these-cups-unstuck.html

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Freeze them? Alternatively, put ice cubes into the smaller one and periodically try?

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Try running the outer cup under hot water. Hopefully it will expand it so that you can pull out the inner one.

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Fill the blue cup with hot or boiling water? Maybe put some cold water into the green cup? (Not too cold, don’t want it to shatter.)

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Exactly and in the future make sure that only one cup is in the teleportation pod at a time.

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image

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This, but don’t put the warm water in the cup, put the cup in warm water. Rinse the inside of the large cup with oil.

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Yup, that’s an even better idea.

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You could try asking that guy who was trying to make a dinner reservation:

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I understand Uri Geller is still available.

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The problem with these thermal expansion solutions is that ceramic will crack rather than expand. I’d try lubrication. Vegetable glycerin is the standard solution. Cooking oil works. If you have access to an ultrasonic cleaner big enough to fit them in that might work too.

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This happened to me once with a pair of handmade bowls. I got them apart by gently tapping the inner one with a rubber mallet. It was definitely one of the more terrifying uh… home repairs(?) I’ve done but they came apart and as of today both bowls are intact and not visibly chipped or scratched.

I do like the idea of getting a little oil in there. I think I tried the hot water bath but it didn’t work, but you could do both things as a prelude to tapping on the inner mug gently. I suggest boiling a pot of water and actually floating the outer cup in it, without letting the water get inside, to maximize the difference in temperature between the cups.

Don’t listen to the person worrying they’ll crack, that’s nonsense. Teacups are meant to be filled with boiling water, they can handle the thermal gradient.

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A bit of WD-40 or penetrating oil?

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With the handles toward you, put your thumb on the left side of the small bowl’s handle and your four fingers on the right side of the large bowl’s handle and make a squeezing motion, applying a constant gentle rotational pressure to both cups as well as some pulling apart pressure. Slowly increase force until they dislodge. Or the handles break.

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This YouTube video suggest coconut oil, and some commenters used olive oil.

Also, it never hurts to try a little glob of warmed-up KY jelly. :blush:

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Olive Oil, allow it to work into the stuck place and wiggly slowly. It takes a while to work into the crease.

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What is the combined value of the cups?

Offer your daughter one dollar less than that if she can figure out and show you how to separate them with damaging either cup.

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I have some bowls that do this all the time. It happens when I stack them while they’re still hot from the dishwasher. Just running hot water over them usually releases the seal.

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Systematic jiggling. Rotate the top cup handle up and down while pulling apart. Rotate the cups a little relative to each other and try again. Repeat.

There must have been some irregularity in the roundness that allowed them to lock so you just have to find it.

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Rotate the inner cup in the direction so that its handle is more toward the center of the larger cup and it should come free during that rotation… Maybe.

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