| James May's Toy Stories | |
|---|---|
| Presented by | James May |
| Narrated by | James May |
| Country of origin | United Kingdom |
| No. of series | 1 (and 1 Special) |
| No. of episodes | 7 |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Will Daws Stuart Cabb[1] |
| Editor(s) | Ian Holt |
| Location(s) | Various |
| Running time | 60 minutes |
| Production company(s) | Plum Pictures |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | BBC Two |
| Original run | 27 October 2009 – 12 June 2011 |
| External links | |
| Website | |
| Production website | |
James May's Toy Stories is a television series presented by James May.[2][3] The series was commissioned for BBC Two from Plum Pictures.[3][4] The first episode, "Airfix", was shown on BBC Two at 8:00 pm on Tuesday 27 October 2009.[1]
The premise of the 6-part show was to bring favourite toys of the past into the modern era, by using the toys in real life large scale enterprises. In each episode, he also explores the history of each toy.
In Airfix, he builds a full-sized model of a Spitfire WWII fighter plane, using the plastic moulding and assembly technique used in the Airfix self-assembly plastic toy scale model range. In Plasticine, he models a full-sized garden out of the toy modelling clay Plasticine, as an exhibit in the Chelsea Flower Show. In Meccano, he builds a full-sized footbridge out of the mechanical construction toy range Meccano, to cross a canal in Liverpool. In Scalextric, he reconstructs the Brooklands racing circuit in full size using the slot-car toy racing track used by the Scalextric range. In Lego, he builds a full-sized house in Dorking out of the Lego toy model brick range. In Hornby, he re-lays a railway track along 10 miles (16 km) of a disused full-sized railway, the Tarka Trail, using the 1:76.2 scale track used in the Hornby Railways model train range. Of the six episodes, the Hornby attempt was the only one that failed; May revisited it in 2011 with a follow-up episode, The Great Train Race.
Contents |
May's interest in technology is known from his presentation of such programmes as James May's 20th Century and James May's Big Ideas. He credits much of the inventiveness of humans to the love of playing with toys and he has credited many technological developments to men playing in sheds.[5] He has shown his passion for toys in programmes he has presented including James May's Top Toys and James May: My Sisters' Top Toys and he has discussed his desire for children to get away from games consoles and play with real toys preferably with their parents.[2] May was quoted as saying:
| “ | For too long now we have regarded the great toys as mere playthings. It's time to use them to bring people together and achieve greatness. And I bet it'll be a right laugh as well.[2] | ” |
The ambitious — world record-breaking in many cases — projects included:[2]
| Episode | Title | Original airdate | Summary |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | "Airfix" | 27 October 2009 | Attempting to build a full-sized model Spitfire from a giant Airfix kit. |
| 2 | "Plasticine" | 3 November 2009 | Creating a Plasticine garden and entering it for the 2009 Chelsea Flower Show. |
| 3 | "Meccano" | 10 November 2009 | Building a life-sized rolling bascule bridge made entirely out of Meccano. |
| 4 | "Scalextric" | 17 November 2009 | Racing two Scalextric cars at the site of former grand prix track Brooklands in Surrey. |
| 5 | "Lego" | 20 December 2009[6] | Attempting to build the world's first full-sized house made entirely out of Lego bricks. |
| 6 | "Hornby"[7] | 25 December 2009[8] | Linking Barnstaple to Bideford with the world's longest model train set. |
| (7) | "The Great Train Race"[9] | 12 June 2011[9] | 2011 Special: Re-attempt of the OO-gauge challenge between Barnstaple and Bideford, racing against a German team from Miniatur Wunderland. |
Many of the plans involved significant engineering problems, so the programme makers searched for architects, designers and engineers to help them.[10] However, many more volunteers would be required as a labour force, so appeals for volunteers were distributed in local newspapers.
James successfully constructs a model Spitfire, on a scale of 1:1, by having the pieces constructed out of fibreglass by Gateguards in Cornwall.[11] Once the fibreglass pieces have been made, it becomes clear that they cannot support their own weight without internal polystyrene supports. The model was completed and placed on display at the Royal Air Force Museum Cosford until November 2009.[12] In October 2010, the Spitfire returned to Cosford's Hanger 1.[13]
May designed a garden named "Paradise in Plasticine" made entirely of Plasticine for the 2009 Chelsea Flower Show. He missed out on the official awards but won 'The People's Choice' award and was also awarded a special "Plasticine Gold" Award for his efforts.[14] May refused to take credit for the garden, the largest of its kind, saying that 2,000 volunteers assisted with the venture.[15]
In July 2009, the garden was moved to Sudbury Hall in Derbyshire,[16] and was placed on permanent display in the upper mall of the Octagon Shopping Centre in Burton upon Trent in February 2010.[17]
In September 2009, May unveiled a life-sized Meccano bridge 23 metres (75 ft) long.[18][19][20] The scheme was designed at the University of Liverpool by Architecture students John Carroll, Daniel Dobson and Josh Woods, and was then engineered by the design and engineering consultancy Atkins. The bridge comprises two parts; a swing bridge and a rolling bascule bridge, which in total weigh about 1⁄2 tonne. It took 20 students and technicians more than 10 weeks to build, enlisting help from the University of Liverpool's Engineering Department to manage the project. The bridge's two sides have 14 sections within the swing side and 22 sections within the bascule side. Each section required around 40 hours to build to a sufficient standard. It was situated in the heart of Liverpool's newly redeveloped Pier Head. As the home to Meccano for more than 70 years during the running of the Binns Road 'factory of dreams' until 1979, Liverpool is an appropriate location for the bridge. It is also believed to be a new world record for the biggest Meccano bridge ever built, with over 100,000 individual parts per side — including 28,000 bolts.[21] After the successful completion of the project the student project managers were invited to the Lego House in Episode 5 for a party as a reward for their efforts.
Both sections of the bridge have remained at the University of Liverpool, with one of the two sections on public display within the engineering department.
May re-created the banked track at Brooklands in Scalextric track.[22][23][24][25][26]
The 2.95 miles (4.75 km)[27] long track was assembled by 400 volunteers who used approximately 20,000 Scalextric pieces. The project faced a number of obstacles as James insisted on using the route of the original Brooklands track, most of which has now been demolished and built over. Obstacles including residential housing, commercial buildings, fences, a road, and the most challenging obstacle - a large pond. The track broke the world record for the longest successful Scalextric track, with the previous record measuring 1.59 miles (2.56 km).
The race had two teams. Volunteers (often referred to, in the show, as "Tom's Team"; Tom Ferris being a participant from a nearby company) and residents of Brooklands against "Scalextric Professionals". The race used multiple drivers in a relay, with each 'driver' racing one part of track as a single power unit could not power the whole track and one person would not be able to run the length of the track. The cars briefly stopped due to crashing off the track, the contacts acquiring dirt and flawed changeovers. Tiff Needell guested as the race reporter. The volunteers raced a maroon Aston Martin DBS V12 model and the professionals raced a silver Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren.[28] The Aston Martin won the race by a few minutes.[29]
Publicity from the programme makers called for volunteers to help with the building project.[30] The response was overwhelming; on Saturday 1 August 2009 huge queues formed at the construction site, Denbies Wine Estate in Dorking, Surrey. Some people started queuing at 4:30 am. 1,200 were given tickets to work on the project while another 1,500 people had to be turned away.[31][32]
Volunteers made standardised hollow blocks each made of 272 standard 8-stud Lego bricks: 12 bricks long by 6 wide and 8 bricks high.[33][34] The house was completed on 17 September 2009. Overall, the construction project overran by one month.
The programme makers attempted to sell the house to the Legoland theme park in Windsor. However, the cost of dismantling and reassembling the house was estimated at £50,000 which was judged to be too expensive, and the deal did not go through.[35] Having spent one night in the house, May said "I slept in it on Friday and had the best night's sleep for a long time. The bed was a bit hard but I slept like a brick. Knocking it down is just wrong on every level. It's a lovely thing — it will break the hearts of the 1,000 people who worked like dogs to build it.[36] During the construction, James May noticed that one of the plastic bricks on the outside wall of the house, which was supposed to be entirely red, contained one pink lego piece on the outer rim. James May sarcastically said on air that he "hated" the volunteer who did this, as it upset the colour and balance of the house.
The house could not remain at Denbies because the space was needed for vines and there was no planning permission.[37] Despite attempts to save the house, dismantling the house began on Tuesday 22 September 2009. Before the demolition, on Sunday or Tuesday a Lego cat named Fusker, after May's own pet, went missing and is assumed to have been stolen by a member of the public — a few of whom had been allowed to look round the house after filming.[38] The 3.3 million plastic bricks used to build the house will be donated to charity.[37]
May, who had previously identified the train set as his "absolute favourite"[39] attempted to build the world's longest model railway. The team hoped that a train would run successfully along the length of the track, built on the picturesque Tarka Trail – a disused 37-mile (60 km) long railway line acquired by the local council in 1990 and which was converted for use as an off-road cycle track.[40] May chose the site because he thought that people wanted to see a line rebuilt there and because of the dramatic scenery. May joined 400 enthusiasts, including students from Petroc, to build the miniature railway stretching 10 miles (16 km) from Barnstaple to Bideford, in North Devon.[41]
The attempt was disrupted by vandals and thieves who interfered with the track. Coins were dropped on to the line, causing short circuits and some batteries and parts of the track were taken.[41]
Simon Kohler, marketing manager of Hornby model railways, said that the train which travels at just 1 mile per hour (1.6 km/h) failed two miles short of Bideford station; but he also told BBC news "Even though the last locomotive gave up the ghost at Instow, we did link the track – in fact I finished it at about 2230 – so we'll just need to wait and see what Guinness make of it.[41]
As shown in the programme, five trains set off on the track. The first, James' own 1970s-vintage Flying Scotsman model, failed very early (it had been out of use for many years). The other trains were chosen to reflect the original services on the line: a steam-hauled passenger train (a rebuilt SR 'West Country' class locomotive and Pullman coaches), to represent the Atlantic Coast Express; a diesel-hauled passenger train (a BR Class 42 Warship with Mark 1 coaches), to represent the 'everyday' passenger services; a diesel-hauled goods train (EWS-liveried Class 37 and hopper wagons), to represent the clay trains that ran to Fremington Quay; and the prototype of Hornby's Class 395 "Javelin" model.[41] Passing sections allowed the faster models to overtake the slower ones. The "West Country" locomotive had been carried by Oz Clarke on trains from London Waterloo to Barnstaple, to replicate the original route of the Atlantic Coast Express. The Javelin was the last train running.
After the failure of the first attempt, a new toy train challenge occurred on 16 April 2011. A team composed of Germans from the Miniatur Wunderland (including one of its founders) who had assisted in the first toy train attempt raced against a team from Britain, again between Barnstaple and Bideford in North Devon.[42] The new challenge was to race three different types of trains from one end of the track and see who could get to the other station first, with each team starting at opposite ends. May asked for help from the local marines to guard the components as last time batteries and track were stolen and coins were placed on the track causing short circuits. A different, sturdier type of track was used from the previous attempt, as was a new battery system to power it; the length of the track was divided in 100 yard insulated sections with two batteries, one would power the section the train was on and the other would power the next section and the first battery would move to the section after the second battery when the train moved into the second battery's section. This time, for most of the route, two parallel tracks were laid to avoid the opposing trains meeting head-on.
The German Team started at Bideford and the British Team at Barnstaple. The race was a best of three rounds. The first round used steam locomotives, the Germans using a model German DR Class 58.30 and the British using James' own childhood model LNER Class A3 4472 Flying Scotsman – "with realistic chuffing sound" – which had been repaired since the last attempt and was driven by Oz Clarke. The second race involved a German DB Class 403 diesel train, nicknamed the "Donald Duck", and a British Railways InterCity 125. The third round featured modified trains driven by any power source the teams could come up with:
The Germans were the first to complete the full journey with the Donald Duck. The British then won the second round with their hydrogen fuel cell train, and the third round was also won by the British with the Flying Scotsman after the German DR58 steam locomotive had problems. James May, after the crushing disappointment from the first attempt, was emotional that his Flying Scotsman model had made it to Bideford, and was delighted that the mechanically generated "realistic chuffing sound" was still working.
Several of the engines that finished had problems which were fixed en-route. The Flying Scotsman had to have a new chassis block, the "Donald Duck" had two breakdowns due to a faulty gearbox, both within view of the finishing point, and the German steam BR58 limped along very slowly with unspecified problems to finish last of all the trains several hours after the others. Both experimental trains that finished had reliable power sources but major issues with top-heavy stability. All six trains eventually arrived at their destination.
The episode aired on BBC 2, 12 June 2011 at 8:00pm.[9]
The British models (and the track) were made by Hornby Railways, the German models used were made under the Rivarossi brand, which is also owned by Hornby.
The series was nominated in the Features category of the 2010 British Academy Television Awards, but lost out to the eventual winner, Masterchef: The Professionals.
James released a well-received book in conjunction with the series, through Conway Publishing (2009).
Rivarossi Importer - Ontracks.co.uk. Stockist of the models used by the German team