Hand Flip Coin Trick
Easy coin switch sleight, that when mastered will allow you to perform lots of amazing magic and coin tricks
Flip The Coin Trick
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| 1. Lay
two coins in the palms of your hands like this - the positions of the coins
are very important! Notice that the coin in my left hand is right in the middle of my palm. The coin in my right hand is near my thumb. |
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| 2. In one quick motion, flip
both hands over and slap them straight down onto the table. The coin in your right hand should get flicked across and under your left hand. The coin in your left hand should simply fall straight down. |
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| 3. Ask your audience where they
think the coins are – they'll probably guess there's
one under each hand. If you move your right pinkie finger a bit, people usually guess the coins are under your right hand – then you can reveal they are wrong! |
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| 4. Reveal both coins under
your left hand. If you repeat the trick, be quick! Try not to let anyone notice the positions of the coins. Now, you can make the coins land under your right hand instead? |
What's going on?
The position of the coins in your palms makes this trick work . As you rotate your hands from " palms up" to " palms down", the coin in the centre of your palm stays put and falls straight down. But the coin near your thumb travels around the centre of your palm and gets catapulted towards the other hand. With a bit of practice, it is almost impossible to see this coin shooting across before you slap your hand down to cover it.
The reason one of the coins gets flicked across is easy to understand if you imagine using a table tennis bat instead of your hand. Imagine laying one coin smack bang in the centre of one of a bat. As you rotate the bat, the coin rotates around its own centre too, but it does not get flicked away.
If you lay the second coin right on the outside edge of the other bat, something quite different happens. This coin travels around the centre of the bat in a big semi-circle and if you rotate the bat quickly enough, it will get flicked away.
How fast the coin gets flicked across depends on how far it is from the centre of your palm and the speed with which you flip your hands over. If you want to sound smug when people ask how this switch trick works, just say "it's just simple rotational mechanics . baby!"
Oh and if you really like annoying people with coin tricks, try the Coin Melting Through Paper Trick too.