Are those "balance a coin on a floating lemon" games legal if they're rigged?

Posted by pbzeppelin1977@reddit | AskUK | View on Reddit | 38 comments

Where I work has set one up where if you win you get a free drink and if you lose then the money goes towards the tip jar. You have to use a 20p coin.

The rules they give means it's impossible for you to win. To me this seems like a scam.

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Naishalyz@reddit

The lemon cant move in this water you literally trapped it 😒

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TheGuyUrSisterLikes@reddit

Me an about five other people could not do it. I had my upstairs neighbor at work try it if he's very calm and he does games all the time first try did it. Son of a bitch it's as hard as it looks.

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Automatic-Vanilla-13@reddit

Brook why did it give me that Fekin name XD is that what guests get named lmfao

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Defiant-Heat8094@reddit

I literally did it 3 times tonight and got photo and video proof lmao

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_Bernhard_@reddit

I send you $10 if you send me a film showing me that it's possible.
No tricks with the lemon (weight in the bottom) ;-)

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FondSteam39@reddit

I've managed to do it with a 50p and I've seen it done with 20 so no. Its not rigged just ridiculously hard

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_Bernhard_@reddit

I send you $10 if you send me a film showing me that it's possible.
No tricks with the lemon (weight in the bottom) ;-)

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Drake911@reddit

ht tps:// www. tiktok. com/ @theyellowlemon22/video/7519904161199099152

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Drake911@reddit

Don't know if we're allowed to post links on reddit... never did it... but here it is: https://www.tiktok.com/@theyellowlemon22/video/7519904161199099152

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SpecialAgent_UT@reddit

Yeah Ken I’ll take things that never happened for $800

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Just watched a guy basically accidentally do this in a bar, he just really gingerly placed it. He couldn't repeat it. One handed seems more challenging and it's definitely not easy. But it's not rigged unless they go out of their way to rig it.

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East_Writer_7601@reddit

We had two winners today on our lemon game... Very possible! Just tricky! We also give free sticker to those who try and don't win

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raconteur3000@reddit

https://youtu.be/fxgN88Vu8Ws?si=iAIGEDmPJmke327m

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puzzhead2000@reddit

What rules?

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Tim-Sanchez@reddit

How is it rigged? I've seen them before and had a laugh, but never seen anyone win because I just figured balancing a coin on a floating lemon was really tricky/impossible. Not rigged?

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pbzeppelin1977@reddit (OP)

Basically you need to lower it's centre of gravity first because any coin on top will roll off. This involves doing something to the lemon or what it's in.

The rules for this one state you're not allowed to do anything to anything basically thus literally impossible to win.

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Tim-Sanchez@reddit

It's not exactly rigged though...

It's a normal lemon, in normal water, and all you're asked to do is put a 20p on it. The coin rolls off, the bar wins, but there's no rigging involved? Everything is normal, it's not like a game where they're forcing you to lose, that's what rigging implies to me.

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pbzeppelin1977@reddit (OP)

They are forcing you to lose though, the rules they impose make it impossible to win.

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Tim-Sanchez@reddit

They're not forcing you to lose by rigging though, you are forced to lose because it's an impossible game.

Rigging to me is when a can is bolted down so it won't be knocked over if a ball is thrown at it, if the coconuts in a coconut shy can't be knocked over, or if a ring hoop game can't work. These are all games that should work, but have been rigged against you.

The lemon game is just a trick, it never works and the pub changes nothing about them, they just ask you to try it. Rigging would be the pub putting something in the lemon or water to ensure a loss every time, not just letting punters lose because it's impossible already.

If I offered a challenge in the pub that said "toss a coin and make it float in midair", would you also consider that rigging? It's basically the same thing, it's already impossible, not rigged.

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Dickby_Hittenbottom@reddit

If i had a steel coin and some strong magnets, or perhaps a.light coin and a couple small air blowers, one could possibly make.the coin float mid air.

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vln@reddit

It's not impossible to place/drop a coin on it which is balanced, perfectly, to survive the subsequent movements.

It's not rigged, even though it's massively, incalculably unlikely that anyone will win.

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Big-Candidate-38@reddit

I was with you until you said incalculably

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Signal_Bake@reddit

Not impossible I witnessed a buddy at a bar do it it’s just really hard

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One-Pen1648@reddit

It's rigged because it's impossible to do there might be a brief moment where it sits on top but it will always move which is why they do it that way free tips.

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HoldCo1_HoldCo2@reddit

You could always not play

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throwwwwwwwaway420@reddit

There’s a way to do it… it just takes incredible concentration and steady hands. Look up rock balancing online. I learned to do this years back. Any single point on a rock can lock onto another point of the rock it’s balancing on, if that makes sense. The lemon/water/coin trick is sort of a similar concept.

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BottomDog@reddit

The lemon is not rigged and it's not theoretically impossible to balance a coin on it, just very difficult. If you perfectly lined up the centre of mass of the coin with the centre of mass of the lemon then the two would be in unstable equilibrium where the slightest movement would cause the lemon to roll and the coin to fall off. In reality it's very unlikely to balance it as you will be creating small waves in the water when you balance the coin which will disturb the equilibrium. So in theory it's possible, in practice it's unlikely but whatever the case, it sounds like you need to lighten the fuck up. It's a pub for Christ's sake.

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