Memoirs of a real Airship Pilot!

I acquired this wonderful book a month ago at a "Antique Mall" in Airdrie Alberta.

Written by T.B. Williams and published in 1974. This book chronicles the his adventures after joined the Royal Navy in 1915 to become an Airship pilot. In the days before the fixed wing heavier than air craft became the standard military aircraft, the hydrogen filled airship, non-rigid and semi rigid were the mainstay of the Royal Navy for scouting and convoy protection from submarine attack near the coast of England. No convoy suffered a loss from submarine attack when one of these airships was in attendance during their approach.

Williams was awarded Airship Pilot Certificate no 28 in 1917. He was instrumental in the training of other pilots as well as being on the crew of the Italian semi-rigid that was the first aircraft to ever fly from Italy to England. He eventually was promoted to Captain.

A fascinating look at the uses that the Royal Navy, and later the Royal Airforce put these primitive but very useful craft too.

Captain Williams also chronicles the post war decline and attempted resurrection of the Airship, for commercial use including the R100 and R101.

The book is filled with interesting photographs and has an extensive bibliography of books that will be very useful to track down.

A must read for anyone interested in this unsung chapter of military aviation.

Keep your sightglass full, your firebox trimmed and your water ived.
KJ

Title
Airship Pilot No.28

Author
Captain T.B. Williams A.F.C.

Publisher
Willia Kimber and Co.
London

Date
1974

ISBN
07-183-0153-6

A fun short film!

The trials of being an inventor.



Keep your sightglass full, your firebox trimmed and your water iced.
KJ

In case anyone was wondering, heh.

I have had an amazingly busy September.

Calgary hosted the first annual Beakerhead event this year and the various Steampunk groups I belong to were trying to get organized to attend.  We actually had a pretty good turnout and had a great time.

Beakerhead is a five day festival celebrating Science, Technology, Engineering and Art. With street displays, interactive exhibits, a mini Maker Faire and one hell of a lot of partying.

One shouldn't drive one's couch when under the influence of Absinthe.

 Next year will be even bigger and we are planning to make sure that Steampunk is a big part of it!
If you are interested in helping out check out the Steampunk Arts and Sciences Society Facebook page.

Keep your sghtglass full, your firebox trimmed and your water iced.
KJ

Painting plastic to look like metal.

I'm working on a device for an upcoming Steampunk event and went looking for techniques to make plastic pipe look like metal.

My artistic skills are just about nil but this tutorial from the talented gang at "Its a Trap" shows one way to do it.

Enjoy
Keep your sightglass full, your firebox trimmed and your water iced.
KJ

Found this posted on the Book of Faces today.

How to Recognize a Steampunk
By  Austin Sirkin
at Steampunk R & D 

Steampunks don't always walk around wearing their full Steampunk finery, so how can you tell whether someone is a Steampunk or not? Here's a tongue-in-cheek (and yet 100% true!) guide to help you determine whether someone you know is a Steampunk.
They may be a Steampunk if....

• ...their eyes light up whenever someone throws something metal away.
• ...their everyday clothes are several decades out of date.
• ...they adopt an English accent for no discernible reason.
• ...they wear goggles but don't actually need them.
• ...all of their plastic items have been spray-painted to look like brass.
• ...they own more than one hat that isn't a baseball cap or a fedora.
• ...many of their stories start with "I was in the workshop and..."
• ...they eschew a wristwatch in favor of a pocket watch.
• ...they use words like "eschew".
• ...they own more broken than working clocks.
• ...they own more books than movies.
• .......most of which were written more than a hundred years ago.
• ...they take pride in how old their belongings are.
• ...they own more than one set of cufflinks.
• ...they know what a cravat and/or bustle is.
• ......and the difference between a gear and a cog.
• ...their Nerf guns are all in various stages of being painted and/or taken apart.
• ...their ears perk up whenever someone says the word "esteem".
• ...they have a crush on Nikola Tesla.
• ......and they get angry whenever someone mentions Thomas Edison.
• ...their wardrobe consists entirely of shades of brown.
• ......and yet will tell you that brown isn't the only color in Steampunk.
• ...they use a smart phone, but it has a wood or leather case.
• ...they visit their local thrift store more often than their local department store.
• ...they've picked up something someone has thrown away and said, "Oh, I could make ___ out of this..."
• ...they visit the hardware or sewing supply store more often than the grocery store.
• ...they work odd historical facts into every conversation.
• ...they used to drink coffee, but now exclusively drink tea instead.
• ...even their underwear is historically accurate.
• ......or only their underwear is historically accurate.
• .........or their underwear is so concealing that it would qualify as outerwear.
• ...when they refer to The Wild, Wild West without the word "bad", they mean the TV show from 1965, and not the 1999 movie.
• ......and likewise when they refer to The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, they mean the comic books and not the movie.
• ...when they wear Steampunk clothes, they insist that it's an "outfit, not a costume".
• ...they carry a cane, but don't need it.
• ...they own a parasol, and don't refer to it as an umbrella, or worse as a "sunbrella".
• ...they don't like anise, but cultivated a taste for absinthe.
• ......or they drink vodka screwdrivers just for the name.
• .........or they've learned to appreciate the taste of gin.
• ...it never occurred to them to wear their corset under their clothes.
• ...they are convinced that they alone know the true definition of Steampunk.

If more than five of these apply, the person in question is probably a Steampunk. If more than ten of these apply, the person in question is definitely a Steampunk.
If more than twenty of these apply, the person in question doesn't need a list for other people to know they're Steampunk, because they ooze it out of every pore!

=============================================
Keep your sightglass full, your firebox trimmed and your water iced.
KJ

There is a intriguing beauty in clockwork.

These images by photographer Guido Mocafico show the elegance and beauty of these amazing high end watches.  The photographs are collected in his book Movement.

This is from one of the reviews on Amazon:

The first paragraph in this book reads: "This is a book of photographs. The photographs in this book all show watch movements, but it is not a book about watches."

That is undoubtedly true. This is not a book about watches, it is a book solely about the beauty of high grade, contemporary wristwatch movements. The Italian photographer Guido Mocafico, together with the German design team of Steidl Publishers, and with the technical advice of Swiss watchmaker Antoine Simonin, has created one of the most extraordinary `watch books' I have ever seen.

The team selected 37 contemporary wristwatch movements, and took amazing, full movement photographs of them (sometimes the under dial view, sometimes the back of the movement). The core of the book consists of these 37 very large, incredibly detailed pictures. They are each reproduced on a double page, in 12 inch diameter vivid color images of stunning clarity and depth of focus, without any text on the pages to diminish their visceral impact. 

Shorn of their faces and without cases these could be any kind of machine not just a watch.  Perhaps these are parts of some larger mechanism or the controls of some fearful weapon. These images inspire imagination!

Here are some examples:

Keep your sightglass full, your fiebox trimmed and your water iced.

KJ

Finally

I managed to get a reasonable diagram put together of the airship I have been designing and describing in my Practical Airship Design series.

The diagram is loosely based on the Graf Zeppelin. I was going to use the outline of the Hindenburg which is smoother but I like the look of the slightly more primitive shape of the Graf.

The base shape was done by Wolf  and can be found along with similar drawings of many airships real and proposed at http://wolfsshipyard.com/www.wolfsshipyard.mystarship.co/Misc/Airships/Airships.htm  
That page is definitely worth a visit if you are interested in Airships!

So here she is in all her glory the newly christened HMAS Velvet Brush.

Keep your sight glass full, your firebox trimmed and your water iced.
KJ