Two Ohio State students will attempt to immortalize their love of Pepsi products with an extreme structure of Mountain Dew cans that will set a world record on Sunday.
OSU mechanical engineering major Tyler Skirtich and pre-communication major Justin Culver, along with Texas State University student Frank Bartley and University of Cincinnati student Tony Trucco will use empty Mountain Dew cans to erect a structure 5 cubic feet in size and enter it into the Guinness Book of World Records. Skirtich said the feat should set two world records: the largest single-brand collection of soda cans and the largest soda can structure.
“Our only motivation was to do something big and unique. Like climbing Mt. Everest, you do it because it’s there,” Skirtich said.
Skirtich said the inspiration for the project came on June 20, 2004 while the four high school friends were spending a Sunday evening playing video games and drinking Mountain Dew.
According to a letter sent by the group to the Pepsi Company, “as the evening was winding down Frank proposed creating a ‘Dew Pyramid’ to celebrate a great week. Having already seen a ‘Dew Pyramid’, Tony suggested that instead we do something a bit more outlandish – build a ‘Dew Cube’.”
The group continued discussing and reinventing the project until, in a haze of caffeine, sugar and computerized violence, they decided on setting a world record.
Since then the group has spent more than $2000 amassing 6,292 cans that have collected in the various dorm rooms of three universities. The entire collection of cans now sits in the basement of Skirtich’s parents’ house.
“We’ve been working on this thing for a year and we’re really excited to see it come to a head and finally see the entire collection together,” Skirtich said.
To meet the requirements of the Guinness World Records organization they reserved a gymnasium to hold the event, arranged the attendance of a notary public and a city council person, alerted the media and filled out an 18-page packet about their record attempt. Skirtich said the process has been time and labor intensive.
“It is such a complicated and convoluted process to go through. I wouldn’t want to go through that again,” Skirtich said.
Skirtich said they consumed between 3 and 4 cans of Mountain Dew a day beginning June of last year. Trucco consumed an ambitious 4 to 5 cans a day, resulting in a vow to abstain from the popular drink for 3 months.
“I felt I needed to cleanse myself of the Dew,” Trucco said.
Despite the soda saturation, the group remains devoted Mountain Dew drinkers. Skirtich said they still drink 2 cans a day, and each will bring a 12-pack of the soda to the event.
According to the Guinness World Records Web site, there is no previous record set for the largest soda can structure. Skirtich said the previous record for a single brand soda can collection was approximately 3,200 Pepsi cans.
The erection of the Mountain Dew structure will take place inside the Holy Spirit Grade School gymnasium in Whitehall, a school both Trucco and Skirtich attended. Plans for the 6,292 cans after the completion of the project have not been decided.
“We were hoping it would stay intact somewhere. We thought maybe we could get it into an art museum. We also thought Pepsi might be interested in it,” Skirtich said. “We’re probably going to end up recycling them.”
