How to become practical

[Roberto]

I had Meccano but the adventure ended with a bang when I plugged the two wires of the small battery-operated motor in a 220 socket "to make it run faster"

My favourite was "Chemistry kit for kids" though, much to my mother's despair after I spilled a beaker of acid in the middle of an ancient persian rug, I turned all the goldfishes white by bleaching them, I burned a chair with the Bunsen torch, etc.
I even copper-coated a spider in a galvanic bath with a solution of Cu2SO4 (good memory haven't I )

So I safely taught tricot knitting to my elder daughter

 

[Conachair]

Having grown up on farm and now live on a steel boat it feels like I've lived inside a meccano set from birth

 

[AntarcticPilot]

So a few questions: do you consider yourself practical? And did you have a Meccano set as a kid (please, no Lego-philes: a poor imitation)? And do your kids (and, if not, why not?)

Um. Difficult; because it depends on your standards!

Do I consider myself practical? Not really; I know plenty of people who are better at practical things than I am. But I also know plenty who are worse, and in general, it is lack of experience rather than lack of understanding that stops me. I'm practical enough not to feel daunted by dismantling the engine on my boat, and confident enough that it will still work when I put it back together. But I'm not confident of doing it quickly, and might have to get help and advice to finish the job.

Did I have a Meccano Set? Yes, my brother and I had an extensive collection of Meccano, and also had things like a Mamod steam engine. We used them to build all sorts of weird and wonderful contraptions, and gained useful practical knowledge about gear trains, chain drives and so on. The steam engine was a stationary one; attempting to make a workable vehicle powered by it was a challenge (the power to weight ratio was way too low). I also messed around with electricity quite a lot - generating sparks with old HT coils was good fun, especially daisy chaining two together! I even built a primitive manually operated AND gate using switches, and nearly got a simple adding circuit wired up. Played with early electronics kits - main problem there was that the kit came with 2 transistors; the leads on the transistors were fragile, and replacing them (at the time!) was fiendishly expensive! I remember 10/6p as the replacement cost for one - and that was when you could get a fair bit of a week's shopping for £1.

Did my kids (no longer kids; two young ladies now)? Well, Meccano was out of production when they were the right age; at least, I never saw it on sale when they were that sort of age. I doubt they'd have been interested anyway; despite our best efforts NOT to impose gender-based role models, they insisted on liking Barbie and similar things! They did use Duplo and Lego, but didn't really show much inventiveness with it - built the designs that came with the kits, but rarely tried to experiment. One of them was quite keen on N-gauge railways for a while!


More broadly; my childhood experience means that I'm not scared of dealing with mechanical things (though I'm not keen on getting too mucky ). Later education means that I have theoretical backup for most of the practical things I did as a child. But I don't deal with mechanics on a day-to-day basis, so I'm pretty thumb-fingered when it comes to handling tools and what is broadly called workshop practice. I missed out on formal carpentry and metal-working classes; I did a fast stream to O-level, so there wasn't time for them.

 

[jwilson]

Yes - did have Meccano, though nothing remotely practical at school, though I could understand the Latin of the new Pope's announcement better than the BBC commentators who very clearly couldn't.

Then went on to work on own cars, including total engine rebuilds, and fixing own old boats. Now greatly prefer to have someone else do the mechanical stuff, especially on modern cars, but I do know what's going on.

 

[MYStargazer]

http://www.allatsea.net/southeast/d...dbf&utm_source=Campaign Monitor&utm_term=more

 

[V1701]

Another yes, yes, no kids here. We also had stickle bricks, remember them? And woodwork, metalwork & tech drawing at school, apprentice for a couple of years & fiddling with bicycles, motorbikes & cars...

 

[Daydream believer]

I still have my No 10 meccano set complete with Mamod, clockwork motor & the 20 v electric one complete with transformer
I told my son i would sell it & to my surprise he asked me to keep it for my grandson
My son had no interest but wants to get my grandson interested
Seems they feel it will help in this world of computers
If he does like it i tend to agree it does develope ones attitude to mechanical things

 

[Halo]

Had meccano set but the practicality was started before that at around 5 when my grandad gave me a hammer and nails and an old wooden stool. he showed me how to knock them through the seat, turn it over and knock 'em back out. If I banged my thumb - tough! Kept me busy for hours and have been able to use a hammer ever since.
We went on to saw up wood and chop sticks with a hatchet - again kept me busy for hours.
My Dad was wilfully impractical so this gave me a chance to shine
Grandpa's do your kids kids a favour and get 'em going with the tools!

 

[Deleted member 36384]

I used to be very practical, renovating classic bikes, building custom bikes, building large garages, renovating houses, car/motorbike maintenance and making stuff out of wood that was to an acceptable (but not professional standard by far).

Now I have become quite lazy, I cant be bothered anymore. It probably started when I modernised myself and started buying stuff that has been pressed and moulded into existence with processors and such like. It all became a bit of a black box to me. Also I am relatively well off now with disposable income and it's so much easier to buy reliable functional stuff or pay someone to do stuff that I used to do. I feel so let down by myself.

Anyway, I have resolved to reinvigorate my previous enthusiasm for all things DIY and improve my resolve and increase my skills, particularly woodworking stuff. I now have time on my hands and have settled down a bit as well. Less typing now as I have a router table, band saw and router kit to unload from the car, then up to Edinburgh to collect the kids from school - sigh!

I had a plastic mechano kit when I was young and built 4' tall tower cranes and bi planes, from what I can remember. The best thing was my Mammod Steam Tractor though, still have it and fire it up once a year.

 

[charles_reed]

Bako, anybody?
Bakalite/plastic "bricks" with slots each side which went over vertical metal roads stuck into a green base. Mainly could only build "buildings", but imagination produced some odd creations too.
Ah those were the days; balsa wood, E D Bee engines, "cement" glue, sticky fingers, blobs on the carpet. Sliced fingers from the surgical knife . Triang, Airfix, (built many Lancasters, Spitfires and Hurricanes then peppered them all over with a red-hot skewer to look like Nazi bullet-holes. Trix Train-sets, and the introduction of Corgi toy cars with windows and suspension.
Then along came Commodore computer(? ), ZX Spectrum and that was it for practical imagination.

Minibrix - made of rubber. Remember them well.

In reply to the OP question - yes to Meccano, no to Lego which wasn't invented in my childhood - my children all had Lego, but it's my daughter who's the engineer - well runs the materials dept in Southampton Uni. School of Engineering as well as being Director of Postgraduate Training.
Personally I am of the opinion that women are far more practical than men even if they don't disassemble things and put them back together to not work and have lotsa bits left over.

 

[maby]

yes, yes and yes.

I went beyond Meccano - my first job was on an engineering shop floor, building turbine pumps - and that was in the days before CNC lathes and milling machines - I had to raise a piece of steel that I could not lift without a hoist into a four-jaw chuck and spend a couple of hours carving it by hand into a drive shaft. It was probably the most enjoyable job I've ever had - but, sadly, did not pay as much as I can earn selling IT systems...

 

[aslabend]

Yes (fairly), no(horrible stuff) & no kids.
Hated meccano but loved taking things apart. Had a small hornby train set but kept taking the transformer apart to see how it worked so it never worked.

I'm not sure if Meccano is not the symptom of a practical mind rather than a cause of it. I learned a lot when at school as the grammar school I attended used to a technical college so had great wood/metal work departments. 'Speedy' Mellor was my metal work master, good bloke.

 

[nigelmercier]

Had meccano set but the practicality was started before that at around 5 when my grandad gave me a hammer and nails and an old wooden stool. he showed me how to knock them through the seat, turn it over and knock 'em back out...

I was about the same age when my parents took me to the film set for The Guns of Navarone (I have no idea why, they were not in it as far as I know). They needed to keep me occupied, so they found some bits of wood, a hammer and some nails and I played happily all day. I took the wood home and kept playing with it for weeks.

 

[AntarcticPilot]

I was about the same age when my parents took me to the film set for The Guns of Navarone (I have no idea why, they were not in it as far as I know). They needed to keep me occupied, so they found some bits of wood, a hammer and some nails and I played happily all day. I took the wood home and kept playing with it for weeks.

I too remember learning to use a hammer and saw, making "boats" out of lengths of wood - sawed a V shape at one end for the bow, and nailed a small bit of batten on the bottom for a keel, and a block on top for a cabin!

 

[prv]

I too remember learning to use a hammer and saw, making "boats" out of lengths of wood - sawed a V shape at one end for the bow, and nailed a small bit of batten on the bottom for a keel, and a block on top for a cabin!

Same here, except rather more elaborate with lots of different blocks on top to make the upperworks of battleships, destroyers, etc. No keel on the bottom, they were models from the waterline up only so that they could cruise around the carpet having battles . Swivelling gun turrets made of slices of skirting board to give a curved front, with nails for guns. Big six-inch nails for masts, including tripod masts on the battleships, and rigging (the stay from stem to stern via the mast tops) made of thin wire unravelled from old transformers. Some had signalling yards with flag hoists on - my ex-Navy grandfather gave me some appropriate codes to use.

Pete

 

[Tidewaiter2]

We couldn't afford Mechanno, but I had a 4 or 5th hand large scale clock work train set(what would that be worth now?), some toy soldiers and lots of plasticine as presents-hours of fun, even if it all turned the one brown colour after a while

 

[OGITD]

lots of plasticine as presents-hours of fun, even if it all turned the one brown colour after a while

Don't forget after a week or two it contained a percentage of animal fur and carpet fluff as well ...... but can anyone explain why it turned brown!?

And it never tasted nice ... no matter what colour I decided to eat......

 

[Little Sam]

Meccano-Yes
Lego-Yes
Dont have kids old enough.

What turned me into a practical person, I loved Bikes and still do, My Dad used to buy me old broken down things for 50 quid with you name it wrong with them, smashed in accidents, seized engines....etc etc. Then, when i would fix them he would sell them and obviously pocket the dosh. (he used to buy the new parts we needed though).

But it wasnt all bad, i remember one Christmas getting an almost new Moto Crosser which i could go racing with my mates (rich ones) i don't know how my dad managed to get me that bike, as in those days it cost a fortune, i used to dream about one day owning one but knew it would never happen as my parents just didnt have the money... but he found a way. Then he bought me a car when i got my first job as an apprentice engineer and payed for a full course of driving lessons and the test too, i still dont know how he managed that either but he found a way. He's a real B stard in some ways but he could give me the worlds greatest surprises !

 

[Spyro]

Yes Meccano and lego. I've got 2 boys one loves taking things to bits and doing things one doesn't. Been like that since they were young. The older one would never be bothered if he couldn't do something he would just give up or get someone else to do it. He is never challenged by anything it's just the way he is. I'm not saying he's not clever, he's at Uni. The younger one loves puzzels and fixing things and doing anything practical so I don't think it's all in the upbringing.

 

[Skylark]

Great thread! Happy days!
Meccano, Mamod steam engines, push bikes, b&w photo processing, radio controlled balsa model aeroplanes, Lambrettas, Cutlass Class 4 Cart, virtually scrap cars, amateur radio, kawasakis, stationary engines, scuba diving, dinghy sailing, BMW bikes, mountain bikes, and finally, the floating money pit. I hope never to outgrow my toys!