I thought I wrecked the engine management on an 04 Transit by attempting to change the Glow Plugs (a 5 min job I thought). Yes one snapped in the head and burned out a wire, after which the engine would do nothing. An auto electrician had to come round with his computer to get it going again. My old smiley face transit (98 on an S plate) now deceased could be fixed with a few spanners at the side of the road.

Similarly my Leyland 270 tractor will start in any weather you throw at it as long as the battery has a full charge and you warm the battery up overnight on the boiler!

Regards

Pat

ps The guys who can change wrecked glow plugs without taking the head off are pretty good.....perhaps there are some engineers out there who can still fix things.

email (option): sacombsashtrees@hotmail.com

just to add about out of stock parts in the mid nineties one of the peugeot saloons had the alarm/central/imobiliser locking go down there was only a small amount of spares was made when these had run out that was it all you could get from the garage when you asked what to do to fix it all you got was a french shrug of the shoulders

email (option): roger.beck@node6.com

email (option): stu.gibbins@btinternet.com

Guys, it is our duty to pass on the interest and the skills to future generations. My son has a Triumph Speed Triple but I managed to encourage him to come to Normandy a few years ago and threw a G3L together for him to ride. Thinking that he would come only once and get bored spending a week with old blokes I was surprised when he wanted to come back the following year with two of his mates. Last year there were 4 of them who wanted to come and I had to get 5 bikes up and running. They now do all the mechanics themselves and really enjoy it. They have taken engines out and dismantled them and doing all the maintenance themselves. When I suggested that I might give Normandy a miss this year and do something else they said that they will go regardless. As well as riding the bikes they have all enjoyed learning the skills needed to keep the bikes going and now understand how engines work.

It's up to us to pass on the skills and interest to the next generation and we need to inspire their interest.

Cheers,

JT

I couldn't agree more John..These bikes will be around a lot longer than we will and someones got to keep them going....What most of us fail dismally to do is actually record the knowledge we accumulate, so it's important to pass it on...Of course, I'll be taking my M20 with me...Ian

email (option): ian@wright52.plus.com

Hi John ,thats one of the better stories i,ve heard all week,its great to think of another generation to take over when we lift off ,I feel a bit like ian about taking mine with me ,unless my boys take enough interest and gain the necessary skills to keep the ole girl breathing,because i,m sure she will way out live me.

email (option): cruiser3@icisp.net.au

To comment on Ian's original post, I feel it is a shame that our educators feel that our young no longer need to be taught about the basics of the workings of an engine. The line that successive uk governments take is that we don't need to make anything anymore and that the City can make money without the need for manufacturing. How wrong they have been proved to be. Only Germany within Europe has stuck to manufacturing in a big way and now it is the only EU country making money.
Now more than ever we need to encourage our young into design and manufacture. This starts at schools and collages where we need to inspire and encourage young people.
Remember, design and manufacture still happens but not so much in the UK. If we want to compete we need the skills. I have worked in engineering since 1982 . There are too many people in engineering who are a similar age to me. When we eventually retire I don't see many people starting at the bottom to replace us.
Successive governments have been happy to let these skills go. The massively growing economies of India and China have been quick to take on our manufacture. The bean counters in companies are usually happy to let manufacturing go. It doesn't take long before Design follows leaving nothing in the UK. I feel better now I have got that off my chest.
Paul

Well said Paul,
I run a small machine shop with conventional and CNC turning and milling capabilities, when we try to recruit new engineers the average age is now 50, we hardly ever see any younger engineers coming through, hence last year I took on an apprentice.
We need to do more to bring the younger generation through, the governments and the economy has allot to answer for it's short term gains. China will inflate to high to be feasible at some point, leaving a huge hole.

email (option): 79Aust@sky.com

Well I'm a Toolmaker by trade and have watched the demise and collapse of British manufacturing over the period of my career (maybe it's my fault )
In the early Seventies there was a skills shortage in the UK so the Engineering Apprenticeships were shortened from 5 to 4 years..then 3 in some cases and finally you could go on a 12 month Government course and go into the trade on parity with time served men...What a joke..I remember saying at the time 'why don't they make the Apprenticeship 1 day and then they'd have all the Engineers they want' ..
Shortly after that they just dispensed with apprenticeships altogether for 20-25 years....
Unfortunately the result is that the 'chain of learning', whereby skills were passed from one generation to the next has been utterly broken....
The fact is one Government after another has failed to realise the importance of manufacturing as part of the economy and has had no interest in maintaining a manual skills base...It was Maggie Thatcher who planted the seed of the idea that we live in a 'post industrial' age where the Service Industry will keep us all wealthy and manual skills are niether desirable nor neccessary.
As we live in a country that is run by barristers, bankers and semi professional politicians it is unsurprising that such a nonsensical view is prevalent.
Unfortunately the greed of the people that run the service sector has seen to it that any wealth generated has gone into the hands of a few and we are now burdoned with the debts they accrued in their rush to enrichen themselves.
Another point barely mentioned is that the service sector only employs people from a very narrow part of society and the education system...and the remainder have to face unemployment or semi skilled work...Manufacturing on the other hand employs from a very wide section of society and presents an opportunity for career improvement as additional skills are aquired...
As I said to my pal who is an accountant and who believes totally in the 'service sector' ethic..'Don't forget, without Engineers you'd be sat naked in a field scraping on a slate with a stick'...Ian

email (option): ian@wright52.plus.com

I’ve been listening to this topic with interest, but things are not as bad as they seem. Fact is, Britain is still the 4th or 5th largest manufacturing nation on Earth. We just don’t see it in the way we used to see it.

All the ancient skills we used to have are still around, and are being rediscovered all the time.

We have the second biggest defence industry in the world (after the USA). We produce fantastic nuclear submarines. We make more cars in the UK than ever. In a few years Hinckley Triumph will have produced more Bonnevilles than Meriden ever did. We were major contributors to the Airbus programme and the Joint Strike Fighter. We’re leaders in the petrol-chemical industry, the pharmaceutical industry, and the automotive industry (such as Ricardo Engineering, Lotus and Mclaren). We’re also streets ahead with the new Sabre air-breathing rocket.

In short, Britain is an industrial leader, full stop. France is a little bigger, and Italy is big too (I think it recently overtook us). But British industry is more hidden these days, that’s all. Tucked away. The skies aren’t as dirty as they used to be. The chimneys are gone. That’s because the grubby side of it goes to China and India—along with the industrial diseases that accompanied it and blighted lives, and shortened them.

But there are still people here who are blacksmiths, and charcoal burners, and thatchers. There are still people who can make Roman chariots and Viking longships and so on. Just not so many, and that’s because we don’t need them in such huge numbers.

Instead, we’ve got enthusiast groups like this one who can cherry pick the best of it and enjoy it privately. True, school kids don’t know a poppet valve from a radio valve, but if we ever need low-technologies again (most of which are actually high technologies—because there’s nothing “low” about smelting iron and creating carbon steel), we’ll redevelop them.

But we’ve moved on, socially and industrially. What we really all want is the best of both worlds, and to some extent we have that. Want to ride a steam train? There are plenty around. Want to sit in a workshop and machine crankshafts? Get on with it. Want to ride around on clattery old sidevalves? Just do it. Yes, that could be under threat some day. But not today. The information is still around. You just have to look for it, or discover it first hand.

I love old technology. I still use a dial phone circa 1965, and I sometimes plug in an old 1940s phone too (always expecting to hear an eerie long-dead operator ask: What number please, caller?). I’ve got old valve radios, and I even built a valve amp for my guitars. I’ve got old bicycles too (Hercules, Humber). I like old hand-operated tools (but use them only when I actually HAVE to fix something). I love rivets and eat ‘em for breakfast. But it’s not necessary for EVERYONE to know how to fix this old stuff. There are ALWAYS going to be guys who’ll pass on the knowledge as long as that knowledge is required (and there are still guys out there who know how to create those traps and locks for Egyptian tombs, and there can’t be a high demand for that skill down at the Job Centre).

No, we don’t see much British industry at street level; in the shops, etc. But it’s out there, one way or the other. China and India might do the sweatshop stuff, but who do you think designed it? Tip: Britain, France, Germany, the USA, Japan and Italy (not necessarily in that order). And yes, there are other great engineers out there in other countries.

Yes, we should increase British industry, and much of it IS coming back now that China and Japan have increased their standard of living and raised wages. We shouldn’t rely entirely upon our financial and service sectors. Factories are wonderful things. We should increase industrial apprenticeships and get down to a few basics. But we shouldn’t get it out of proportion either.

For most of us in the West, this is the best time there ever was, and if the price we pay is fewer factories and engineers, I think it’s probaby worth it. It just doesn’t matter if the WHOLE country doesn’t know how to tune a carburettor or fettle a gearbox. A few interested and enthusiastic men, and women, will do the job. And these guys are in The Netherlands, France, Greece, America, Australia, New Zealand and all over.

You can remind me of all this the next time I forget it, which I often do.

email (option): dannydefazio@sumpmagazine.com

Oh dear Danny. I wish things were as good as you suggest. It is true we have a good defence industry and we make nuclear submarines and the like. We still have these industries because the government cannot out source them due to their sensitive nature . Our car industry is now largely foreign owned and under constant threat of closure from their oversea masters. Our governments have offered many incentives to keep them here but when things get tough we have no control of our destiny . Sadly we are now seeing this at Honda in Swindon where 370 people may lose their jobs.
The notion that China has taken the dirty heavy industry that we are well rid of is simply not true. China started with manufacturing but is now heavily into design too with their own brands. The news this week was how Samsung have overtaken Apple in phone sales. Also mentioned was how China was close on the heels of them. Given time we shall see where china are.
The electronics companies in which I have worked are all gone , either they have been taken over or the design departments has been moved east following the manufacture.
The Guardian published this in November 2011, I think is sums things up well:
http://m.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/nov/16/why-britain-doesnt-make-things-manufacturing

Here are a couple of paragraphs I have picked out:

Meanwhile Britain has been undergoing one of the biggest industrial declines seen in postwar western Europe. When Thatcher came to power, manufacturing accounted for almost 30% of Britain's national income and employed 6.8 million people. By the time Brown left Downing Street last May, it was down to just over 11% of the economy, with a workforce of 2.5 million.
Even so, by any standards these numbers represent a collapse. As the government itself admits, no other major economy has been through our scale of de-industrialisation. The Germans and French have kept their big domestic brand names – the Mercedes and Mieles, the Renaults and Peugeots – and with them their supply chains of smaller suppliers and partners. In Britain there's been no such industrial husbandry, with the result that we have few big manufacturers left – but a profusion of bit-part makers. Is that a bad thing? Plenty of evidence suggests so. Bad economically, and terrible socially and culturally.

Paul

Hi Danny..I can't say I look at it that way with well over a million unemployed and millions more in dead end unskilled or semi skilled jobs or part time work..and for the minimum wage....Triumph and others offer the proof that they are able to mass produce consumer products to the right quality and at the right price to compete on a world market and in doing so they can provide well paid, quality employment.
If Germany can successfully manufacture cars, washing machines etc. etc. so can we and we should...and that no longer means that the inevitable consequence is smog and industrial diseases...
I agree we still have some world class Industries such as defence but we should have a whole lot more....Manufacturing produces 'career' opportunities (not 'job' opportunities)...It makes me sick to think of all the capable younger people who have semi skilled part time work or no work at all because we have uneccessarily thrown away hundreds of thousands of good quality skilled manufacturing jobs and deliberately destroyed the infra structure that supported them....
I hear people harp on about the 'British car industry'...We don't have a British car industry..What we do have is a local branch of Honda, Toyota et al..and make no mistake, if the going gets too tough they will pull out without a thought...
Also, a distinction needs to be made here between craft skills such as dry stone walling, thatching, smithying etc. etc. and manufacturing skills which are employed in the business of mass production.
When I talk about 'Engineering' I don't mean, for example, someone hand beating a petrol tank out of a sheet of Aluminium or hand making a pair of shotguns..All very quaint..but I mean the application of every Engineering skill to the creation of a variety of manufacturing businesses that can bring real benefits to much of the population..In my opinion the last thing we want now is less factories and less Engineers, quite the reverse in fact...Less politicians and speculators maybe....Ian

email (option): ian@wright52.plus.com

Well said Ian, only I said some of it slightly before you !
Paul

Your younger than me..you probably type faster....It seems our outlook is very similar though...Ian

email (option): ian@wright52.plus.com

While I am typing fast and fired up: Triumph was brought back from the dead by John Bloor, a self made man who sunk huge amounts of his own money to literally build the new Triumph from scratch. Yes he was awarded an OBE in 1995 but surely he should have been given a nighthood as an example to us all. Instead of that our government awarded a Nighthood to the head of RBS . Enough said. This shows clearly what governments think of manufacturing.
Paul

As Goering famously said..'When I hear the word culture I want to reach for a gun'......Substitute the word 'culture' with the word of your choice..Bankers, politicians, Eton boys etc. etc... ...Ian

email (option): ian@wright52.plus.com

Hi Paulco (and Ian)

Sorry, but it IS true. Yes, China is also involved in R&D, but it’s a long way behind the rest of the world. That’s why China keeps stealing technology, and that’s why it bought Rover, etc. And yes, China IS suffering serious pollution, not always directly from manufacturing. That’s too simplistic. A lot of the pollution comes from the power stations needed to supply the energy ( said to be building at the rate of one a week at present). That was the same problem in industrial Britain. Take note that it’s largely British and other foreign engineers who are currently working in China keeping their production lines running.

Of course we need to produce some defence items at home for security reasons, but it doesn’t alter the fact that we still have the SECOND LARGEST defence industry in the world. We still have the brains.

What’s happening is that people misunderstand globalisation. Yes, a company might well be “foreign owned”, but that isn’t necessarily the issue, except when it comes to national pride. The fact is, many of the investors in foreign owned companies are British. That means you and me if we want to invest. It works the other way too. Many British companies have foreign investors. Long gone are the days when everything considered “British” was actually British. It’s gone beyond that. It’s global.

It’s not entirely a new phenomenon. The Ford Motor Company, for instance, was one of our biggest manufacturers, but they were American. Vauxhall was huge too, and they’re American as well (General Motors). Take these two big players out of the game and what do you have left? Austin and Morris, mainly, plus the Rootes Group. Most of the rest produced great cars (Lanchester, Alvis, Jowett, Rolls Royce, etc), but not in huge numbers. Ford and Vauxhall had the lion’s share. American firms. Not British firms.

One hundred years ago, there were plenty of other American entrepreneurs in Britain. The Singer Sewing Machine Company, for instance, had a huge factory on the Clyde. We often think of them as a British firm, but it was an American outfit. Dunlop Tyres is another huge “British” firm that was American. Heinz had dozens of factories here, and they were American. Nestle had factories here, and they were Swiss. Hoover was here in force and that was American. RCA had electronic factories here and was a Yank firm. Edison too, come to that.

There are hundreds of other examples, the point being that the labour market has always been fluid. A hundred and fifty years ago, British entrepreneurs were heavily investing in China and producing goods for the Euro market. Britain was awash with the stuff. Then communism kicked off, and the Chinese market collapsed. Then we had a relatively narrow strong British industrial window (maybe 50-80 years).

Take note that companies in Britain have been collapsing too ever since there were founded. Jobs have ALWAYS been at risk. Look at the 1930s. There have always been mergers. We DO have a British car industry, but the ownership is not always home based. Jaguar, Land Rover, Rolls Royce, Aston Martin, Bentley, Lotus, McLaren and Mini are all here because Britain is still the spiritual home of these marques. They are still, in the minds of the world, British. Some companies, such as Aston Martin, are registered here and pay taxes here.

No one’s arguing that British industry is in decline. I write about this constantly. We need more industrial people. People who create things. Engineers. Technicians. Designers. No argument. No dispute. But British industry is not in terminal decline (not yet, anyway), and as I said, to a large degree it’s simply mutated into higher-end technologies. I’d love to see more factories in Britain. But all the car factories are still employing British engineers and workers. The money is still flowing into Britain. It’s still putting bread on British tables. Ditto for other industries.

Plenty of the designers at Mercedes and BMW and Porsche and Honda are British designers. Ditto for Honda and Yamaha. What’s happened is globalisation. National borders don’t mean anything anymore. It’s a moveable feast, and we’re actually eating better than ever. People loose track of this.

As for Germany manufacturing cars, they’re also outsourcing to the far east. So is Honda, Yamaha, Kawasaki, Suzuki, Harley-Davidson, and so on.

Also, as I said, we still have great engineering firms. I mentioned Ricardo, Lotus, and McClaren, but I might also mention Dyson, Triumph, the VT Group, and British Aerospace.

I think you’re arguing against me, but I’m not arguing against you. I’m simply saying that it isn’t all doom and gloom, and Britain is still the 4th or 5th largest manufacturing nation in the world. But high-tech machinery and robotic tools have made the labour force smaller, and it will continue to shrink just as it will elsewhere in the world.

Once again, we still have the skills, and I wish the industrial sector was stronger. Much stronger. But we’re all still better off overall, and the world is still beating a path to come and live here. Let’s keep our misgivings in perspective.

email (option): dannydefazio@sumpmagazine.com

Here’s a quick list of successful British Engineering firms. These were found after about three minutes searching on the net. There are dozens if not hundreds of others. The annual turnover is given after each name.

So cheer up everyone. It’s bad, and ought to be better, but there are still some great names out there.

Rotork – Bath Somerset, £447 million
Spirax-Sarco Engineering – Cheltenham, £650 million
Triumph, Hinckley £345 million
Weir Group, Glasgow, £412 million
Smiths Group, London £2,842 million
JCB, Rocester, £2,750 million

Give me half an hour, and I'll have plenty more. British firms, British jobs, bringing money back to Blighty.

email (option): dannydefazio@sumpmagazine.com

Danny I can see that I will struggle to convince you of our industrial decline. I hope that time will prove me wrong. We need more people like you with a positive outlook.
Paul

Hi Paulco

I can see you're not listening. Let me REPEAT it. I know Britain is in industrial decline. I said that about ten different ways. You're NOT failing to convince me. I know. Check this line in my last post: "No one’s arguing that British industry is in decline. I write about this constantly. "

Now read this line carefully: I HEREBY SOLEMNLY DECLARE THAT I BELIEVE BRITAIN TO BE IN INDUSTRIAL DECLINE. Signed Danny DeFazio

I Simply said that:

1. Britain is number 4 or 5 in the world league of industrial nations. We used to be number 1 many years ago. But we're now 4 or 5, which is still not bad considering our size and population, etc.

2. British engineering is still a strong sector and still brings in lots of revenue.

3. British engineering skills are not lost, but fewer people have them.

4. I'd love to see more industry in the UK, and more is in fact coming back.

5. More cars are produced in Britain than ever. Most of the factories are foreign owned, but most or all use British investment capital, and many have British chairmen, directors, etc. And they keep British workers in work.

6. This is the best time ever to be alive in the West, all things considered.

Okay?

P.S. By the way, I know Britain is in industrial decline.

email (option): dannydefazio@sumpmagazine.com

for Ian...

http://vimeo.com/31575162

Hi Nick...A great piece of film. The guy touched on the satisfaction of creating something by hand or machine and the connection between the craftsman, the materials and the skills used..I recently made a one off rear light mounting, for a 'special', that I hacksawed and filed from a 3"x 2" solid lump of aluminium...It took me 2 days to make and I could have done it a lot more quickly using my machines...but sometimes I just enjoy exercising my hand skills for the sake of it...Ian

email (option): ian@wright52.plus.com

Ian I have a close friend who is a very talented tool maker, he has owned a genuine 900SS from new, one day a few years ago now a young lady driving whilst on her mobile phone did a U-turn in front of him in a small suburban street. The bike was dropped to avoid the car, but he could not, he broke an arm and collar bone but the bike was fine apart from a snapped front brake lever.

When he recuperated he remade that brake lever from a piece of solid billet, just filing it down slowly over the course of a few days. The bike still wears the hand made level and if you didn't know the story you'd think it was a bought one.