# Honda commercial: The part with the tires **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 5, 2003, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honda-commercial-the-part-with-the-tires/179929 "2003-06-05T20:53:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![CookingWithGas](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cookingwithgas/32/485_2.png) [@CookingWithGas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CookingWithGas)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2003, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honda-commercial-the-part-with-the-tires/179929/1 "2003-06-05T20:53:40Z")
If you haven’t already seen [this Honda commercial](http://multimedia.honda-eu.com/accord/), it’s a great way to spend two minutes. Click on the cog, then click on the star icon. then select the desired resolution. This commercial depicts a Rube Goldberg device made of Honda car parts. It is supposedly 100% Real World, no computer animation. In about the middle, a tire rolls into three other tires that are queued on a ramp. The three tires bump one another up the ramp, until the one at the top rolls off. The initial tire does not seem to have nearly enough speed to be able to transfer the momentum up the ramp. Further, if you watch carefully, you will notice that the second tire hits the top one and rolls backwards slightly, then _reverses again continues to roll uphill_ as the top tire falls. This is clearly not consistent with classical physics. 1. Can you confirm my observation? 2. Can you explain it? ---
**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2003, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honda-commercial-the-part-with-the-tires/179929/2 "2003-06-05T21:05:55Z")
1. Yes. 2. Yes. There’s probably weights inside the tires, which a) help them balance on the incline without rolling down it and 2) help them roll with greater energy than the initial collision would seem to impart. ---
**Author:** ![everton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ecb155/32.png) [@everton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/everton)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2003, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honda-commercial-the-part-with-the-tires/179929/3 "2003-06-05T21:23:55Z")
It’s hard to find any official confirmation from a cite I can link to, but the general consensus seems to be that the tyres were weighted inside. [This](http://www.marketingfix.com/archives/amazing_honda_ad.php) is the best reference I could find (there are other links from there you might want to follow). ---
**Author:** ![ski](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bbe5ce/32.png) [@ski](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ski)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2003, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honda-commercial-the-part-with-the-tires/179929/4 "2003-06-05T21:29:13Z")
I couldn’t find the claim that it was not a computer simulation. I find it hard to believe that this was all done with real objects, especially the tires. ---
**Author:** ![everton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ecb155/32.png) [@everton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/everton)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2003, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honda-commercial-the-part-with-the-tires/179929/5 "2003-06-05T21:43:25Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by ski \* > \*\*I couldn’t find the claim that it was not a computer simulation. I find it hard to believe that this was all done with real objects, especially the tires. \*\* It was in the [_Daily Telegraph_](http://www.dailytelegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/04/13/nhonda13.xml&sSheet=/news/2003/04/13/ix.html) article linked from within the reference I gave you: > [@](#): > > Filming was done over four near-sleepless days in a Paris studio, after one month of script approval, two months of concept drawings and a further four months of development and testing. One of the more surprising things about the ad is that it was not a cheat. Although it would have been much easier to fiddle the chain of events by using computer graphics, the seesaw and shunt of events really did happen, and in one, clean take. > > The bigshots at Honda’s world headquarters in Japan, when shown Cog for the first time, replied that yes, it was very clever, and how impressive trick photography was these days. **When told that it was all real, they were astonished**. ---
**Author:** ![Rob\_V](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Rob\_V](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rob_V)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2003, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honda-commercial-the-part-with-the-tires/179929/6 "2003-06-05T22:02:17Z")
The tires are weighted. It IS real. It took over 600 “takes” to capture everything working right. The film crew had nightmares, cuz it took HOURS to set everything up for a take, and then some one would walk _just_ a little too hard, and it would set off a chain-reaction, and they’d have to set it up all over again! Here’s a link to an article about how they did it. [http://www.dailytelegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/04/13/nhonda13.xml](http://www.dailytelegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/04/13/nhonda13.xml) ---
**Author:** ![Rob\_V](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Rob\_V](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rob_V)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2003, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honda-commercial-the-part-with-the-tires/179929/7 "2003-06-05T22:09:27Z")
The tires are weighted. It IS real. It took over 600 “takes” to capture everything working right. The film crew had nightmares, cuz it took HOURS to set everything up for a take, and then some one would walk _just_ a little too hard, and it would set off a chain-reaction, and they’d have to set it up all over again! Here’s a link to an article about how they did it. [http://www.dailytelegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/04/13/nhonda13.xml](http://www.dailytelegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/04/13/nhonda13.xml) ---
**Author:** ![Rob\_V](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Rob\_V](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rob_V)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2003, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honda-commercial-the-part-with-the-tires/179929/8 "2003-06-05T22:15:05Z")
The tires are weighted. It IS real. It took over 600 “takes” to capture everything working right, once. The film crew had nightmares, cuz it took HOURS to set everything up for a take, and then some one would walk _just_ a little too hard, and it would set off a chain-reaction, and they’d have to set it up all over again! Here’s a link to an article about how they did it. [http://www.dailytelegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/04/13/nhonda13.xml](http://www.dailytelegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/04/13/nhonda13.xml) ---
**Author:** ![everton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ecb155/32.png) [@everton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/everton)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2003, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honda-commercial-the-part-with-the-tires/179929/9 "2003-06-05T23:02:47Z")
They probably heard you the first time, **Rob**. In fact, if they were paying attention they heard it from me ;).