► HOW IT WORKS | Wine Glasses, Grand Piano, Water Tap, Soy Sauce | Episode 1 | Free Documentary

the show that reveals how extraordinary items in our world are designed constructed and produced see the engineering the technology and big ideas that make the world go round find out how it works [Music] brush [Music] coming up how grand pianos are built by hand from the pedals up why the humble tap never lets you down some serious engineering makes sure the water flows perfectly and next time you buy a takeaway think about how this unappetizing mash is transformed into millions of bottles of soy sauce [Music] but first wine glasses it's not just the grape or vineyard which affect the flavor of a great wine the glass makes a difference too this factory makes a quarter of a million of them every day but before mass production you have to start with a prototype now you may not pay much attention to the shape but each glass is scientifically designed to enhance the flavor of the wine it's intended for [Music] for example there's a bitter agent in red wine called tannin this only mellows when it comes into contact with air so to lose some of the harshness the glass has to have a wide bowl which can let the wine breathe you should only pour a third of a glass and then you'll be able to swirl it around to speed things up it's the other way round for whites they have subtle aromas which are important to the flavor these aromas drift away when they make contact with the air so you need a small narrow glass to keep the aromas where they belong a 3d image is modeled on a computer and then a prototype is made by hand [Music] the blowheads got to keep the pipe moving or the white-hot semi-fluid substance would drop to the floor the oak mold has been made to the glass designers exact specifications the glass is blown in and sets in about 15 seconds they warm up the bottom of the bowl and then add another blob of glass that's cut stretched and then turned to make the stem they add a final blob and then press it into a mould to make the base [Music] the prototype is a success and the design is ready to go into mass production over at the factory handmade processes give way to a high-tech production line the main ingredient of this glass is quartz sand which accounts for about 70 percent of the mix they drop in some soda to lower the glass's melting point lime helps to stabilize the compound and aluminium and titanium make the glass tougher the mix is lifted up to the melting furnace where it's joined by pieces of glass that the factory recycle from waste and seconds at 1500 degrees celsius the materials melt and fuse at this temperature glass has the consistency of warm chewing gum 36 hours later it's carried away in heated tubes and then squeezed through an opening and cut into portions of 240 grams the glass is still white hot about 1200 degrees celsius [Music] the portions are squashed flat and then a stream of air from above the center forces them into roughly the right shape for a wine glass bowl [Music] the exact shape of the design is created as it's enclosed in a water-cooled mold after five seconds the mold opens the glass has cooled down to 400 degrees but it's still extremely fragile [Music] each glass has a temporary lid on top of its bowl which is used to carry it around the factory without getting damaged the bowl is turned upside down and the bottom is heated with a torch then they get their stems and bases another blast of fire shapes and polishes the bases after their baptism of fire the glasses are given an hour to cool off a laser locks off the temporary lids these go off to be melted and start the process again the sharp edges are smooth with sandpaper but are still too rough to be drunk from the rims are then reheated to 1200 degrees celsius and gets smoothed out in just a few seconds smooth enough to be touched by lips after a last check for air bubbles and cracks the wine glasses are ready to be safely packed and shipped in this factory they've turned a traditional craft into a modern production process [Music] it's big it's beautiful it's a grand piano and each one of these majestic instruments is exquisitely hand crafted [Music] the main difference from a standard upright piano is that in a grand the strings are longer and have to be arranged horizontally the sound is produced by a felt hammer hitting up to three strings at once the thicker and longer the strings are the lower the note [Music] each string begins life as a single steel wire attached to a spinning machine one of the workers scuffs up the surface with sandpaper so when a copper wire is wrapped around it'll stay in place [Music] he adds another wire to the string to give it a deeper bass note [Music] the strings for a grand piano range in length from just five centimeters to over two meters that's what allows them to produce an incredibly wide range of notes finally he tightens the end of the wire to stop it from uncoiling they have to use layers of flexible wood for the piano's casing so they'll be able to bend it into the traditional shape they're glued together and then squashed in a press until the adhesives dry then it's taken over to another press which will give it its shape it's a tough job to get it into position and requires a bit of muscle and a lot of teamwork [Music] when the strings are fixed they'll have a combined tension of 24 tons so the metal frame needs to be a super tough structure it's made of precision cast iron in a technique that was developed in the early 19th century a cocktail of bronze powder dissolver and thickener is sprayed onto the metal surface to fill any pores and give the frame a smooth finish the metal frame weighs about 170 kilograms and has to be lifted into the wooden casing with a pulley then it's time to fix the strings or 240 of them low notes have just got one string but the middle and higher notes have two or three to make them louder they're called bi-chords and tri chords [Music] each individual string has to be stressed until it reaches the exact pitch [Music] finally they check the strings with a felt hammer the hum is controlled by a mechanism that enables a series of notes to be played consecutively at high speed [Music] the workings of the piano are now complete but before it can be fitted into the casing an expert must check that all the hammers reach the same keystroke height so they produce an even sound a key has to drop under a weight of 52 grams and they all have to be tested one by one who said the music industry was glamorous all that remains is the final assembly every individual grand piano is handcrafted to the highest standards that's why this factory builds on average just one a day [Music] coming up after the break the mass production of a tap molded cut and then approved by a robot and a computer all so you can wash your hands in a steady flow and the science behind soy sauce how microbiology combines with traditional methods to make the distinctive flavor [Music] [Music] some objects are so familiar to us that we never actually consider how they are made or how they work [Music] a single lever mixer tap begins life as a bucket of very fine quartz sand it's forced into heated moulds and then baked at 260 degrees celsius [Music] when it's hardened the sand has been transformed into a mold itself once they've smoothed off the edges it can be used to cast the taps [Music] meanwhile recycled brass parts have been melted into a huge two and a half tonne furnace at 1050 degrees celsius they place the molds into a low pressure casting machine and blow away any loose grains with an air gun as the liquid brass is poured in the duct is heated with a blow torch to keep it flowing smoothly two minutes later a couple of pairs of taps drop out they need to get rid of the solid sand inside the taps so they blast them with ultrasonic sound waves to break it down into grains the taps have been created as co-joined twins but they are easily separated by a metal saw [Music] each tap can now be drilled countersunk and cut this large machine contains 17 different tools and does all of the jobs single-handedly each opening and thread is carefully checked if any of the taps aren't up to scratch they get melted down and remolded for those that pass it's time to get scrubbed up first a robot smooths out any rough edges by rubbing them on sandpaper then it polishes the surface with pure cotton the brass body is finished another robot displays every angle to a camera lens which checks it's perfect this one is faulty so it's put to one side for inspection a human has the final say and the quality controller confirms the robot's findings it's rejected and will be recycled for the lucky survivors it's time to take a dip a computerized system guides them on a route through several troughs first a rinse removes any dirt or grease then they get dunked in nickel it forms a silvery coating which helps to protect them from corrosion [Music] finally they're immersed in a chrome bath for four minutes beneath the bubbling surface the taps are receiving a final coating that will help them last a lifetime electrical current sets the taps to a negative polarity and the chrome bath to positive this causes the taps to attract tiny chrome particles from the water and creates a fine surface layer of chrome that's thinner than a human hair while the bodies are drying the heart of the mixer tap is put together the simple mechanism is what makes the tap so efficient and environmentally friendly turning the handle moves an element with an oval opening inside the tap to the left opens the waterway to the hot water pipe in the center to both hot and cold and moving it to the right closes the hot water flow so just cold water flows out mixer taps with spray mechanisms like this can save up to 80 percent of the water used by standard pillar taps as they produce a steadier flow with less water pressure once the mechanism is put inside the tap a final test ensures that the water flows out smoothly they've been polished by robots coated with nickel and chrome and their inner workings will help to conserve the world's water supply maybe this humble tap is not so humble after all [Music] soy sauce is a key ingredient in both chinese and japanese food and has become a common sight on british supermarket shelves in this japanese factory they use hundreds of years of brewing experience to produce what the locals call shoyu but is best known to the rest of us as soy sauce [Music] it's a source that begins with very simple ingredients soy beans wheat and a special mold master hiroyama oversees the production process and the first thing is to make sure that they've got the right mix of ingredients when they've steamed the beans and milled the wheat they call the lumpy mix koji the mold multiplies and produces enzymes and this kick-starts the fermentation in this room the koji is kept on the move to make sure it's thoroughly mixed sea salt and water are added and then the moist mash is transported into huge tanks it's left that ripen for about 6 months the sludge doesn't look like anything you'd want to eat at the moment but at a microscopic level a transformation is taking place the mould breaks down the soybean proteins into amino acids meanwhile the wheat ferments and produces sugar giving the mash a slightly sweet taste together these two processes give soy sauce its characteristic aroma flavor and color despite its appearance the master is impressed with the flavor so the mash can go on to the next step this stage requires linen several kilometers of it the mash is spread evenly on top and then the linens folded 600 times to make a massive soy sandwich a team of workers haul the tower of linen through to a hydraulic press the press rings out the linen with a 200 ton weight and squeezes out a brown liquid each pile yields around 5 000 liters of raw soy sauce [Music] it's heated at all for a high temperature and then the six month process is over and they can bottle it up in sharp contrast to the rest of the production this is done in just a few seconds [Music] [Music] each year this factory produces 270 million liters of soy sauce which will find its way onto the plates and pallets of consumers across the planet [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Free Documentary

Views: 1,443,464

Keywords: Full documentary, HD documentary, BBC documentary, Cool Stuff: How It Works, How It Works, How It's Made (TV Program), How its made, discovery channel, Soy Sauce, Piano, Documentaries

Id: aIWObPuL244

Length: 23min 32sec (1412 seconds)

Published: Tue May 20 2014