First off, I really like the show. However some episodes seem to have too much salt in them. For example the steam powered car. They salted the junkyard with steam engines, whistles and boilers. It would have been much more fun if the contest was to make a car that did not have an internal combustion engine. Rockets? Electricity? Compressed Air? I like the environment that generates amphibious Land Rovers and walking jeeps. Keep up the good work. PS, for the football toss, the first though that came to my mind was a giant trebuchet.

-- Bill Conrad (choplift@san.rr.com), December 26, 2000

Answers

Check out my article http://www.the-nerds.org/on-seeding.html

Basically, they wanted to teach how a steam engine works. British law prohibits casual building of steam boilers, so they had to provide.

As to the rugby flinger, the projectile (light, asymetric) meant most aproaches wouldn't work. Some sort of centrifugal flinger might, but air cannon really are the best choice.

-- Jeff - The NERDS (dp@the-nerds.org), December 26, 2000.

I love the show too. So much much I'm actually cancelling seeing my girlfriend to watch the show. She understands,though, how important the show is to me. I have to say, supplying the boilers and letting the contestents "find" them is somewhat disappointing. Perhaps it should be given to the contestents up-front, at the last minute, before they start. It's obvious to us viewers that they were placed earlier and it's somewhat disappointing. At least then both teams can study the part (motor,boiler, etc.) and build the contraption around it. In the same way it would limit the team if they happened to actually find another boiler or engine in the scrapyard. My point is if you're gonna give them a part, just give it to them and don't hide it in such obvious places. That's all. LOVE THE SHOW!!!!

-- Tom Vogl (TJV1974@yahoo.com), December 27, 2000.

Except which team decided on which boiler was based on the rest of their design. It was possible to get wrong (there were three out there, we got baby bear, and the beachies used momma bear. There was a much larger one on offer.

-dp-

-- Jeff - The NERDS (dp@the-nerds.org), December 27, 2000.

Thanks for the timely answers to the very issue my family has been debating: the "salting" of the junkyard with vital items. (Example: the Land Rover used by the Nerds in the "fireboat" episode seemed in good shape, and I doubt it would've been surrendered as "junk" by anyone.)

It's interesting (yet not unexpected) to learn that some items have been placed in the yard to be "discovered" by the contestants. Can you tell me if the "salted" items have been gathered from other junkyards, or if they've been donated or conveniently "scrapped" while still in decent condition?

Regardless of the authenticity of the "junk", it's still a great show!

-- Scott Aikens (smaikens@mediaone.net), December 27, 2000.

Actually that 'drover was purchased from a breakers yard. It had faild annual inspection because of structural rot. Land rovers are deceptive - because the body is aluminum, it doesn't decay. But the underpinnings can be truly trashed. On ours, the heater sprayed crash in the face, the steering had more than half a turn of play (don't know if it was tie rods, or the steering box) The brakes barely grabbed, the clutch seriously grabbed. (leaking transmision seal and down to the rivets). The exhaust noise wasn't seriously changed by our cutting the muffler off. And the transmission was grumpy about going in and out of 4wd.

The two guys that stocked the yard were inveterate scrounges. The only stuff in there that was new, was specific safety related parts.

-- Jeff - The NERDS (dp@the-nerds.org), December 27, 2000.

for the football toss i was actually thinking of som kind of heavy kick machine, i dont undertand how the two bikes had to ride six miles total to launch a single football 60 yards, people throw farther than that. Any ways, GO NERDS! and i was wondering if there may be a way that the next machine you make, i want you to spraypaint the tires or whatever parts that are gonna be the main thing as much color as possible. and please tell me the name of that steam powered car, you know the unessisarily long name for a steam powered machine.

-- Sean Durkin (seandurkin@msn.com), December 28, 2000.

On the rugby toss episode, I also immediately thought that a trebuchet was the thing to build. As for the lightness of the projectile, couldn't a team just duct tape on some weights to the sides of the rugby ball to compensate and allow the ball to sail further or would doing that violate the rules?

-- Tom (geo5370@aol.com), December 29, 2000.

Speaking of salting...We thought the motorcycle the Megs used in the final challenge (dragster) was in way too good of a condition for junk. They basically just had to add pieces to the reat of an already built machine. Especially in comparison to the opposing team. The Brothers built theirs from scratch. Megs had a good motor and transmission. Brothers only got a good motor. Luck of the find? Or unfair? We were wondering if the people who salt the junkyard confer with the Experts beforehand in order to get specific "junk". Awesome show! Our 2 & 4 year olds love it too.

-- Lisa Caudle (lcaudle@mail.warden.wednet.edu), December 29, 2000.

Salting. Is that another British term? I never heard it used in that context and apparently neither does Webster.

-- Tom (TJV1974@yahoo.com), December 29, 2000.

Americans have used the word salt to mean to place things such as gold in a place, such as a mine, to make it seem as if there's more of it there than there really is.

-- Richard Manahan (rjcyclesk8@hotmail.com), December 29, 2000.

The most obvious placement of materials (even considering the steam engines) was the roll of mylar! Knowing that one expert was skilled at creating artistic zeppelins steered the team to build that kind of craft. I was really interested as they tried different plastics for heat seal and helium holding characteristics - then they find a brand new roll of mylar! (or crisp packet material, as they say)

-- DavidAllen (davida@airmail.net), December 29, 2000.

It would've been better if they had salted the place with used mylar balloons like the ones they sell at flower shops. Putting in a big new roll of mylar in a car trunk makes it too obvious.

I don't think there's anything wrong with adding extra parts and materials to the junkyard. You want them to be able to build more kinds of stuff than the same old car-based machines.

-- Richard Manahan (rjcyclesk8@hotmail.com), December 29, 2000.

If you looked closely, the motorcycle that the team used was totally crushed in the back. If you tried to ride that you'd probably junk it too.

-- Brian Jordan (brian@brianworks.com), December 30, 2000.