The boat that Guy built

[The Merry MillerParticipant @themerrymiller]

Correct me if I was seeing things but was the clockmaker in last nights program using a micrometer as a “G” clamp?

[The Merry MillerParticipant @themerrymiller]

[Chris GunnParticipant @chrisgunn36534]

Yes I thought he was using an old mike for a G clamp as well. Do you think they are trying to recreate Fred Dibnah after the steeple jack segment last night as well as the format they are using? Is it a bit lightweight?

Chris Gunn

[The Merry MillerParticipant @themerrymiller]

My feelings entirely Chris.

[John ShepherdParticipant @johnshepherd38883]

Firstly there is no comparison with Fed Dibnah! and yes there is a lot wrong with the program if you take it too seriously but being broadcast at 7:30 it is obviously meant for family entertainment and if it gets just a few youngsters in particular interested in our industrial heritage and engineering then that’s all right by me.

 

 

John

[Ian S CParticipant @iansc]

I think it was one of my school teachers who said that soon we would be using the imperial micrometers foe G-clamps, because they would be usless once we changed to metric. “Fraid we don’t see these programs on this side of the rock. Ian S C

[John Stevenson 1Participant @johnstevenson1]

Anyone spot where when the clock was screwed to the wall, about 29 minutes on I player, he split the case ?

[Steve GarnettParticipant @stevegarnett62550]

Yup, agree entirely with all the above – plus, he’s going to ruin that mattress, putting it directly onto a sheet of shuttering ply with no holes in it. It will be soaking wet in no time at all!

 

This series is a very good example of what’s wrong with our current mainstream TV output. If you have access to channels like Discovery Shed (yes, really!), things improve a bit. Also I was quite impressed with Robert Llewellyn‘s “How do they do it” series – much better made, and far more informative.

[TerrydParticipant @terryd72465]

Posted by Steve Garnett on 17/03/2011 17:12:46:

Yup, agree entirely with all the above – plus, he’s going to ruin that mattress, putting it directly onto a sheet of shuttering ply with no holes in it. It will be soaking wet in no time at all!

 

This series is a very good example of what’s wrong with our current mainstream TV output. If you have access to channels like Discovery Shed (yes, really!), things improve a bit. Also I was quite impressed with Robert Llewellyn‘s “How do they do it” series – much better made, and far more informative.

Hi Steve,

 

I agree wholly with all you said. The problem is that many of these shows are dumbed down because some producer thinks that the majority of the British public aren’t interested in detail and quality. Good examples were those makeover shows that were once so popular, where so called ‘Designers’ tried to be as outlandish as possible with other peoples homes, while using acres of mdf and gallons of primary coloured paints. Those weren’t designers they were more like Art School dropouts who thought they could design.

 

Your comment about the mattress reminds of when I built my children’s bunk beds many years ago and made the mattress base out of 10mm ply. I spent happy hours with a semi blunt Eclipse holesaw making what seemed like hundreds of holes to ensure ventilation. Happy days (?)

 

Best regards

 

Terry

[Eric CoxParticipant @ericcox50497]

Going back to the “G” clamp, micrometers when locked to the correct size make excellent snap gauges.

 

Verniers can be used as finely adjustable spanners and 24 and 36 inch verniers are useful as sash clamps when making picture frames.

 

By the way Robert Llewellyn‘s “How do they do it” is American with him doing the voice over.

The original version is sometimes shown on “Quest”

Edited By Eric Cox on 18/03/2011 08:52:44

Edited By Eric Cox on 18/03/2011 09:02:17

[modeng2000Participant @modeng2000]

‘By the way Robert Llewellyn‘s “How do they do it” is American with him doing the voice over.’

 

That is interesting, I saw a Warco machine in the workshop in one of the programmes.

 

John

[John Stevenson 1Participant @johnstevenson1]

Damn things get everywhere 😀

 

John S.

[Steve GarnettParticipant @stevegarnett62550]

Posted by Eric Cox on 18/03/2011 08:51:59:

By the way Robert Llewellyn‘s “How do they do it” is American with him doing the voice over.

 

I wouldn’t regard that as a problem, particularly, or even a significant issue.

 

Back in the good old days, American TV was generally regarded as pretty poor, overall, and the UK output was rather better – and held up as a model for the Americans to aspire to, and in a lot of cases, it worked. And then Auntie Beeb got more concerned with social do-gooding (like what’s happening today) than operating the Reithian model, and all the standards dropped. This largely coincided with the arrival of management-speak in the form of Birtism…

 

But the other significant factor in who makes what is, of course, that the majority of serious programming is based on international co-production these days, and often voice-overs are added for different markets anyway – it doesn’t neccessarily mean that it was an ‘American’ production at all. The reason for the co-production of course is cost-based; with most broadcasters now running management-heavy operations and also having to cope with advertisers who don’t generally like ‘factual’ material around their adverts, the only way to make these programs is to spread the cost/risk.

Edited By Steve Garnett on 18/03/2011 13:05:38

[KWILParticipant @kwil]

Not USA but Canada (Wikipedia)

[chris stephensParticipant @chrisstephens63393]

Hi Guys,

I think the way to tell where it comes from is that if Kryton is doing a voice over it is foreign and if he actually appears in the film it is an English part.

chriStephens

PS do you hear a funny whirring noise when listening to Auntie Beeb, that’s Lord Reith spinning in his grave.

[MikeParticipant @mike89748]

When “The boat that Guy Built” series first started, I asked my wife to record all the episodes for me. I have now asked her to erase them. I find the programme dumbed down and amateurish – an insult to engineers both professional and amateur. There does seem to be a certain element within the BBC with a philosophy of “if you don’t understand a subject, take the mickey out of it.”

[Anonymous]

Posted by Mike on 18/03/2011 16:44:16:

When “The boat that Guy Built” series first started, I asked my wife to record all the episodes for me. I have now asked her to erase them. I find the programme dumbed down and amateurish – an insult to engineers both professional and amateur. There does seem to be a certain element within the BBC with a philosophy of “if you don’t understand a subject, take the mickey out of it.”

 

It’s worse than that; it only seems to apply to engineering, and to some extent science. I don’t suppose that everybody in the BBC speaks German, but can you imagine them taking the mickey out of the Ring Cycle because they don’t understand the language?

 

Regards,

 

Andrew

[blowlampParticipant @blowlamp]

There also seems to be a belief with many of the programme makers that if we’re not singing, dancing, or laughing, then we can’t be having fun or enjoying ourselves.

 

I’ve also noticed the ‘fear’ of the producers of anyone having a meaty chat about things mechanical as it’s always done in a jokey way, as if it’s too painful for the viewer otherwise.

 

It is interesting to see how they’re trying to remind the population of our manufacturing past and I wonder if those in charge are hinting at what we should be doing now, with programmes like this, along with the very interesting documentory Britain At Work, which is presented quite nicely by Kirsty Young. After all, now it’s so expensive to buy a degree, many school leavers may need to go back into manufacturing whatever we can.

 

 

Martin.

[chris stephensParticipant @chrisstephens63393]

Hi Guys,

Surely the problem is that the BBC saw how popular Fred Dibnah was and thought “let’s make a similar sort of program but make it suitable for everyone”, thus taking away detail for those who know something about the subject and stopping those who don’t from getting bored.

chriStephens

[TerrydParticipant @terryd72465]

Hi Graham,

 

The ‘no conkers’ rule was enacted by misguided heads of few small primary schools down south. The other 4700 or so schools carried on as normal. Quote:

 

“Top Gear, along with other media commentators, mistakenly stated that the wearing of goggles during the game was due to an official Health and Safety Executive (HSE) edict when it was in fact an initiative which the schools themselves had put in place independently” (Wikipedia) . I.e. not an official policy, no ‘Elfin safety’ there then!.

As far as teaching is concerned, teachers now are now more or less only able to teach what the National Curriculum allows and that was enacted by the vapid industry hater one M. Thatcher in the late 1980’s and is now having such a consequence. We were told in no uncertain terms that these industrial skills were those of the past and the new skills needed were those of the service industries, one of those being the hugely influential pop music and media industries. Graham, please enlighten us as to where this Lady GaGa course is to be held, or is it another Daily Mail scare story?

 

BTW n the same way Thatcher’s decision to scrap school meals, balanced as they were, to be replaced by those that the children (read ‘consumer’) wanted to buy, led in large part to the burger and chips culture and obesity problem we now have to deal with at enormous cost. (in anticipation of Jamie Oliver, in 1986 I predicted to anyone who would listen that we would have an obesity epidemic in 25 to 30 years.)

 

Best regards

 

Terry

Best regards

[Steve GarnettParticipant @stevegarnett62550]

Posted by KWIL on 18/03/2011 13:12:32:

Not USA but Canada (Wikipedia)

 

I’m afraid not…

 

Everything I said about American TV is true, and Canada (because it has a very strong government-supported film tradition) has always done better anyway, but ‘How Do They Do It?’ is actually made by an independent UK company for Discovery (which is probably why you see Warco lathes, etc), and they are London-based Wag TV. It actually says this in the first line of the Wiki page if you look…

 

But, I don’t think that the BBC is intellectually capable of making programs like that any more.

 

[Steve GarnettParticipant @stevegarnett62550]

Oh, and the Lady GaGa degree is, fortunately, only on offer in an American institution…

 

But don’t worry – there has in the past been at least one University in the UK offering, to all intents and purposes, a degree in Witchcraft, so we aren’t entirely immune…

[blowlampParticipant @blowlamp]

For those that remember them, some of the BBC’s Horizon and Channel 4’s Equinox documentaries made for excellent viewing.

Martin.

[NJHParticipant @njh]

Hi All

 

Time for a little humble pie. After the first posting about Guy & Co ( on another thread) I took some of you to task for a gloomy response to the programme. My wife & I quite enjoyed it and I’d not come across the lift between the two canal levels before. The next programme was, however, poor and the latest offering dire! I doubt that I will have an opinion to express on the rest of the series as life is too short to waste watching and evaluating such trash.( I think it was the micrometer clamp that finally did it !)

 

So my apologies – you were not at all gloomy but quite right. I suggest Guy sticks to the M/C racing, which I understand he does well, and the BBC concentrates on Blue Peter etc. Shame though – some of the Open University progs. used to be good and they did, at one time, run a second level course on canals etc.

 

Regards

 

Norman

Edited By NJH on 19/03/2011 00:35:02

[chris stephensParticipant @chrisstephens63393]

Hi Norman,

I suppose we should have guessed that the program would be a bit naff, the time slot gave it away. We all watched it following the “….to travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive,…..” principle. If it had really been made with us lot (minority audience) in mind it would have been on BBC4 at 4AM. Cynical, me?

chriStephens

[Author]

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