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00:00Hello, these days I spend more and more time in my Wiltshire home and the pub I own, thinking
00:14about all the big problems in the world and some smaller ones that annoy me. Luckily there's a
00:22place I can go to solve them all, or at least try. My shed. Right, it's here that I have the tools,
00:32let's just saw some wood up, the tea, and a couple of other highly competent blokes,
00:39very good, brace yourself, who've agreed to help me rid the world of problems,
00:45great, and small. The cereal has gone soggy. I'll also have to take on other people's problems.
00:55What is wrong with Peter? He used to make a sound and now he doesn't. By which I mean the locals at
01:01my pub who are always bringing me stuff to mend. Is it a train set? So join us and our excitable crew,
01:11who will capture our endeavours. That was epic. As we create, make, that feels like a terrible
01:21thing we've just done, repair, so it's never worked. Not in my lifetime. And repurpose,
01:26in my shed load of ideas. What do you think? This is just brilliant.
01:41You might think that sitting on this bench in Wiltshire is very relaxing. And so it should be,
01:51unless your mind is filled with concern for all the problems of the world and how to solve them.
01:57Right now I'm keen to take on one of the most persistent problems that affects the whole planet,
02:04waste. And that's plastic waste. In Britain, we discard 1.7 billion pieces of the stuff every week.
02:14And while we do recycle nearly half of it, that comes with its own set of problems.
02:20Back in the olden days, when I was a lad, the business of rubbish was very simple. You produce
02:26some rubbish, this bottle for example, and you put it in the bin. And that was the end of that. We didn't
02:33know what happened to it. We didn't care. We were blissfully ignorant. Now, of course,
02:38we have recycling. And recycling is a wonderful thing. I think the key to human happiness is
02:43infinite recyclability and abundant renewable energy. Because then we can indulge our desires to
02:48produce and consume, but without filling the world with our tat. It does come with a few problems,
02:54though. I mean, this is the brown bin. Is that glass? Or is that plastic? Or is it cardboard? No,
03:00maybe cardboard goes in the greenwood. But that depends which authority you're living under.
03:04There are 39 different recycling regimes across the UK alone. Do you take the tops off bottles?
03:12Do you leave them on? Are you supposed to rinse them out? Are you supposed to take the labels off?
03:15Are you supposed to put green glass separate from clear glass? Does that go out on Thursday
03:19afternoon? Or is it the blue bin? And it goes out on Wednesday morning. People are very annoyed
03:22about recycling because it's too complicated. Apparently, 82% of British households put something
03:29wrong in the recycling bin. What if you could recycle your plastics, for example, yourself? What if you
03:36could cut all this out, all this frustration, all this annoyance, and at home simply turn all those old
03:43bottles and what have you into something beautiful and enduring? Let's try.
03:49In case that wasn't clear, I want to reduce plastic waste and make something useful. So I consult my
03:55team of recycling enthusiasts. My inventive engineer, Simi. We're now set at two bar. And my up for
04:01anything carpenter, Tony the tool. And not forgetting our crew, who have been busy collecting and shredding
04:10plastic for our great recycling experiment. We are planning to make a board game for the pub,
04:17so Tony Sim and I prepare our garden smithy. Right, situation report viewers. We've shredded all our
04:24plastic. We are going to melt it. We're going to use this little oven and this toasted sandwich maker.
04:30We're looking for a temperature of around 150 degrees at which it will become very plastic but not
04:35liquid. Simi has this attractive pair of silicon gloves. When we have made our plastic into a plastic
04:41state, one of us is going to need it until we've got enough to put in our mould to make a rectangular
04:47section. To melt plastic safely, it must have a number two on its recycling symbol, which tells us
04:54it's non-toxic. This can be found in milk bottles and without giving the game away, so to speak, plastic
05:01lids are perfect for our counters and board of different colours. To begin with, we're going to
05:08do white and we're going to do it in the oven. The aim of our back garden experiment is to find out if
05:15this process actually works. By running different heating appliances all at the same time, we're hoping
05:21to generate enough plastic to build our game. Put a sheet of baking paper on there in the hope that it
05:26won't stick. Shall we start with that? Yeah, let's put that in and then let's do the same thing with
05:33the toasted sandwich maker. We will do a different colour. We'll do the top, shall we do blue? Once
05:37heated, the plastic must be malleable enough for us to reshape it. It's burning. After five to ten
05:44minutes, the plastic has melted. So if we get that on there. Okay, so now let's get some more in here,
05:50we can reuse that. It's getting hard and breaking apart. Got that one there.
05:59We want to create a marbling effect, but quickly discover it's not really that simple. I'm not
06:05sure the colours are going to combine very effectively. The table is going to collapse. The
06:08table is going to collapse. Polymer thermoplastics melt easily, but once off the heat, they cool and
06:15harden within seconds. It's going to take about three days at this rate. That's already gone too
06:20hard now. Work it, work it. I'm just going to shove that in there for a minute just to see if I can get
06:29any shape to this whatsoever. At least it's taking on a rough shape. We've made nougat. That's not even
06:40quarter of what we need. Situation update, viewers. That is what we have created so far. It's very
06:46difficult to get it into a properly plastic state. It doesn't mix together very well. It doesn't form
06:51very well. It sets fire to greaseproof paper. It burns Tony's hands. Would you like to know,
06:58viewers, what it was that we were hoping to make for the pub? And then you can gauge how successful
07:04we've been so far. It was, is, a chessboard and a set of drafts.
07:14The artists amongst you, like Rodan looking at a block of stone and being able to see the finished
07:19work within it, will look at that and say, yes, yes, a set of drafts and a board.
07:23Oh God, what are we going to do? I've done all that stuff about bins and recycling and how annoying
07:36it is. But Simmy thinks he may have the answer. I don't know if it's the answer.
07:46Well, I think it's worth trying. We're running out of options, son.
07:52We leave Simmy with the burden of solving our plastic problem.
07:56I find, I think, better over a pint. So Tony and I head to the pub. We're also meeting a local dude
08:03who would like us to repair his 19th century family heirloom. No pressure then.
08:08You're Peter. Yes. James. How are you? Hello. This is Tony. Hello, Tony.
08:14What is that? It's a Victorian, a compendium of games. That's the book. Now, the reason it's wrapped
08:24up in cellophane is because this tray is all broken. I had the utmost difficulty in getting it out
08:30because it all sort of fell apart. So I put it in the bag so I could lift it.
08:34And it's Victorian, you say? Yes. But the book of instructions gives us
08:39some clue. So it's before bridge, even auction bridge. So when is that? Late 19th century?
08:44Yes. The Victorians could be quite verbose. Yes.
08:48And it also always amazes me when I see anything Victorian that the type is so tiny.
08:52Yes. And yet they had to read it with candles most of the time because they didn't have electricity
08:56either. As chess stands pre-eminently and without question at the head of all the games detailed
09:04hitherto, so does the game of whist occupy the position of honour amongst all the multitudinous
09:13games of cards. It is THE game. There's several pages of this before it actually tells you how to
09:18play it. Where did you get this from? My parents gave it to me when I was about 11.
09:24You weren't 11 in 1875? No. So it was already an antique? Oh yes. All the screws perfectly
09:31aligned. There's a lot of work gone into that. Before my fascination with the Victorian gaming
09:37world takes hold, we need to find out how we can help. The main problem is this tray here.
09:43That is a picture of it. Oh. And you see there's that tray which sits in there. To lift it out,
09:50there should be a ring at each end. Ah. So that's what snapped? Yes. Now you can see the holes there.
09:57Unfortunately, one of the rings has got lost. Whether you can get your hands on another one?
10:02We can make one. You can make one, yes. Let's not forget, Tony, that when this was made,
10:07there were very few distractions. There was no internet, obviously, no electricity, no television,
10:12no radio. Just good, wholesome family fun. Yeah. Played by little children in massive knickerbockers
10:19and their parents who were dying of consumption. But had at least that afternoon enjoyed the public
10:25hanging at Newgate. Ah, the good old days. So I've got all these bits together. But where do these
10:34belong? Da-da-da. Something is missing from down here. We can reinstate that, I think,
10:41with a bit of careful gluing and clamping, and then once over with a very finely set plane.
10:48This is actually rather nice, isn't it, Tony? It's beautiful. Given that it was probably made in
10:53great numbers, what's your ambition for this? To put it in a state, really, when the grandchildren can
11:02play with this again. Peter, we shall tidy up the box, replace that bit that's peeled off,
11:09yeah, make another loop and blend it in as seamlessly as possible. Yes, leave it with us,
11:15Peter. We will be in touch, and you will be astonished, and you'll look at it and think,
11:19that's great, and then go back to your iPhone. Thank you very much. This might be a relatively
11:24small repair, but it will involve some intricate carpentry and some light metalwork. But the weight of
11:31history will add extra pressure as we attempt to get Peter's compendium of games back to full working order.
12:01Here in Wiltshire, we're trying to tackle the big issue of plastic waste by seeing if it's possible
12:07to skip the bins altogether and recycle our plastics at home in our DIY recycling centre.
12:13Smirking. It's burning. Our idea was to make a draft set for the pub out of milk bottles,
12:20but so far our efforts have proved fruitless. It looks terrible. Oh god, what are we going to do?
12:27But we may just have hit upon a solution. So we need to melt in small quantities. I think so.
12:35And a smaller mould. I was wondering if, just as an experiment, we put a little bit of material in
12:43there. It's a piece of his vacuum cleaner from his van. See, the thing is, ideally you'd put it into a
12:49hot mould, heat the tube itself with the torch, let it cool or dunk it in some water. Hopefully it will
12:56shrink a bit and a nice round section pellet of recycled plastic will pop out. Are you ready? Yep.
13:05That's so exciting. Oh man. Look at that. Ta-da. Hey. What a breakthrough. I'm so happy. I'm so happy,
13:28given everything we've been through today. It's good. It is good. I love it. Yeah. We've just got to
13:35refine it. Yeah. We've just got to make decent moulds. Yep. We put the ball in the middle of it,
13:40and we put a lever on something that goes in it, and then we just ram it down. A proper mould will
13:47speed up this whole process, so we waste no time in getting back to the shed. While Tony makes the start
13:54melting more plastic, Sim and I craft the smaller moulds using my new milling machine.
14:01I'm going to bore it on the Rishton, which is a lovely machine. Isn't it lovely? Isn't it lovely?
14:07Lucy wants to give it a name. It's a Rishton. It is a vertical mill, so you could call it,
14:12you like alliterative names, Victoria the Vertical Mill. Nice. Vincent the Vertical Mill or Ricky Rishton.
14:22It's a girl. I think it's a girl. Why is it a girl? Well, you've made the lathe a man, so I...
14:27I haven't made the lathe a man. You did. The lathe is a lathe.
14:32I think the milling machine should be a girl called Millie. I'll make a little sticky label.
14:37Update, viewers, number eight or nine or ten, we're not quite sure. We think we can see an end to the
14:44recycled plastic conundrum, and it involves making some very, very simple moulds, which we're going to do
14:49here on Millie, the milling machine, and Doris, the drill.
15:00Ignition. Millie is milling. Bet you £100 in snatches.
15:06Down.
15:16So this is basically our mould, and we're going to put our plastic in it, and we're going to press out
15:22counters. Using it as a press, this redundant old pillar drill, which will ensure consistency,
15:30which is the key to mass production. Does the pillar drill have a name?
15:34No, nothing has a name. The mill doesn't, the little mill doesn't, the pillar drill doesn't,
15:39the little lathe doesn't, the big lathe doesn't, the bench doesn't, my mini doesn't. The only things
15:44that have names here are Simmy and James. This piece of aluminium is not called Alan the aluminium.
15:51It's just a piece of aluminium.
15:53Now we've cleared that up, we can get back to making Malcolm the mould and Peter Piston,
15:57which we need for pressing the counters for our draft set.
16:01Where would you keep your G-clamps?
16:04Do you want to use the G-clamp that I made as a 15-year-old?
16:07Yes. If it still works.
16:08I believe it does. It's a bit rusty and...
16:14That's rather... That is rather good.
16:17Did you cast all that?
16:18Yeah.
16:18Yeah. So you made a wooden pattern?
16:21Yep.
16:22Sand casted?
16:24Yes. Used the horizontal mill on those faces, I think, and then turned everything else and...
16:31That was that.
16:33That would be marvellous.
16:36Now I quickly turn a piston on the lathe. This will be used to press into the mould to create the counters.
16:43Into this churk.
16:44Done. All we need now is a bit of mould and plastic to go in there. Job done.
16:53Beautiful.
16:54Where is Tony?
16:56He's in the kitchen, melting a small quantity of plastic for us to press into our newly made mould.
17:04Here's Tony!
17:06Anybody order green balls?
17:07Hopefully this time it will work.
17:09He's got hands of asbestos.
17:11Right, James, would you like to do the honours?
17:15Just... Let's try.
17:16Where do I stop?
17:17Here they go. Just keep going.
17:21Hey!
17:23Can we have another one?
17:25It's a bit rough.
17:28Surface finish on the outside is not that great. It's still very hot as well.
17:31I think the alley is probably just sucking all the heat out of it very quickly, but...
17:34I think it's getting better.
17:37That one is better. That one is better. That was much better.
17:42I would say we have cracked the counters.
17:44Yes sir.
17:45Great.
17:47All we need to do is repeat the process 23 more times and build a draughts board.
17:52So we will now shift to something more interesting than this, if that's possible.
18:00Once our game is completed, I'll be bringing it to the pub for everyone to enjoy.
18:05This will give the locals another reason to drop by.
18:09It's not easy running a pub, you know, what with business rates, the cost of thatching,
18:14spiralling wage costs, people making off with the cutlery.
18:18And on top of all that, I have to think about choosing the right flavour of crisps.
18:23Which got me thinking, perhaps it's time to revolutionise the nation's favourite pub snack.
18:32We love crisps, but we have identified a problem, which is that you buy a bag of crisps,
18:38here's a blue packet, which is cheese and onion, and you think, oh, excellent.
18:43They are absolutely delicious. Peak cuisine.
18:47But what if you get half it down the bag and then you suddenly think,
18:50do you know what, I fancy salt and vinegar.
18:52So we were thinking, what if all crisps were plain, and then, let's say we're in my pub,
18:58and you have, rather than a packet of crisps, a bowl of completely plain crisps,
19:03and then, a series of flavours, perhaps in atomiser bottles, that you added to the crisp.
19:11So you picked a crisp up and you think, I think I'll have salt and vinegar for this one.
19:16Munch.
19:18And then the next crisp, you think, no, I enjoyed the salt and vinegar,
19:21but this time I'm going to have cheese and onion. Eat. Every crisp could be different.
19:29Let me talk to you a bit about some of the flavours I was imagining. Spam, anchovies,
19:36or even combine them in a new flavour, spam and anchovy.
19:40Oh, that'd be minging.
19:41No, I think it'd be quite nice, wouldn't it?
19:43Spam and anchovies.
19:43Spam and anchovy, and it rolls off the tongue. A bag of spam and anchovy, please.
19:47OK, what if we...
19:48Cook it up.
19:49Pour them in there.
19:50Yeah, cook it up.
19:51With the spam.
19:53With some spam.
19:54This is where everybody's going,
19:55get the spam out, make a hole in the bottom of the tin.
19:58Have you ever met somebody who speaks like that?
20:01Yes.
20:03People who give you advice on the internet.
20:09They're right, though.
20:10They're right.
20:13Oh, this is a nice looking block of spam.
20:17When was the last time you had spam?
20:19About three days ago.
20:23I had spam and beans when I was left on my own at home the other day.
20:27Right, there's the cubed spam.
20:29You've added some more oil into there, yeah?
20:31I have, yes.
20:32OK, that can go on the cooker with a wooden spoon.
20:38While we wait for our flavours to blend, I think I've spotted another opportunity to
20:43enhance the pub snack experience.
20:47What if?
20:49Spam on a cheese and onion, Crisp.
20:51Here you go.
20:55OK, ready?
20:56Cheers.
20:56Cheers.
20:57Three, two, one.
21:00Oh, yeah.
21:03God, that's good.
21:04That's really good.
21:06Mmm.
21:09Does anybody from the crew want to try a...
21:11Yeah, I'll try it.
21:12This is the hand of Will Fisher coming in.
21:16What do you think?
21:16Oh, that's excellent.
21:18That's for Andy.
21:23It's good, isn't it?
21:25How are we just going to spend the rest of this eating spam?
21:28Well, it's just...
21:30Right, back to the task in hand, which is trying to make atomised flavours for crisps.
21:34This needs to be heated up.
21:35Do you mind doing that, Sammy?
21:36No, no.
21:36Because you're nearest and you're experts at cooking.
21:39Is it worth sprinkling a little bit of salt in as well, too?
21:42Oh, yes.
21:43Yes.
21:44Within a matter of moments, our spam-chovy mix, you're welcome, is ready.
21:49Pass me a piece of fun, I'm going to come up.
21:54What?
21:55As Tony fashions a funnel out of foil and pours the infusion into the sprayer,
22:00I'm already convinced this will be a hit in the pub.
22:04I am genuinely quite excited about this.
22:07This could be a world-changing moment.
22:08Spam-and-anchovy crisp for the first time in the history of humanity.
22:25What?
22:25It was.
22:26It tastes of spam-and-anchovy. That's amazing.
22:30Step aside, cheese and onion. Stand down, salt and vinegar.
22:35A new flavour combination has arrived.
22:39You have to eat them quickly, obviously, otherwise they go soggy.
22:41But you do eat crisp quickly, don't you? You don't sit and...
22:43Mmm.
22:44...pontificate.
22:45Sometimes you get a note of anchovy, and then sometimes you get the spam first.
22:49So it's a bit of a surprise as well.
22:50Yeah.
22:50The basic idea of that works.
22:54You can have a bowl of plain crisp and then add any flavour that the pub can conceive.
23:01There'll be a great big rack of them, colour-coded with little signs that say spam-and-anchovy.
23:06Spice paste, the regulars, salt and vinegar, cheese and onion, prawn cocktail.
23:11It's fantastic.
23:12That has completely revolutionised crisp.
23:14They've been trapped for...
23:17When were crisps invented?
23:18Probably the 1920s. I don't know.
23:20They've been locked into this small-minded idea that the same flavour has to run through the whole bag,
23:25and it doesn't.
23:28God, we're good.
23:30You saw it here first.
23:31The crisp spray atomiser coming soon to a pub near me.
23:42Welcome back to Wiltshire, where, as well as tackling some of the world's biggest problems,
23:47we're also often busy mending personal effects brought into the pub by the locals.
23:53So Tony and I are back in the workshop to get started on the business of mending.
23:59Peter came to the pub.
24:00He brought us his Victorian games box.
24:05These bits are broken.
24:07And Tony is an expert on gluing things together, because that's the sort of thing he does.
24:12There's a lot in here, actually.
24:14It's rather cleverly done.
24:15This appears more broken than when we got it.
24:17It does, actually. The lid, Tony, is coming apart at the back and needs gluing and clamping.
24:25He doesn't want it restored, but he doesn't want it to fall apart any further.
24:30So there should be a little ring in each end for lifting it out.
24:33One of them is long lost, but it's okay, because I have some brass rod of an appropriate diameter
24:42to make another. Do you want to make two and make them match?
24:45I mean, that's the original ring. Victorian fingers went through that.
24:50We won't get rid of that, but I think they should match.
24:54While I reacquaint myself with my ancient soldering kit...
24:57It has some solder paste, various solders, two tins of flux that I've had for,
25:03I'm afraid to say, 40 years.
25:05Tony begins the delicate job of gluing the tray inside the box.
25:09Is it sticking together?
25:11Yeah, it's just fiddly, and there's so many little bits.
25:17I think I'm just going to use masking tape to clamp it, because it doesn't need a lot of pressure.
25:20No.
25:21Heating the rod makes the metal easier to bend.
25:24Let's do this without setting the fire to the Victorian games box,
25:29because that will make the job a lot more complicated.
25:33Right, leave that to cool naturally, and then it will be more malleable.
25:38This bit at the back is going to need some quite hefty clamping and probably leaving overnight.
25:44That is now much easier to bend, because it's been annealed,
25:47which is a sort of posh metal worker's way of saying, made a bit softer.
25:51Man in heaven, virtually perfect.
25:55See, that annoys me, that one's not in the same direction as all the others.
26:00That's properly weird, Tony.
26:02Don't you line them up?
26:03No.
26:03On your light switches?
26:04On your plug sockets?
26:06No.
26:06They've got to be in the same direction.
26:08That's disgusting.
26:09They've got to be at the right tension, which may not be with the slot in the right direction.
26:14You can't compromise integrity for lining your slots up.
26:18Well, I think visual aesthetics are better than safety.
26:21I quite like a certain amount of randomness.
26:23I like the odd picture in my house to be slightly on the top.
26:26Look, whoever did this originally has lined them up horizontally.
26:29That's probably why that one came undone.
26:34Next, we focus on the lid repairs.
26:37It's not split, it's merely come away.
26:39It's slightly warped, so we need to get some glue into the gap.
26:43But Tony's taping the inside so that any glue that goes all the way through
26:47doesn't run down and spoil the inside of the lid.
26:51Very wise.
26:52Oh, that's nice.
26:53The glue is squidging out, which is a good sign.
26:55I would leave that overnight, wouldn't you?
26:57Yeah.
26:59With the lid of the box clamped and secure, I can return to crafting two identical brass rings,
27:04which act as handles for the tray.
27:08Beautiful curve, but somehow there, maybe it was when I squeezed the pliers,
27:13I might have twisted it slightly in my hammer.
27:15It appears that I may not be bothered about screws and light switches being aligned,
27:19but I do like my rings to be perfectly circular.
27:23I have improved it a bit, look.
27:24That's not bad.
27:26It's not bad, but it's not good, is it?
27:28Here's a little jewellery mending tip you probably never thought you'd be getting from me.
27:33The mistake people make, I want to demonstrate, you take a ring, say, from your necklace,
27:38and you think, I need to open that one up to put another one in,
27:40or whatever, and you open it by doing that and pulling it apart.
27:44You will never get it back together.
27:45Always open it by doing it that way, because then you can squash it minutely in that plane,
27:53and then when you push it back together, the ends will be tight against each other,
27:58and you can solder it.
27:59Clumps itself.
28:00Yeah.
28:02Does that look ringy enough to you?
28:03It's perfect.
28:05So you are a bit of a perfectionist, aren't you?
28:07Not really, but people are watching.
28:10Well, at least I hope they are, because next is the incredible science of soldering.
28:16The way I always do this, because it's very easy to put too much on,
28:21clip a tiny bit of the solder off, I'll put a bit of fluxite on there,
28:26and then if you put your little scrap of solder...
28:30How will it stay in place?
28:32You can simply heat it up, and then that little bit will run into the joint.
28:37The trick with soldering is to heat up the metal near the joint, rather than the joint itself.
28:42Oh, wow.
28:46That's impressive.
28:49Get in!
28:50That's very impressive.
28:51Right, you can glue your box back together now, Tone.
28:54Excellent.
28:55That was very satisfying.
28:57I'm not good at chess. I sort of know the rules. You're only good at chess?
29:00I joined a chess club for a laugh, because I thought it'd be exciting, and it wasn't.
29:04You thought it would be exciting?
29:06Yeah, I don't know what was going on to me.
29:08What was the alternative?
29:09It was a Rubik's Q club. That was quite new.
29:12I wasn't a member of any clubs. We had gangs, and, you know, a few people were interested in
29:17making stuff out of wood and building bicycles. Some others were interested in
29:22photography and that, so that you just, you sort of formed natural clubs, but they weren't
29:26formalised, because if they were formalised, they'd involve a grown-up, and that would spoil it.
29:32We've got a sort of club here.
29:34We have.
29:35We don't have any knowledge here, do we? But it is a club.
29:38You're just going to hold it together with some tape?
29:41Yeah.
29:41See, that's already a massive improvement.
29:45How are my rings?
29:45The rings are lush. You've got the nicest rings I've ever seen.
29:49And the trick is to do that, and then get a bit of tension around the corners, isn't it?
29:53So all that's really left to do is for you to assemble and glue, is that the dominos tray?
29:58Yeah, this is for the dominos.
29:59Ssemble and glue the dominos tray, give it a bit of a wipe down, check the gluey marks, and then
30:05give it back to Peter, and enjoy his astonishment. This is quite zen, isn't it, this,
30:12mending the old Victorian box. I would leave that overnight, wouldn't you?
30:16Yeah.
30:20Now all that's needed is a good night's sleep, but that's not always possible.
30:24Here's a fact I recently discovered. Four out of ten couples are not sharing a duvet fairly,
30:31leading to a lot of bedroom drama and ruined sleep. But I think I could put an end to all that,
30:38here and now.
30:41Here is a problem that has plagued couples ever since the invention of the duvet,
30:45which was sometime in the mid-1970s. The double duvet is, by its nature, something to be shared
30:51equally, but it isn't, is it? Even with a modern, same-sex, mixed-race, gender-fluid couple like
30:58this one, you will get problems when one of them rolls over in the night and steals part of it from
31:03the other. For example, Simi, if you imagine you're asleep and you roll over and you steal, there you go.
31:09You see, and now Tony thinks, hang on a minute.
31:17There is, I'm afraid, no happy ending to this scene, but I've had an idea.
31:22What I reckon you two is, what if, this is very simple, I've got some bungees,
31:33what if we bungeed each corner to the floor so that you have a sort of self-centering duvet?
31:39Ooh, that's nice, yeah. And sort of almost like a floating duvet. We really need one of those
31:44eyelet-punching things. Or a cable tie. Oh, a cable tie's a good idea.
31:49Do you want to double them up so they're longer? Well, possibly.
31:55Cos then they'll... Yes, I think you're right. That'll do.
32:01Hogging the duvet is big news in Britain, outranking the age-old problem of snoring as
32:06the main reason for night-time squabbles. If this works, no more.
32:12My idea is, the bungees, which will be under equal tension on all four corners,
32:20will centre the duvet. If somebody pulls it one way, obviously it will spring back the other.
32:28And this will be unknown to them, because they'll be asleep.
32:31But the duvet will always be in the middle.
32:34Makes a change, him doing all the work, doesn't it?
32:36Yeah. Makes a change, us doing nothing.
32:40Oh, it's moving.
32:42Hey, there might be something in this.
32:45Also, if you had a height-adjustable bungee anchoring point,
32:49you could make more of a hovering duvet for very hot days, such as today.
32:54Ooh. Ooh, that's a nice draft. It is.
33:01Clear sleep. This is a serious experiment.
33:05Obviously, in the final version of this, it will be adjustable.
33:08There. Now imagine one of you rolls over and grabs some duvet.
33:12Oh, well, you...
33:15Oh.
33:19James, I think you've cracked it. It's not bad, is it?
33:21It's not bad at all. It's very good.
33:23Do a bit of tussling now. It's the middle of the night.
33:25Just mind your eyes.
33:27Yeah, if the bungees become unhooked for some reason...
33:31Look at that!
33:34Automatically centred duvet.
33:37The end of the argument. We've solved it.
33:46There's your happy ending.
33:53You join us once again in Wiltshire, still working away recycling our own plastic to create a game for the pub.
34:02But we also like workshop games, so we've invented one that tests our basic knowledge of physics and makes use of eggs past their sell-by date.
34:11It's called the yolks on us, and that's the last egg pun that there will be in this sequence, but it does involve an egg.
34:20We've got a box of eggs that have gone way past their sell-by date.
34:24There are two indentations in our simple rig that hold the egg.
34:28Eggs are famously very strong in that direction. Supposedly, you can drive a tractor over them and all sorts of things.
34:34But the winner is the person who gets the most weight on there without breaking the egg.
34:40How are we going to balance everything? It'll be like buckaroo.
34:42Well, that's why it's interesting.
34:44Oh, okay.
34:45I'm going to start with this hammer.
34:48Which weighs 876 grams.
34:53So I'm going to put it there.
34:55Sim, it's your go.
34:56Anything.
34:57Anything at all. Anywhere beyond that line.
35:00Oh, Sim.
35:01Oh, bold.
35:02It's 13,000 grams.
35:08But you've written it in, a bit premature, because you might break the egg.
35:13You might break the wood at this rate.
35:15I'm just getting it to be on the line.
35:25It's funny what the egg was thinking. I've got this, I've got this.
35:32This game is great, but because Tony didn't get to demonstrate his engineering prowess, it's only fair we play best of three.
35:434,100.
35:44But let's be clear.
35:47Oh, it's gone right there.
35:49At this point, we're all in it to win it.
35:521990.
35:531990.
35:541990.
35:54I'm not feeling that, um...
35:59You've played a very tactical game, Tony.
36:04Yeah, there's a little bit of water in it.
36:08The average egg can withstand a surprising amount of weight, up to 35 kilograms when pressure is applied evenly.
36:17So I'm going to add 1,231, and I can't put it any further back than that.
36:24Simi, I'm finding this genuinely tense.
36:27That's... 445.
36:38Oh, that's good!
36:40If this game wasn't exciting enough, for the final round, we decide to add more drama.
36:47There's a minimum weight limit of 500 grams.
36:51Simi.
36:51The pro-hex head screws.
36:55Oh, he's just... he's ballsy.
36:57I'm not looking at this any...
37:05That's so breaking.
37:08It's never taken this much weight.
37:09Oh!
37:10Winner!
37:16So I got a lose, so I'm down to noughts, and you had the most.
37:20So, yes, it's an absolute draw.
37:24Everybody has zero point.
37:26Well, you can play it at home, if you've got some eggs that are well past their sell-by date,
37:30and some pieces of wood and some screws and a piece of plywood to protect your kitchen table,
37:34even though you've made some screw holes in it.
37:36Or you need some scales as well.
37:39And that's an exit.
37:40Ah!
37:46But it's not all fun and games, you know.
37:49We have also been working hard to reduce plastic waste.
37:54Our goal was to recycle some ourselves and transform it into something exquisite and enduring.
38:00A game fit for the pub.
38:02Have we been victorious?
38:05So, viewers, we are ready to show you our draft set for the pub made out of recycled plastic.
38:12Not just recycled plastic, plastic that we have recycled ourselves.
38:16This is such a big moment.
38:19Because we're blasé about the idea of recycling, we say,
38:22oh, yes, I recycle everything.
38:23And what you really mean is you put it in a different coloured bin bag.
38:26We haven't done anything different from what you were doing in the 1970s, i.e. throwing things away.
38:32It's just now you put it in something with a colour so you think, oh, I'm saving the environment.
38:36Rubbish.
38:37The way you save it is to not recycle it in the first place.
38:41You take it and you turn it into something else.
38:44That's what we've done.
38:45Ignore this box.
38:46We've just put it in this old chess set box so that we can do what on TV is called a reveal.
38:53Is everybody ready?
39:04It's possibly a bit smaller than you were expecting from the amount of angst and energy that was involved.
39:10I think the word is homespun.
39:13It's brilliant. It's exquisite.
39:15It is exquisite and it shall endure.
39:18Here is the board.
39:20You might look at this and say that's very small.
39:23I say it's convenient and travel size.
39:26It's quite amazing how much plastic it took to make that small set.
39:31That's a very good point because we had a massive heap of milk bottles and milk bottle tops.
39:36OK, would you two like to play?
39:38Yeah.
39:38In the interests of entertainment, for this game we will be playing speed drafts.
39:46Although I must point out Simi is at a slight disadvantage.
39:50He is colour blind and red and green look the same to him which is something we didn't consider rather stupidly when we made the set.
39:58That's red though.
39:59Yes.
39:59OK, that's all right.
40:00I wondered why you didn't do that.
40:02Well, because I couldn't see it.
40:04You're playing a man who can't tell the difference between the two sets.
40:08I take the wins where I can.
40:10Oh, massive error.
40:11Oh, I forgot you could go backwards.
40:13You can if you're taking people.
40:15I forgot.
40:17Bit shafted, aren't you?
40:18I am.
40:19That's Tony, that's you.
40:20Oh, why is that there then?
40:22Because Tony's popped it up.
40:24There you go.
40:25The first ever victory on the Royal Oak homemade recycled plastics draft board was won by a man who can't see it.
40:35So, there you have it.
40:36We drank the milk, collected the bottles and tops and turned them into something useful.
40:42Something that may well outlive us all.
40:45Now that is the true definition of recycling.
40:50Before Tony demands a rematch, we must move to another part of the pub to meet Peter
40:56and return his Victorian games box, which has been fixed for the first time in 150 years.
41:05There wasn't really a great deal wrong with it, but it was coming apart at the seams here and there.
41:10There was a loop missing and it was a bit broken off.
41:13Because I did tell him I'd make it look like a repair.
41:15I think that's fine though, because I really struggled with making it look like new.
41:19And I think every little mark tells a story, every bit has got a story behind it.
41:24I think you're right.
41:25Personality and character.
41:26Here is Peter.
41:27Hello.
41:28Nice to see you again.
41:29Good evening.
41:31So, your Victorian games box, Peter.
41:34You spent quite a bit of time on it.
41:35We haven't restored it because you asked us not to.
41:39Various joints around here have been re-glued along the front.
41:43You remember this piece had sheared off and this piece was missing.
41:47Yes.
41:47I've made you a new one, but did promise that I would make it look like a repair so that it was part of the story.
41:52Yes.
41:52And so it is.
41:53And now, if we open it up, da-da-da-da.
41:59And remove the very wordy instruction book, you will see, sir, two loops.
42:05Where there was only one.
42:07Those have been freshly made by us.
42:09And Tony has reassembled this entire tray.
42:15And it was almost impossible to get it out.
42:18Yes.
42:18And if you tried it, it fell apart, literally, because all these pieces were loose.
42:23There's no rhyme or reason to why it's made the way it is.
42:26Yes.
42:27When it came apart, literally every piece of it fell apart and there's lots of little pieces.
42:33But we haven't spoiled the very extensive patina and story that is within the wood.
42:41I think that's the important thing, because every mark's got a story behind it.
42:44Oh, yes.
42:44And we had this dilemma, didn't we, about whether we'd clean this up and make it look brand new.
42:49Yeah, a big part of us, yeah, we did want to plane it all down, but we fought that urge.
42:56Do you think anyone will ever play any of these games again?
42:59Or is this...
42:59Well, I think they will.
43:01We used to play a little bit with my children when they were small.
43:04But now, the next generation have come along and hopefully the grandchildren will enjoy it.
43:10And that is for you.
43:14Right.
43:14Well, thank you very much indeed.
43:15I'm glad I brought it along.
43:17Absolute pleasure.
43:18We were fascinated by it.
43:19It's tremendous.
43:20Don't sell it.
43:21No, don't sell it.
43:22Certainly not.
43:23Don't drop it, because it will disintegrate.
43:26It will do many generations yet.
43:28Excellent.
43:29Goodbye.
43:30Thank you for coming.
43:30Bye.
43:31Bye.
43:31Bye.
43:32Oh, that's another satisfied customer.
43:34Bye.
43:35Bye.
44:01Bye.
44:02Bye.
44:03Bye.
44:04Bye.
44:05Bye.
44:06Bye.
44:07Bye.
44:08Bye.
44:09Bye.
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44:30Bye.
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