bizzard

Don't chuck away your empty plastic washing up liquid bottles, make Sharks out of em, like so

 Cut out sharks dorsal fins from thin plastic or card, about 8'' tall for adult ones decreasing in size to an inch or so for baby sharks will do.

   Stick these fins to the w/u liquid bottles nearer to the tapered neck end with plastic glue. Paint the whole thing black, then paint eyes, snout and gaping snapping mouth full of wicked teeth, let dry.

  Now comes the technical bit,''ballasting'' You will need some cement, mud or anything heavy that will set.

  Convey your sharks to the sink, bath or bankside. Remove the red squirter nozzle from sharks snout and pour in your ballast of choice keeping your shark fin upwards, try half full at first then add a little at a time, the object being to attain more or less neutral bouyancy, the sharks body barely showing on the waters surface with the fin standing up nice and vertical, firm and erect. When this delicate ballasting is is done and set firm and your satisfied with it, pop the nozzle back on for good. Now the idea is to tow your shark or shark family behind your boat to frighten everybody so do do this get some very light, say 1ib fishing line and lots of it as its best to tow them a long long way behind you, as if they're nothing to do with you and are oblivious that its you towing them along. The fine fishing line should be almost invisible and attach to the snout.

 A family of homemade sharks can all be towed together being kept apart by either little opposite counter fins under their tummies or by strips of Balsa wood stuck to em underneath to join them up.

  Demonstration.   Launch your sharks whilst moving slow ahead and pay out the line, about 200 yards of it. When you've taken up the slack of the tow watch the realistic and beautiful V bow waves from the fins, speed up your boat and watch your sharks body rise slowly up, the gentle upward angle of the towline and the  tapered bottle neck causes this.

  Now cruise along looking unconcerned and oblivious of the flotilla of sharks that are chasing you while all the gongoozlers on the path scream and shout with horror.

  You can even surupticiously pull em in and pretend to feed em. That's it for now folks, well its for when your really really bored really. bizzard.

Wouldn't it be nice when and if you peddle a bicycle along when lock wheeling to not have to pedal it. I always felt sorry for Victoria Peddlemore, no wonder she retired early from it .

  So. the latest state of the art bike which meets the modern day bicyclers latest cutting edge needs for lock wheeling duty is the type that you don't have to peddle at all. Chuck those silly over expensive Mountain bikes with 9,000 gears two of which you can only ever find anyway away along with the shiny go faster suites and streamlined flying insect helmets and build yourself, Wait for it.  A SAILING BIKE!!.

  I once constructed one of these from an old bone shaker of a bike, one with strong Woods wheel rims and rod brakes are immensely tough machines. The one I made had an inherant and dangerous fault which made me look an imbecile.

 I took it to the big green near Lambourne End Chigwell Row in Essex along with a mixed bunch of bicycling friends to demonstrate it on ''the green''.. When we all finally emerged from the nearby pub along with many curious drinkers I led them all wheeling my sailing bike across the road to the said green,'' I felt like the Pie-eyed piper of Hamlin, and a touch apprehensive lest I should not put on a good display for this big audience.

  The wind was strong and gusty similar as today and ablowing from a Westerly direction so I rigged the sailing bike, facing it down wind for the first demonstration run and mounted the saddle. Because of the high wind a friend had to hang on to my saddle to hold the beast back and to stop me doing a somersalt  as the strong gusts of wind hit the square rigged high aspect sail which kept lifting the bikes rear wheel off the grass.

  As soon as there's a lull in the wind ''let go'' i cried. The lull eventually arrived and he let go. At first it was all quite gentle and pleasant like, bowling gently along with feet up across that green with everyone cheering and shouting encouragement, I felt generally quite pleased with life.

  Then all of a sudden a massive great big storm force gust of wind overtook me, took me completely by surprise as I was showing the onlookers how easy it was to casually light up a cigarette whilst underway on a sailing bike, and accellerated me up to a dizzy dizzy speed, trees, bushes and shrubs flashed past me like lightening, I tried a slight swerve as there was an enormous old Oak tree looming up dead ahead on the horizon, this was no good as I had no outriggers to steady the bike for when sailing the bike on the wind so had to be content with dead down wind travel. I did shout for help at one stage but felt a goon saying it. However at times of fearsome endeavour the old adrenalin kicks in and saves the day, but it didn't save my day. I hit that huge Oak tree square on, knocking a tooth out and bruising my hooter collapsed upon the ground moaning with a tangled sailing bike upon me.  My self esteem and street cred had been destroyed. This is a true account of what happened.

  Right, now lets get down to modifying a bicycle to sail by wind power for lock wheeling duties.

Any old bike will do. Find a long stick for mast,'' The boat pole or mums clothes prop will do'' a shorter stick ''the Yard'' for the square rig sail ''an old bed sheet'' to hang on and some odd bits of rope and a bit of metal with some holes in it.

   Remove your bikes O/S front wheel nut, screw the bit of metal to the masts foot and fastening it the the wheel spindle with the nut. Haul the mast up vertical and lash it to the handlebars with a bit of rope. Lash the Yard to th mast a few feet from the top. Tie the sail to the yard and tie two ropes to to corners of the sails foot, these are your sail control sheets ''your throttle''. Now to prevent what happened to me happening to you I suggest you wear a pair of Roller-Skates or lash a couple of Skate-boards to your feet to use as outriggers which will enable you to have much more control over your direction of sailing.

  If anyone needs any instruction on how to build their homemade sailing bike, don't hesitate to pm me. Happy lock wheeling folks. Probably lots of spelling and grammar mistakes but I'm too tired to bother reviewing or editing it.

    Bizzard.

Passed by me coming down from Stortford town an hour or so ago whilst I was working on a boat on the river. Rained off now.

Minder ITV4 Freeview 24 ON NOW the one with the canal boat in it.

A few days ago there was a thread with folk going on about trying to insulate themselves from their engine noise and its consumption of combustion air ect ect.

  Well here's a simple and once again I use the word ''cheap'' way of lessening the this dreadful racket from perforating your lugholes eardrums. RWLP mentioned the folly of wearing a large brimmed hat on the grounds of it halting the noise on its upward path and  concentrating the noise  more lovingly around the vicinity of your hearing appendages, and rightly so.

 However the wearing of a massively brimmed Sombrero hat in rainy weather will keep you dry and if fitted with a drainpipe to the large turned up brim which can be lashed to your back in a way so as to drain water away clear of your feet ''same as a houses gutter and drainpipe all well and good, it all depends which is most important to you, becoming Mutton-Geoff or getting wet.

  Leaving that aside I'm going to concentrate on helping you to deal with your engine noise and so help preserve your hearing whilst cruising about, but alas with the use of big brimmed objects.

    Go walkies and find an old fashioned round dustbin lid either metal or one made of that black fibrous stuff. Where the handle is in the centre cut out a hole big enough to pass over your bonce. When done have a dress rehersal by lowering the lid over your head ''outer rim facing downward'' and rest it upon your shoulders. The gap left between your neck and the hole will need sealing up, this is easily done by winding an old rope, bed-sheet, any old thing around the gap ideally finally sealing off with either a very large Jubilee clip or a handful of car body filler or Sillycone, smoothing it of to a nice finish with a finger.

  The idea of this is to deflect your unwanted engine noise back down from whence it came before too much of it reaches your lugholes.  Of course a big Sombrero hat can be adapted to serve the same purpose by turning it inside out, punching a head sized hole in the top and donning it upside down in the same manner as the dustbin lid.

  Why not make one for all your crew members, and spare ones for visitors too.

   That's about it folks, happy and quieter boating everyone.   bizzard.

  Ps With the neck type of sound deflector in position resting upon you shoulders you can then wear a large brimmed hat upon your head in confidence and without fear of  much engine noise reaching your ears. But you will then from the chest upwards resemble the layered roofs of a Chinese Pagoda.