Pic of the Day

[Richie]

Working with magnesium is notoriously difficult !

Last night I mentioned the Bugatti Aerolithe to you Bill..... Here it is.



This project (a basic one in comparison to K7) took the guild a decade to complete. The body is made out of mag.


When will we be finished ?

[Renegadenemo]

Fantastic looking car. I'd seen it before but didn't know what it was.
Mag is strange stuff to weld it has a crunchy sort of texture like half-set icing when molten unless you get it seriously hot and it gives up its heat as fast as you can put it in but by far the best bit is that once all the filing and grinding is done you can sweep up the swarf and scatter it on the floor in someone else's welding bay where there's MIG welding going on. Soon as the spatter hits the floor your unsuspecting colleague can then be laughed at as he dances about inside his own personal firework.

[f1steveuk]

Ah, but Nigel, getting out is merely traveling between the two! Unfortunately, I have become, through no choice of my own, a man of liesure (sudden cancelation of my contract, though I have three manuscripts to finnish), so I may get about a bit more!

Magnesium, I can think of two grand prix drivers who are no longer with us because of the stuff, that and fire marshalls throwing water on it. A real pain to work with, yet BRM used to hand beat the stuff into ultra thin, lightweight body panels

[quicksilver-wsr]

I spend much of my time a similar way, Steve ... although in my case it's Office, Post Office, Office, Post Office!

On the more serious note of a book contract being cancelled - I know from experience that it's no joke. It happened to me many years ago, and if you write for a living rather than doing it for fun it is a body-blow to your livelihood as much as your pride. Bloody publishers!

Magnesium - I was thinking the same thing. Piers Courage's car burned so badly that even when they buried the wreckage at the trackside it was still aflame when they dug it up again. That's what I was told way back, anyway. Horrible stuff, magnesium, on one level ... but much-used in all sorts of things.

Got to rush now, though. Post Office.

Nigel

[lsrdatabase]

I started work at LOLA's in 1975, the same year we lost Graham Hill. Anyway the chaps there were talking about a bad fire in the workshop, shortly before I started there. Evidently, a wheel was being turned on the big lathe. The raw castings were made of Mag. and this day it got too hot! Some bright spark was about to throw a bucket of water, When the shout went out MAG-MAG! Unfortunately too late and the lathe exploded in a ball of white fire. Luckily no one was injured.

Regards, Fred

[Terminator]

Cheers Mike A cracking pic of the day as far as I am concerned guys and moved by your kind comments accompanying the pic of the day. A long but most rewarding day stood hour after hour at the bench fettling ( with the odd cuppa and biscuit thrown in ) away at the inner and outer surface's of another one of DC's fire suppression bottles. Both Sorted now though,and fit for purpose once again. Excellentum

Novie Dzinora
The Bluebird Project Fettler

[mtskull]

So that's why Novie wasn't at home when I called by to say hello at the weekend!

[Renegadenemo]

Have to point out that the bottle wasn't just patched with any old scrap of tin, it was a piece of 1/8th 4130 Chromoly milled plate so the patch is both thicker and stronger than the native metal then it was hammered to recreate the proper shape and to stress-relieve it and that was before Novie set about making it smooth as a baby's bum. Hydraulic testing next then a coat of RAL 6009 polyester. Did we miss anything?

[Terminator]

Can't wait to see the finished result, it makes all that patient work worth while
Novie

[pmc]

?.
Today's pic looks like a lesson in JPEG for anyone who took the time to investigate. Expand the pic look at the red stuff.
JPEG figures that red, being not blue, isn't relevant to the subject?