There’s just something very wonderful about steam powered motorcycles. We saw several a couple of weeks ago, and then even more came to our attention – and today we have one that Mr Addison (a regular contributer, and an appreciated one) found – the 1970′s Arthur Hubbard motorcycle conversion.

What’s the obsession, do you think? Is it the idea of riding along on one of these trying to get to the rocketship in time for blast off to the moon? Or hurrying to catch the dastardly villian steaming away on his steamtrain? Either way – the motorcycle above is a beautiful example of the genre. Created from a theoretical article written in 1918, made from an old 1956 East German motorcycle and hand converted between 1969 to 1973. What a journey.

Mr M. Moores sent me a few links some time ago, and one of those was for the company Stanley London (beware, the front page makes a strange noise and has a rather amusing picture of a young lady and a telescope, in my opinion). The company seems to stock a great deal of shiny brass items – from telescopes of various shapes and sizes to magnifiers, sextants, compasses and others. Strangely, for a company called Stanley London (and with a union flag in the icon) it seems to be based in the US.

But that is neither here nor there – they still sell quite dashing items that would not look out of place on the table of Nemo himself. Certainly worth going there, if only to window shop.

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Arthur Ganson makes some very pretty, very delicate and very thoughtful looking kinetic sculptures. From never-ending trails of chain going through a tube, to very exhausted looking wishbones pulling contraptions along the floor, to seemingly pointless connections of wire cogs, turned by hand.

In particular I’d recommend the high res images in the images section, and the video right at the bottom of the sculpture page that shows how he makes his wire cogs. Lovely stuff. Mechanical, and thus a little bit Steampunk.

A curious thing to post about, an obituary but I’d like to here.  The Telegraph has an article about the life of the recently passed Lt Col John Pine-Coffin, of the Kings African Rifles and Parachute Regiment.  And what a life it was, my personal favourite tale that is recounted:

“A series of staff appointments followed. In 1963 he was in Nassau when he was ordered to investigate a party of Cuban exiles that had infiltrated Andros Island, part of the Bahamas. His seaplane landed in thick mud and Pine-Coffin decided that his only chance of reaching dry land was to strip off.

On coming ashore, plastered in mud and wearing only a red beret and a pair of flippers, he was confronted by a party of armed Cubans. Mustering as much authority as he could in the circumstances, he informed the group that they were trespassing on British sovereign territory and were surrounded. The following morning, when the Royal Marines arrived to rescue him they were astonished to find him and his radio operator in a clearing standing guard over the Cubans and a pile of surrendered weapons. He was appointed OBE.”

As Nothing To Do With Arbroath stated, it’s like a tale from ripping yarns – real Steampunk adventurer/officer.  What a character he must have been.

I’m sure there’s probably a law against falling head over heels for a tractor, but my goodness, if the Hornsby Chain Tractor isn’t the most beautifully Steampunk contraption that was intended for farm use! (Well ok – there are some very nice traction engines too, but just look at it!)

You’ll find a slightly larger version of the above image here, and you’ll find history of this worlds first tracked engine (1905) on this page. Amusing that they the idea on quite cheaply to the American company now known as Caterpillar! And lastly a picture that someone took of a scale model of a Chain Tractor at a show. Thank you very very much DerGolgo!

A Mr. John Park kindly alerted me to a very Steampunk text adventure (or Interactive Fiction, as is the current name for the genre) called Slouching Towards Bedlam. How Steampunk? Well, it’s set in the 1800′s around London, and you’re surrounded by madmen, inventors, steam devices, calculating devices (which follow you around) and terrible secrets. A mystery then – and a very interesting one at that. Alas, I got stuck fairly early on, which is fairly typical for me – I floundered when I knew what I wanted to do, but couldn’t find the phrase to accomplish it.

But do not let my own clumsiness put you off – the game has won awards for its game, story, setting and NPC’s – pretty much across the board in the competition it was entered to. It’s delightfully Steampunk, and the mystery is thick – something has gone very wrong, can you believe in even yourself?

(William) Heath Robinson is a household name in the UK, and I’m sure many people don’t know all that much about him – or why we refer to peculiar convoluted machines as being a bit “Heath-Robinson”. Well, Mr Robinson was a turn of the century illustrator who will be remembered most for his illustrations that poked gentle but astute fun at the changes in British society – books and illustrations on subjects as diverse and amusing as ‘How to be a Perfect Husband’ and ‘How to live in a Flat’ (or, apartment, to those across the way). The BPIB biography for Mr Robinson describes them so:

“A typical Heath Robinson involved a panoramic view of a complex and convoluted contraption. The device, usually dilapidated from intense use, is designed to perform a very simple task and is usually run by a large group of overly serious attendants – each executing a simple task like ringing a bell or cutting a string. The mechanism [which was popularized in the states by Rube Goldberg's homages - what we in the U.S. call a 'Rube Goldberg device' is simply a 'Heath Robinson' in the U.K.], derives its humor as much from the cleverness and complexity of the contraption as from the implied effort that these serious souls are going to expend to reset it for the next run. And Robinson’s vantage point usually maintained a quite proper distance from the activities.”

So there we go – a Heath Robinson device often appeals to the humour of the Steampunk fan – being as it is both mechanical in operation, somber in it’s use, and generally borderline impractical. Lovely. (Thankyou Mr Addison.)

Make (and I believe several other places today) have posted about this lovely device above – a device that will show you in no uncertain terms how certain ‘things’ are doing. What things? Well, that’s up to you – the Device plugs in to your computer and you use the software provided to set up what things it will display the changes of – from the temperature of your hardware, to the progress of your online auction, to the time left before you achieve your dreams of world domination! (I assume you have to enter some dates for that last one).

There are two dials, and a vial of agar based gel that can glow at different brightnesses on command – and a red light on the top for emergencies. The creator of the device is looking for support for when they go to visit the people with the money to make such items for consumers, so I wish them the best of luck. I wouldn’t count this as the most Steampunk item I’ve ever seen – but it’s not far off, and if this gets made, who’s to say a more Steampunk version with valves couldn’t make an appearance!

You may recall that Penguin UK were releasing a 10 part Steampunk novel, and indeed some of you may have recieved your first part today, but for the rest of us – either still waiting, or unable to enjoy this retrospective experiment with publishing, there is the online interactive fiction (IF) game to play. Play as one of two of the main characters listed in the book – either the distressed but determined Miss Temple, or as the dangerous hunter who may now be hunted, Cardinal Chang. I’ve not played it much yet – for I fear it may contain spoilers. But I doubt it will be a long game, and has probably been created to generate more interest in the book/s. For those who cannot, or chose not to get the 10 part series of books, I believe that a single hardback edition of the book is also available for $26, 978-0-385-34035-9 (0-386-34035-4) from Bantam Books, or as an audio book from Simon & Schuster.

If you recal the beautiful Steampunk laptop I posted about a few days ago, you may remember that the site it was from was beyond my ken. However, the resourceful Mr Andy W asked a good friend of his to translate the page, and so we have some more information regarding it’s construction.

“I tried to make it different looking from Macintosh. Rather than that, my feeling after I was waived by a girl affected the style of it. I my myself like this type of design anyway, though. I made leather bags for LCD and AC, it weighs 10 kilogram totally with main machine. I went out in the city couple of times, but my shoulder seemed to be broken. The space bar is made of wood. The cool equipment in this version. When you ring the bell, it works as enter key. You know when you change the line on the typewriter, you can hear the sound of bell. I put the circuit for delay , since the key imput is recognized as chattering. This is a side story, but I am developing Morse code keyboard which allow you to input info with one key. It should be helpful for the olds who cannot handle with the keyboards. Serial, USB, analogue display, etc …. are equipped.but you cannot connect LAN cable I ask you not to call it Terry Gilliam or Cronenberg. It really depress me. And if you have good sense, you can see they are totally different.”

Thank you very much, Mr Andy W. It’s very intersting to know what that page was saying – particularly things like their plans for the future (the morse keyboard) and not comparing it to Gilliam or Cronenberg. (And the weight!)