Mystery, explain?

[kilroi]

Copied from ekoos:

I have these two coke cans. One completely empty and the other about 1/4 full. Unremarkable except for the fact that I never opened them.

kilroi and I went to the beach and I brought a six pack of coke with us. They were in a little cooler with a plastic coated ice block and (I think) a little more loose ice. We didn't tip it, but I'm

Comments

[feylike]

i have an unopened can of Dr. Pepper from Japan sitting on my shelf at work. its base is now embedded in a puddle of brown sticky matter which i assume is the dehydrated former contents of the can. it doesn't look like nearly enough to be the entire contents of the can. pressure inside the can is well below its original value, judging by the ease with which i can deform the side wall of the can. there is what appears to be a small drip of dried syrup along most of the height of the can, which leads me to believe that a pinhole leak developed near where the side wall of the can necks down towards the lid.

i would imagine that unless you raised the pressure inside the can somehow, you would have trouble getting additional leakage to appear from the partially full can. you could try heating up the mostly empty can to expel some of the remaining gas, then submerge it under cool water to see if it takes up any water. (weigh the can before and after or something.) of course, you would have to keep the pressure differential developed from crushing the can.