Man's Manual For Living

List of Problems Solved by MacGyver

I'm a big MacGyver fan. I remember watching it with my older brother and thinking he was the coolest person ever. I mean he lived on a houseboat, how cool is that!? He also drove a sweet Jeep and and was a zeitgeist of late 80s / early 90s man's man fashion.

Some of my favorites include:

"In order to fix a piston connecting rod for a water pump, MacGyver makes an arc welder out of a generator, some jumper cables, and two half dollars. By running the DC current from the generator through the coins, he creates heat and electrical discharge, with which he can weld the con-rod."

"MacGyver destroys a building with a propane tank, a grindstone, and some ball bearings. He lets the gas from the tank loose and switches on the grindstone. From outside, he shoots the ball bearings into the building at the grindstone. Although he doesn't hit the grindstone, the bad guy he is after shoots a crossbow into the building, and does hit the grind stone. A spark ignites the gas, and the building is destroyed."

"MacGyver creates a diversion and a surprise attack using an inner tube, pressurized air, chloride, a catalyst, two glass jars and a gas mask. The inner tube was put in a truck and filled with air until the glass broke creating a loud noise. Meanwhile MacGyver filled the two gas bombs filling one glass jar with chloride and the other with a catalyst. Then he threw them at his attackers resulting in a reaction producing toxic chlorine gas when the two liquids mixed."

The whole thing make for great reading. Really, just scroll through it at random and stop anywhere, you'll find out how to make and do just about anything.