On Mar 15, 10:53*am, Mizter T wrote:

Tunnel boring


So, it's finally really happening.


Most days I travel one way or the other through Paddington on the
Hamcity & Mersmith line and I've been watching the machinery being
assembled bit by bit. Its impressive kit. I don't recall the channel
tunnel machinery being as impressive but maybe grey cells are
decaying.

--
Nick

D7666 wrote:

On Mar 15, 10:53*am, Mizter T wrote:

Tunnel boring


So, it's finally really happening.


Most days I travel one way or the other through Paddington on the
Hamcity & Mersmith line and I've been watching the machinery being
assembled bit by bit. Its impressive kit. I don't recall the channel
tunnel machinery being as impressive but maybe grey cells are
decaying.


The Channel Tunnel machinery was crude and simplistic on the British
side, but extremely sophisticated and impressive on the French side.

The British tunnelling engineers laughed at the French machines,
claiming that they were absurdly complex and would make very slow
progress compared to the much simpler machines on the British side.

In the final reckoning, the French machines were very reliable and
worked faster than expected despite encountering ground conditions
that were much worse than expected. Meanwhile, the British machines
struggled in better ground that the French had to deal with and proved
unreliable and inadequate.

The planned meeting point between the British and French tunnel drives
had to be moved towards Kent several times (and by significant
distances) because the French machines made such rapid progress
compared to ours.

On 15/03/2012 20:48, Bruce wrote:
wrote:

On Mar 15, 10:53 am, Mizter wrote:

Tunnel boring


So, it's finally really happening.


Most days I travel one way or the other through Paddington on the
Hamcity& Mersmith line and I've been watching the machinery being
assembled bit by bit. Its impressive kit. I don't recall the channel
tunnel machinery being as impressive but maybe grey cells are
decaying.


The Channel Tunnel machinery was crude and simplistic on the British
side, but extremely sophisticated and impressive on the French side.

The British tunnelling engineers laughed at the French machines,

Which engineers, and how do you know that they did?

It doesn't seen the sort of thing that engineers (real engineers, rather
than repairmen or shopkeepers) who I've come across would do, as most
seem to find different approaches to specific problems to be quite
interesting.

--
Arthur Figgis Surrey, UK

On 15/03/2012 20:53, Arthur Figgis wrote:
On 15/03/2012 20:48, Bruce wrote:
wrote:

On Mar 15, 10:53 am, Mizter wrote:

Tunnel boring


So, it's finally really happening.


Most days I travel one way or the other through Paddington on the
Hamcity& Mersmith line and I've been watching the machinery being
assembled bit by bit. Its impressive kit. I don't recall the channel
tunnel machinery being as impressive but maybe grey cells are
decaying.


The Channel Tunnel machinery was crude and simplistic on the British
side, but extremely sophisticated and impressive on the French side.

The British tunnelling engineers laughed at the French machines,

Which engineers, and how do you know that they did?

It doesn't seen the sort of thing that engineers (real engineers, rather
than repairmen or shopkeepers) who I've come across would do, as most
seem to find different approaches to specific problems to be quite
interesting.


You forget that Polson was Morton's right hand man on the project and
therefore knows everything about it.

--
Graeme Wall
This account not read, substitute trains for rail.
Railway Miscellany at http://www.greywall.demon.co.uk/rail

In message , at 08:36:36 on Fri,
16 Mar 2012, Graeme Wall remarked:
You forget that Polson was Morton's right hand man on the project and
therefore knows everything about it.

iirc he was involved in one of the rival bids (and unsuccessful) bids to
build a bridge instead.
--
Roland Perry

On 16/03/2012 10:34, Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 08:36:36 on Fri,
16 Mar 2012, Graeme Wall remarked:
You forget that Polson was Morton's right hand man on the project and
therefore knows everything about it.

iirc he was involved in one of the rival bids (and unsuccessful) bids to
build a bridge instead.

Difficult to disentangle all his myriad claims but IIRC he was allegedly
working on the tunnel project but thought the bridge proposal was a
better option.

--
Graeme Wall
This account not read, substitute trains for rail.
Railway Miscellany at http://www.greywall.demon.co.uk/rail

On 16/03/12 11:50, Graeme Wall wrote:
Difficult to disentangle all his myriad claims but IIRC he was allegedly
working on the tunnel project

Remember that he has also claimed to have managed an opencast mine,
worked in every nuclear power station in Britain, run shops in Preston
and North Yorkshire, been a civil servant, written the transport section
of the Labour Manifesto in 1997, supervised the Piccadilly Line tunnel
under Heathrow and taken cover photographs for Vogue. I suppose it's
possible that some of these claims might be true.

Ian

On 16/03/12 10:34, Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 08:36:36 on Fri,
16 Mar 2012, Graeme Wall remarked:
You forget that Polson was Morton's right hand man on the project and
therefore knows everything about it.

iirc he was involved in one of the rival bids (and unsuccessful) bids to
build a bridge instead.

[citation require]

Ian

In message , at 23:51:45 on Tue, 20 Mar
2012, The Real Doctor remarked:
You forget that Polson was Morton's right hand man on the project and
therefore knows everything about it.

iirc he was involved in one of the rival bids (and unsuccessful) bids to
build a bridge instead.

[citation require]

http://groups.google.com/group/uk.ra...5dfe76b6edfa72

Sorry, I knew he'd posted about the bridge option, but I had the context
reversed.

--
Roland Perry

The Channel Tunnel machinery was crude and simplistic on the British
side, but extremely sophisticated and impressive on the French side.


Yes, you can always rely on the French to be a bunch of poseurs.

Pity they aren’t so good at armies.

Mind you, I bet they wouldn’t have needed £17bn to build HS2.