The Night Mail

[Winslow Boy]

"I don't know. Bl**dy voters what more do they want. They've got the chance to exercise there democratic right. It's not our fault that they can't book there bl**dy holidays on the right dates. If it's such a big deal why can't they come home early. I don't like the tone of his email. I feel threatened. He should be reported. I'm going home because it's not safe here. Wait till I tell my mum she'll come and bash him."

 

That's a report from our fly on the wall reporter.

[Happy Hippo]

This evening I have mainly been digging holes so that higher authority can plant ferns.

 

It seemed sensible to do it when it was cooler rather than out in the blazing sun.

 

That time was reserved for timber work in the garage, and trying to fix a set of solar powered garden lights.....

 

Every time I put them down on the bench they went on, but when I lifted them up they sent off.

 

Puzzled of Shropshire did this for about 15 minutes, and employed various electrical test gear to find the fault.......

 

Only to find that when you cover up the solar panel the lights come on, but if it is exposed, then it's 'daylight', so the lights automatically switch themselves off and the battery starts to recharge.

 

 

[Winslow Boy]

19 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

This evening I have mainly been digging holes so that higher authority can plant ferns.

 

It seemed sensible to do it when it was cooler rather than out in the blazing sun.

 

That time was reserved for timber work in the garage, and trying to fix a set of solar powered garden lights.....

 

Every time I put them down on the bench they went on, but when I lifted them up they sent off.

 

Puzzled of Shropshire did this for about 15 minutes, and employed various electrical test gear to find the fault.......

 

Only to find that when you cover up the solar panel the lights come on, but if it is exposed, then it's 'daylight', so the lights automatically switch themselves off and the battery starts to recharge.

 

 

That's this new fangled technology for you. Stick with some rushes and goose grease.

[monkeysarefun]

From the Australian Electoral Commisions website:

 

The AEC will send your postal vote pack by Priority Post through Australia Post or by international courier if you are overseas.

 

I'm assuming that the reason for this level of service  is that  voting is compulsory here so the AEC is obliged to make some kind of  reasonable effort to  give us the ability  to do it, to the point that they fly voting booths and officials out to remote communities in the outback on polling day.

Edited June 25 by monkeysarefun

[J. S. Bach]

Night Owl from the Piedmont.

[AndyID]

3 hours ago, polybear said:

 

Bear used Boots Sultan in Malta; it's on their Tick List and the price is right.  Worked for me.

 

Have you tried this?

 

[AndyID]

12 hours ago, Hroth said:

 

Section and plinth it, if its so iconic, people will come to look at its corroded innards.

 

 

Are there any original bits?

 

I suspect that people would still come to see it was a piece of clever stage-craft with a smoke/steam and sound generator in the tender and propulsion was provided by the diesel at the rear of the train.

[AndyID]

 

https://on.soundcloud.com/7NDXSJSCD2rXZTsdA

[pH]

19 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

The thing to remember is that you and I, the middle-aged white male transport enthusiast (if I may be so bold as to stereotype us) are not either museum's target audience in terms of visitor numbers.

I agree. We took our Canadian grandson to the Riverside Museum twice during a 10 day holiday in Scotland - twice because he had enjoyed his first visit so much. He was 2 at the time, and now at age 8 he still remembers the “trunk open” car - the Hillman Imp with the engine on display. I would say the presentation of the exhibits certainly worked for one visitor.

[iL Dottore]

12 hours ago, TheQ said:

 

The nearest thing to " modern thinking" is the removal of some WW2 posters deemed sexist...

 

Which posters are those Q?

Now I’m not au fait with all the minutiae of WWII British posters, but I’m pretty sure the various ministries of the time didn’t issue posters that read along the lines of

 

< Girls, do YOUR bit for Military Morale: get your **** out for the troops >
or

< Ladies, help feed Britain: Bonk a GI for spam and chocolate (and nylons for yourselves) >

 

Is someone at your museum perhaps a tad oversensitive???

[iL Dottore]

9 hours ago, Dave Hunt said:

…And I have to admit that I am often accused of being a cynic.

 

Dave

You? Cynical?

 

C’mon you’re just a rank amateur* Dave, admit it. Let’s face it, you’ve been known to be cautiously optimistic at times, that will never do…

 

Stick to what you do best: keeping tonnes of metal in the air and making superb scale locomotives and leave the cynicism to the professionals - like me.

 

Leave it to the pros, Dave. Leave it to the pros….

[jamie92208]

12 hours ago, TheQ said:

Luckily at the radar museum the building itself is listed and an exhibit, so the reinforcement required to raise heavy items to stupid heights is impossible. Many of the rooms are in themselves small, meaning all you can do is arrange equipment so people can wander around and see the items.

The nearest thing to " modern thinking" is the removal of some WW2 posters deemed sexist...

Other than fitment of a projector and drop down screen, the operations room is exactly as left when the RAF moved back down the underground bunker in 1993 ( it's fit out dates from 1966-73)

It's the lead picture .. here.

https://www.radarmuseum.co.uk/

 

Those switches the young lady is about to press, is one of the type I spend a lt of time repairing. The manufacturing dates on them are generally 1969, but the plastic  parts weren't designed to last 55 years, much deployment of  plastruct, plasticard, super glue and plastic magic.

 

That is sad about the posters.  Surely the social mores of the times are part of history. 

 

Jamie

[AndyID]

26 minutes ago, jamie92208 said:

That is sad about the posters.  Surely the social mores of the times are part of history. 

 

Jamie

 

Absolutely. Attach a note that these were historical and probably not acceptable by today's standards. We cannot erase history. Will history books have to be re-written to remove the likes of Henry VIII?

[iL Dottore]

I really don’t see the fascination in the Flying Scotsman (a.k.a. the Flying Moneypit). Certainly, Gresley designed very good locomotive in the A3s, but he also designed the A4 - which in its streamlined casing is much more emblematic of Britain’s Railway Heyday (I don’t know enough about LNER locomotives to comment on, which was the better Loco: the A3 or the A4).

 

Much as it pains me to say it, Swindon certainly missed the boat by not creating a fully streamlined version of - say - a Castle or a Manor. The A4 and Coronation class streamlining may have made the locos a PIA to service, but they certainly appealed to the public, providing huge PR - notwithstanding that few would have been able to afford to travel on a train service like the Coronation Scot - the very epitome of regularly scheduled but luxurious train travel.

[iL Dottore]

P.S. it has just occurred to me that the UK TOCs - never adverse to trousering large wodges of dosh - have never created specific timetabled “luxury” services  (like the TEE did or the Matterhorn Gotthard Express or Glacier Express in Switzerland today - both rather profitable and prestigious).
 

A dedicated two- or three-car EMU, luxuriously appointed (perhaps an all First Class service?), with business amenities (e.g. WiFi), an included top-notch lunch and a non-stop service (London Edinburgh, London-Manchester) could be a winner, especially given that now to fly from A to B in the UK is both tedious and time consuming.
 

A good service, aimed at the business market (where cost is a secondary issue), with fairly priced tickets would attract the environmentally conscious business traveller. And with suitable timings could provide a reliable city centre to city centre service with only marginally longer travel times than going by plane (as is the case of travelling from Basel to Paris by air or by TGV)

 

Of course, there is the teeny tiny matter of a) getting the unions to buy in; b) choosing a suitable EMU to serve as the starting point for a customised train-set; and c) getting the DfT to agree to the modifications of both train-set and service (I’m not sure which of the three would be the major stumbling block).

 

What EMU would you use as a basis of a such a service?

[AndyID]

5 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

I really don’t see the fascination in the Flying Scotsman

 

It just demonstrates the power of very clever, or more likely very lucky, marketing.

[Hroth]

45 minutes ago, jamie92208 said:

That is sad about the posters.  Surely the social mores of the times are part of history. 

 

Jamie

 

13 minutes ago, AndyID said:

 

Absolutely. Attach a note that these were historical and probably not acceptable by today's standards. We cannot erase history. Will history books have to be re-written to remove the likes of Henry VIII?

 

Then there's the fragile types who photoshopped pictures of Brunel because he was smoking a cigar.

 

It seems that we must re-imagine* the past in our own image!

 

* Now there's a weasel word....

 

[iL Dottore]

59 minutes ago, jamie92208 said:

That is sad about the posters.  Surely the social mores of the times are part of history. 

 

Jamie

Indeed  and all the wishful thinking in the world (and brushing uncomfortable, realities under the carpet) will not change that.

26 minutes ago, AndyID said:

 

Absolutely. Attach a note that these were historical and probably not acceptable by today's standards. We cannot erase history. Will history books have to be re-written to remove the likes of Henry VIII?

There are many, on both sides of the political fence, who would absolutely love to be able to do that.
 

Although the German philosopher Georg Hegel famously said, "The only thing we learn from history is that we learn nothing from history.", I think that we do. Perhaps grudgingly, often unwillingly, but nonetheless we do learn a little bit from history in each generation. Perhaps not as much as we should, but learn we do.

 

Although “learning from history“ is thought to be a matter of politics, “learning from history“ is something we all do in all walks of life. In medicine, for example, Madame Curie thought it was a good idea to leave radioactive elements out, around the laboratory, history has shown us that that is definitely not a good idea.

 

But if you remove the “unpleasant“ or “contentious“ items of history from public awareness, how will we ever learn?

Edited June 25 by iL Dottore
Typo

[TheQ]

I don't actually know which posters were removed, as they were in a room I don't often visit, there are a large selection of posters, so they do change them around anyway. But I know the people who run that room weren't happy with management...

[Happy Hippo]

8 minutes ago, TheQ said:

I don't actually know which posters were removed, as they were in a room I don't often visit, there are a large selection of posters, so they do change them around anyway. But I know the people who run that room weren't happy with management...

The Great Orme Mine in Llandudno has a very deep mine shaft called Vivian's. (500ft+?)

 

I did suggest that making up T shirts and china mugs emblazoned with the following strap line:

 

'I've seen Vivian's Shaft.... and it's a big one.'

 

I thought it was a sure fire money spinner, especially from the clientele who were always turning up in ludicrously emblazoned hats and tops.

 

The wife of the boss vetoed the idea, as she thought it was vulgar and not befitting the establishment.

 

 

[Winslow Boy]

9 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

The Great Orme Mine in Llandudno has a very deep mine shaft called Vivian's. (500ft+?)

 

I did suggest that making up T shirts and china mugs emblazoned with the following strap line:

 

'I've seen Vivian's Shaft.... and it's a big one.'

 

I thought it was a sure fire money spinner, especially from the clientele who were always turning up in ludicrously emblazoned hats and tops.

 

The wife of the boss vetoed the idea, as she thought it was vulgar and not befitting the establishment.

 

 

Your obviously mixing in the wrong circles.

[Happy Hippo]

In other news I seem tobe looking forward to having an an action packed day.

 

First off is to get my dive cylinder, which I use for recharging my air rifles, up to the local company that re-fills and tests cylinders.  The 5 year pressure test certification expires this month, so it has to be inspected and then hydraulically tested.  I shudder to think what the test pressure is, as the cylinder is rated at 300bar.

 

Then it's off west down the A5 to Llandrinio for the Borders MRC workshop day.

 

Since it is a nice day, I may extend my journey down the A5 to Chirk and drop into the Dapol factory and see if they have any  7 mm scale bargains in the NQP bin.

 

Then this evening I am off on a recce to Newport (Salop) for a Girlguiding event that Nyda is organising.

 

The days of saying 'It's a nice evening, we'll just go for a walk around town and play some games in the park, rather than use the meeting hall' have long gone.

 

Now it's a full recce, risk assessments, permission slips, responsible person as point of contact.

 

Not because they will be scaling the Eigerwand, but they are going outside the designated meeting place by about 50-100 yards!

[AndyID]

30 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

Indeed  and all the wishful thinking in the world (and brushing uncomfortable, realities under the carpet) will not change that.

There are many, on both sides of the political fence, who would absolutely love to be able to do that.
 

Although the German philosopher Georg Hegel famously said, "The only thing we learn from history is that we learn nothing from history.", I think that we do. Perhaps grudgingly, often unwillingly, but nonetheless we do learn a little bit from history in each generation. Perhaps not as much as we should, but learn we do.

 

Although “learning from history“ is thought to be a matter of politics, “learning from history“ is something we all do in all walks of life. In medicine, for example, Madame Curie thought it was a good idea to leave radioactive elements out, around the laboratory, history has shown us that that is definitely not a good idea.

 

But if you remove the “unpleasant“ or “contentious“ items of history from public awareness, how will we ever learn?

 

Sadly too many people seem think they can "learn from the Internet" as long as the information they receive happens to align with their particular preferences and prejudices. It seems to have become a major force in terms of political polarization.

[AndyID]

3 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

I shudder to think what the test pressure is, as the cylinder is rated at 300bar.

 

Not even 5,000 PSI. No big deal 😄

[jamie92208]

56 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

P.S. it has just occurred to me that the UK TOCs - never adverse to trousering large wodges of dosh - have never created specific timetabled “luxury” services  (like the TEE did or the Matterhorn Gotthard Express or Glacier Express in Switzerland today - both rather profitable and prestigious).
 

A dedicated two- or three-car EMU, luxuriously appointed (perhaps an all First Class service?), with business amenities (e.g. WiFi), an included top-notch lunch and a non-stop service (London Edinburgh, London-Manchester) could be a winner, especially given that now to fly from A to B in the UK is both tedious and time consuming.
 

A good service, aimed at the business market (where cost is a secondary issue), with fairly priced tickets would attract the environmentally conscious business traveller. And with suitable timings could provide a reliable city centre to city centre service with only marginally longer travel times than going by plane (as is the case of travelling from Basel to Paris by air or by TGV)

 

Of course, there is the teeny tiny matter of a) getting the unions to buy in; b) choosing a suitable EMU to serve as the starting point for a customised train-set; and c) getting the DfT to agree to the modifications of both train-set and service (I’m not sure which of the three would be the major stumbling block).

 

What EMU would you use as a basis of a such a service?

 

How about the spare class 325 parcels units. Not many windows, which isn't a problem as they will all be on their laptops and phones. P, us there are no seats and a bare interior to fit out. 

 

19 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

The Great Orme Mine in Llandudno has a very deep mine shaft called Vivian's. (500ft+?)

 

I did suggest that making up T shirts and china mugs emblazoned with the following strap line:

 

'I've seen Vivian's Shaft.... and it's a big one.'

 

I thought it was a sure fire money spinner, especially from the clientele who were always turning up in ludicrously emblazoned hats and tops.

 

The wife of the boss vetoed the idea, as she thought it was vulgar and not befitting the establishment.

 

 

Similar reaction for my idea for a T shirt /hat stall outside the White Rose shopping centre with the logo "I hate fing shopping'.  

 

Jamie