Castle Aching

[Northroader]

As kids, we used to buy calcium carbide at the ironmongers, where it was available no questions asked, as it quite commonly used for bike lamps. I’m won’t describe how we used it, lest you may think I’m an hooligan.

[Regularity]

As kids, we used to buy calcium carbide at the ironmongers, where it was available no questions asked, as it quite commonly used for bike lamps. I’m won’t describe how we used it, lest you may think I’m an hooligan.

Aha. Tales of a misspent youth, eh?

Or just the practical application of chemistry lessons, to verify what was taught in the classroom.

[Hroth]

As kids, we used to buy calcium carbide at the ironmongers, where it was available no questions asked, as it quite commonly used for bike lamps. I’m won’t describe how we used it, lest you may think I’m an hooligan.

 

Perish the thort!

[Northroader]

It’s not the kind of thing they’d teach in chemistry classes, even then. It’s nice to see how they tog them up these days with protective goggles and gloves. I wonder if one these cosseted pupils ever covertly blows down an unlit Bunsen burner at the back of the class whilst sir is conducting a key experiment using a lit Bunsen at the front of the class?

[Regularity]

Well, there were several things we weren’t directly taught on my chemistry A level course, which I may or may not have tested...

 

We also learned about thermite reactions (not on the syllabus) when trying to make brass: the Bunsen burners just weren’t up to it, so a thermite mix applied to the constituent metals, buried in a tube inserted into a bucket of sand, was deployed. It was carried outside, with us wearing lab coats (one emblazoned “Rampton Escapee”, IIRC) and a manganese fuse applied and lit. We sheltered (cowered?) behind various built up flower beds, etc, whilst about half the school rushed to Windows yo see what was going on.

Well, it did work. We did make brass (of a rather poor quality) and spent the rest of the lesson picking up the small pieces produced in a 3 or 4 metre radius.

When I say it worked, I mean it worked too well. Yes, lots of heat. Unfortunately, enough to make it explosive, hence searching for small pieces of brass in a circle..

 

Just as well the head of chemistry was wise enough to make us go outside, really.

 

Still, it was a nice way to spend an afternoon.

[St Enodoc]

It’s not the kind of thing they’d teach in chemistry classes, even then. It’s nice to see how they tog them up these days with protective goggles and gloves. I wonder if one these cosseted pupils ever covertly blows down an unlit Bunsen burner at the back of the class whilst sir is conducting a key experiment using a lit Bunsen at the front of the class?

You weren't in my class were you?

[Andy Hayter]

As kids, we used to buy calcium carbide at the ironmongers, where it was available no questions asked, as it quite commonly used for bike lamps. I’m won’t describe how we used it, lest you may think I’m an hooligan.

 

Never found that, bur I was in an ironmongers in Pont-en-Royans in France and bought 2 kilograms which was served up in a large paper bag.

Slightly unnerving stepping out of the shop into a thunderstorm!  I ran to the car.

[Hroth]

My school was never that interesting...

[sem34090]

Mine wasn't either... bloody HSE!

[drmditch]

Re: Prams or Praams

 

The French invasion craft of the early 19th Century, some of them quite large, were also known as prams. 

As referenced in 'Heart of Oak'.....'but should their flat bottoms in darkness set oar......'

 

To revert to topic, wouldn't North Norfolk in the early 20th century have been provided with sea-borne traffic by those flat-bottomed stalwarts of the East Coast later known as 'Thames Barges' ?

[wagonman]

Re: Prams or Praams

 

The French invasion craft of the early 19th Century, some of them quite large, were also known as prams. 

As referenced in 'Heart of Oak'.....'but should their flat bottoms in darkness set oar......'

 

To revert to topic, wouldn't North Norfolk in the early 20th century have been provided with sea-borne traffic by those flat-bottomed stalwarts of the East Coast later known as 'Thames Barges' ?

 

 

Thames barges were rare on the exposed north Norfolk coast, the more usual craft being collier brigs for the coal traffic and tops'l schooners for most other trade. One peculiar local design was the Billy Boy, a bluff and unhandy craft usually ketch- or sloop-rigged. 'Bluejacket' and 'Angerona' were two such that frequented the Glaven estuary – indeed the well-rotted remains of 'Bluejacket' are still out there somewhere on the Morston marshes.

 

But sea-borne trade was on its last gasp in Edwardian days...

Edited December 13, 2018 by wagonman

[Hroth]

By the beginning of the 20th Century, I would have thought that more "go-ahead" traders would be using small steamers along the lines of the Clyde "Puffers".

 

Apropos of nothing, the Dogger Bank is so called because shallow-draughted Dutch fishing boats called Doggers would fish there.

[Talltim]

 

Apropos of nothing, the Dogger Bank is so called because shallow-draughted Dutch fishing boats called Doggers would fish there.

My son told me that yesterday, following a conversation about kils/kills in New York. He is fascinated by Doggerland.

[Annie]

Thames barges were rare on the exposed north Norfolk coast, the more usual craft being collier brigs for the coal traffic and tops'l schooners for most other trade. One peculiar local design was the Billy Boy, a bluff and unhandy craft usually ketch- or sloop-rigged. 'Bluejacket' and 'Angerona' were two such that frequented the Glaven estuary – indeed the well-rotted remains of 'Bluejacket' are still out there somewhere on the Morston marshes.

 

But sea-borne trade was on its last gasp in Edwardian days...

http://www.victorianweb.org/technology/ships/37.html

[Hroth]

http://www.victorianweb.org/technology/ships/37.html

 

Back a bit....  back a bit....

 

CRUNCH!!!!!

 

Oops!

[Guy Rixon]

Thames barges not suitable for an exposed coast...are we sure? I have a book somewhere on sailing barges, and it holds that that a feature of a Thames barge was that one man and a lad could sail her between the UK and the Netherlands. They were seaworthy, but not oceangoing.

 

I also disagree that rigged vessels were nearly extinct by the Edwardian period. They had retreated from the high-value cargos and routes, but they were still around the UK in numbers. Steam coasters never entirely eliminated the coastal trade by sail (motor vessels managed that, but rather later). Rigged vessels of an evolved kind were still competitive on slow voyages and Windjammers were still working up to the 1930s. (If you don't know what is meant by "windjammer", look it up. It's rather interesting for a technology enthusiast.)

[TheQ]

 The majority of the shipping for East /  North Norfolk will have come in at Kings Lynn, with a little at Wells and Blakeney, In all three cases proper ships would have been used, whilst a Thames barge no doubt couild and did once in a while venture that far. By 1903 the  railways would have taken much of the smaller traffic away. Only bulk cargoes like imports of Timber and coal. exports of wool, grain etc would have gone through the ports.. 

[Andy Hayter]

I think that there is some unintended distortion of history.  Barges (Thames or otherwise) were still being widely used up until the 1930s and some into the 60s - but these the exception.  13 Thames barges were used in the Dunkerque evacuation in 1940 and were therefore still in operational use at that time

 

I could not find any datable pictures of Kings Lynn but (at the risk of crossing the Nor-Suf border) the pictures on the site below dated at or around 1900 suggest that steam shipping impact on smaller ports - with more local traffic and short-sea rather than long-sea traffic - is rather minimal.  Clearly the first 2 decades of the 20th century were a period of major change in shipping so the situation 10 or 15 years later would have been different and perhaps by grouping the balance would be more like 50:50, although I would like to see evidence of that before making firm pronouncement.

 

https://felixstowedocker.blogspot.com/2016/06/ipswich-docks-historical-photographic.html

[Caley Jim]

Regarding coastal shipping traffic, in 1852 when the GNR opened from Doncaster to London, the price of coal in the capital fell from 30s/ton to 7s/ton, presumably due to the lower cost of transporting it by rail rather than sea.

 

As far as 'standing on the shoulders of others' goes, Einstein always said that he stood on the shoulders of James Clark Maxwell.

 

Jim

[Guy Rixon]

By the beginning of the 20th Century, I would have thought that more "go-ahead" traders would be using small steamers along the lines of the Clyde "Puffers".

 

Apropos of nothing, the Dogger Bank is so called because shallow-draughted Dutch fishing boats called Doggers would fish there.

 

According to my book* on the subject, most steam coasters of the 20th century were larger than the Clyde Puffers. The latter were only made that small to fit locks on a canal. The frontispiece plate shows a selection of vessels, including a Puffer, from the ancestral Collier of 1852 through to the large steam-collier Arundel of 1956. All the proper ships are at least twice the length of the Puffer. This plate also indicates that steam coasters were built c.1908 with fore-and-aft rigs for sailing and anything built earlier would probably have retained some sails. Some earlier steamers were built ship-rigged, with engines only for assistance.

 

*Steam Coasters and Short Sea Traders, 3rd edition, by C. V. Waine and R. S. Fenton.

[Regularity]

Here’s a link to the Wells-next-the-Sea history web page:

https://www.wells-guide.co.uk/pages/past-and-present

It suggests a certain amount of erroneous information has been pasted today, but hey, this is a forum. Never let facts get in the way of a trenchant opinion.

[RedGemAlchemist]

Here’s a link to the Wells-next-the-Sea history web page:

https://www.wells-guide.co.uk/pages/past-and-present

It suggests a certain amount of erroneous information has been pasted today, but hey, this is a forum. Never let facts get in the way of a trenchant opinion.

Ah, Wells-next-the-sea. A seaside town with two railways that's actually a mile inland.

[Nearholmer]

Don’t tell me: it hasn’t got any wells either.

[Regularity]

A couple of friends went for a dawn paddle at the beach at Wells, one of them having sustained a fairly heavy night on the “grown up pop.”

There they were, walking along, setting the world to rights, when one who had been drinking inadvertently wandered into a channel cut by the outgoing tide, and promptly discovered the sobering effects of 4’ of North Sea brine...

 

Not a well, but I think he said something like, “Well, well. Dearie me.”

The other friend was nearly sick from laughing.

 

Not sure why that came to mind.

[Hroth]

Immersion in cold brine water is said to be good for the constitution.

 

Seaside towns have made a lot of money out of that thesis.....

 

(As have the railways!)

Edited December 13, 2018 by Hroth