Sunday Variety

It's All On-Line No 494

Fake Picture. Surely Not?

The above monstrosity is a "headline" picture on a YouTube post about "giant commercial vehicles" As usual, this particular vehicle does not feature in the video - because it does not exist. It could never exist because the funnel needs to be at the front end of the boiler to create the draught in the boiler tubes to draw the heat from the fire to turn water into steam.

Then you would have to wonder how those six giant wheels might respond to the one set at the front which might be steerable. Although, as they would appear to be fixed to the chassis ...

... we have a not steerable, non steamable very unbalanced non vehicle.

Tunnels Under The Sea

Erm, haven't you forgotten the tunnel? 

Or maybe all passengers are equipped with wet suits and SCUBA breathing apparatus for their journey between continents?

There has been a little spate of these items on-line. (Can you have a little spate? Surely a little spate is a dribble?)

This time it is waterproofed cars with their own oxygen supply, needed in large quantities to ensure the engine will run. Or maybe each car has huge batteries reliably insulated for sub-aqua use? Perhaps there will be fast charging stations on the ocean floor, complete with air supply?

One on-line article is almost poetic in its explanation of the possibilities that such a tunnel will offer.

There is even a section of FAQs!

And a key question ...

In yet another version of the article, we do now have a tunnel, set very shallow and lit from outside. But it appears to be suspended from who-knows-what with pieces of string.

So now you know!

If you are planning to drive from the UK to New York, don't hold your breath!

To make it work, according to some illustrations, you would have to hold your breath for a very long time.

Yet again, one of the benefits of the interwebnet, namely to inform and educate,

More Tunnels

It's not entirely clear who might want to drive from the UK to Iceland, a distance of 2,760 miles taking an estimated 90 hours ...

... OR who would pay to build it!

This picture is, indeed, of a roundabout in a tunnel ...

... but it is on the Faroe Islands, NOT Iceland. These remote Islands are part of Denmark, as yet not sought by a certain American leader!

But there is a YouTube video or "the only roundabout in a tunnel".

Yep, it's in Norway - which isn't Iceland OR The Faroes OR Denmark.

So it isn't unique.

More success for on-line learning!

And A Train Tunnel in London

In a Trump-like move, Mr Khan is always ready to annex new territory. This time he is after the Northern City Line, running  (historically) between Finsbury Park and Moorgate.

It once looked like this ...

... then looked like this!

The line was taken over by British Rail and looked like this ...

... and was later more fully incorporated into the national rail network. It now looks like this.

Currently, the core service is every 30 minutes on each of two routes ...

... to Stevenage via Hatfield and via Hertford.

Apparently Mr Khan will take over the existing trains and give the line a new name and a new colour. He also wants to run trains every 20 minutes on each leg but, on the line via Hatfield, they won't quite fit with the other services, so there frequency will be uneven.

On Line Sales Pitch?

Back To Sanity : Possibly? (1)

Readers may recall that Oliver Bulleid (of the pre-nationalisation Southern Railway) built two four car sets of "double deck" trains.

They were not a success.

K R Models has created an OO version of the set ...

 ... also available in blue as were the prototypes in their declining years.

Now, in a rush for crackpot unrealism, the company has announced a 4DD set in ...

... Network SouthEast colours - which, of course, they never wore! Sadly (even ludicrously) the blue does not match the lower lower deck window height so the whole thing is not only inaccurate but just looks wrong.

How about a set in Great British Railways livery?

No, that would be silly!

And A Peterville Puzzle

What might the above be? Here it is folded ready for adhesive.

More tomorrow.

And this?

Now what could you possibly do with a 4 x 2 Lego brick?

Seems sort of "basic" to fbb.

Again, more tomorrow.

 Next Variety Blog : Mon 12th Jan