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Bloke I worked with many years ago had had in the past a Heinkel (or Messerschmitt) bubble car, which had top access, and no reverse gear (seriously!) He built a lean - to garage on the side of his house to store it. The first time he drove it in, forwards, he discovered that he'd built it too low and he could neither open the lid to get out, nor reverse out. He was there for a few hours, seemingly; if he was becoming insufferable, it was always a good ploy just to bring "The Lean - to" into the conversation to quieten him down.

Isn't it behind the toolpost? With the two extension handles?

The guy taking us for Workshop Tech 'O' level at my school (in the Colne Valley) reckoned these were the finest lathes built in the UK

Doesn't anyone issue standards for stuff like coupling compatibility anymore? Are there still things like (I suppose) DfT "requirements"?

Other advantages of piston valves vis - a - vis slide valves were:- 1: The valve heads could be widely spaced, so that the steam/exhaust passages could be made straighter (and therefore with a greater area), thus reducing the resistance to flow in them, resulting in a more free - running engine 2: With inside admission piston valves (that is, with the high pressure steam contained between the valve heads), the valve rod gland and the valve chest cover, don't need sealing against high pressure steam.

Thing is, especially in non - league, clubs coming down from the EFL tend to think that they will "piss this tinpot league"; it actually happens most of the way down the pyramid, with "big" clubs dropping a division or two (not looking at you in particular, Stockport County!), I'd say that the National League is probably the most difficult to get out of upwards. Not that my club has ever even been close.

No third rail for that very reason, I think

20,000 tons used to be considered a battleship 100 years ago! Especially looking at the length x beam.

Too loud, man!

When the real thing looks like a model; oh, yes, it does!

How big is that bunker barge? It does remind me a little of the product tankers, in the range 20,000 to 25,000 dwt, that I served on.

It's always been like that, hasn't it. In my time, there was the Eastern Anchorage and the Western Anchorage; have they finally become just one? That looks busier than Lagos in 1976, or Jeddah in 1979!

They were all rebuilt between about 2014 and 2016 in anticipation of the scheme being completed by the original scheduled date. There has been a considerable amount of civils work done between Ashton Moss North and Staly over the last 10 years

It certainly isnt! in about 1975 or thereabouts, aboard one of BPs River class product tankers, the engineers were testing the remote boiler level trips after a drydock. Fire the boiler (for those not in the know, there was only one), and let the water level in the steam drum fall until the remote trip operates. Only the trip(s) were faulty and didn't operate, and no - one was watching the local gauge glasses. The result was that the drum ran dry, which resulted in the ship being out of action for several months. Chief Engineer to a junior:- Go and have a look what the boiler glasses are saying A few minutes later, back comes the junior:- Honest chief, they aren't saying anything!

I can feel myself coming over all Captain Mainwaring!

Before pooling, there wouldn't be any back loading of foreign wagons, would there? Say a consignment of engine parts was being sent from say, North Eastern Marine on Tyneside to Silley Cox in Falmouth; the load would surely go in a NE wagon of some sort, if it went by rail, and the NE wagon would have to be sent back empty to the nearest point on the NE system when unloaded. Am I correct, even with this poor example?

Livestock carrier?

I'm going to guess that the J6/J39 photos at Sleaford were to do with tulip specials to/from Spalding. These trains ran at least into the 1970s, possibly later. What's the stock behind the B12?

An unusual feature of the Tay Bridge disaster inquiry was that it involved an Admiralty receiver of wreck (Rothery), because the wreckage ended up in a tidal river, and a prominent civil engineer (Barlow) Didn't the Hixon inquiry involve a tribunal as well?

80 years ago yesterday, the Pedestal convoy sailed through the Straits of Gibraltar. Wasn't 12/08/42 when HMS Eagle was sunk while part of the escort?

When someone like H & W or Kincaids built B & W engines under licence, didn't they use BSW/BSF, rather than metric, fastenings, certainly up to about 1967? I seem to recall one British - built ship I was on had a 9-98VT2BF, with 2" or 2 1/2" BSF head bolts

Yes, that sounds like the poisonous gas. Phosgene was a chemical warfare agent used by both sides in WW1.

Where would the pre - war GWR railcars fit into all of this?

C.T.C. is,of course, carbon tetrachloride, which has been banned as a firefighting agent for many years, due to the poisonous(?) gases given off when applied to a fire

Frightening. A large dollop of Swiss cheese there. In 1975 the BP tanker British Ambassador, (44,000 dwt) fully loaded, suffered an overboard pipe failure in the engine room in the South China Sea. Because the main bilge and emergency bilge valves couldn't be opened, the engine room flooded, and eventually the ship sank while under tow.