James May's Shed Load of Ideas (2025) s01e02 Episode Script
Supermarket Trolley-Bike
1
JAMES: Hello.
These days, I spend more and more time in my Wiltshire home
and the pub I own.
Thinking about all the big problems in the world
And some smaller ones that annoy me.
Luckily, there's a place I can go to solve them all,
or at least try.
My shed. Right.
It's here that I have the tools
Let's just saw some wood up. the tea Mm.
and a couple of other highly competent blokes
Very good. Brace yourself.
Dirty fly tippers.
and small.
The cereal has gone soggy.
I'll also have to take on other people's problems.
He used to make a sound and now he doesn't.
By which I mean, the locals at my pub
Is it a train set?
So, join us and our excitable crew
who will capture our endeavours
That was epic.
Oh!
That feels like a terrible thing we've just done.
repair So, it's never worked?
Not in my lifetime.
Wow. in my shedload of ideas.
What do you think? This is just brilliant.
Here I am, apparently driving for pure pleasure
through the glorious Wiltshire countryside
in my Mini.
Actually, and despite the vacant expression,
I'm thinking about one of those little problems
that really bother me.
The weekly shop,
and what a senseless waste of life that is,
as you drive to the supermarket,
you park your car, you go and find a trolley,
you take your trolley round the supermarket,
you put all your shopping in it, then you go to the till
and you unload the shopping again so you can pay for it.
And then it gets put into bags, and then you put the bags back in the trolley,
then you wheel the trolley back to the car park
and you take the bags out of the trolley and you put them in your car.
And then, unless you're a blight on society,
you go and put the trolley away in the trolley parking place.
Then you drive home, then you unload the bags
and then you put it all in your house.
I mean, for a start, it's un-environmental,
because we're told we're not supposed to use our cars
for short local shopping journeys,
and you use all these bags,
and these are plastic, and that is B-A-D.
Despite bag charges and reusable bags for life,
we still use over 400 million single-use plastic bags per year,
and make lots of shopping trips in our cars.
Something needs to be done,
and we have an idea.
What if we got rid of the need for bags and cars
when we go shopping?
The answer could be surprisingly simple,
combine one of my favourite things - the bicycle,
with one of my least favourite things -
the shopping trolley.
And to make the world's first supermarket trolley-bike,
I'm going to need these two.
My engineer, Simmy
So, I've got this plan
who collects vintage socks.
And we'll heat it up a little bit to anneal it,
and then we'll hammer it out.
And the incomprehensible Tony the Tool
That's cannae far that.
and always ready with a power tool.
And, of course, our up-for-anything crew.
Woo. Who are also
Sorry, Lottie.
So, here is the supermarket trolley,
we've also got a couple of bicycles that I've recovered from the recycling centre,
and we've got to combine the two,
such that you ride your supermarket trolley to the supermarket,
around it and back out again without getting off.
It's quite a challenge, because, A, this is surprisingly heavy,
and as we know, supermarket trolleys do not steer.
So, I've heard, I've never actually driven one,
let me have a go at this.
This is completely
it's random.
You can tell he's never ever shopped in his life.
Obviously, normally my butler does the shopping,
How it works. works.
Could you make it a sidecar?
I hadn't thought of that, I'll be honest.
SIM: For good reason.
Yeah.
It's very odd.
Where's the brake?
Nice idea, Tony, but we can eliminate it.
We gather around the whiteboard
for one of Simmy's excellent engineering drawings
So, in my head, that is a trolley axle Yeah?
Some kind of pivot from this point,
anywhere between here and here,
going back up to our frame, which will be seat post,
however, that's attached. So, you've got your pedals,
and then your back wheel.
The clever bit will be that pivot there,
whether it's underneath the axle
or somewhere back here.
I'll just turn this upside down because we can,
and it will stand up.
So, in effect,
that's chopped off there,
so the - the trolley, is in effect sitting on here.
So, the trolley can do
Ah. So, this is just an elaborate steering mechanism.
So, we have to ride it upside down?
Only in Australia.
It's fantastic. You get on this
outside your house or in your garage or your shed or whatever,
you set off and you don't get off again
until you're back at your house with your shopping.
If your house is the right shape, you could ride it into your kitchen.
Right, cup of tea.
And when I say a cup of tea,
I of course mean a pint of beer
in a very nice pub I know.
Morning.
And I know it's very nice because it's my pub,
and my regular customers know that I'm always up for taking a look
at their broken odds and sods,
as I have a bit of a reputation for mending stuff.
And sure enough, no sooner have I sat down with Sim,
than local Amy turns up with a precious family heirloom.
AMY: Hello.
I am.
Da-dah! Is, is it a train set?
It is. Ooh, do sit down Thank you.
to sit down for a long time.
Because this is from the '50s.
Ahem, yes, it is my dad's.
Erm, what is wrong with it?
The transformer,
uh, seems to be the problem. So, this bit.
It smokes after it's done a couple of rounds.
Does it?
Not for about ten years or more.
And why now suddenly have you decided?
Dad turned 75 this year.
So, I thought it might be quite a nice thing to,
erm, reinstate his childhood train set.
No, he doesn't.
So, if we fail, we can just
I have to admit, this is slightly my specialism,
mending toys and especially toy trains.
So, this is post 1959, I know that by the coupling.
But the track I know is from the late '50s
because this is the first series of tracks the Tri-ang made.
Oh, wow. It's quite possibly
before they moved to Margate.
Erm, that is the 0-6-0 Jinty.
Okay. These are Tri-ang trains.
Which later became Tri-ang Hornby, and then Hornby.
Today's Hornby railways are actually directly descended from these, not the Hornby of Liverpool.
Oh, yes, that's the automatic Hopper,
Oh, look at that.
and then drops the coal out.
This will probably be largely a strip and clean job.
What we want to do first, Simmy, is find out what's wrong with that
because nothing will happen without that, the transformer smokes
Did the last time I plugged it in.
Did you unplug it immediately or did you run around going,
I unplugged it immediately.
Excellent, so you may have saved the windings.
By the way, the other thing that's very, very encouraging about this
is your motion work is intact.
Okay.
And so I think your father took very good care of this.
Right, we are going to plug in the transformer.
For those of you who don't know, the transformer takes the mains voltage AC,
transforms it into a safe 12 volt DC
so that it doesn't kill you when you put your fingers on the rails.
And then that goes through this control box which is basically a rear stat,
and that controls the speed of the train.
Right, so if we plug that in and it doesn't go bang or bursts into flames,
we can then check the output of those,
They should be.
Shall we go for it? Bang.
Is it humming?
Yes, it is. Right, 12 volts DC.
DC. 14.5, 14.6. It's about 14 volts.
That's about right because there'll be a little bit of loss in here.
If there's any kind of short in that, which would short that,
which would make that probably smoke.
Now we're going to see if this,
which is the train's speed controller, works.
Happy? Yes, I'll hold the probes.
I will get, I'll be the quick reacting switch.
Hang on, hang on, hang on.
Okay, so your - your AC switch and viewing display
If it starts to smoke, I will turn it off.
So, you've got 14 volts.
Turn the knob.
Just see if that's getting warm. There you go. It works.
Yeah, so if I now take those two wires
and apply them to the two sides of the locomotive's electric motor,
we might see some life.
You ready?
Excellent. That's remarkable.
God, you're good. Given the amount
That. A pigeon
That is more than a pigeon.
And up my arm.
Oh, God.
The update is that the transformer and the rear stat works,
but the train set is now covered in guano,
But it's a small price to pay,
and it is considered good luck in some circles for a
So they say.
You find us deep in Wiltshire,
in the middle of a groundbreaking engineering project
to solve both the environmental issues and inconvenience
of the weekly shop.
By joining together a bike and a trolley.
Which we are in the middle of dismantling.
Look what I've found.
Conveniently discarded at the back of my shed,
I happened upon some wheels
which are just the right size.
Check it under and see.
Oh, that's almost bespoke.
That is absolutely brilliant.
TONY: Just cut these, these.
Well, I'd weld it on first.
Shall we do that? Let's do that.
Before we weld anything together, we're going to have to strip
both our trolley and our bike of anything not strictly necessary.
I think we'll have a montage here with some slightly twee doing music
from a free music library somewhere.
Tony and I use brute force.
Whoa. Dispose.
This bit can go as well.
And a hammer to get rid of that child seat
Job done. While Simmy preps the bike's head stock
ready to see if it will fit nicely onto the trolley.
So, that's about the right height.
And with our three-wheeled prototype beginning to resemble Simmy's drawing,
I think we've just about had enough of this twee music.
So, if we cut this off,
This needs to be vertical, because when you ride a -
a two wheeled bicycle,
when you go round a bend, you lean
and you have a thing called rake and trail,
which is basically the distance between the centre of that
and the centre of the pivot, and that is at an angle.
But it doesn't want to be at an angle on something with two wheels at the front.
Otherwise, when you turn, one wheel will be trying to lift off the ground.
So, that needs to be vertical.
So, if we put a plate on here,
because all this is very strong,
and we attach the fork straight to that plate.
Because these trolleys, they're designed to hold a lot of weight.
Very - Yes.
Are you confident of where the plates should go?
Well, the box section.
I'm going to go and cut some box section now.
We'll measure that and get those in.
And we'll cut
the head stock off.
Happy? Yes.
Just, just mind your eyes there.
This box section cut from Simmy's old barbecue
will form a frame
that the bike's fork will be welded onto.
Right, nothing more of that.
Simmy angle grinding with his shorts on
is slightly not HSE.
No, it isn't, so please remember to wear the appropriate protective equipment
if you're making a trolley-bike at home.
Right, the next thing I - I think is we cut this.
Yeah. But you haven't got any goggles on,
so don't get anywhere near it. Well, do you want me to put some goggles on?
Yeah, put some goggles on. Thank you.
Right, don't mind my eyes then.
We're cutting the bike frame so that we can establish the essential geometry
between the headstock and the trolley.
And also, so that there will be room for me to pedal.
Turn it over.
Right, nice and solid.
Yeah.
That feels like a terrible thing. you've just done.
What, chop a bicycle up? It's only metal.
We're gonna make it better though. Okay.
Will our cut down bicycle pivot correctly
with our stripped back trolley?
That is, again, almost too good to be true.
You lose a little bit of trolley space,
but let's be honest,
we're men, we're gonna go and buy three bottles of beer,
That is very true.
What that you could fit in a shopping basket? Yeah.
Or just in your backpack, I mean, or your pockets, even.
Why are we doing this? Okay.
Yes, innovation is fun,
but it's also very hard work.
The summer sun beats down,
all this grafting makes for a very hot and sweaty team.
So, I'm wondering if there's a way to cool down
that doesn't involve expensive air conditioning or electric fans.
But perhaps something a little more homemade.
It's very hot today, it's about 28 degrees outside,
it's about, well up to ten degrees hotter in the workshop
and we've been getting very sweaty.
So, what if you could make cooling clothing?
We have these packs,
these are existing commercially available
chilli-bin packs.
And we also have some sodium polyacrylate, which is
basically what goes in here mixed with water.
And it improves its ability to hold cold.
So, what we're going to do, and by we, I mean Simmy,
because he can operate the sewing machine expertly,
is make a T-shirt for me.
We're also going to make Tony a pair of cooling pants.
Oh, God.
One inside the other,
skilfully sewn together by Simmy,
so that the whole thing can be filled with the
chilli medium, which is what you're gonna make, Tony.
Oh, yeah, unfortunately, yes. Okay.
This is not just about humiliating Tony,
we're trying to do our bit to fight global warming
by finding low-fi, low-energy ways to stay cool.
As there are quite fortuitously six of these little ones.
Could I have a six pack?
Other way round. Is it
It's that, I know you've never seen one before. Yeah, well, I've
Not in the mirror, I haven't, no.
So, three there
No, no. No, no.
Two, two, two. Yes. What?
Two, two, two. That's it. Oh, yes.
Yeah.
So, Simmy gets to work sewing individual pockets
for the ready made ice packs to sit in.
Go on, shove it in.
There you go.
Shall I hold that up and we can see what the effect
Um Excellent.
Excellent.
I look like one of those, you know, cartoon superheroes.
All right, so next, Simmy is going to incorporate these
larger packs into the shoulders.
And then we'll put it in the fridge.
But first, we need to fill Tony's pants
with our homemade cooling gel.
Right, so Tony and I will make up the gel.
It's ten grams per litre, which doesn't sound like enough,
but apparently that's right according to the instructions
Sodium Polyacrylate, also known as water lock
Shall we do one litre first and give it a shot?
is often used in nappies and fire retardants
because it can absorb up to 300 times its weight in water.
Wow. Is it turning into Okay, It's really thick.
It's used in cool packs because the water gets trapped inside the gel,
reducing the rate at which it heats up.
It looks a bit like, um,
Yeah, it looks like a slushie.
So it stays cooler for longer than plain ice.
It's fantastic.
Now we've mixed up the cooling gel,
it's time for Simmy to sew individual pocketed channels
into Tony's massive pants
to accommodate all the sodium polyacrylate mixture.
This is wild, this stuff.
There's something slightly unsavoury about it,
your pants are also becoming very heavy, Tony.
That's
It's just
What are you doing to me?
So, we're ready to put our cool clothing in the fridge.
We'll leave them in there for an hour, put them on and see how good we look.
And how good we feel.
And just a few hours later,
enough time for a walk, a pint and two shakes of a lamb's tail
Right, men it's time to see if our hand sewn cooling clothing
actually works.
I'm gonna go first, Tony, if that's okay.
Ooh, yes, it feels cold.
Just put your hand on there.
Oh. That's gonna be Ooh.
Right, I'm going to disappear into the lav and then emerge
to gasps of amazement.
Very cold.
It's so realistic. Yeah.
That's great.
I've got to say, okay, apart from that,
we've got the six pack a bit low
All right. but the sensation
You look very broad.
But it's really good, this, these bits especially because they -
they cool down the sort of base of your neck.
It does square your shoulders off as well.
Doesn't it just.
How cold is it? Is it comfortable?
It's, yeah, it is, actually.
There's - there's no, there are no sharp edges or anything,
I'm definitely cooler.
I'm cooling down even as I stand here talking to you.
And when you touch it, do you actually think you've got abs,
are you convincing yourself it's like Yeah.
He's just oozing sex appeal.
And then we decided it was time for Tony to put his pants on.
Oh, my God.
I'm never gonna keep these on.
Come on, Tony.
Do I have to? Let's have a look.
They're gonna fall down.
They're falling down.
I feel like I've got some sort of disease.
Are - are you cooler?
They're cooler but mainly my thighs,
it's all dropped out.
It does.
They're coming down.
Feel it, it's not right. MAN: Ooh!
No.
It's horrible.
That's it. Yeah,
so we don't have to look at that.
Argh!
I wish to be able to see less well.
Erm, what can we conclude from that?
As an idea,
I'm not so sure about the pants, but the shirt, I think, is an idea it works.
If these were a bit thinner
and they were more evenly distributed,
chuck your T-shirt in the fridge the night before,
get up, slip it on.
Walk out, ice cool.
Oh, it's leaking.
Urgh, God.
It's squeezing up my back.
Oh, my God.
Right. I think that's the end of that scene.
I do hope so.
Welcome back to Wiltshire,
where we've been tackling climate change
by inventing cool clothing
and welding together a supermarket trolley and a bike,
obviously.
And now we're about to attempt to repair a broken train set
a surprise for Amy's dad's 75th birthday.
No pressure then.
MAN: Yeah.
Right, the toy trains have been cleansed of bird poo
by a very low-paid junior researcher,
we're now ready to start mending them,
which in this instance isn't very difficult
because I can reveal
that I had almost exactly
this train set. In fact, I still have it.
It had these two locomotives, the 0-6-0 Jinty
and the 462 Princess Elizabeth.
I also have the Guard's van,
this green coal truck. I have that flat one,
I have one of these green ones,
and I did have one of these blood and custard coaches.
But my big sister trod on it in about 1969.
And I haven't seen her since.
Nevertheless, there is a joy in mending things
and there's a particular joy in mending these trains,
because, actually, over the years I've mended hundreds of them,
they're very, very simple mechanisms.
All of these Tri-ang locomotives were designed to come apart
by the removal of one screw
down the chimney on these early ones.
Oh, yeah.
So, problems with the motor
tend to be that the magnet becomes weak,
a good test is if you put the motor down and put your screwdriver on it,
I can sort of pick the motor up with the screwdriver,
which is a rough and ready test.
But
it would be remiss of us not to use the re magnetiser.
Sting, dah-dah-dah! The remagnetiser.
It's in here,
it's a remarkable thing.
I do like the, uh the use of Meccano
Yes, it's Meccano themed,
this was made by a man called Ronald Dodds,
who's a toy train mender.
It's not something you're likely to have lying around in the home, to be honest.
In fact, I've never met anybody else in the world apart from Ronald Dodds,
who has a toy train magnet remagnetiser.
Using this compass, you establish the North Pole of the magnet,
this isn't absolutely crucial,
but it means that the locomotive will run in the correct direction.
I meant to say, actually, you shouldn't put anything
like your watch or your mobile phone
Or really expensive cameras.
Or your expensive cameras.
Are you ready for remagnetising?
Makes quite a loud noise, so brace yourself.
That's it.
These are basically coils with soft iron bars in them,
and they become a magnet when you apply the current.
And that re magnetises, because it's touching it,
the magnet in the motor is essential to its operation.
You can see that they're stuck to it now.
And doing my screwdriver test
MAN: What have you done?
Well, I've somehow de-magnetised it, which means it
Hang on.
I think you did.
Yeah, but that should just magnetise it in the other direction.
I think, well
How can I have killed a magnet?
Let's try that again.
That's the one, that's the one.
Yes, look.
So, the screwdriver test works.
It's back. It's back.
Now, let's test the remagnetised motor for real.
Could you give me some juice on the controller?
Yes.
Look at that.
Finally, an electro motive force.
That's nice. I like the little sparks.
And with the sparks flying,
it's time for a track test.
Okay, Simmy, if you could
Plug in.
Transformer is on, I can hear it.
The transformer is buzzing, so here we go. Are we ready?
I don't want to do this.
Go on.
It wants to go
and yet it doesn't.
I've got a bad feeling about this repair, for some reason.
I don't know why, it's just
I ought, I should be. I've done this dozens of times.
It doesn't work.
Time to run some diagnostics.
First, we check the power.
We've got 14 volts there, so we eliminate that.
Then we check the wiring.
That connection is good.
So, there's no short.
Then clean the track.
And clean the wheels.
Sometimes you get sort of invisible dirt.
And finally
We've had a bit of a fiddle around and we isolated the problem to the controller, the rear stat.
We wiggled it and wiggled it and hopefully cleaned it up.
So, it's just dirt and it needs cleaning like most things in life,
and it's not really surprising after all those years in the loft.
What is it that, erm Benjamin Franklin said,
"He who lives by hope alone will die farting."
Did he say that?
Right, that is running, it's buzzing,
here we go.
Look at that. Yes!
That's great. That is fantastic.
That's very pleasing, I hope Amy's father, how old is he?
Seventy five and a half now,
present it to them and
they'll go, "Wow, that's amazing." Take it home and put it back in the loft again
for another half century.
Very good.
Well, I enjoyed that.
But as much as I'd like to play with Dave's train set all day,
I have more pressing matters over in my pub.
We're trying to invent new pub games to entertain the customers
so they'll buy more beer and eat more food.
And today, we have invented a garden game
based on an old English idiom.
This is called "Two birds, one stone."
Simmy, if you'd like to activate the mechanism.
We fashioned two birds out of thin plywood,
cut out a small round hole in each
and mounted them onto a pivot system.
As you can see, the two birds swing, they've got holes in them,
the idea is that you have to throw a stone
at the point where the holes line up
and it goes through both birds.
And then you win a prize.
That's it, that's the tweet.
Yeah.
There's a, there's a jug there full of carefully selected pebbles.
We need to establish the throwing distance.
Oh.
That's good. That's cannae far, that.
No, that's, well, it can't be too easy.
I don't think it's gonna be easy.
You get three shots each.
Okay, Simmy, activate the two birds mechanism.
Do you think it's overarm or underarm?
I'm gonna go underarm. Okay.
Rubbish.
See, it's harder than you think.
Nope.
Pants.
Are you aiming for the hole?
Oh, that wasn't, that was very low.
Simmy, do you want to go? I'll activate the birds.
He's hidden them,
good stones at the bottom.
Rubbish.
It's hard.
Ooh!
This is one of those games that, I mean, it doesn't really mean anything,
but once it starts,
it sort of becomes very important, doesn't it?
Like so many things in life, timing is everything.
I think it starts from when you lift your arms, you've gotta
schwoo, there it is.
It's about the rhythm of the throw
versus the birds movement.
About understanding space and time.
Oh.
Or it's about throwing a stone at some birds.
Did that go through?
Oh.
So, you are the first person ever to score at two birds, one stone.
I've got two more yet.
Thank you very much.
With only one stone through the hole,
we invite members of the crew and a few locals to play along.
Ooh. Oh, that was very close.
What's this game called? Course it is.
Gooo! I can't do it, I honestly can't.
We even let cameraman Will have a go.
Yeah.
What does this button do?
Rubbish. Where are you from, sir?
MAN: Norway. Norway.
Norway, nil points.
Turns out to kill two birds in this game
takes 12 members of the crew,
three locals, some bloke from Norway and about 500 stones before
we eventually hit the target.
Yes!
But it's very satisfying when it's achieved.
That was, that was an almost perfect shot.
So, it's a fantastic game, actually.
I'm amazed no one's ever thought of it.
Every pub in England will have one of these soon.
And that's a promise.
In Wiltshire, we're back in my pub,
and after a lot of delays, cancellations and derailments,
Sim and I are now ready to hand back this repaired
and perfectly running train set that Amy brought us
when she heard that the Royal Oak is a pub of mending.
So Amy, who brought us this broken train set a few weeks ago,
is now waiting in the bar of the pub with her dad, Dave,
who was 75 a couple of months ago.
This is actually his train set,
he apparently hasn't seen it for many, many years,
he certainly hasn't seen it running for probably decades.
And this is meant to be a big, slightly belated,
birthday surprise for him.
So, it will either be very emotional because he loved his train set,
or he's completely forgotten about it
and wonders what the hell we're doing.
We're going to find out in about 15 seconds.
They're coming.
Amy.
Hello.
Good, thank you. How are you?
Very well, thank you, you must be Dave.
Hi, Mr May.
Thank you very much.
I gather it was a big one. We have something over here for you.
Do you recognise it?
I do. And does it work?
Well, let's find out. Sir.
If you'd like to take the driver's seat.
Is this the sort of thing that you thought Amy would do for your birthday?
I think Amy's always had an attachment
to junk, and
And really wouldn't throw anything away.
And, and she's just a hoarder.
And, erm
Whereas, erm yeah, I, uh
I put it away in the loft and forgot about it, really.
Erm Do you think
you'll simply put it back in the loft?
Probably.
I've got, I've now got a policy where, erm,
nothing goes in the loft. Erm
so, because if it's in the loft, you don't need it, so
No. No.
But it will be passed on to someone else. Yes.
Yeah. Yeah.
Well, that wasn't quite the emotional reaction we were hoping for,
but wait till he sees it go.
If you'd like to give it maximum berries forward, sir, which is clockwise.
It should
There you go.
When was the last time you saw that going around?
Forty years, I don't know. Yeah.
It is bringing back memories of my childhood,
and I did spend a lot of time setting it up and
going around buying model kits
where you used to glue
station buildings together and,
I mean, I - I honestly felt that I wouldn't see it again.
So
Oh, it's just brilliant. It's just really lovely
to see it running after all these years and with the age behind it.
It was actually a pleasure to make it work again
Yeah.
a train set back to life because you know that you're
effectively resurrecting somebody's childhood,
and the joy of childhood and the excitement.
Because back when we were young,
oh, God, here I go,
the train set and a new bicycle,
They were like the iPhones of the day, weren't they?
Yes, exactly. You couldn't have a more exciting thing.
Yes.
Gosh, am I going to get a bill now?
It's two and six.
Thank you, James. Enjoy. Thank you. Thank you.
And now, from one mode of transport to another.
I set off on a bike ride across the countryside
as I return to the problem of
unenvironmental supermarket trips.
Except, this isn't just a normal bike.
This is a trolley-bike.
The perfect merging of two engineering miracles.
This is the weirdest thing in the world.
Expertly combined by me, Simmy and Tony
to create something that outshines both.
It offers the ease and joy of riding a bike
straight to your destination,
with the convenience of a trolley ready and primed
to receive a shed load of shopping.
Argh.
And in the knowledge that you can do it in one go without ever leaving the saddle.
Sorry, can't stop.
And here it is in all its glory
on its inaugural ride to a well-known supermarket.
You missed, didn't you? Yeah.
And I'm into the supermarket, I'm still not off my bike.
Will it gets through the doors? Yes.
And we're in.
Right.
Er, rice and pasta,
seasonal, condiments - I hate that word.
WOMAN: Morning.
but now let's see how it fares as a trolley
Crisps and snacks.
Here we go.
Boo
peanuts.
Epic.
Oh, look,
beans and sausages.
It's quite fast, actually, it accelerates very well.
I did a skid.
Coming left.
Thank you. Pies.
Chocolate fingers.
Ooh, they're high.
Wee.
This is just brilliant.
I mean, all I'm doing is going for a bike ride, really.
It just makes shopping pleasurable.
Erm, straight line steering is quite good,
it's got a good turning circle, it does misbehave slightly in corners.
You have to remember about the back pedal brake.
So, the geometry may need a little bit of work.
But the basic idea is good.
Oh, my goodness, May. Good morning.
And it's proving very popular with happy shoppers.
MAN: Morning.
Thank you so much.
Cheese. Thank you so much.
Happy travels. that's all right.
Love it.
That's such an old-fashioned idea.
Look at those people pushing a trolley.
Some people are absolutely stuck in the 1970s.
Doo-doo-doo-do-doo-do-doo, doo-doo.
We need bog roll.
Oh
Unfortunately, I never passed my bike-trolley proficiency test.
Now all that's left to do is ride this incredible machine
to the checkout.
Under the watchful eye of the crew and Mel.
Morning.
Oh, no.
I've realised that there's a slight issue with this.
Would you like me to help?
I'm supposed to do this without getting off the bicycle.
That's all right.
Can I, actually - hang on
Yeah.
Pie.
I'm still on the bike.
No, you're fine.
Most people are quite helpful,
aren't they? They are. There we are, thank you.
And then I pay, and then we just put it back in there.
Yeah, okay. Okay. Would you like any bags?
Okay.
That's good.
That comes to 41.42, is that cash or card?
Of course I don't have cash or a card,
my butler does this.
Do you need me to pay it, James?
There we are, thank you so much.
Thank you very much. It's been absolutely fantastic.
Bye. Bye.
Ooh.
I'm still on the bike.
It turns out that this year is the 75th anniversary
of the very first shopping trolley being introduced to the UK.
Seventy-five years.
And in all that time, no one has thought
it could be combined with a bicycle.
And this is brilliant, you just go for a bike ride
and pick up everything you need for a happy existence on the way.
It's excellent.
Every home should have one.
And will.
Having fun?
JAMES: Hello.
These days, I spend more and more time in my Wiltshire home
and the pub I own.
Thinking about all the big problems in the world
And some smaller ones that annoy me.
Luckily, there's a place I can go to solve them all,
or at least try.
My shed. Right.
It's here that I have the tools
Let's just saw some wood up. the tea Mm.
and a couple of other highly competent blokes
Very good. Brace yourself.
Dirty fly tippers.
and small.
The cereal has gone soggy.
I'll also have to take on other people's problems.
He used to make a sound and now he doesn't.
By which I mean, the locals at my pub
Is it a train set?
So, join us and our excitable crew
who will capture our endeavours
That was epic.
Oh!
That feels like a terrible thing we've just done.
repair So, it's never worked?
Not in my lifetime.
Wow. in my shedload of ideas.
What do you think? This is just brilliant.
Here I am, apparently driving for pure pleasure
through the glorious Wiltshire countryside
in my Mini.
Actually, and despite the vacant expression,
I'm thinking about one of those little problems
that really bother me.
The weekly shop,
and what a senseless waste of life that is,
as you drive to the supermarket,
you park your car, you go and find a trolley,
you take your trolley round the supermarket,
you put all your shopping in it, then you go to the till
and you unload the shopping again so you can pay for it.
And then it gets put into bags, and then you put the bags back in the trolley,
then you wheel the trolley back to the car park
and you take the bags out of the trolley and you put them in your car.
And then, unless you're a blight on society,
you go and put the trolley away in the trolley parking place.
Then you drive home, then you unload the bags
and then you put it all in your house.
I mean, for a start, it's un-environmental,
because we're told we're not supposed to use our cars
for short local shopping journeys,
and you use all these bags,
and these are plastic, and that is B-A-D.
Despite bag charges and reusable bags for life,
we still use over 400 million single-use plastic bags per year,
and make lots of shopping trips in our cars.
Something needs to be done,
and we have an idea.
What if we got rid of the need for bags and cars
when we go shopping?
The answer could be surprisingly simple,
combine one of my favourite things - the bicycle,
with one of my least favourite things -
the shopping trolley.
And to make the world's first supermarket trolley-bike,
I'm going to need these two.
My engineer, Simmy
So, I've got this plan
who collects vintage socks.
And we'll heat it up a little bit to anneal it,
and then we'll hammer it out.
And the incomprehensible Tony the Tool
That's cannae far that.
and always ready with a power tool.
And, of course, our up-for-anything crew.
Woo. Who are also
Sorry, Lottie.
So, here is the supermarket trolley,
we've also got a couple of bicycles that I've recovered from the recycling centre,
and we've got to combine the two,
such that you ride your supermarket trolley to the supermarket,
around it and back out again without getting off.
It's quite a challenge, because, A, this is surprisingly heavy,
and as we know, supermarket trolleys do not steer.
So, I've heard, I've never actually driven one,
let me have a go at this.
This is completely
it's random.
You can tell he's never ever shopped in his life.
Obviously, normally my butler does the shopping,
How it works. works.
Could you make it a sidecar?
I hadn't thought of that, I'll be honest.
SIM: For good reason.
Yeah.
It's very odd.
Where's the brake?
Nice idea, Tony, but we can eliminate it.
We gather around the whiteboard
for one of Simmy's excellent engineering drawings
So, in my head, that is a trolley axle Yeah?
Some kind of pivot from this point,
anywhere between here and here,
going back up to our frame, which will be seat post,
however, that's attached. So, you've got your pedals,
and then your back wheel.
The clever bit will be that pivot there,
whether it's underneath the axle
or somewhere back here.
I'll just turn this upside down because we can,
and it will stand up.
So, in effect,
that's chopped off there,
so the - the trolley, is in effect sitting on here.
So, the trolley can do
Ah. So, this is just an elaborate steering mechanism.
So, we have to ride it upside down?
Only in Australia.
It's fantastic. You get on this
outside your house or in your garage or your shed or whatever,
you set off and you don't get off again
until you're back at your house with your shopping.
If your house is the right shape, you could ride it into your kitchen.
Right, cup of tea.
And when I say a cup of tea,
I of course mean a pint of beer
in a very nice pub I know.
Morning.
And I know it's very nice because it's my pub,
and my regular customers know that I'm always up for taking a look
at their broken odds and sods,
as I have a bit of a reputation for mending stuff.
And sure enough, no sooner have I sat down with Sim,
than local Amy turns up with a precious family heirloom.
AMY: Hello.
I am.
Da-dah! Is, is it a train set?
It is. Ooh, do sit down Thank you.
to sit down for a long time.
Because this is from the '50s.
Ahem, yes, it is my dad's.
Erm, what is wrong with it?
The transformer,
uh, seems to be the problem. So, this bit.
It smokes after it's done a couple of rounds.
Does it?
Not for about ten years or more.
And why now suddenly have you decided?
Dad turned 75 this year.
So, I thought it might be quite a nice thing to,
erm, reinstate his childhood train set.
No, he doesn't.
So, if we fail, we can just
I have to admit, this is slightly my specialism,
mending toys and especially toy trains.
So, this is post 1959, I know that by the coupling.
But the track I know is from the late '50s
because this is the first series of tracks the Tri-ang made.
Oh, wow. It's quite possibly
before they moved to Margate.
Erm, that is the 0-6-0 Jinty.
Okay. These are Tri-ang trains.
Which later became Tri-ang Hornby, and then Hornby.
Today's Hornby railways are actually directly descended from these, not the Hornby of Liverpool.
Oh, yes, that's the automatic Hopper,
Oh, look at that.
and then drops the coal out.
This will probably be largely a strip and clean job.
What we want to do first, Simmy, is find out what's wrong with that
because nothing will happen without that, the transformer smokes
Did the last time I plugged it in.
Did you unplug it immediately or did you run around going,
I unplugged it immediately.
Excellent, so you may have saved the windings.
By the way, the other thing that's very, very encouraging about this
is your motion work is intact.
Okay.
And so I think your father took very good care of this.
Right, we are going to plug in the transformer.
For those of you who don't know, the transformer takes the mains voltage AC,
transforms it into a safe 12 volt DC
so that it doesn't kill you when you put your fingers on the rails.
And then that goes through this control box which is basically a rear stat,
and that controls the speed of the train.
Right, so if we plug that in and it doesn't go bang or bursts into flames,
we can then check the output of those,
They should be.
Shall we go for it? Bang.
Is it humming?
Yes, it is. Right, 12 volts DC.
DC. 14.5, 14.6. It's about 14 volts.
That's about right because there'll be a little bit of loss in here.
If there's any kind of short in that, which would short that,
which would make that probably smoke.
Now we're going to see if this,
which is the train's speed controller, works.
Happy? Yes, I'll hold the probes.
I will get, I'll be the quick reacting switch.
Hang on, hang on, hang on.
Okay, so your - your AC switch and viewing display
If it starts to smoke, I will turn it off.
So, you've got 14 volts.
Turn the knob.
Just see if that's getting warm. There you go. It works.
Yeah, so if I now take those two wires
and apply them to the two sides of the locomotive's electric motor,
we might see some life.
You ready?
Excellent. That's remarkable.
God, you're good. Given the amount
That. A pigeon
That is more than a pigeon.
And up my arm.
Oh, God.
The update is that the transformer and the rear stat works,
but the train set is now covered in guano,
But it's a small price to pay,
and it is considered good luck in some circles for a
So they say.
You find us deep in Wiltshire,
in the middle of a groundbreaking engineering project
to solve both the environmental issues and inconvenience
of the weekly shop.
By joining together a bike and a trolley.
Which we are in the middle of dismantling.
Look what I've found.
Conveniently discarded at the back of my shed,
I happened upon some wheels
which are just the right size.
Check it under and see.
Oh, that's almost bespoke.
That is absolutely brilliant.
TONY: Just cut these, these.
Well, I'd weld it on first.
Shall we do that? Let's do that.
Before we weld anything together, we're going to have to strip
both our trolley and our bike of anything not strictly necessary.
I think we'll have a montage here with some slightly twee doing music
from a free music library somewhere.
Tony and I use brute force.
Whoa. Dispose.
This bit can go as well.
And a hammer to get rid of that child seat
Job done. While Simmy preps the bike's head stock
ready to see if it will fit nicely onto the trolley.
So, that's about the right height.
And with our three-wheeled prototype beginning to resemble Simmy's drawing,
I think we've just about had enough of this twee music.
So, if we cut this off,
This needs to be vertical, because when you ride a -
a two wheeled bicycle,
when you go round a bend, you lean
and you have a thing called rake and trail,
which is basically the distance between the centre of that
and the centre of the pivot, and that is at an angle.
But it doesn't want to be at an angle on something with two wheels at the front.
Otherwise, when you turn, one wheel will be trying to lift off the ground.
So, that needs to be vertical.
So, if we put a plate on here,
because all this is very strong,
and we attach the fork straight to that plate.
Because these trolleys, they're designed to hold a lot of weight.
Very - Yes.
Are you confident of where the plates should go?
Well, the box section.
I'm going to go and cut some box section now.
We'll measure that and get those in.
And we'll cut
the head stock off.
Happy? Yes.
Just, just mind your eyes there.
This box section cut from Simmy's old barbecue
will form a frame
that the bike's fork will be welded onto.
Right, nothing more of that.
Simmy angle grinding with his shorts on
is slightly not HSE.
No, it isn't, so please remember to wear the appropriate protective equipment
if you're making a trolley-bike at home.
Right, the next thing I - I think is we cut this.
Yeah. But you haven't got any goggles on,
so don't get anywhere near it. Well, do you want me to put some goggles on?
Yeah, put some goggles on. Thank you.
Right, don't mind my eyes then.
We're cutting the bike frame so that we can establish the essential geometry
between the headstock and the trolley.
And also, so that there will be room for me to pedal.
Turn it over.
Right, nice and solid.
Yeah.
That feels like a terrible thing. you've just done.
What, chop a bicycle up? It's only metal.
We're gonna make it better though. Okay.
Will our cut down bicycle pivot correctly
with our stripped back trolley?
That is, again, almost too good to be true.
You lose a little bit of trolley space,
but let's be honest,
we're men, we're gonna go and buy three bottles of beer,
That is very true.
What that you could fit in a shopping basket? Yeah.
Or just in your backpack, I mean, or your pockets, even.
Why are we doing this? Okay.
Yes, innovation is fun,
but it's also very hard work.
The summer sun beats down,
all this grafting makes for a very hot and sweaty team.
So, I'm wondering if there's a way to cool down
that doesn't involve expensive air conditioning or electric fans.
But perhaps something a little more homemade.
It's very hot today, it's about 28 degrees outside,
it's about, well up to ten degrees hotter in the workshop
and we've been getting very sweaty.
So, what if you could make cooling clothing?
We have these packs,
these are existing commercially available
chilli-bin packs.
And we also have some sodium polyacrylate, which is
basically what goes in here mixed with water.
And it improves its ability to hold cold.
So, what we're going to do, and by we, I mean Simmy,
because he can operate the sewing machine expertly,
is make a T-shirt for me.
We're also going to make Tony a pair of cooling pants.
Oh, God.
One inside the other,
skilfully sewn together by Simmy,
so that the whole thing can be filled with the
chilli medium, which is what you're gonna make, Tony.
Oh, yeah, unfortunately, yes. Okay.
This is not just about humiliating Tony,
we're trying to do our bit to fight global warming
by finding low-fi, low-energy ways to stay cool.
As there are quite fortuitously six of these little ones.
Could I have a six pack?
Other way round. Is it
It's that, I know you've never seen one before. Yeah, well, I've
Not in the mirror, I haven't, no.
So, three there
No, no. No, no.
Two, two, two. Yes. What?
Two, two, two. That's it. Oh, yes.
Yeah.
So, Simmy gets to work sewing individual pockets
for the ready made ice packs to sit in.
Go on, shove it in.
There you go.
Shall I hold that up and we can see what the effect
Um Excellent.
Excellent.
I look like one of those, you know, cartoon superheroes.
All right, so next, Simmy is going to incorporate these
larger packs into the shoulders.
And then we'll put it in the fridge.
But first, we need to fill Tony's pants
with our homemade cooling gel.
Right, so Tony and I will make up the gel.
It's ten grams per litre, which doesn't sound like enough,
but apparently that's right according to the instructions
Sodium Polyacrylate, also known as water lock
Shall we do one litre first and give it a shot?
is often used in nappies and fire retardants
because it can absorb up to 300 times its weight in water.
Wow. Is it turning into Okay, It's really thick.
It's used in cool packs because the water gets trapped inside the gel,
reducing the rate at which it heats up.
It looks a bit like, um,
Yeah, it looks like a slushie.
So it stays cooler for longer than plain ice.
It's fantastic.
Now we've mixed up the cooling gel,
it's time for Simmy to sew individual pocketed channels
into Tony's massive pants
to accommodate all the sodium polyacrylate mixture.
This is wild, this stuff.
There's something slightly unsavoury about it,
your pants are also becoming very heavy, Tony.
That's
It's just
What are you doing to me?
So, we're ready to put our cool clothing in the fridge.
We'll leave them in there for an hour, put them on and see how good we look.
And how good we feel.
And just a few hours later,
enough time for a walk, a pint and two shakes of a lamb's tail
Right, men it's time to see if our hand sewn cooling clothing
actually works.
I'm gonna go first, Tony, if that's okay.
Ooh, yes, it feels cold.
Just put your hand on there.
Oh. That's gonna be Ooh.
Right, I'm going to disappear into the lav and then emerge
to gasps of amazement.
Very cold.
It's so realistic. Yeah.
That's great.
I've got to say, okay, apart from that,
we've got the six pack a bit low
All right. but the sensation
You look very broad.
But it's really good, this, these bits especially because they -
they cool down the sort of base of your neck.
It does square your shoulders off as well.
Doesn't it just.
How cold is it? Is it comfortable?
It's, yeah, it is, actually.
There's - there's no, there are no sharp edges or anything,
I'm definitely cooler.
I'm cooling down even as I stand here talking to you.
And when you touch it, do you actually think you've got abs,
are you convincing yourself it's like Yeah.
He's just oozing sex appeal.
And then we decided it was time for Tony to put his pants on.
Oh, my God.
I'm never gonna keep these on.
Come on, Tony.
Do I have to? Let's have a look.
They're gonna fall down.
They're falling down.
I feel like I've got some sort of disease.
Are - are you cooler?
They're cooler but mainly my thighs,
it's all dropped out.
It does.
They're coming down.
Feel it, it's not right. MAN: Ooh!
No.
It's horrible.
That's it. Yeah,
so we don't have to look at that.
Argh!
I wish to be able to see less well.
Erm, what can we conclude from that?
As an idea,
I'm not so sure about the pants, but the shirt, I think, is an idea it works.
If these were a bit thinner
and they were more evenly distributed,
chuck your T-shirt in the fridge the night before,
get up, slip it on.
Walk out, ice cool.
Oh, it's leaking.
Urgh, God.
It's squeezing up my back.
Oh, my God.
Right. I think that's the end of that scene.
I do hope so.
Welcome back to Wiltshire,
where we've been tackling climate change
by inventing cool clothing
and welding together a supermarket trolley and a bike,
obviously.
And now we're about to attempt to repair a broken train set
a surprise for Amy's dad's 75th birthday.
No pressure then.
MAN: Yeah.
Right, the toy trains have been cleansed of bird poo
by a very low-paid junior researcher,
we're now ready to start mending them,
which in this instance isn't very difficult
because I can reveal
that I had almost exactly
this train set. In fact, I still have it.
It had these two locomotives, the 0-6-0 Jinty
and the 462 Princess Elizabeth.
I also have the Guard's van,
this green coal truck. I have that flat one,
I have one of these green ones,
and I did have one of these blood and custard coaches.
But my big sister trod on it in about 1969.
And I haven't seen her since.
Nevertheless, there is a joy in mending things
and there's a particular joy in mending these trains,
because, actually, over the years I've mended hundreds of them,
they're very, very simple mechanisms.
All of these Tri-ang locomotives were designed to come apart
by the removal of one screw
down the chimney on these early ones.
Oh, yeah.
So, problems with the motor
tend to be that the magnet becomes weak,
a good test is if you put the motor down and put your screwdriver on it,
I can sort of pick the motor up with the screwdriver,
which is a rough and ready test.
But
it would be remiss of us not to use the re magnetiser.
Sting, dah-dah-dah! The remagnetiser.
It's in here,
it's a remarkable thing.
I do like the, uh the use of Meccano
Yes, it's Meccano themed,
this was made by a man called Ronald Dodds,
who's a toy train mender.
It's not something you're likely to have lying around in the home, to be honest.
In fact, I've never met anybody else in the world apart from Ronald Dodds,
who has a toy train magnet remagnetiser.
Using this compass, you establish the North Pole of the magnet,
this isn't absolutely crucial,
but it means that the locomotive will run in the correct direction.
I meant to say, actually, you shouldn't put anything
like your watch or your mobile phone
Or really expensive cameras.
Or your expensive cameras.
Are you ready for remagnetising?
Makes quite a loud noise, so brace yourself.
That's it.
These are basically coils with soft iron bars in them,
and they become a magnet when you apply the current.
And that re magnetises, because it's touching it,
the magnet in the motor is essential to its operation.
You can see that they're stuck to it now.
And doing my screwdriver test
MAN: What have you done?
Well, I've somehow de-magnetised it, which means it
Hang on.
I think you did.
Yeah, but that should just magnetise it in the other direction.
I think, well
How can I have killed a magnet?
Let's try that again.
That's the one, that's the one.
Yes, look.
So, the screwdriver test works.
It's back. It's back.
Now, let's test the remagnetised motor for real.
Could you give me some juice on the controller?
Yes.
Look at that.
Finally, an electro motive force.
That's nice. I like the little sparks.
And with the sparks flying,
it's time for a track test.
Okay, Simmy, if you could
Plug in.
Transformer is on, I can hear it.
The transformer is buzzing, so here we go. Are we ready?
I don't want to do this.
Go on.
It wants to go
and yet it doesn't.
I've got a bad feeling about this repair, for some reason.
I don't know why, it's just
I ought, I should be. I've done this dozens of times.
It doesn't work.
Time to run some diagnostics.
First, we check the power.
We've got 14 volts there, so we eliminate that.
Then we check the wiring.
That connection is good.
So, there's no short.
Then clean the track.
And clean the wheels.
Sometimes you get sort of invisible dirt.
And finally
We've had a bit of a fiddle around and we isolated the problem to the controller, the rear stat.
We wiggled it and wiggled it and hopefully cleaned it up.
So, it's just dirt and it needs cleaning like most things in life,
and it's not really surprising after all those years in the loft.
What is it that, erm Benjamin Franklin said,
"He who lives by hope alone will die farting."
Did he say that?
Right, that is running, it's buzzing,
here we go.
Look at that. Yes!
That's great. That is fantastic.
That's very pleasing, I hope Amy's father, how old is he?
Seventy five and a half now,
present it to them and
they'll go, "Wow, that's amazing." Take it home and put it back in the loft again
for another half century.
Very good.
Well, I enjoyed that.
But as much as I'd like to play with Dave's train set all day,
I have more pressing matters over in my pub.
We're trying to invent new pub games to entertain the customers
so they'll buy more beer and eat more food.
And today, we have invented a garden game
based on an old English idiom.
This is called "Two birds, one stone."
Simmy, if you'd like to activate the mechanism.
We fashioned two birds out of thin plywood,
cut out a small round hole in each
and mounted them onto a pivot system.
As you can see, the two birds swing, they've got holes in them,
the idea is that you have to throw a stone
at the point where the holes line up
and it goes through both birds.
And then you win a prize.
That's it, that's the tweet.
Yeah.
There's a, there's a jug there full of carefully selected pebbles.
We need to establish the throwing distance.
Oh.
That's good. That's cannae far, that.
No, that's, well, it can't be too easy.
I don't think it's gonna be easy.
You get three shots each.
Okay, Simmy, activate the two birds mechanism.
Do you think it's overarm or underarm?
I'm gonna go underarm. Okay.
Rubbish.
See, it's harder than you think.
Nope.
Pants.
Are you aiming for the hole?
Oh, that wasn't, that was very low.
Simmy, do you want to go? I'll activate the birds.
He's hidden them,
good stones at the bottom.
Rubbish.
It's hard.
Ooh!
This is one of those games that, I mean, it doesn't really mean anything,
but once it starts,
it sort of becomes very important, doesn't it?
Like so many things in life, timing is everything.
I think it starts from when you lift your arms, you've gotta
schwoo, there it is.
It's about the rhythm of the throw
versus the birds movement.
About understanding space and time.
Oh.
Or it's about throwing a stone at some birds.
Did that go through?
Oh.
So, you are the first person ever to score at two birds, one stone.
I've got two more yet.
Thank you very much.
With only one stone through the hole,
we invite members of the crew and a few locals to play along.
Ooh. Oh, that was very close.
What's this game called? Course it is.
Gooo! I can't do it, I honestly can't.
We even let cameraman Will have a go.
Yeah.
What does this button do?
Rubbish. Where are you from, sir?
MAN: Norway. Norway.
Norway, nil points.
Turns out to kill two birds in this game
takes 12 members of the crew,
three locals, some bloke from Norway and about 500 stones before
we eventually hit the target.
Yes!
But it's very satisfying when it's achieved.
That was, that was an almost perfect shot.
So, it's a fantastic game, actually.
I'm amazed no one's ever thought of it.
Every pub in England will have one of these soon.
And that's a promise.
In Wiltshire, we're back in my pub,
and after a lot of delays, cancellations and derailments,
Sim and I are now ready to hand back this repaired
and perfectly running train set that Amy brought us
when she heard that the Royal Oak is a pub of mending.
So Amy, who brought us this broken train set a few weeks ago,
is now waiting in the bar of the pub with her dad, Dave,
who was 75 a couple of months ago.
This is actually his train set,
he apparently hasn't seen it for many, many years,
he certainly hasn't seen it running for probably decades.
And this is meant to be a big, slightly belated,
birthday surprise for him.
So, it will either be very emotional because he loved his train set,
or he's completely forgotten about it
and wonders what the hell we're doing.
We're going to find out in about 15 seconds.
They're coming.
Amy.
Hello.
Good, thank you. How are you?
Very well, thank you, you must be Dave.
Hi, Mr May.
Thank you very much.
I gather it was a big one. We have something over here for you.
Do you recognise it?
I do. And does it work?
Well, let's find out. Sir.
If you'd like to take the driver's seat.
Is this the sort of thing that you thought Amy would do for your birthday?
I think Amy's always had an attachment
to junk, and
And really wouldn't throw anything away.
And, and she's just a hoarder.
And, erm
Whereas, erm yeah, I, uh
I put it away in the loft and forgot about it, really.
Erm Do you think
you'll simply put it back in the loft?
Probably.
I've got, I've now got a policy where, erm,
nothing goes in the loft. Erm
so, because if it's in the loft, you don't need it, so
No. No.
But it will be passed on to someone else. Yes.
Yeah. Yeah.
Well, that wasn't quite the emotional reaction we were hoping for,
but wait till he sees it go.
If you'd like to give it maximum berries forward, sir, which is clockwise.
It should
There you go.
When was the last time you saw that going around?
Forty years, I don't know. Yeah.
It is bringing back memories of my childhood,
and I did spend a lot of time setting it up and
going around buying model kits
where you used to glue
station buildings together and,
I mean, I - I honestly felt that I wouldn't see it again.
So
Oh, it's just brilliant. It's just really lovely
to see it running after all these years and with the age behind it.
It was actually a pleasure to make it work again
Yeah.
a train set back to life because you know that you're
effectively resurrecting somebody's childhood,
and the joy of childhood and the excitement.
Because back when we were young,
oh, God, here I go,
the train set and a new bicycle,
They were like the iPhones of the day, weren't they?
Yes, exactly. You couldn't have a more exciting thing.
Yes.
Gosh, am I going to get a bill now?
It's two and six.
Thank you, James. Enjoy. Thank you. Thank you.
And now, from one mode of transport to another.
I set off on a bike ride across the countryside
as I return to the problem of
unenvironmental supermarket trips.
Except, this isn't just a normal bike.
This is a trolley-bike.
The perfect merging of two engineering miracles.
This is the weirdest thing in the world.
Expertly combined by me, Simmy and Tony
to create something that outshines both.
It offers the ease and joy of riding a bike
straight to your destination,
with the convenience of a trolley ready and primed
to receive a shed load of shopping.
Argh.
And in the knowledge that you can do it in one go without ever leaving the saddle.
Sorry, can't stop.
And here it is in all its glory
on its inaugural ride to a well-known supermarket.
You missed, didn't you? Yeah.
And I'm into the supermarket, I'm still not off my bike.
Will it gets through the doors? Yes.
And we're in.
Right.
Er, rice and pasta,
seasonal, condiments - I hate that word.
WOMAN: Morning.
but now let's see how it fares as a trolley
Crisps and snacks.
Here we go.
Boo
peanuts.
Epic.
Oh, look,
beans and sausages.
It's quite fast, actually, it accelerates very well.
I did a skid.
Coming left.
Thank you. Pies.
Chocolate fingers.
Ooh, they're high.
Wee.
This is just brilliant.
I mean, all I'm doing is going for a bike ride, really.
It just makes shopping pleasurable.
Erm, straight line steering is quite good,
it's got a good turning circle, it does misbehave slightly in corners.
You have to remember about the back pedal brake.
So, the geometry may need a little bit of work.
But the basic idea is good.
Oh, my goodness, May. Good morning.
And it's proving very popular with happy shoppers.
MAN: Morning.
Thank you so much.
Cheese. Thank you so much.
Happy travels. that's all right.
Love it.
That's such an old-fashioned idea.
Look at those people pushing a trolley.
Some people are absolutely stuck in the 1970s.
Doo-doo-doo-do-doo-do-doo, doo-doo.
We need bog roll.
Oh
Unfortunately, I never passed my bike-trolley proficiency test.
Now all that's left to do is ride this incredible machine
to the checkout.
Under the watchful eye of the crew and Mel.
Morning.
Oh, no.
I've realised that there's a slight issue with this.
Would you like me to help?
I'm supposed to do this without getting off the bicycle.
That's all right.
Can I, actually - hang on
Yeah.
Pie.
I'm still on the bike.
No, you're fine.
Most people are quite helpful,
aren't they? They are. There we are, thank you.
And then I pay, and then we just put it back in there.
Yeah, okay. Okay. Would you like any bags?
Okay.
That's good.
That comes to 41.42, is that cash or card?
Of course I don't have cash or a card,
my butler does this.
Do you need me to pay it, James?
There we are, thank you so much.
Thank you very much. It's been absolutely fantastic.
Bye. Bye.
Ooh.
I'm still on the bike.
It turns out that this year is the 75th anniversary
of the very first shopping trolley being introduced to the UK.
Seventy-five years.
And in all that time, no one has thought
it could be combined with a bicycle.
And this is brilliant, you just go for a bike ride
and pick up everything you need for a happy existence on the way.
It's excellent.
Every home should have one.
And will.
Having fun?