The Liberty Ship legacy.

The photo above shows the recently completed affordable housing development by Moat Housing Association which is located in James Watt Way, between Morrison's petrol station and the KFC drive through. The site used to be the location of Erith Trades and Social Club. It consists of a total of forty apartments for affordable rent; understandably interest in the apartments has been very high. The scheme has been finished well over a year later than planned, due mainly to the original building contractor going bust, and it taking a long time to source a replacement builder. The task was completed by Salford based Bowsall Ltd, and the flats are now occupied. In news this week, The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, plans to scrap viability assessments, which private developers use to determine how much affordable housing they can allocate to a site. Under his plans, announced in Estates Gazette, there will be a set rate of 35 per cent of affordable housing on every new housing development.

As reported a couple of weeks ago, Orbit Housing Association carried out a survey of the residents of the Arthur Street Estate, off North End Road, and opposite the newly built stage one of the Erith Park development. The current Arthur Street Estate is very old and shabby, and has an unfortunate reputation as a sink estate. Orbit Housing Association have carried out an in - depth consultation with residents, and the results have been pretty astonishing. Ninety percent of the hundred or so residents that attended the open day voted for the existing tower blocks and low level housing to be demolished and replaced with new housing stock, similar to that which Orbit have been constructing across the road in Erith Park since 2014. I cannot say that I am in any way surprised - the new Erith Park development is fantastic - well designed and constructed, thoughtfully laid out and much more energy efficient and wheelchair / buggy friendly than what stood there before. Understandably their neighbours on the other side of North End Road have seen this and would like the same themselves. I will be covering more on both the ongoing Erith Park and now the Arthur Street Estate redevelopment in future. It looks like being an interesting and fulfilling time for the residents of both estates. Lots of practical problems will have to be solved, such as where the existing Arthur Street Estate residents will live whilst their homes are torn down and rebuilt. I hope to be covering these kind of questions in the months to come. If you have any information or thoughts on the new redevelopment, leave a comment below, or Email me at hugh.neal@gmail.com.

Last Sunday saw the re - launch of a TV show that has been off the air for around thirteen years. Robot Wars is now showing each Sunday in the 8-9pm slot on BBC 2 previously occupied by the disastrous, pointless and little watched reboot of Top Gear. The Robot Wars reboot seems very similar to the original 1998 version, just with a much bigger budget and far slicker presentation. Motor, material and most importantly battery technology has come a very long way in eighteen years, and the new robots are far heavier, more powerful and better armoured than the old ones. Whilst the technology inside the competition robots has moved on, the kind of amateur engineers who enter their robots into the show have changed very little. Robot Wars is sport for the non - sporty. Back when the show originally ran, I had a friend, Adam Harper (see the photo above - click for a larger view); he used to run a small, independent bicycle shop in Nuxley Road, Upper Belvedere (NOT Nuxley Village – there is no such place – that name is an invention of Estate Agents). Adam’s bread and butter was selling and repairing conventional bikes, but he had an unusual and quite lucrative sideline. When Sinclair vehicles went bust after the commercial failure of their Sinclair C5 electric trike in the late 1980’s, Adam Harper bought up the entire unsold stock, which he then warehoused at a secret location in Bexleyheath. Harper correctly guessed that the C5 would become a cult item, and its value would rise accordingly. He was correct. When new, a C5 retailed at £399. Nowadays, an unused, crated C5 with all its accessories will sell for around £5000! Harper also sold nearly all of the electric motors used by the competing robots in the original series of “Robot Wars” – because of his expertise with electric motors, the producers of the show hired him as one of the three competition judges. Back in the day, the C5 motor was one of the most compact, efficient and powerful available - which made it a prime choice for robot builders. Now electric motor technology has moved far ahead, and there are far superior alternatives available for the budding combat robot engineer to utilise. But I digress. I accompanied Adam Harper on a number of occasions to the studio to watch the Robot Wars being filmed. Back in those days it was presented by Craig Charles and Philippa Forrester, and was filmed in an old warehouse building next to the Excel Centre in Custom House, East London. I would imagine that it has long been demolished and replaced with an office building or hotel by now. The programme production was all quite amateurish and cobbled together - unlike the rebooted show which has far higher production values - even if the kind of person who took part, whether as a competitor, or in the audience has stayed exactly the same. Back in the middle to late 90's, Anyone who initially met him would think Adam Harper was an open, friendly guy – which indeed he was. It was only when you got to know him well that you realised he was someone very unusual – he had a very strong drive and ambition, accompanied by an almost non – existent sense of self preservation. As a by product of selling C5’s, Adam used to take quite a lot of flak from sceptics, who thought the little vehicle somewhat ridiculous. Harper decided to counter this by modifying a Sinclair C5 to attempt to beat the then world land speed record for an electric three wheeled vehicle, and thus give the C5 an image boost. I spent a considerable amount of time helping him design and build the world record machine in the back room of his bicycle shop. The souped up C5 had special, high power motors, fed by a custom electronic power control unit. The batteries were extremely high powered (for the time) gel units for military use – he had to get special permission to get a licence to use them – I recall a meeting at Exide I attended with him – his considerable charisma and power of persuasion were tested to the limit before Exide relented, and not only granted him a licence, but became of his principal sponsors . The front wheel of the racing C5 was from a Harrier jump jet, and the rears from a Lynx attack helicopter. The front wheel had a small parking brake, but the main method of bringing the tiny vehicle to a halt was a parachute built by Irvin – the people who built the parachutes for the Space Shuttle. The underside of the C5 was fitted with an aerodynamic under tray of Harper’s own design, as was the aluminium nose cone – which was tested in the wind tunnel at MIRA - you can see this is the photo above. This might all sound like a bit of a diversion, but bear with me. Adam Harper realised once he had built the super C5 that he would need publicity before the world land speed record itself. Harper had been invited to join the Dangerous Sports Club, and considered what even by his own standards to be an absolutely hare – brained stunt. In the months before the Dartford river crossing bridge (now known as the QE2 Bridge) was completed, there was a large gap in the middle, before the North and South side roadways were joined up. Adam wanted to jump the gap in the super C5! He went as far as contacting the contractors, and both Thurrock and Dartford councils. Understandably, all parties immediately said no. Adam parted company with Robot Wars after he disagreed with the producer over the direction the show was heading in. The Producer wanted to introduce (scripted) feuds between the competing robot teams, and have the team shouting threats at each other to mimic the manufactured rows between rivals in WWE wrestling. Adam disagreed with this, as he felt it gave out the wrong message to young viewers; he was of the opinion that the robot fighting was merely a means to an end - in getting young people interested in science, technology and engineering through constructing robots for use in combat. He called it "education by the back door". Needless to say the producer got his way, and Robot Wars and Adam Harper and the show parted their ways. Unfortunately I lost contact with him not long thereafter. A real character and a pleasure to know.

For those local residents living in and around Fraser Road, Alford Road and Pembroke Road (the area often better known as the "Pom Pom") you may well have noticed that after quite a few months of preparation work, construction has finally started on the Erith Quarry site. I understand that building work to create an initial forty seven new homes on the eastern boundary, by Birch Walk is now under way. It would seem that the main access point for the site is the land which once housed a petrol station on Fraser Road. I would imagine that the owners of the piece of vacant land on the corner of Pembroke Road and Fraser Road, opposite the site entrance must be rubbing their hands in glee; I am pretty certain the property departments of the big supermarket chains such as Tesco and Sainsbury's must be looking to build and open a large convenience store so close to the new housing development. I reckon the existing Londis store will also do well out of it too.

News reaches me this week that something that has been locally rumoured for years actually turns out to have a basis in truth. The Driving Test Centre in Woolwich Road, Upper Belvedere (based in what was once Belvedere Police Station) is the second hardest place to pass a driving test in the whole of the UK. It is only beaten by the test centre in Wanstead, East London. In 2013/ 2014 The Belvedere test centre was the toughest in the entire UK - and was even featured on the BBC News website at the time, which you can read here. Currently if you take your driving test at the Belvedere test centre, you have a sixty seven percent chance of failing. The reasons for the high failure rate are not clear; it may be a combination of factors.

Now that Boris Johnson is now longer Mayor of London, and has been carted off to the relative obscurity of the Foreign Office, it may well be that his high concept “Boris Island” airport scheme gets quietly dropped. The plan had all sorts of problems, many of which could not easily be resolved. As I wrote extensively back in January 2012, not least of these is the ever worsening threat posed to the lower Thames and estuary by the abandoned wreck of the wartime cargo ship the SS Richard Montgomery. As you may recall, back in the day I almost had a too close encounter with the infamous shipwreck – more on this later. In case you are not aware, the remains of the SS Richard Montgomery are one of the most contentious and controversial wrecks in the World. The American Liberty Ship, loaded with bombs and ammunition, sank in a storm in 1944, and broke in half in the Thames Estuary, between Sheerness on the Kent side of the river, and Southend on the Essex side. Contemporary accounts say that  on 20th August 1944, she started dragging her anchor, and despite warning sirens from surrounding ships ran aground on a sandbank around 270 yards from the main Medway Approach Channel, in a depth of 33 feet of water. Normally a Liberty Ship has an average draught of 28ft but the Montgomery, at this time, actually drew 31ft. Her overloaded, shoddily built and early welded construction made her vulnerable to the severe stress of grounding, and several serious cracks appeared in her hull, she eventually broke her back on the sand banks near the Isle of Sheppey about 1.5 miles from Sheerness and 5 miles from Southend. As the tide ebbed the ships plates snapped with a sharp crack heard over a mile away and the crew, mindful of its hazardous cargo, abandoned ship at 0300hrs using floats and lifeboats. A Rochester-based Master Stevedore T.P.Adams of Watson and Gill, was given the urgent and highly hazardous job of removing the cargo, which began on 23rd August 1944 at 1000hrs, using the ship's own cargo handling equipment, driven by a venerable, old (and expendable) steam ship the “Empire Nutfield” moored alongside. By the next day, the ship's hull had cracked open further, causing several cargo holds at the bow end to flood. The salvage operation continued until 25th September, when due to a severe gale they were forced to finally abandon the ship before all the cargo had been recovered. Subsequently, the ship broke into two separate parts, roughly at the midsection. During the enquiry following the shipwreck it was revealed that several ships moored nearby had noticed the Montgomery drifting towards the sandbank. They had attempted to signal an alert by sounding their sirens but without response, as Captain Willkie of the Montgomery was asleep. The ship's chief officer was unable to explain why he had not alerted the captain or carry out any remedial action. A Board of Inquiry held aboard the ship during the initial unloading, concluded that the ship’s crew had acted in accordance with their instructions and that the anchorage the harbour master assigned had possibly placed the ship in jeopardy, and returned the Montgomery's captain to full duty. The salvage of the SS Richard Montgomery was abandoned shortly thereafter, and the vessel was declared a hazard to shipping and marked by several warning buoys. It has stayed in position ever since. According to a 2008 survey, the wreck is at a depth of 49ft, on average, and leaning to starboard. At all states of the tide, its three masts are visible above the water. The Maritime and Coastguard Agency nevertheless still believe that the risk of a major explosion is remote. The UK government's Receiver of Wrecks commissioned a risk assessment in 1999, but this risk assessment has never been published. The Maritime and Coastguard Agency convened with local and port authorities to discuss the report in 2001 and concluded that "doing nothing was not an option for much longer." The New Scientist magazine carried out an investigation concluded in 2004, based partly on government documents released in that year, that the cargo was still deadly, and could be detonated by a collision, an attack, or even the shifting of the cargo in the tide. The bad condition of many of the bombs is such that they could explode spontaneously. Documents declassified shortly before, revealed that the wreck was not dealt with immediately after it happened, or in the intervening 60 years, due solely to the expense. According to a survey conducted in 2000 by the United Kingdom Maritime and Coastguard Agency, it was confirmed the wreck still held munitions totalling approximately 1,400 tons. This is thought to consist of:- "13,064 general purpose 250lb bombs, 9,022 cases of fragmenting bombs (these would produce massive amounts of shrapnel.), 7,739 semi-armour piercing bombs, 1,522 cases of fuses, 1,429 cases of phosphorous bombs, 1,427 cases of 100lb demolition bombs, and 817 cases of small arms ammunition". However, because the emergency unloading was carried out in great haste and under less than ideal conditions, no check or tally was made of exactly what was unloaded. Due to this, estimates of explosives remaining in the holds vary between the official figures of approx. 1400 tons and 3600 tons which was the unofficial estimate made by the stevedores and confirmed by the SS Richard Montgomery’s First Officer back in 1944 when the abortive salvage attempt was made. Although the published breakdown of cargo carried appears to be comprehensive, a ship's manifest exists which indicates, that in addition, she was carrying 240 Mustard Gas bombs and other unidentified munitions. Although chemical weapons were not used by either the Allies or Axis powers during WWII, both sides did stockpile such weapons for potential use. A BBC news report in 1970, speculated that if the wreck of the SS Richard Montgomery exploded, it would throw a 1,000-foot-wide column of water and debris nearly 10,000 feet into the air and generate a wave 16 feet high. Almost every window in Sheerness (population 37,852 (2011 census)) would be broken and buildings would be structurally damaged by the blast. This, however, is a very conservative view based on 1400 tons of explosive detonating in a chain explosion rather than one single detonation. The opinion was sought in October 1964 of retired Royal Engineer Major A. B. Hartley, MBE, GM., Britain's then most famous bomb disposal expert. His initial analysis said that "Some sixteen different basic combinations of explosives were used in American fragmentation bombs during the war. Those that were filled with TNT might remain comparatively safe for a long time provided, of course, the TNT hadn't crystallized (crystalline TNT is so unstable that the tip of a penknife blade scraped across its surface may cause it to detonate). And provided that the TNT was pure to begin with. But the production standards of all explosives made by the warring nations Allied and Axis became less rigid toward the end of the war. And by 1944 manufacturers were required only to produce explosive fillings with sufficient 'shelf life' to get them through the war. Those bombs inside your ship have existed long past their intended shelf life." His conservative forecast would be for windows to be shattered in Southend-on-Sea, Westcliff-on-Sea, Leigh-on-Sea, Shoeburyness, all some 6.5 miles away in Essex, and a number of smaller communities with a population totalling at least 375,000. In addition all these places might also suffer a heavy fall of shrapnel. The ship and cargo are closer still to the town of Sheerness, Kent and it is estimated that that damage and casualties might well be severe. A tidal wave would inevitably follow the huge explosion, which could  wash away sea walls and flood defences. The bombs also happen to lie alongside the Thames main fairway used by thousands of the world's merchant ships including LPG Gas tankers feeding a huge gas terminal and storage, also seriously at risk and countless amateur yachtsmen at various marinas. There is no doubt that any ships, however large or small, in the vicinity of the explosion would go down. A tidal wave could sweep up the River Medway to cause havoc in Rochester, Chatham, Gillingham and a dozen or more outlying places in Kent. If Mustard Gas bombs are indeed also on board as has been claimed, the results of any detonation could potentially involve widespread chemical contamination on top of any blast and tidal wave damage. In the late 1980’s when I was working for Radio Caroline, we would often make tender runs from Strood on the River Medway, out into the Southern North Sea, and the South Falls Head, where the Radio Caroline ship, the Ross Revenge was moored, outside British territorial waters, and thus outside of the law. These trips were invariably made at the dead of night, navigating by radar and from navigational buoy to navigational buoy using good old fashioned charts and a compass. On one occasion I was at the wheel of the thirty foot fishing cruiser we were using as a covert supply vessel; we had to time our trips precisely; at that time, the Olau Line ferry company operated a couple of very large passenger ferries out of Sheerness. The skipper of the Olau Britannia was a great friend to Radio Caroline, and would often go out of his way to help us. One way he gave us practical help was by allowing us to exit the Thames Estuary in the huge vessels’ radar shadow, thus hiding our activities from the authorities. I was concentrating on staying in formation with the giant car ferry, when I suddenly noticed a series of warning buoys dead ahead – I was steering the vessel straight into the wreck of the SS Richard Montgomery! Needless to say, I came around hard to Starboard, to the consternation of the skipper and the rest of the crew, who were thrown around by my sudden course changes, and we narrowly avoided a collision. I reckon if we had have hit the wreck, we would probably have been the first fishing cruiser in orbit! 

The vintage Pathe News clip below shows events from back in 1952. It features children "testing" some toys for the newsreel cameras. The toys were manufactured by D. Sebel and Co., trading as the Mobo Toy Company, whose factory and offices were located in West Street, Erith in part of the works originally occupied by the Vickers armaments factory. Mobo toys were a premium brand that were sold all over the world, and were particularly popular in the USA. The company eventually disappeared in the early 1970's with the import of cheaper (and less well made) rivals from the Far East. Mobo toys are now highly collectible. Leave a comment below, or Email me at hugh.neal@gmail.com.

YouTube - you fool.

The photo above was taken by me recently; it shows the traveller pony that lives on the parcel of land between Morrison's car park and the Thames side walk. Various ponies have been kept on the land for the last few years. They seem generally well looked after, and many parents with small children take them to visit, usually taking a couple of carrots or an apple for the pony. The area is adjacent to the recycling centre that has been the root of so many problems. When I have mentioned the recycling centre behind Morrison’s and next to the terminus of James Watt Way, it has usually been to bemoan the problem of commercial fly – tippers, who habitually dump materials which should really be taken to a proper tip like the one in Thames Road, Crayford. This time things are different; the Morrison’s recycling centre has been a victim of its own success over the Christmas period. It would seem that local people have been taking their Christmas wrapping materials, cardboard and plastic and disposing of them responsibly at the site. The problem has been that the dedicated waste hoppers in the recycling centre have not been emptied over the holiday period, and the place has become overloaded with waste material. This has been especially noticeable with regard to the bottle banks on the site – Christmas is always a time when more glass bottles get used than during the rest of the year, and it is easy to understand how the bottle banks could get overwhelmed. This situation got me thinking – recycling glass bottles is far better than making brand new ones from raw materials, but it is still a very energy intensive process – a hell of a lot of electricity gets used to melt down the glass and reform them into new bottles or other glass objects. Would it not be far preferable to return the bottles to the manufacturer to be stripped of labels, steam cleaned and then re – used? This was the old way of doing things, and I wonder why the practice was ever stopped? My feeling is that we should look to reintroduce a deposit charge on glass bottles to encourage them to be returned to the original supplier for sterilisation and re – use. I reckon  a 10 – 15p deposit charge would do the trick, and it might even encourage the old children’s trick of scouring the streets for old bottles to return to collect the deposit as a way of generating extra pocket money. This would have the secondary effect of partially clearing the streets of rubbish. It might be a long shot, but potentially I can see it working. What do you think? Is this too ambitious, misdirected, or is it the way to go? Do leave a comment below, or Email me at hugh.neal@gmail.com.

I am aware that humour is a very personal thing, and what appeals to one person may not appeal to another. Nevertheless, I have been astonished at the success of one programme in particular, which I just cannot understand the appeal of, as it seems to hark back to early 1970’s sit coms like “Bless this House” and “On the Buses” whilst to my mind lacking the wit or charm of those shows. On top of all this, the show managed to rack up the highest viewing ratings of the Christmas period – so a lot of people must like it. What show am I talking about? “Mrs Browns Boys”. It really seems to be a Marmite show for a lot of viewers – you either love or loathe it, and I am firmly in the latter group. It does seem to be a “guilty pleasure” programme, as when I have mentioned it to people, all I have asked have said that they detest it, but some at least must be lying, as the viewing figures have been so high. I won't bother a critique of “Mrs Browns Boys” as others have done far better than I, and I know my personal views are extremely unlikely to sway the opinion of someone who actually likes the show. I am mystified.

You may recall that last week I had an article comparing Pier Road today with what it looked like back in 1972, just before the old Victorian row of shops were demolished on what is now the site of Farm Foods and the Erith Police Office. Local Historian Ken Chamberlain has kindly supplied the following two photographs; the upper one shows the Victorian shops in Pier Road when they had been stripped and were awaiting demolition. The shops, from left to right were:- Randall Press, Collins Dry Cleaners, H.M.L. Miles. Shoe shop, Penton and Deans Gents outfitters, Turntable Record shop, George Gilbert Photographers, A (name unknown) Dry Cleaners, Barclays Bank, then an alleyway. Two semi-detached Villas, Solicitors and Doctors Surgery, Then the two semis that faced towards Bexley Road.

The second photo (click on it for a larger view) may look exceedingly unfamiliar to anyone who only knows the modern Erith – it was taken from the opposite end of Pier Road, where it met with Bexley Road, adjacent to Christ Church – which is just to the right of the scene, but out of the photograph. The building in the picture was the Wheatley Hotel – a popular pub that had overnight accommodation for travellers from the nearby Erith Station. The pub was located roughly where the hideous fish roundabout now resides. I can tell that the second photograph was taken at some point between 1964 and 1972, as the car at the turning of the road is a Morris 1800 mark one, better known colloquially as a “Land Crab” – a very popular model at the time. Since the premises in Pier Road were demolished in 1972 / 73, and the car only went on sale in 1964, hence the approximate ago of the image. Nevertheless it is quite difficult to visualise the location bearing in mind how much the basic geography of central Erith has changed since the horrendous 1970’s Brutalist Concrete shopping centre was built – the roads in and around the town centre were re – sited, renamed and in some cases totally ceased to exist. I have a couple of maps from the late 1940s’ that bear little resemblance to the town we see today. I suspect that much of the changes to the roads were quite necessary – the main aim of the work seems to be to permit far higher levels of motor traffic to pass through the town without causing a traffic jam – though the Bexley Road Bridge has historically always been a local choke point for traffic – an issue the Council have talked about addressing by widening the bridge to allow two lanes in each direction, instead of the current one lane. Whether it actually comes to pass is now debatable, as Bexley Council are cutting back their expenditure yet further. The only way I see the work now being done is if a body like Transport for London takes up the task.

This week is the thirtieth anniversary of the launch of the Sinclair C5 electric vehicle. As some may know, I had a very minor part in the history of the C5, as I used to know Adam Harper, Belvedere based inventor, engineer and businessman - the photo above (click for a larger view) shows him with his record breaking customised C5 at Silverstone race circuit in the summer of 1995, where he was able to open it up on the main circuit as part of a series of public demonstrations of the Guinness world record breaking machine. You can read more about Adam Harper in an interview here. More on him later. Sir Clive Sinclair dominated the home computer market in the UK and much of Europe in the early 1980’s. His ZX80 and subsequent ZX 81 barebones computers introduced many people into the world of computer programming, and the subsequent colour Sinclair ZX Spectrum became the computer of choice for untold millions of people – it was a simple computer with adequate, if not particularly outstanding specifications for the time. It was easy to program, and had very bright, colourful graphics. This, along with the relatively cheap retail price meant it was extremely popular, and there was a huge amount of software available for the ZX Spectrum, including thousands of games. Many of today’s programmers learned their first code on a ZX Spectrum. Emboldened by huge commercial success, Sir Clive Sinclair turned his attention to another of his areas of interest, personal transportation. In a project that illustrates how wild success in one realm can build over-confidence that leads to utter failure in another, the Sinclair C5 was to forever tarnish the Sinclair name. The C5 was a battery-assisted tricycle (not an electric car, as elements of the press kept saying) that was intended to revolutionise personal transportation. On paper it was able to drive up to twenty miles on a single battery charge for just a few pence,  the C5 was supposed to be the solution to urban congestion and the high cost of owning a car. Unfortunately the design fell short of the market requirements and the machine was savaged by the press following its launch. Among the issues:- The open concept and exposed driver position meant the C5 was only really practical in dry weather, although a wet weather kit including a fitted poncho for the driver was soon available. It had no reverse gear and was difficult to turn around in confined spaces. Even modest hills were too much for the C5’s battery to handle and the design meant that using the pedals to assist was hard to do effectively. There were quality control problems at the factory, and early reports of components failing further dented the machine’s reputation. Perhaps most importantly, the public did not feel safe driving such a small and open vehicle in real traffic. In the end 17,000 were sold, but this was far short of projections. To many, the C5 was seen as a novelty item rather than a serious mode of transportation and just eleven months after the failed launch, Sinclair Vehicles went bankrupt. As long term readers of the Maggot Sandwich will be aware, I had some involvement with the story of the C5; when Sinclair Vehicles went bust, the entire remaining stock of unsold C5’s, along with component parts and tooling was bought by a company based in Upper Belvedere called Harper Cycles, which was run by Adam Harper. He correctly realised that the C5 had been given a mauling by the press, which had effectively ended its chances of success, but nevertheless seventeen thousand of the vehicles had been sold. The owners would require spares, servicing and repairs. Harper also correctly surmised that the C5 would become a cult vehicle, and mint, unused vehicles would appreciate considerably in price. Adam Harper made a steady income supporting C5’s for many years, and supplied new vehicles to Princes William and Harry at Kensington Palace, and created a one – off solar powered model for science fiction writer Sir Arthur C. Clarke for use on his estate in Colombo, Sri Lanka. Many of the press “facts” about the Sinclair C5 were made up, and in many cases just plain wrong. It became an urban myth that the C5 used a washing machine motor – in reality the motor was built in a Hotpoint factory, but it was a specially designed, high efficiency unit that was even studied by NASA as it had such an impressive power to weight ratio. It was also said that the rider sat too low to the ground, making the machine dangerous – in fact one sat at the same height as if you were sitting in a Ford Capri MK III. The separate aluminium alloy chassis the C5 used was designed and built by Lotus Cars at their Hethel factory, and was capable of far more performance than the C5 had. The poor road speed of the C5 was not down to any technical limitation – it was restricted to fifteen miles an hour in order to comply with UK traffic law – any powered vehicle capable of more than this speed required a licence to use, which would have essentially killed the project before birth. This is not to say the C5 did not have problems – the short battery life being one of the biggest challenges – a rider would not get anything like the claimed twenty mile range, even when pedaling to assist the electric motor. Adam Harper invented an improved battery and power management system which cured this weakness, which was available as a retrofit to existing machines. Adam also sold considerable numbers of the powerful and efficient C5 motor to competitors in BBC 2’s series “Robot Wars”, and many of the winning robots were powered by his products. Because of this connection, Adam Harper ended up as one of the “Robot Wars” competition judges; I used to regularly accompany him to filming, which took place in an old warehouse next door to the Excel Centre in East London. As I have previously written in some detail, Adam Harper also set a Guinness World Record for the fastest electric three wheeled vehicle in a hugely modified Sinclair C5 that could hit 0-60 in under four seconds, and exceed 150 mph. The main reason for the creation of the C5 racing machine was to scotch the incorrect stories about the normal C5 and give the much maligned machine a bit of a publicity boost, though nowadays the C5 has a reputation as a gigantic white elephant. It was certainly not perfect, but it was  way ahead of its time, and nowhere near as bad as the press would have you believe. 

Not too long before Christmas I was walking through Soho on my way to a meeting at an office just off Berwick Street. It had been some time since I had passed that way, and I was pleasantly surprised at how the area has been cleaned up and made a lot more visitor friendly. I had cut through St. Anne’s Court – once a very seedy and run down area, but now a pleasant and very up market office and residential location I really did not need to walk the route that I did, but there were personal reasons, as the area holds some memories for me. Back in the mid 1980’s St. Anne’s Court was the home to Shades Record Shop. This was a basement shop over which was built a structure that somewhat resembled a large garden shed that was plastered in posters advertising bands and films. Alice’s Restaurant was a pirate radio station operating out of East London, which played an esoteric mix of mainly rock based music – the record shop was allegedly nothing to do with the radio station, but pretty much everyone knew the opposite. To enter the shop you had to go through a slightly forbidding (at least to a thirteen year old) doorway and down a flight of stairs to the shop itself. The first thing one noticed about the shop was the huge number of rock and heavy metal albums the place contained – albums from bands I had never heard of, and exotic imports from Japan and elsewhere; the second thing was the fact the ceiling of the shop was covered in black bin liners held in place with drawing pins. Initially I thought this was some kind of post punk arty design, but I soon found out that they were there for a far more prosaic reason; they stopped the rain from leaking through from the upstairs. It was that kind of place – initially it appeared quite intimidating, but the staff were knowledgeable and friendly, and every so often a rock star would pay a visit – Lemmy from Motorhead was a regular, and many rock and heavy metal bands would hold album signings in the shop. When I was working for Radio Caroline I did not have time to visit, and by the time I turned up in St. Anne's Court a couple of years later, I was only to find it boarded up and empty. Their lease had run out and the landlord had decided to sell the site to a property developer; shortly thereafter the shed was demolished and a new office building constructed on the site.  To be honest the area needed improvement, but nevertheless it was a shame to see the shop  disappear. Not long afterwards the radio station closed down, with some of the staff going on to form the excellent and ground breaking RFM Rock Radio, a station that nearly got a commercial licence, but ended up losing out to KISS FM. Shades record shop was a one - off place. You can read more about it here.

In 2014 medical institutions and healthcare providers made up nearly a third of all hacking attacks and other data breaches, according to records from the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse campaign group. While attacks on financial services are slightly more prevalent, consumers should be much more concerned with getting their medical insurance or NHS health records ripped off. In the first place, banks tend to cover consumers in instances of fraud. If someone steals your Visa card number and uses it to buy a round-trip ticket to Kazakhstan, and you will easily get those charges reversed — plus the bank will issue you a new card. But even in the worst case scenario, your personal well being isn't threatened. Not so with medical fraud. As the Medical Identity Fraud Alliance points out in its report on medical fraud, the patient often doesn’t find out their identity has been stolen until they notice a discrepancy in their own records. For instance, a man goes into to a hospital to get treated for a back injury. Upon being X-rayed the doctor also notices that the man has a swollen lymph node, for which he prescribes penicillin. The man says he is allergic to penicillin. The doctor asks, then why did you come into this hospital a week ago for penicillin? The man says, I didn't come into the hospital a week ago for penicillin. Now imagine that same scenario except the patient is unconscious and his/her record has been altered to remove the reference to his penicillin allergy. Now we are talking about a scenario where the patient’s life is potentially in danger. In addition, it can be really hard to prove that you didn't receive the medical services indicated on your record, which can cause all sort of confusion to GP’s and their practice administrators. Medical identities can sell for as little as $50 U.S, according to a report issued earlier this year by the FBI. With more and more hospitals moving to electronic health records and healthcare breaches on the rise, it is hard to see how this problem won’t become more widespread in the coming year. When I received a notification from my G.P that they were moving to electronic records, I completed and returned the denial of request form; whilst my medical records are very boring, I really don't want to see them being bandied about for sale online by some Bulgarian hacker collective. The threat is not just to your records from a medical perspective, but that they also may be used in identity theft, or even for blackmail purposes.

Just as the Maggot Sandwich was about to go to press, one of my occasional contributors, Brian, dropped me the following story concerning Erith and Belvedere Football Club, which local football fans may well find of interest. "The Deres are at home to Yaxley FC on Sunday 18 January in the fourth round of the FA Vase.  Both teams are thus four wins from Wembley! - where the Vase final will be played on 9 May.  The game kicks off at 3pm at Park View Road, where the Deres groundshare with Welling United. The FA Vase is for teams below step 4 of the non-league Pyramid, and Erith & Belvedere's league (Southern Counties East) is the best represented at this stage, with 5 teams in the last 32.  Near neighbours Phoenix Sports, based in Crayford, have a long trip to Bodmin Town, and have decided to make a weekend of it with an overnight stay in Newquay.  Another Kent-Cornwall clash sees Greenwich Borough host St Austell, while further down into Kent Ashford United host Norwich United and Tunbridge Wells (Vase finalists in 2013) visit Highworth Town."

You may recall that I have mentioned the fight against illegal bike riders in and around the local area; some months ago Erith Watch announced a success against one such rider who was photographed carrying out an offence, and subsequently identified and dealt with by the Police. This has not stopped a gang of illegal riders who regularly terrorise pedestrians and motorists around Northumberland Heath, Erith and Belvedere. The gang have made a major tactical error however - they have posted a video to YouTube which clearly identifies one of the ringleaders of the group that you can see in the screen capture above. One would think that a balding thirty - something would have better things to do than pull wheelies on an asthmatic 50cc scooter with a puny engine that sounds like an angry wasp in a biscuit tin, but it would appear not. Below you can see the entire video of the gang illegally riding their bikes in what would appear to be the Northern end of Norman Road / Mulberry Way in Lower Belvedere. If any of the gang are reading this - don't bother taking the video down from YouTube. It has already been downloaded and sent to the Police as evidence - oh, and by the way, I know you knew what you were doing was illegal - as you have digitally obscured the number plates on the bikes in the clip. You did not do a very good job however - and the owner of one bike in particular will be having his fat and sweaty collar felt before very long. How anyone can be so stupid as to film themselves carrying out illegal acts, and then publish them to the world on YouTube amazes me. See for yourself, and leave a comment below, or Email me at hugh.neal@gmail.com.

Eight years of the Maggot Sandwich.

The photos above were taken late on Saturday morning in the entrance hall of Trinity School in Erith Road; it shows the first public consultation event held over the forthcoming redevelopment of Erith Quarry - the brown field site that is between Bexley Road and Fraser Road that has been left empty and disused for around the last forty years since the loam was exhausted and the quarry closed down. The consultation was set up by public relations company Lexington Communications on behalf of the developer, the Essex based organisation The Anderson Group. They plan to build approximately seven hundred new homes on the site. Unlike a lot of other development work going on locally, which has concentrated on one and two bedroomed flats, the Erith Quarry site will have two, three and four bedroomed houses - they are targetting second or third time buyers looking to upsize from smaller accommodation. There will also be a new primary school on the site, and a large amount of public open space. at present the details are still pretty sketchy; to be honest, whilst I was talking to a chap called Ed Grieve (who I believe is the Erith Quarry project manager for Lexington Communications, the PR company), I got the feeling that they were quite nervous about possibly getting a negative reaction to the development. My own view is that the site has been left unused and left to rot for far too long. It is a sizable piece of land and much good can be made of it. There are sizable engineering problems to be overcome, not least in that the site varies in height by around thirty metres from highest to lowest point, and the physical access points to it are currently quite limited. These can be resolved; their initial issue is that the site has been used as a dumping ground for the best part of forty years, and they need to run ecological surveys to determine just what nasties such as heavy metals and poisonous chemicals pollute the ground, and potentially the groundwater. A team of environmental scientists are currently checking the site, and drilling boreholes to check for underground contamination. One biological problem will certainly challenge the scientists. The whole site is utterly overrun with invasive Japanese Knotweed - which is very hard to kill. I suspect that a mass digging up of the roots, followed by burning may be the only viable solution, since it is illegal to transport Japanese Knotweed plants, as they are legally classed as controlled waste. Once this has been completed there will be a second round of public consultation - it strikes me that the developers are very keen to involve the local community, and seem genuinely to want to engage with the residents of Erith. There is a website where you can register to be kept up to date with the latest developments regarding the Erith Quarry site that you can visit by clicking here.

Recently I wrote that I did not want to describe Erith as one large building site; I am now of the opinion that to all intents and purposes it is. The entire town is undergoing a degree of regeneration not seen in a couple of generations. Not since the old and beloved Victorian town centre was demolished to make way for the brutalist concrete monstrosity that was the 1970’s era shopping centre (of which my enduring memory as a small child was the ever present smell of stale wee). Whatever issues or subjects Erith residents of a certain age disagree with, the unifying subject is that the heart of the town was ruined when the shopping centre was constructed. Only really in the last few years have things started improving, firstly by the fundamental re- engineering of the old shopping centre to form the current Erith Riverside Shopping Centre, which is a very pleasant place to be, and light years away from the gloomy and threatening old structure. Morrison’s have added a lot to Erith; in fact the Erith store was the first the then Northern based supermarket chain opened in the south, back in 1999. I recall being served by Sir Ken Morrison on the first day of opening (though I had to be told who he was, as I was clueless). Morrison’s employ well over five hundred local people, and put a lot of money back into the local economy. I would estimate that they are second to, or equal with ADM Oils as being the largest employer in the town. There have been a lot of rumours about the Erith Morrison’s over the last couple of months. Until now I have declined to mention this, as I wanted to try and find out more. After consultation with someone in the know, I can say that Erith Morrison’s is not closing due to lack of trade. It is correct that Morrison’s are reducing the number of managerial grades in all of their stores over the coming months in order to streamline and modernise their management structure, and that some managerial roles may be merged with some local job losses. I think it extremely unlikely that anything more than this will happen to the Erith store; if anything it will need to strengthen its position, now that the Asda in Lower Belvedere has proved to be so popular, and with the advent of the forthcoming giant Tesco on the site of the old Bexley Council offices in Bexleyheath.

On Wednesday the 16^th, the Maggot Sandwich officially celebrated its’ eighth birthday. I had absolutely no idea how the blog would take off – indeed for the first couple of years, it did struggle to find a style. You can see the very first posting above - I am sure that you can appreciate that it has evolved substantially over time. Nowadays it is so much part of my life that I could not imagine a Sunday without a publishing deadline to meet. I have never missed a Sunday in all these years; on a couple of occasions I have had to go elsewhere in order to publish, due to no network connection at home, but I have never actually missed a deadline. The Maggot Sandwich has enabled me to meet with innumerable people who have now become friends, and in return I have been empowered to highlight some local issues that could have otherwise had a very negative impact on the local area. A number of people have commented in the past saying that they think that I am a frustrated journalist, and I guess that they are right. I always wanted the blog to have a positive impact on Erith and the surrounding area, as historically the town has had a bad rap, with nobody really giving it an online voice. Others such as the excellent Erith Town Forum do far more for the area than I, but as far as the online presence of the town is concerned, I try and do my bit. 

Although I have previously explained where the name of my blog originated, I feel that it was long enough ago, and I have picked up many recent readers, so that the story bears repeating. Back in 1987 I was working for a small but very influential Bexleyheath based pirate radio station called Radio Lumberjack, which broadcast live every Saturday on 92.4 FM from 9am until midnight or later from a house off Bedonwell Road. The station played an eclectic mix of music and humour; much of the comedy material was written by the station staff. There were many spoof adverts, with commercials for fictional companies such as “Bethlehem Motors – car faith healers – save money and save your soul! With one simple low cost prayer, we can have your vehicle back on the road”. “Tacky’s Nightclub, with your host, Bland Groover”. Also, “Gaskets motor spares – suppliers of neo Georgian suspension, arc brake lights and stained glass windows”. Best of all, a commercial for the Thamesmead Tourist Board, with a cod salsa song “it’s the place for fun, it’s the place for sun, come to Thamesmead – go on day trips to all the popular holiday destinations like the Belvedere Rift Valley – home of the world famous earwig farm; enquire at the Thamesmead Tourist Board office – the little green hut behind the bike sheds in Thamesmead High Street!” It was all very slick and professional; the chap that ran the station was a big fan of Kenny Everett, but had his own unique style. Each presenter had their own introductory jingle – mine started with an incredulous voice – “oh my God.... It’s Arthur Pewty!” followed by the sound of Stuka dive bombers, explosions and collapsing buildings, accompanied by a massed band of Daleks screaming “Arthur Pewty, Arthur Pewty!” It was all very over the top and surreal. My pseudonym came from the meek and mild insurance salesman Arthur Pewty from the famous Monty Python sketch about the marriage guidance counsellor. When I first started my evening show, I racked my brains to think of a suitably surreal and silly name for it. I had already got my nickname, and recently I had read a history of 1960’s offshore station Radio London, where John Peel got his big break into radio. John Peel had a show called “The Perfumed Garden” where he played a lot of hippy music and recited poetry sent in by listeners (some of it toe curlingly bad, but I digress). I thought that my show needed a really surreal title, so, as a play on “John Peel’s Perfumed Garden”, “Arthur Pewty’s Maggot Sandwich” was born. And the rest, as they say is history. Back in 2006, when I started this blog, I resurrected the long disused name of my one time radio show; my thoughts were that whilst it was no longer on the radio, it was a newer form of interacting with an audience that could be anywhere in the world. This proved to be correct. Today the Maggot Sandwich has readers all over the planet – from Australia, Japan and India to the USA and mainland Europe, along with people closer to home. It might be a silly name for a blog, but I can guarantee nobody forgets it! Please feel free to comment below, or Email me at hugh.neal@gmail.com.

The photo above was taken on Friday the 18th July at 8.15 pm, and sent to me by a resident of Manor Road who wishes to remain anonymous. It shows a van belonging to Concept Building Services illegally avoiding the road closure, and driving along the pavement. There have been innumerable occurrences  of motor bikes doing this, but this is the first time that such a blatant criminal act in a four wheeled vehicle has been recorded since the road works began. The van drivers' employer and the local Police have already been informed and sent a copy of the incriminating photograph. Hopefully the outcome will be available for me to publish in the next edition. Fortunately the road works on the residential section of Manor Road are close to completion. Hopefully the offender in the photo will be brought to justice, or at the very least sacked by his employer.

As many will already be aware, I have been documenting the appalling standard of food hygiene in the London Borough of Bexley, and Erith in particular for some considerable time. I have bemoaned the number of food outlets that score less than a three out of five stars for their food hygiene standards. Nine places in West Street alone got zero scores last year; not something the area would really want to boast about. I have been very pleased (and not a little surprised) to discover that many of the very low scoring places have now been re – examined by the health inspectors, and have been given substantially improved star ratings. The Yildiran kebab shop on the corner of West Street and Mildred Road has gone from an awful one star out of five to a very creditable four stars in their most recent inspection; I am very pleased by this, as their food has been consistently excellent. It would seem that the council are doing some positive work in encouraging better standards of cleanliness and good food preparation practice, which is gratifying. Even Town Kebab, by the infamous fish roundabout on Bexley Road / Bronze Age Way junction has improved and now has an acceptable three stars. I half jokingly mentioned last year that if the place did not get closed down by the health inspectors, it could make a small fortune from feeding the hungry students of Bexley College when it opens in September. It seems that the owners of Town Kebabs have taken this to heart, and could well be doing very nicely indeed by this time next year. Being the closest fast food outlet to the new college campus will have all sorts of advantages, however good the food in the college refectory undoubtedly will be - the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. I expect the whole of Erith to benefit from the influx of around a thousand college students. Until now Bexley College was located out of the public eye, half way to Belvedere; the building was difficult to access and it was generally not in a position to be a very active contributor to the local community. Now that the new campus is slap bang in the middle of town, it will be far more inclusive and an important part of life in Erith. Retail outlets in the Riverside Shopping Centre will also benefit from having an influx of new customers, which should be interesting, especially at lunchtime. I might sound like a propagandist for the college, but hard as I try, I cannot think of any negative aspects of the college moving into town – it seems to be a win / win to me.

You may have seen the BBC News website story on the thirtieth anniversary of the launch of the Sinclair C5 last week. Those with longer memories may recall how the revolutionary electrically assisted trike was launched with a wave of publicity by Sir Clive Sinclair at a time when his star was still very much in the ascendant; he was the golden boy of the British technology boom of the early to mid 1980’s. The press referred to the C5 as an electric car, which it clearly wasn’t, and derided its’ low profile and relatively sedate road speed (something that was partially dictated by the road legislation of the time, which required a licence for any powered vehicle using the road that was capable of speeds in excess of 15 mph). It was intended to be an entirely new class of vehicle to be used instead of a car for short local journeys, but as soon as the press saw it, they made fun of it. They said that as it was made in a factory operated by Hoover that the C5’s electric propulsion was powered by a washing machine motor, which was factually incorrect – the drive was a specially designed, very efficient and advanced design for 1984. The chassis of the C5 was designed by Lotus, who then as now had a reputation for producing lightweight and very well handling car designs. All this did nothing to stop the press from making fun of the C5 and Clive Sinclair. They cited the low driving position and lack of visibility to other road users as potential dangers. It really was a case of an invention that was too far ahead of its time. The C5 only sold around 12,000 units before the project was scrapped. I think if the C5 was launched now (with updated technology) it would be a hit. They were never designed to be driven on roads next to cars, though this is invariably what the press always seemed to show. I have a personal involvement with the Sinclair C5 story; after Sinclair Vehicles went bust, owing over £1.5 million to Hoover, the remaining stocks of unsold C5’s plus all of the spares and accessories, including the right to the C5 name were bought by a friend of mine. Adam Harper used to own a bicycle shop in Nuxley Road, Upper Belvedere (NOT Nuxley Village – there is no such place – it is a name made up by Estate Agents who don’t live in the area and know its history). Adam bought everything related to the C5 from Sinclair, and stored them all in a warehouse. He was of the opinion that eventually the C5 would be recognised as the ground breaking piece of transportation technology that it actually was. He was correct. A mint, boxed and never used C5 with an uprated 24 volt specification battery can sell for up to £4,000 now. Even a fairly run of the mill used model will sell second hand for £450 - £475. Adam Harper got so fed up with the negative and inaccurate press the C5 continued to get, even after the end of production that he built a special racing C5 in 1995. The machine cost over £30,000 to put together, including several sessions at the MIRA wind tunnel (where the photo above was taken). It had an aerodynamic under tray which provided down force; the front wheel was from a Lynx helicopter and the rear wheels from a Harrier jump jet. The racing C5 was powered by aeronautical gel batteries supplied by Exide, which were actually graded as military secrets, and he had to get a special licence to use them, and a custom made, ultra high output double electric motor; it also had a braking parachute made by Irvin – the same company that manufactured the parachutes for the Space Shuttle. Performance – wise the special C5 could accelerate from 0-60 mph in 2.9 seconds and hit 150mph. As you can see from the photo above, it was substantially different from a stock model, but the basic body and chassis were original – a real tribute to the design engineers at Lotus. Adam was featured in many TV and press articles, and even made the front cover of the Sunday Times magazine. During development of the racing C5 (much of which took place in the rear of his bike shop) Adam discovered that the aerodynamic under tray was so close to the ground that it would occasionally scrape against the ground, interrupting the aerodynamic flow and causing the vehicle to become unstable at high speeds. Without funds to book another wind tunnel session at MIRA, Adam decided to try a more practical problem solving approach. Despite being enormously modified from stock, the racing C5 was still road legal as long as it stayed below fifteen miles an hour. He sprayed the under tray with some removable marker paint, and we decided to drive the racing C5 slowly along Woolwich Road from the Abbey Wood end back towards Upper Belvedere and his shop we would then check the paint on the under tray to see where the problem was coming from. I was to follow in the “chase car” (an old Volvo 240 estate, if memory serves). One bright and sunny weekday morning, Adam started trundling sedately down Woolwich Road. He had his crash helmet on, but not his protective overalls. We were making sedate progress when a couple of lads driving a Ford Escort XR3i pulled up parallel with Adam and started shouting insults at him. It would appear that even though by this stage Adam was a minor local celebrity, they did not have a clue as to who he was, or that the C5 was far from bog standard. I was following behind, and helpless to do anything. I noticed that the C5 had begun to gain speed; the Volvos’ speedo was reading 25, then soon 45 miles per hour. Adam did not take criticism well, and was easily riled. The XR3i driver and his hapless passenger were getting perplexed; as soon as they increased speed to outrun the tiny electric tricycle, it matched, then exceeded their speed. By this time we had got as far as the entrance to Abbey Woods, where Adam opened up the C5 fully. There were tiny spurts of smoke as the rear tyres tried to spin under their load, and the vehicle shot off, seemingly at Warp speed. The XR3i occupants were so gobsmacked they pulled over to the side of the road, enabling me to try in vain to catch up with the errant racer. The racing C5 had enormous straight line speed, but it also had a great weakness – it was impossible to turn either left or right at anything over around 20 mph. The consultants at MIRA had previously told Adam that if the vehicle tipped over at speed, helmet or not, he would be killed, as his neck would be broken. Adam had obviously realised this too, as he was very rapidly approaching the roundabout opposite All Saint’s Church and Belvedere Police Station. The racing C5 had two braking systems – a very small bicycle type parking brake for very low speed use, and the aforementioned Irvin Parachute system which was used for rapid deceleration at the end of high speed runs. Adam was now alongside Belvedere Library, and rapidly running out of options. I saw a puff of smoke and sparks from the front wheel – we later discovered the aluminium parking brake had vapourised as it overloaded with far more energy than it was ever designed to cope with. There was then a sharp crack as Adam deployed the main parachute, which was roughly the same size as a chute you would use for sky diving. Adam and the 150mph C5 came to an undignified halt right on the roundabout with smoke coming out of the nosecone and the parachute slowly falling to the ground at the rear. A couple of amused looking coppers outside the Police station were looking on. Surprisingly, although he got a stern ticking off, no charges were pressed. I get the feeling the Police did not want to stand up in court to recount the incident. That was the last time the vehicle ever went on public roads. To further promote his souped up C5 and electric vehicles in general, he then undertook a series of publicity stunts. Initially he raced a Group B racing car – a VW Golf VR6 on the main straight at Silverstone, just before the start of the 1996 formula 3000 championship. The C5 easily won; he then planned to jump the gap between the two sides of the Queen Elizabeth II bridge at Dartford, before it was completed. Understandably the authorities took a very dim view of this and banned him from the attempt. He then decided that the racing C5 should be driven through a 75 foot tunnel of fire. I was involved with this, and accompanied him to Pinewood studios where we met with the head of Eon Productions stunt team – the James Bond people. I have actually been in the James Bond production office and in the Pinewood members bar and on the James Bond sound stage. Eon arranged the tunnel of fire on the Pinewood back lot, and it all went very smoothly indeed - I was unable to be there, as I had recently got a new job in London after being out of work for quite some time, and did not want to ask for a day off so soon after starting. At this point Adam was invited to join the Dangerous Sports Club, which was limited to one hundred members, all of which were by invitation only. He also became involved in the BBC TV series “Robot Wars”, where initially he was employed as a technical consultant. Later he became a competition judge, and for several years he was a regular on television. I used to accompany him on many occasions to the location where the show was filmed (an old warehouse adjacent to the Excel Centre in East London – long since demolished). An interesting time. Unfortunately not long after this I moved house and lost contact with Adam - he had moved to the Midlands to take up an engineering consulting role. I wonder what he is doing now?

The end video this week is something I stumbled across on YouTube; it is a mock documentary on the history of the USA, had the South won the civil war. It is thought provoking, and sometimes blackly humorous piece - especially watch out for the commercial breaks - they remind me somewhat of the spoof commercials in the original "RoboCop" movie. Feel free to leave a comment below.

Adam, James and the Alien.

The photo above shows the long shuttered and closed Cross Keys pub, the Erith Playhouse theatre, and Potion bar - the home of Erith's recreational pharmaceutical trade, which is frequented by those of mono brow and webbed of hand. Avoid. Meanwhile, the Cross Keys has now been closed for almost two years to the day since it was shut down after a series of incidents in which a large group of travellers rode horses in and out of the pub, which made national news. It was put up for public auction last year, with a reserve price of £300,000 but was withdrawn on the day of the sale. Since then I am led to believe that the building has been sold, but no development or refurbishment work appears to have been begun - the building is dark and empty still. The Cross Keys is a listed building within Erith High Street conservation area; this limits what any potential developer can do with the structure to some extent. Some time ago I wrote to Shepherd Neame, Fuller, Smith and Turner and Young's to see if one of the regions' brewers and pub chain operators would be interested in taking the Cross Keys on. I got polite, but non - committal responses from all three of them. It would be lovely to think that the pub would re-open after a refurbishment to serve home cooked food and proper real ale, but somehow I don't think this is realistic. We can only hope that it does not get either turned into yet more unwanted flats, or worse still, into a convenience store, like so many pubs around the country. The only thing preventing this is happenstance - there is both Erith Post Office virtually opposite, and Morrison's super store just around the corner. The Cross Keys cannot stay boarded up forever; I just wish something good would happen to it for a change.

I was talking to a couple of work colleagues earlier in the week, and the subject ended up on James Bond, and how Daniel Craig is set to earn £37 million for his next two appearances as the eponymous secret agent. I happened to mention in passing that I had been to Pinewood, and had actually been in the Bond production office. This provoked a lot of questions – how I had managed to secure myself an invitation to the studio, and what I had seen whilst I was there. It is a long story, but probably one that deserves to be told. I had a friend, Adam Harper (see the photo above - click for a larger view); he used to run a small, independent bicycle shop in Nuxley Road, Upper Belvedere (NOT Nuxley Village – there is no such place – it is an invention of the Estate Agents). Adam’s bread and butter was selling and repairing conventional bikes, but he had an unusual and quite lucrative sideline. When Sinclair vehicles went bust after the commercial failure of their Sinclair C5 electric trike in the late 1980’s, Adam Harper bought up the entire unsold stock, which he then warehoused at a secret location. Harper correctly guessed that the C5 would become a cult item, and its’ value would rise accordingly. He was correct. When new, a C5 retailed at £399. Nowadays, an unused, crated C5 with all its’ accessories will sell for around £5000! Harper also sold nearly all of the electric motors used by the competing robots in the BBC TV series “Robot Wars” – because of his expertise with electric motors, the producers of the show hired him as one of the three judges. I accompanied him on a number of occasions to the studio to watch the programme being made. Anyone who initially met him would think Adam Harper was an open, friendly guy – which indeed he was. It was only when you got to know him well that you realised he was someone very unusual – he had a very strong drive and ambition, accompanied by an almost non – existent sense of self preservation. As a by product of selling C5’s, Adam used to take quite a lot of flak from sceptics, who thought the little vehicle somewhat ridiculous. Harper decided to counter this by modifying a Sinclair C5 to attempt to beat the world land speed record for an electric three wheeled vehicle, and thus give the C5 an image boost. I spent a considerable amount of time helping him design and build the world record machine in the back room of his bicycle shop. The souped up C5 had special, high power motors, fed by a custom electronic power control unit. The batteries were extremely high powered gel units for military use – he had to get special permission to get a licence to use them – I recall a meeting at Exide I attended with him – his considerable charisma and power of persuasion were tested to the limit before Exide relented, and not only granted him a licence, but became of his principal sponsors . The front wheel of the racing C5 was from a Harrier jump jet, and the rears from a Lynx attack helicopter. The front wheel had a small parking brake, but the main method of bringing the tiny vehicle to a halt was a parachute built by Irvin – the people who built the parachutes for the Space Shuttle.  The underside of the C5 was fitted with an aerodynamic under tray of Harper’s own design, as was the aluminium nose cone – which was tested in the wind tunnel at MIRA (the photo above was taken during testing there). This might all sound like a bit of a diversion, but bear with me. Adam Harper realised once he had built the super C5 that he would need publicity before the world land speed record itself. Harper had been invited to join the Dangerous Sports Club, and considered what even by his own standards to be an absolutely hare – brained stunt. In the months before the Dartford river crossing bridge (now known as the QE2 bridge) was completed, there was a large gap in the middle, before the North and South side roadways were joined up. Adam wanted to jump the gap in the super C5! He went as far as contacting the contractors, and both Thurrock and Dartford councils. Understandably, all immediately said no.

With this setback in mind, he decided to try a different approach, and wrote to Eon Productions – the company behind the James Bond franchise, who were intrigued to the point that they invited Adam along for a chat; I was asked along too. We turned up in my not very impressive, but classic Triumph Dolomite at the iconic gates of Pinewood Studios, and were waved in. We parked the car and were met by Simon Crane, the newly appointed stunt co-ordinator for Goldeneye, which was at that time in pre – production. We were then ushered into the Bond production office, which was exactly as one would expect it – a 1930’s mock Tudor house opposite the main studio office block; once inside your feet sank into some of the deepest white shag pile carpet I have ever encountered. The huge, open plan office was decorated with framed posters of all the Bond movies in languages from all over the world, and the centre of the room housed a large Victorian roll – topped desk, which (then) belonged to Cubby Broccolli, who thankfully was not around, as I was already in fanboy heaven – I was gob smacked enough as it was. Simon Crane then showed us onto the Bond Sound Stage, where they were in the middle of filming “First Knight”; we also got to enter the members bar, and generally got a good look around the studio; most of which, quite disappointingly is just like a large industrial estate – if you have seen the car chase scene in “Goldfinger” around Auric Goldfinger’s metal works, that is actually the back lot and workshops at Pinewood. Adam Harper got talking in detail about what he wanted to do stunt – wise, which turned into a race through a 70 foot tunnel of fire. One regret I have is that I missed this event – I had recently started a new job, after a considerable time unemployed. I did not want to ask for a day off so soon after starting the job, so missed the show. By all accounts it went seamlessly, and Adam emerged from the inferno unscathed. One side effect of all this was that Adam ended up with a credit on “First Knight” as “Specialist Transport Supplier” – he used to have a modified Milk Float as his company vehicle – the rear milk carrying compartment was boxed in to form a storage area that was painted on both sides with his company logo and contact details. The driver and passenger compartment was fitted with Perspex doors, a gas powered heater and a car stereo system – it made a very effective sales gimmick, as he drove it locally (very slowly, naturally) and lots of potential customers got to see it. He had decided it was time to sell it on – he mentioned this to Pinewood, and they purchased it to transport the very heavy plate armour used in the Arthurian thriller “First Knight”. Harper jokingly asked to be credited, and the producers took him at his word – much to his surprise!

Later I helped him with another publicity stunt – he raced his super C5 against a Group B Golf VR6 race car, along the main straight at Silverstone, as part of the pre race entertainment for the 1996 Formula 3 championship. I was the driver of one of the three unmodified C5’s that escorted Adam onto the track. As we got going the three standard C5’s did our “ground based Red Arrows” party piece. Each trike had a smoke canister attached to the back, and we slowly trundled down the straight in front of thousands of spectators with one C5 spouting red smoke, the second white, and the third (mine) blue smoke. It certainly got a big laugh, though the laughter shortly turned to amazement as Adam gave the special C5 some beans – it shot off (0-60 was something like 3 seconds) beating the race car easily, before we heard the sharp crack of the parachute deploying, and the super C5 trundled safely to a halt.

Another amusing incident involving Adam Harper and I happened in the historic pumping station in Crossness Sewage Works; as many will already know it is one of only two industrial buildings that hold Grade One listed status in Greater London – the other being Tower Bridge. The pumping station has been used as a location for many big budget movies, including the original “Alien”, the 1987 Tim Burton “Batman”, and the 2009 Guy Ritchie directed “Sherlock Holmes” (the Masonic temple at the start of the film, where Holmes and Watson foil a human sacrifice by the evil Lord Blackwood was filmed in the main pump room.) Back in the mid 90’s, Harper was a guest and occasional presenter on a BBC Children’s TV show called “It’ll Never Work” – a kind of kids’ “Tomorrow’s World”. The show was filmed in the pumping station, giving it a gothic, post apocalyptic look and feel. I was present for several of the filming sessions, which it has to be said for the most part were extremely boring. In TV you seem to spend most of your time sitting round and waiting for a technician to do something. Not a career I would have ever entertained! Anyway, during one of these long pauses in filming, Adam and I went exploring round the historic building. Back then, the restoration project had not long been running, and much of the structure had not been used for many years – there were offices and store rooms, mostly full of junk. One thing we did find you can see in the photo below. When “Alien” was being filmed in the place, the producers had no idea of the massive cult hit the film was going to become; when the movie wrapped, many of the props and costumes were simply dumped. The Alien costume in the photo below was a genuine one used during filming, that we came across in a abandoned store room – which gave us both a bit of a shock! The photo shows Adam Harper posing with the costume – bearing in mind Adam is about five foot ten, it gives you an idea of how tall the actor playing the Alien would have been. The costume was intact, if rather smelly, and nowadays it would be worth an utter fortune. We briefly entertained the idea of “liberating” it from Crossness, but decided that discretion was the better part of valour – besides which, an eight foot tall Alien warrior sitting in the passenger seat of a Ford Fiesta would attract rather a lot of unwanted attention when driving through Lower Belvedere! I have no idea what ever happened to it – hopefully it is now residing in a museum somewhere. A few months later, Adam Harper got a business offer from a Coventry based engineering group, and he sold up his bike shop and moved to the Midlands. I occasionally heard from him for a couple of years, then we lost contact. He was a real, larger than life character. I wonder what he is up to nowadays?

My antipathy towards mobile phones is well known, and not something I am about to repeat in prose now. I take The Times every weekday, and whilst leafing through its’ pages on Wednesday, I came across the following piece, written by journalist Sarah Vine, entitled “My Secret to a Calmer Life”. Whatever your thoughts on mobile phones, it makes interesting reading. ”I had my mobile phone stolen at the weekend; my fault really. I was picking up my son from football and left it in the car when I dashed to get him. Minutes later I returned to find my car window smashed and the phone gone. At first I felt a bit sick with panic. My whole life was on that phone: contacts, photos, diary dates. I rushed home to block it. The phone company promised to get a replacement out to me as soon as possible, and that was that. Three days on I haven’t received a new phone; three days without mobile access to Google Maps, Twitter, Facebook, emails, messages, diary alerts, or contacts. Far from being frantic, I am calmer than I have been for ages. The absence of this little electronic device has done me nothing but good. Three days without my work being interrupted by calls. Three days without me taking the damn thing to the loo with me in case it rings. Three days without the children pestering me to play on it. Three days without the fear of running out of battery. Three days of peace and quiet. This must be what life used to be like. And it seems to me it was really quite civilised.” Well said. In this case, by someone who in previous articles has described herself as a “mobile phone junkie” – it would seem that even a relatively short time that she has come to appreciate the joys of not having a mobile phone, and constant contact with the world. I think her definition of civilisation is interesting. I wonder what the illustrious readers of the Maggot Sandwich think? Answers on a postcard, or better still, leave a comment below. All comments are moderated within 24 hours; I am getting an unbelievable amount of spam posing as reader comments – which is I suppose to be expected when one considers, that even when all spam is discounted, the Maggot Sandwich is getting well over 11,000 reader hits a month now.

The end video this week is the new release by Mister B the Gentleman Rhymer of a track from his new long playing gramophone record. The record is called "The Tweed Album" and it contains the track below "Just like a Chap". Enjoy.