I watched an English show last night, may have been call Two Hairy Bikers, its not a show I've seen before. Anyway, they were helping restore and old steam tractor of some description. They were replacing a cover that held two bolts. The bolts while having the same Whitworth thread had differing size heads. The bloke explained that during the war, bolt head sizes were reduced to save on material. So, he pointed to one bolt and said that's pre war and the other bolt must have been made and replaced during the war. I wonder if that extends to lamps. Did nut sizes vary on English made lamps pre, during and after the war?
Often they were deliberately different sized. Nuts would be 1/16" smaller or larger than the bolt head so that one tool roll would do the job, saves carrying two spanners the same size Alec.
That's interesting. Kind of gives you an idea of how great the volume of materials must have been to make a difference in even saving on bolt heads. Dean
Hey Dean, I thought the same thing when watching the program. At first you think it must be a lot of trouble to change tooling etc to save such a little amount. On second thoughts, when you consider the amount of production through the war years, it makes sense that little savings here and there would add up to thousands of tons of raw material being saved and used elsewhere.
Yes, there is a show called The Two Hairy Bikers (or 'The Two Hairy W*****s' in this house ) but it's a cookery programme, so I don't know if it's what you watched, Matty. One of them, (Si King?) is from round here and his mate (Dave Myers?) is from the other side of the country around 100 miles away. I realise, in Aussie terms, that probably would make them next-door neighbours...
I just did a search for a photo of the two hairy bikers and it certainly looks like them that I saw on this show. Perhaps it was Two Hairy Mechanics or River Cottage Mechanics I saw? Having said that, whether it was or wasn't them, the mechanic they were helping was the one to mention why there were two different sizes of bolt heads securing the one thing. Yes, that would be "Just up the road" or "Just down the road"
David, look mat this link. The top photo you see one of the blokes hand near a cog on the tractor in the background. The bolt you can make out right next to his knuckles is the bolts they were talking about. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01d88vw Sorry, I should have thought to search for this episode prior to my last post.
Yes, that's them - they've diversified - notice it says something about swopping spatulas for spanners. I missed that series completely although I'd have been interested in the subject matter. They're harmless enough but there's just something about them that gets on my tits. Exactly the same with that Guy Martin fella...
The Geordie one lives about a mile from us in next village & seems canny & ordinary enough when out & about.
I've wondered how well paid people, that do these shows, are. I've seen some of those American ones with blokes collecting scrap steel in NY and selling it. Their vans are dilapidated and don't seem to improve from one series to another. Same with those blokes that take on bagging their quota of alligators. You'd reckon if they got well paid for doing the show they'd able to afford a new pair of boots or something.
Aye, Gary met him in Costco, I think it was, and he chatted to the kids, posed with them for photographs and so on...
Two hairy Bikers seemed to follow Two Fat Ladies. As individuals all are probably very nice, good sorts, as I'm feel sure Guy Martin might be - and he's good on a bike around a race track. But his antics in the series that saw him and his pal mucking about with a narrow boat and the history surrounding the cut had us cringing at the ineptitude and general stupidity. But hey - that's showbiz.
Not so, Matty - but I hereby promote you to full membership of the forum as a 'kerosene junkie'. Congratulations!
Ok, if you insist. Please send a full description of the pay rate and conditions. Unlike those hairy bikers, 'gator baggers and scrap steel merchants,seem to be able to do, I want to be able to improve my holdings within my field to as least one decent lamp/lantern.
I might be.wrong on this but I was always under this impression when it came to bolts. When the steam tractors were built there was no standard for thread sizes and bolt head sizes so they were made to fit and work not to make it easier to work on. If you found 2 of the same model steam tractor not all the bolts would match each other. I'm sure I could be wrong on this but I will say I have seen a lot of information on steam tractors and always heard the same thing. In the USA we refer to it as the S.A.E. (scientific association of engineers) standard.
