The Appliance Of Science
Every year the village I used to live in had a raft race, and every year, I'd enter with some untested vaguely scientific entry.

Year one was Pollution. This was raft made from bamboo tied together and then a load of empty bottles and cans were laid into the spaces between the bamboo. The entire thing was then filled with expanding foam from spray cans. Over £100 worth. Oddly enough it actually floated but it floated 6 inches *below* the water.

Year 2 was Pollution 2. Same raft but this time with 10 sheets of thin polystyrene glued to it to give it more buoyancy. It also featured a 10ft long blow-up killer whale strapped to the front. The best addition was a chair or throne where I sat holding a Ghetto-Blaster that belted out Ride Of The Valkyrie as we paddled under the bridge.

Year 3 was a pub boat. It was actually a decent design being made from ladders with beer barrels tied to it. Quite streamlined. Unfortunately, some dickhead added a bloke from Newcastle to the team and the fat-fucker weighed 22 stone so we went nowhere fast. After the race, we weighed in the team members and I was the lightest at 14 stone. Total weight, not including raft, was over 60 stone.

Year 4 was another pub raft but this time powered by a couple of Royal Marines, the pub landlord, and me. Marines lost their paddles and then started fighting with each other.

Year 5 was another pub raft, this time powered by a bicycle strapped to the raft driving two bike wheels that had been bolted together with mild steel. Between the wheels were bolted planks of wood to make a kind of paddle wheel. We were in it to win it. Sadly we discovered that the torque applied to the paddle wheels just doesn't work with bolts and the wheel buckled under load. Should have welded to the fucker. Tide eventually carried us to the finish line.

On another note, we were disqualified every year on one pretext or another. This wasn't unusual as the judges were very strict and used arbitrary rules to determine whether a raft was legal or not. Other disqualifications have been:

"Taking it too seriously. Alnwick Fire Brigade"

"Raft members are too ugly"

"You won last year"

"Disqualified for coming first as the judge had bet a pint on the second raft"

Blatant cheating. Me. Twice. Once for laying a kilometre of garden twine at low tide and using this to pull the raft along, once for missing out half the course by carrying the raft over the headland. Bloody press photographers!

I never did get to do the ultimate cheat though. But I will one day. I came up with the idea of laying a load of garden hose under the river held down with long staples. Hose will be corked at one end and then hundreds of holes would be made in the hose that would snake backwards and forwards over about 10m X 10m.

Idea is to attach the hose to a cylinder of Co2 and wait for the rafts to pass over the hose. A simple twist of the valve and the water would be filled with millions of bubbles of C02 making the water about as dense as a heavy fart. Any raft entering this zone would plummet to the bottom of the river like a lead brick.

I was quite proud for working that out. Got the idea from a programme on the Bermuda Triangle where methane from the bottom of the sea was suggested as the reason why so many ships sank there.


I have too much time on my hands.

Cheers
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Fri 4 Apr 2008, 0:35, 8 replies)

I think I saw that program!
but how were you planning to staple a hose into the soft riverbed? And how deep is the water?
( flirting with badgers What? It sounded good at the time., Fri 4 Apr 2008, 5:14, closed)

'Tis easy
I've access to loads of mooring pins. Long cork-screw bits of metal that we use to anchor bouys, moorings etc, to the river bed. I was going to use them.

And, at the point I was going to setup the ambush
the water is only knee-deep at low tide. The tide round those parts varies from 3 to 7 meters depending on the day.

Cheers
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Fri 4 Apr 2008, 5:45, closed)

Well if I ever get stuck on a desert island...
I hope the other person I'm stuck with is you : )
( girlinthehole, Fri 4 Apr 2008, 8:34, closed)

The thing is
I've seen photos of some of these babies, and can confirm that Legless is, indeed, a frustrated boat-builder.
( Davros' Granddad a voice of calm reason in a world of spastics., Fri 4 Apr 2008, 9:52, closed)

Your best boat
Has to be the Tight Alnwick - I love that one!
( Tourette's ( . )( . ) has a monkey hair in her fried egg, Fri 4 Apr 2008, 11:01, closed)

Alnwick?
Explains everything!!! ;)

Have a clicky fellow Northerner.
(porkylips looks better as the sun goes down., Fri 4 Apr 2008, 11:16, closed)

^
Us Northerners gotta stick together...
( Davros' Granddad a voice of calm reason in a world of spastics., Fri 4 Apr 2008, 12:06, closed)

Ah, raft building...
Always great fun. Whilst at a rowing training camp, several rafts were made. You'd think Cambridge engineers would be able to work out buoyancy and design something that floated.... no. Mine was made of some old doors we found, on the reasoning that doors are lightweight and full of air. It floated, only slightly below the surface...



(Le Misanthrope last procrastinated on, Fri 4 Apr 2008, 14:40, closed)