Castle Aching

[Poggy1165]

Ah, yes:-

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Flashing_Blade

 

Relatively intelligent for a series made for children.

[Regularity]

Hell is where you find it.

I thought it was “other people”?

At least, that’s what Pope Jean-Paul the Sartre said.

[TheQ]

We arrived back in Wiltshire in 1963 when my Dad left the RAF and we certainly didn't have a TV then, so I can remember sitting around the radiogram, listening to Forces Favourites and The Navy Lark. Left hand down a bit!!!

 

But we did have a TV for the 1966 world cup, but when between the dates we got TV I don't know.

So for Blue Peter, it's definitely Christopher Trace, and Val Singleton, I missed the railway when it disappeared...

 

Also Leslie Crowther and Peter Glaze on Crackerjack!

 

It Friday, it's Five to Five, it's Crackerjack!

[Nearholmer]

DonW

 

I think one of the TVs that received open-heart surgery in our house was probably yours - at least one of them had a tiny CRT, a few inches across, with a big magnifying glass in front, which I kept when the tube finally ‘went soft’ and expired. Beside the valves, I always liked the variable condensers used for tuning - real works of art!

[Edwardian]

I thought it was “other people”?

At least, that’s what Pope Jean-Paul the Sartre said.

 

Well, it certainly would be if the other people were Jean Paul Sartre.

 

I have a theory about philosophy.  After years of poncing around on the Left Bank in black polo-necks and smoking Gauloises, or whatever the Seventeenth Century equivalent of that was, the French worked out that the only point of philosophy was to use it to talk women into bed.

 

Rather cruelly, the French omitted to explain this to the Germans.  

[Regularity]

Well, it certainly would be if the other people were Jean Paul Sartre.

 

I have a theory about philosophy. After years of poncing around on the Left Bank in black polo-necks and smoking Gauloises, or whatever the Seventeenth Century equivalent of that was, the French worked out that the only point of philosophy was to use it to talk women into bed.

 

I’d like to see that happen. The only way I could see that working would be if the woman reckoned that he might shut up if she gave him a .

Rather cruelly, the French omitted to explain this to the Germans.

 

All girls like a winner. To many French women, that would be someone who addressed them as, “Fraulein”.

 

(To be fair to the Germans, in most places that the Western Allies liberated in WWII, women felt they could no longer walk down a street without being molested, whereas under German occupation they were treated with respect. This was particularly noticeable in Rome.)

Edited December 14, 2017 by Regularity

[CKPR]

Well, it certainly would be if the other people were Jean Paul Sartre.

 

I have a theory about philosophy.  After years of poncing around on the Left Bank in black polo-necks and smoking Gauloises, or whatever the Seventeenth Century equivalent of that was, the French worked out that the only point of philosophy was to use it to talk women into bed.

 

Rather cruelly, the French omitted to explain this to the Germans.  

 

 

http://existentialcomics.com/comic/193

[St Enodoc]

We arrived back in Wiltshire in 1963 when my Dad left the RAF and we certainly didn't have a TV then, so I can remember sitting around the radiogram, listening to Forces Favourites and The Navy Lark. Left hand down a bit!!!

 

But we did have a TV for the 1966 world cup, but when between the dates we got TV I don't know.

So for Blue Peter, it's definitely Christopher Trace, and Val Singleton, I missed the railway when it disappeared...

 

Also Leslie Crowther and Peter Glaze on Crackerjack!

 

It Friday, it's Five to Five, it's Crackerjack!

CRACKERJACK!!!!!

 

I have to confess that I remember Eamonn Andrews and Double or Drop. Can never see a cabbage without thinking of that.

Edited December 14, 2017 by St Enodoc

[St Enodoc]

Well, it certainly would be if the other people were Jean Paul Sartre.

 

I have a theory about philosophy.  After years of poncing around on the Left Bank in black polo-necks and smoking Gauloises, or whatever the Seventeenth Century equivalent of that was, the French worked out that the only point of philosophy was to use it to talk women into bed.

 

Rather cruelly, the French omitted to explain this to the Germans.  

I wish I'd known that 40 years ago...

Edited December 14, 2017 by St Enodoc

[runs as required]

Not quite back to the crystal radio era then

 

Don

That is a very nearly genuinely Edwardian recollection. I can just claim it as a Georgian one. My Grandfather, who worked at Mt Pleasant Post Office used to go to Gamages on Holborn regularly in the lunch time. He gave me a Gamages crystal set for my Christmas present from him on which I listened to the Kings speech post war.

Garages was always a fave destination for spend amassed sums from great uncles and half crowns from pretend aunts for Christmas and birthdays.

dh

[Donw]

I read all sorts of stuff when young Satre, Herman Hess, Huxley, looked into various religeons until I finally realised the only point to existance was to exist all the rest is just noise. I then understood why after achieving enlightenment you are likely to return to the market to get drunk with the butchers. Not that I favour getting drunk. 

 

Don

[Branwell]

Since we seem to be drifting towards fractals it is opportune to try this joke found recently in a book on maths:

What does the B in Benoit B Mendelbrot stand for?

Jonathan

 

Which one of the three?

[Branwell]

Whereas now we are a throwaway society, and it is almost impossible to get stuff repaired, unless it is still under warranty. Even then they will often replace instead.

 

I still think this will have a big impact on the world of model railways. There are places where you can still send your Hornby-Dublo 8F or "N2" to be repaired. I wonder whether, in fifty years, there will be people willing and or able to repair the relatively delicate models of today. I have my doubts, frankly. However, as I won't be around then, I don't suppose I'll be bothered.

 

I do wonder what model railways they have in the spirit world though. Probably a version of S7 where you only have to think of the prototype for it to materialise. And nothing will ever derail or burn out.

 

Interesting. I had the plumber round yesterday and was talking to him about his son who's into model railways. Anyway, he also works in the local toy shop (quite a big one) and apparently it's got to the stage where the manufacturers are telling them to bin any returns (even if it's just for something like a missing buffer) so he's acquired quite a stock simply by giving a good home to models that would otherwise have gone to the great model scrapyard in the sky.

[Nearholmer]

I’ve probably bored everyone with this before, but one of my father’s pals was the manager of our local ‘dustbin lorry’ depot, and he used to give a tip to any driver who recovered model railway gear from the rubbish. This was the time when people were junking Hornby Dublo three Rail, and he created a marvellous loft layout using refurbished ‘junk’, and became one of the founders of our local MR club.

 

In short, the throwaway culture started 50+ years ago.

Edited December 15, 2017 by Nearholmer

[DonB]

Interesting. I had the plumber round yesterday and was talking to him about his son who's into model railways. Anyway, he also works in the local toy shop (quite a big one) and apparently it's got to the stage where the manufacturers are telling them to bin any returns (even if it's just for something like a missing buffer) so he's acquired quite a stock simply by giving a good home to models that would otherwise have gone to the great model scrapyard in the sky.

Your plumber's son is probably aware that there has been at least one prosecution for selling (on a well known auction site) items which have been replaced as faulty with request to scrap rather than return.

Seems that he is collecting them for his own use and enjoyment, not selling, but I thought a warning might be appropriate.

 

Edit to say that my cristal set kit was my first attempt at soldering.......it Never worked !!!

Edited December 15, 2017 by DonB

[Donw]

Your plumber's son is probably aware that there has been at least one prosecution for selling (on a well known auction site) items which have been replaced as faulty with request to scrap rather than return.

Seems that he is collecting them for his own use and enjoyment, not selling, but I thought a warning might be appropriate.

 

Edit to say that my cristal set kit was my first attempt at soldering.......it Never worked !!!

 

Quite possibly not your soldering. Crystal sets have no amplification so only the power of the radio waves to drive the speakers. Unless you are close to the station you may not recieve enough power.

[Hroth]

Quite possibly not your soldering. Crystal sets have no amplification so only the power of the radio waves to drive the speakers. Unless you are close to the station you may not recieve enough power.

For a crystal set to work, you have to have:

 

• A good long aerial wire
• A decent earth connection*
• A good coil wound on a hefty ferrite core
• A variable capacitor for tuning (60 microfarad AM)
• A germanium diode (OA91)
• A sensitive earpiece
• A dollop of luck!

 

If you really want to push things, once you get the above working, swap the OA91 for a lump of Galena and a wire point for that real 20s Cats Whisker feeling!

 

* We used to connect the earth to the central heating pipes, which formed a continuous soldered copper circuit, nowadays with poly microbore, it wouldn't work...

Edited December 15, 2017 by Hroth

[Nearholmer]

I've made one, using a genuine crystal and a 'whisker' filed-down from a piece of phosphor-bronze wire that was in the modelling box.

 

It did work, but it was very difficult to find a good spot on the crystal, and to get the pressure on the whisker just right for it to act as a semi-conductor.

 

I think the Crystal has a grain, and you need to be going across it IIRC. I'm fairly sure that when 'wireless' was a hobby to rival model trains in the 20s, the crystals were supplied 'cut and mounted', so it was probably easier to get a good signal. I found an interesting advert in an old magazine, for a sort of very primitive electronics kit, called something like "Black Adder", certainly a horrible snake as a logo, which used a ladder-like arrangement of two conductors, with terminals on the 'steps', onto which could be plugged all sorts of ready-mounted bits, to allow a 'wireless' and a host of other things to be made. It looked very clever, but clearly didn't catch on, otherwise it would be famous in the way that meccano is.

 

One thing I've never tried is to make a 'coherer', which was the diode before the crystal. It is basically a load of very fine iron-filings in a test tube, with two terminal wires, and a solenoid that is used to kick it out of conduction mechanically. There is a big display of them in the science museum, with no real explanation as to what they are, and I often think that 99% of visitors must go away none the wiser about why they are so important in the history of technology.

 

Coherers are bang in period for CA, so this is on-topic, honest!

Edited December 15, 2017 by Nearholmer

[Hroth]

As well as the coherer ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coherer ), you'll need a spark-gap transmitter ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spark-gap_transmitter ) to go with it.

 

Think Titanic...

 

What is the most amazing, is that Marconi got a signal from Newfoundland to Cornwall using such things!

[Regularity]

What is the most amazing, is that Marconi got a signal from Newfoundland to Cornwall using such things!

It would have been even more amazing if he had accomplished it without them!

[Nearholmer]

"Think Titanic"

 

I've always assumed that, if one built a fully Marconi receiver, and tuned carefully, dit dit dit dah dah dah dit dit dit would come crackling down the years from that stricken ship.

 

Which brings me to another tale of my father (feel free to stop me): there was an old lady living near us, whose son was a 'stoker' in the merchant marine. He came back from one voyage with a fancy multi-band transistor radio to sell, any my father, rather unkindly, convinced him that, because the dial was marked in some southeast Asian script, it was only fit to receive foreign language programmes, and bought it from him for next to nothing and a pint of beer.

[St Enodoc]

"Think Titanic"

 

I've always assumed that, if one built a fully Marconi receiver, and tuned carefully, dit dit dit dah dah dah dit dit dit would come crackling down the years from that stricken ship.

 

Which brings me to another tale of my father (feel free to stop me): there was an old lady living near us, whose son was a 'stoker' in the merchant marine. He came back from one voyage with a fancy multi-band transistor radio to sell, any my father, rather unkindly, convinced him that, because the dial was marked in some southeast Asian script, it was only fit to receive foreign language programmes, and bought it from him for next to nothing and a pint of beer.

So that's how you learned to speak Thai...

[TheQ]

Sawatdee krap

[St Enodoc]

Sawatdee krap

Kop khun krap.

[Edwardian]

Sawatdee krap

 

 

Kop khun krap.

 

 

WAI clever was the best I could come up with

 

Phuket!