Stonehenge

It’s a pity that the builders didn’t leave notes about how to use it, but they probably thought that it would be obvious. It would probably have read like this..

“Despite a series of lightning 24 hour stoppages by the workforce and constant rain, we have managed to erect the central supports. However, after a meeting with the local landowner and the unions, we have decided to terminate construction. Note that construction will also stop at our Avebury site.

We have been granted a large piece of desert in Egypt and have been promised a willing workforce. As a result, we will be moving out within the week.

Due to the lack of stone in the area, we do not believe that you will get the co-operation required to finish the job, and you might want to consider reworking the original plans to include installing a timber roof and sides. It would make an excellent tea room and local tourist attraction for many years to come”

The one great thing about Stonehenge is that nobody really knows, and despite finding bits and bobs around it, the true usage is eluding everybody and probably always will. Unlike the Egyptians, nobody bothered to paint anything onto it, or maybe the constant rain washed off any decoration or record of usage. We just don’t know..

The photo at the top shows how Stonehenge looks now, but bear in mind that it has seen restoration over the years and has also been fenced off to prevent further vandalism. I was lucky enough to be able to walk through the stones last time I was there. Now it is a binocular job if you want t get up close and almost personal. There is not a great deal to see in all honesty, but a visit there will leave you asking two questions.

1. What did I honestly expect to see?
2. What were the original builders thinking?

So, this is what was standing over a century ago..

Compare it with the other photo and you can see that it has now been tastefully restored to the correct period.

The really important part is the Britain has got a Stonehenge, and everybody else hasn’t. It will remain one of the great mysteries in the realm of man made miscellany.

Here is a nice aerial view of the entire site..

For more.. http://www.stonehenge.co.uk/index.php

The Last Triumph

Triumph is one of the great names in British motoring history, yet the marque failed so many times to make anything really good.

Handling was never a strong point of the TR’s,, but from the TR4, they got the IRS rear end which helped a little.  Heralds, Vitesses or Spitfires had a swinging axle rear end which when coupled with the tight steering lock made them outright dangerous in fast tight turns. The Spitfire Mk IV got a revised rear axle which improved handling greatly.

Triumph engines often let the cars down too.

1. The TR5 PI was the fastest TR in a straight line, but the PI part was unreliable and affected all Triumphs with the PI nomenclature.
2. Dolomite Sprints were fast, but had a very weak top end, leading to camshaft and valve failure
3. The ‘1500’ engine in the Spitfire could power the car to 100mph, but the three main bearing crankshaft meant that oil and filter changes were critical if you wanted to take the ‘Spit’ to 100mph often.
4. The Stag got a Triumph special V8, special in that it was two four cylinder engines, essentially welded together, possibly the worst engine ever in any Triumph. It could have had the Rover V8, but Triumph wanted to go it alone and spoiled what could have been the best Triumph ever.

And so we come to the last Triumph.

At the time, it was the most reliable mass produced car to ever roll off a British car assembly track. It started every morning which meant that for the first time, a Triumph owner did not have to live close to a Triumph dealer. In CD attire, it was very well equipped indeed. The twin carburettor 1335cc engine gave it good performance, and the handling was good too.

If the description above does not sound like a classic Triumph, it is because the car was NOT a classic Triumph. It was a rebadged Honda Ballade with just enough local content to be a ‘British’ car. The car was called the  ‘Triumph‘Acclaim’ and was the last  to ever bear the Triumph name.

The trouble is that it wasn’t a real Triumph. It didn’t look like a Triumph, and it had qualities which Triumph owners were not used to having. It was actually a good car.

This is an employee booklet for the car and makes for interesting reading..

http://www.hargreave-mawson.demon.co.uk/emphand.jpg

The Acclaim was not a sporting car in the sense that many Triumphs were, and I always got the impression that it was bought by older people. It was finally eclipsed by new Rovers, also made in collaboration with Honda, and looking a little less like Japanese cars.

I think that the last Triumph should have been a sports car, a convertible at the very least, but the Triumph Fury story says it all.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triumph_Fury

If anyone is to be blamed, it has to be Triumph management. The convertible Triumphs were popular cars despite their shortcomings, but they all lacked proper development. When safety laws were introduced for convertibles, Triumph dropped them from the ranges rather than do what it would take to address the issues.

I once owned a Triumph Spitfire 1500, and apart from a 1293 Mini, it was the most fun I had ever had in an easily affordable sports car.

More on Triumphs here..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triumph_Motor_Company

The Telephone..

Alexander Graham Bell was a Scot, and had he developed the telephone and made the first long distance call from the UK, we could have laid claim to it being a British invention. But it was not to be. The idea was in his head and didn’t come to anything until he reached Ontario Canada.

Anyway, the telephone in question is the 712/722 Trimphone. When these were announced in 1964, everybody wanted one, but unlike today’s phones, a man from the GPO had to come and install it, so the wait could be a long one. The wait was worth it because the 712 was the hippest thing on the planet.

This is the info card for the 722. Note the exciting colour range. These phones were very light and easy to carry, and they had as standard the world’s longest cable.For the first time, you could sit further away than six feet from the wall, but it’s weight worked against it too. Dialling the phone resulted in it sliding around and being small, there was not a lot to hold. It was the first phone that didn’t ring too. It warbled, but we still used the phrase ‘I’ll ring you’.

The other issue was the luminous dial. Seen originally as a good idea, when users found out that it was radioactive, albeit very mildly radioactive, that was enough for people to take a step back.

Eventually, the Trimphone turned to tone dialling and then user pluggable (8766/8786) in the late 70’s and early 80’s which overcame the radioactive element and having to wait forever to get a new style phone.

The Trimphone was a GPO telephone. Towards the end of its life, there was an influx of novelty phones, none of them authorised, and all resisted by the GPO as being incompatible with the existing lines.

British Telecom took over from the GPO, promising to make the British telephone system the best in the world, and with that promise came a whole range of BT approved novelty phones, some with advanced features for the time.

Alas, the swinging Trimphone was replaced as the standard telephone, but for a few years blazed the first designer phone trail.

If you want to see what followed it, see here..

http://www.telephonesuk.co.uk/phones_1980on.htm

Welsh slate..

So good that it has been transported across the world and has been the roofing material of preference on some Chinese pagodas.

If fixed down using wooden pegs, a Welsh slate roof can have a useful lifespan of around 400 years. Iron nails are not good as the deterioration in the nails over time also affects the slate. There is no roof more perfect in appearance than a Welsh slate roof, and if you ever go to North Wales, you will know exactly what I mean.

Not just roofing, slate floor tiles have a quality all of their own.

Slate was mainly quarried, but in the case of the slate of Blaenau Ffestiniog, it was mined.

Was it easy work? About as easy as any quarry or mine can be. Open cast on the sides of the Dinorwig escarpments in the middle of winter or any time really would have been difficult on poor quality food, and many fell to their deaths because they no longer had the strength to hold on.

In the Llechwedd deep mines, explosions as the slate was blasted always presented obvious dangers, and like coal miners, the dust was unforgiving.

Quarrymen and miners were only paid for good workable slate blocks. There was always a considerable amount of waste that came away with the blocks, and it all had to be cleared manually and for no wages.

Weather in North Wales is changeable to say the least, in no small part due to its proximity with the Irish Sea, a particularly rough part of the North Atlantic Ocean. Blaenau Ffestiniog has been recorded as having more rain then anywhere else in England and Wales, and there are days in the area when it is impossible to see where the clouds stop and the mountains of waste begin.

If ever you find yourself in this part of the world, I strongly suggest that you do the Llechwedd tour, and while in Dinorwig a visit to the Miners Hospital. The records there will give you a very clear idea of just how tough it was. In the records, you will see the word ‘Marusmus’ in many of the entries. See here for details of the condition..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marasmus

Don’t worry. It is not contagious and your visit will be a safe one. For more on Welsh slate, see here.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slate_industry_in_Wales

.. and what you can still buy..http://www.welshslate.com/

Other mining in Wales..

There is a coal mine in Blaenavon, South Wales which has public tours. Here too is a real eye opener into the life of a miner.. see here..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Pit

As nasty a job as mining or quarrying may seem to you, the miners and quarrymen of North and South Wales were all proud of what they did, and all will tell you that they would do it over again.

It would be good to end on a high note, but there is a scar on the face of coal mining in South Wales. The name of the village was Aberfan..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aberfan_disaster

Tony Robinson

You may know him best as Blackadder’s sidekick, Baldrick.

That scene was back in 1989 and marked the end of probably the funniest sitcom ever, but Tony had a cunning plan way before.

He started acting aged 12 back in 1958, playing a role in the original West End production of Oliver. After appearing in a few West End shows, the die was cast.

Or was it?

Tony Robinson had bit parts in quite a lot of productions, both on TV and the big screen, and also did a stint on the kids show Play Away. He a very easy manner which suited the job as a television presenter well.

His real fame came with a role in Blackadder which made him a household name. Since then, he has become the face and voice of archaeology and history on TV.

Hey, there is an unofficial Tony Robinson website which is full of facts..

http://www.unofficialtonyrobinsonwebsite.co.uk/

Here in Canada, we got the Blackadder series, and we also get Tony’s history and archaeology television presentations, and I must admit to being able to listen to them all day.

Light where you need it - any angle..

Recognise this?

It is the model 75 Anglepoise table lamp, designed and developed originally by George Carwardine, a car suspension designer in the UK. These lamps are not cheap but there is no other multi-position lamp that does it as well as an original Anglepoise.

The original appeared in 1932 and could only handle a 40w light bulb. These days, they have LEDs, but apart from some styling changes, they have remained pretty much the same. You can even buy remakes of the original 1227 design. How cool is that?

Where wouldn’t you find one of these? Anywhere where there is no electricity supply. They were and are still used in homes, offices, hospitals, workshops etc.

Floor mounts, table stands, desk clamps, even a wall mount, there is always a way to make one of these lamps work for you.

Variations of this type of lamp have appeared, but none will be as versatile or long lasting as a real Anglepoise. A full range of spares is available for them too, so you will never have to commit an Anglepoise to the landfill like you do for so many of the other cheap look-a-likes.

For more, see here.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglepoise_lamp and for the current range.. http://www.anglepoise.com/

BBC and the Acorn..

Did you know that while other computer companies were struggling for traction in the early days, the BBC sponsored Acorn Computer Company was leading the world?

Did you also know that an offshoot of the original Acorn Computer Company, ARM, is into processors (CPUs) and is bigger than Intel? ARM = Acorn RiSC Machines.

People always associate computers with the USA, but the first useful computer was made and used in Britain? It was used at Bletchley Park to help break the Axis Powers codes.

The Acorn team in Cambridge UK were a bright bunch. Look what they produced over time.. http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/sec/79/Acorn-Computers/

The most famous is the BBC Micro which was the mainstay of computer learning in British schools. Click on the BBC B Micro in the link I gave you above to see the huge array of software and connectibles for the machine. There was absolutely nothing like them anywhere else.

The language was BBC BASIC, a step up from regular BASIC which embodied commands not seen in the original. It made the language very powerful indeed while still remaining simple to use. Even I managed to produce a few games and bits, even an assembly language clock which stayed on top of whatever was on-screen. Well, not quite always. The trouble is that I was no programmer and didn’t have the mindset to sit for hours bug checking, but what this period did teach me is how everything comes together.

I have more sympathy for the programmers when their stuff fails to interact with whatever else is on a computer. I know how difficult it is to test a program or utility and ever guarantee that it will not affect anything else that is running..

So what beat Acorn and why are they still not making computers? This is a company that built stuff to a high standard. There was nothing flimsy in their lineup. The 90’s saw the rise of the cheap and very often flimsy IBM clones, a market in which the Acorn way of doing things could not compete.

The Archimedes RiSC computer and the associated operating system was way ahead, closer to midrange business machines than for home or school use. Sadly, production of computers was halted.

This is not the end of the story.

The ARM processor which spawned the Archimedes range is a very powerful, very fast, and very power efficient processor, so much so that it is ideal for use in cellphones, PDA’s, tablets, essentially anything where mobility and performance are necessities. The computers may have disappeared, but the technology is alive and well, and huge business for what is left of the original Acorn company.

Also, the Domesday Project of 1986 has been saved from destruction. The laser disks upon which all of the data was stored eventually suffer what is called ‘laser rot’. Very few could ever afford the system on which the Domesday Project ran, but it is now being transferred from the laser disks and updated.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/domesday