UC08 October-November 1974 by Christopher Squire

UNDERCURRENTS is published evev two months ( well, nearly) by Undercurrents Limited, 275 Finchley Road, London NW3, England, a democratic, non-profit company, without share capital and Limited by Guarantee. Telephone 01 794 2750. Our printers are SW Litho Ltd., Corbridge Crescent, London E2. Our distributors are Moore-Harness Ltd., 31 Corsica St., London N4.

Number Eight October -November 1974 EDDIES.. Eddie Currents

..................................... 1 .. ...... .................... 5 Letters..,>.Ã§.toc.Ãˆii...oÃ§<it.oooÃ§.Ã§<iooo<i.ooo<i 6 8 ........ COMTEK: a Celebration of People's Tech Consume-it-Yourself -.. -.. 10 ........................... BRA~/~ithin-y-~aer 11 Interview: the National Centre, ,.. . 12 ................................ 15 Organic Living SwardGardening............................... 18 The other London Underground ................. 19 F r e e R a d i o ................................... 21 , , ., 27 Building With Rammed Earth DIY Multi-blade windmill design. -. 29 Wind Generator Theory,, . .... .... . 33 COPYRIGHT. All articles in Undercurrents are Copy right ...................... Breaking the Hermetic Seal 35 @unies>otherwise stated. But REVIEWS ...................................... 41 we will give permission freely t o non-profit groups who Undercurrents Business News,, .......... . ........ 46 wish t o reproduce our materca

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Yes, yes, we know. UNDERCURRENTS is late again. Why? Well becauseras you'll appreciate if you read Chris Hutton-Squire's tear jerking account of our financial position, the magazine is grossly under-capitalised. This means we have to do things the long, laborious way, because it's the only way we can afford --we're only just beginning to get our subscribers on to a simple, stencilled addressing system, for instance: up to now, we've done it all by hand. Being under-capitalised means we can only afford to pay a half salary to the poor ,starved wretch who edits the magazine, with the result that he has to go grubbing around for additional work to keep body and soul together. ( pause for sob). One additional source of work, and also of capital for the magazine, has been our project to produce a book on 'Radical Technology', for which we have received an 'advance' from Wildwood House in the UK, and Pantheon Books in the States. Radical Technology ( can anyone think of a better title?) will consist of about 290 A4 pages covering Energy ,Food, Shelter, Materials and Communications, and quite a bit more. It's due for publication sometime in the first half of 1975, and we think when our readers see what's in it, they'll forgive us for always being late with the magazine.

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But lest readers getthe impression that our monetary situation is so precarious that we're about to fold, let us reassure them ( a la Court Line) that although the magazine is losing a little money ( say about Â£00 an issue at the moment) the surplus on the book ( when we get all the money from the publishers) ought to be enough to offset the loss on the last few issues. Meanwhile we hope to have built up the circulation near to our break even point. We have always believed in giving readers as much information as possible about why, and how, we produce the magazine : that's why we issue these little explanations now and again. Having explained the constraints we work under, we hope you'll understand if we don't post out copies to you as quickly as we might or i f we leave letters unanswered for long periods ,or if the next issue is also a bit late in appearing. Apologies also to readers who expected another instalment of AT-Man: trouble is, we couldn't think of a good story line to get him out.of the dilemma we put him i n in UC6. Any suggestions? You may also have been expecting Peter Harper's guide to Sources and Contacts in Alternative Technology to have continued in this issue. Well, it would have, had Peter not been stricken by flu for a week just before publication. Next issue, we're promised.

ial, without charge, provided they credit Undercurrents.

Undercurrents is designed and edited b y Sally and Godfrey Boyle. Pat Coyne looks after News, Durham takes care of reviews, and Peter Harper keeps thinking up reasons why we ought to keep on doing whatever it is we 're doing. Or not, as the case may be. Chris Hutton-Squire maintains a cheerful despair about our finances, and fatalistically tries to sort us out. Jenny Pennings set the type, except for a few thousand words ( these included1 set on dear ole Aunt Ann Wards composer at dead of night (yawn). Brian Dax screened the pies, and George Bowden kindly helped with the pasting up. Nigel and Mary and the Metro folk handled the incoming mail and tolerated our eccentricities. Among the many other people who 've helped us are: Jerome Burne, Steve Boulter, Alan Campbell, Oliver Caldecott, Charlie Clutterbuck, Roger Cox, Duncan Campbell, Robin Clarke, Alan Dalton, Sotires Elefetheriou, Gerry Foley, Lyn Gambles, Robin Hall, Satish Kumar, Dave May, Mike Muller, Kit Pedler, Chris Roper, Pat Rivers, Chris Ryan, John Shore, Derek Taylor, and Dieter Pevsner. ~ oforgetting t the anwing Monica Hill who moves in mysterious ways and looks after distribution.

has, until now, been largely unaware of the jewel that has been nestling in its bosom. The AT -crowd from the Centre have spent most of

Pilkingtons. Transport of the Royal Person round the

On His tour of inspection, Prince Phillip will view a solar roof, a wind mill. and a methane digester, - all built off the site -and will inspect the Centre's workshops. To crown the occasion, Mr. Sehastian de Ferrinti has agreed to use the occasion for the unveiling of a new

renovating the outbuildings of the old quarry where the Centre has its home They have had tittle opportu-

ks' breath away. bject is not even confined to British Royals, as the visit of Queen Juliana of the Netherlands t o Sietz Leeflang's rather similar "Small Earth

nology "movement" in Brit Yet very little is known ahou the Society in AT circles apart for the vague general impression that it has hidden wealth and considerable Est-

by Royal Train. No doubt the local Mayor, John Beaumont - w h o also happens to be the owner of the National Centre's quarry - will be there to greethim. From the station,

a few weeks ago and talked

a y or another wit singly frequent o he Establishment

devote more time to the

paper known as a Free

thus virtually a Licence of

at Chequers . . . hauled off. to the nearest Fuzz House screanling 'Expedient in th national interest'. . . it's a lovely thought. Geological maps arc

the extent that a whole lotta

ical Museum. Inhibition

the hills armed with rock pick

or from Stanforcis on Lon

in the province with the exception of areas desiguated as National or Provincial Details of the act are still

it bare and give it the 'lunar'

ment and may even bring in a buck o r t w o . . . Suppose a hunch of AT-frea armed with geological ham-

live on their claims in log

WE ALL KNOW how consumer ~ r o d u c t sare created to give anufacturers a market rather than to fulfil a real need. d reluctantly accepted. But what is not often appreciated the way in which the same brand of thinking is applied to Top level documents from International Computers Limited, Britain's major computer manufacturer recently fell into Undeicurrents hands. They reveal the actual management thinking that produces a new range of computer. These documents reveal that the process is little different to that with which we are already so familiar in less exotic fields. It seems, for instance, that computers are designed as much t o generate future dependence on the company -and thus further business - as to fulfil customer needs. The international standards. But in fairness to ICL, it is clear

system prices by I machines will be required with at least three times this

pheral prices. It will be

and scientific uses in ICL 's markets'. The company has also decided not to try to pull old tricks on its computer con-

latter high in view growing proportion enhancement busln The mark-up on th pherals? 270%!

be as large as possible. ICI, will not be operating on the principle used by IBM in th

ng an automated pr a grinding halt, is a grow ea of the technology. four main processors

two Service Interrupt the current I d . users o must be persuaded to ome users of the New

quote growth paths

ii the consideration of future

enhancement rounds. It would be difficult to rniroduce further models into a (General Motors will also

ancement replacements existing ICI, products'.. nhancement is the profit-

at present is the nature o f any new IBM range '. So in establishing the tentative price structure, ICL's guideline is that 'the intermodule price spacing must be fine enough to deny

'inconvenience' (one interruption per shift) occurring to once in ei&t shifts. At the lower level of the

to keep people buying). ICL have also learnt a lesson from the British aero-

computer (of the sort used for scientific and technical

ge working compo

Undercurrents 8 grammes needed for this selfdiagnosis and reconfiguration will be one o f the keys t o the success or failure of , the top end of the market. And. as this is ICL's first bid t o get into the markets which demand these facilities, it

the desire to co-operate in setting up rational standards for the benefit of the computer user. 'We should try ha strain IBM'sfreed tion arbitrarily to change their own standards to

monising proce on at least one rds issue, 1CL has misleading its cust ers or years. The compan has been consistently c

replacement ofirrecoverly corrupted entities, such hardware modules, by

alphabetic and other c acters in terms of bina bits) substantially diff from that chosen b y t e

gree of system service, to the telecommunicatio

Standards Double-Talk talk dealing with public statements and private licy 'It is important that should have a coherent policy t o present to ICL customers' notes the company in a briefing .tocu on the attitude t o be take t o various international standards organisatio ' hough not all aspec ur policy need be d e publicl) It will he easier to put across to our customers if our cieclarerl p-rlicy statements e a true subset of the

policy Corporate Futures ICL's credibility is perhaps the most important issue at stake with the introduction f the New Range. Many ohervers will be 1ooking;not much at the details of the nee, but at its likely im.t i n t h e market. This is rhaps ICL's last chance t o keep its place as a major bigoininuter manufactnrer. Over the past few years, despite the support of the UK government through its policyo share of the British mark falling steadily. At one time, ICL could compete with IBM in the open market. Yet last year ICL failed to get any o f the vernment sector. And spite the Ă&#x201A;ÂŁ4 million aid eived since 1968 is still, cording t o Eric Moonman, P, 'a critical company in a In this context, the release

READERSOF New Scientist no doubt were intrigued by a piece in the May 9 issue entitled /.noking for electron hungrv explosives in Ulster ( ~ 3 1 0 which ) described two new electronic 'sniffers' capable of detecting hidden explosives and outlined the problems involved in making such devices differentiate between everyday substances (like perfume) and the real thing..What they will not have realised was that the article was altered by a bit of subtle pressure from the Ministry of Defence, including the threat of a 'D Notice'. The sniffers, Pye Dynamics, model L1A1 and the Analytical Instruments (AI) model 47, both work on the 'electron capture' principle which depends on the fact that explosives give off large, electronhungry, molecules which will reduce a known current in a detector. Both pass a stream or argon over a radioactive source which ionises the gas, which is then mixed with the vapour to be tested. If enough electrons are pulled off the ionised argon, the alarm is sounded. The article explains how other substances, such as the musk in perfume, the freon in aerosols, and tobacco smoke, can also trigger the detectors but what did not appear, because it was cut from the original, was a paragraph which read: Virtually all explosives contain nitro compounds, and the @e unit apparetrtly has a substance which absorbs these compounds a t ambient temperatures but rejects them a t a higher temperature. Thus the vapour to be tested is first passed over this substance then the collector is heated and the vapour is expelled into the ionised Argon. The whole process takes 16 sec. uti a a e p i a h l c lime 'o search \i person but I V J O

long for a mail check. According to A t , the 1,lA 1 responds only to nitroglycerine-based explosives - - gelignite and dynamite (which are in fa the most commonly used in Ulster) - but not to TNT or plastic explosives. A 1 also says that contrary to Army claims, neither deteetor will respond to 'co-op sugar' (sodium chlorate weedkiller mixed with sugar) because it is not electron-capturing and has no nitro compoun The actual contents of the paragraph, while inter ing, are hardly (to make bad pun) dynamite and a most certainly would n tell the IRA anything t h did not already know - r had not found out by experience. But leaving aside the morality, or the wisdom, of making false claims ah anything - even weaponry - the actual manner of the request by the MOD to dro the paragraph is instructive as an example of how the establishment deals with the situation when the un conscious self-censorship, that'is assumed t o be part of every journalist's mentality threatens t o break do At New Scientist rece' the news of the Ministry's displeasure in a telephone call at 5.30 on press day, Monflay before publicatio There was n o outright order merely an announceme that the MoD did not like the offending paragraph, with the implication tha the Ministry had powers act if nothing was done voluntarily. It was a seco order D Notice, as one N journalist put it. Since all copy had to be at the printers by 6 pm t h evening, the question bee one of expediency not principle. The offendin paragraph was dropped that the issue could appear on time. New Scientist had been out-manoeuvred and the bland fdcdde of the British e'.tablishnifnl ri.'iiiainei.l unJisIiirhcd

FRIGGIN' ON THE RIGS

THE ECCENTRICITIES of the Celtic fringe are making life extremely difficult for the eager visionaries directing First there was that tiresome Ulster Magistrate,Maxwell,and his recent insistence that all exploration rights round the enlire island of Ireland below the low water mark are properly the province of the Government o f the Irish Republic. Realising the minimal probability of a strike on Ulster's beaches. Her Majesty's Government have now referred the matter t o the Privy Council, where no doubt Mr Maxwell will get the comeuppance he deserves for presuming to Now the recent upsurge in Scottish Nationalism has

ening to kick everybody out and limiting production to a paltry 50 million tons a But keen students of

certain people are beginning to suspect that there is cunning in the old hitch yet.Two,

200 million tons of oil a year - larger than any production figure for the entire UK North Sea so far releassay that it could easily be trebled in capacity. No pipeline as yet connects Shetland with the mainland, and apart from those connecting the Forties field (the first t o be discovered) and the Frigg gas field, no pipeline is being constructed t o Scottish mainland, nor are any being planned. Ethnically and psychologicdlly, the Shetlands have never been part of Scotland and do not consider themselves so now. This point has not been lost on the British Government, which has been remarkably accommodat ing t o the Shetianden, and their ideas on how the oil boom should be handled.

Nats. And if by sum chance Scotland she

'respect the wishes of the

limes in the past and indcf are doing now in Northern Ireland . . .

I Radio 88 is an illegal Swedish Radio Station that broadcasts to Stockholm and its suburbs. Three members o f the group visited Peoples News Service recently, and left this account

present one gets taken We have had 60 to police cars chasing us si taneously. They don't try to get us every week as the get tired of trying. In fact

illegally mainly because it was fun. The programmes were mostly music and jokes and a

not catching us. One o posing as a 'straight' repo ter once interviewed a

the station on the front pages

cast it 15 minutes lat We use our broadca

partly because of the fierce police reaction to them and a lot more people became interested and started workins for Radio 88 and extending its scope.

s o m e anarchists, some

safety procedures that we keep to closely. We broadcast once a

atus t o a different place each week. All broadcasts are pretaped so that we j set things up, go away an come back to collect the stuff when it's safe - may

ment block, because in Sweden they're locked from the inside, from t bottom. Even if the po trace the broadcast and in they still have the trouble of locating the drive out t o forests just

but East and North of the due to be taken t o the stillunbuilt terminal at Sullom Voe in the Shetlands which is destined to become the

Irish I2oreign Minister Garrctt Ht~gerald'sreactio when he heard the news, and he announced that his

there's a big strike on i Stockholm we'll try an get a long interview wi the workers concerned cover home and inte ional news. We tran poetry and music to

lost three sets t o them in

one box (in Sweden t n't have numbers, wh zzled the police whe y found out we had

ny mail sent t o the ss given below will

from anyone who h

Spy in the Sky you're wondering what ndon will be like in a uple of years' time, when e CITRAC system of veillance TV cameras e UC7) has gone into peration above the city reets, you can get a pretty good idea by looking at what's been happening in Sweden lately. Sixty teles i o n cameras have been ailed in the underground way network o f central ckholm. The TV cables verge at a church.in the city, which is now the eadquarters of a 139 strong special branch unit. The TV network was installed for crime prevention, particularly drug dealing. Fach is manned by two officials, video tapes of 'suspicious " are frequent'y evidence. e initially installed the meras in public places without government permisn, although the government subseouentlv authorised this TV network, and 3 the figure was 4651. re convicted. According t o : 'Everywhere you go

'igure 5. Catastrophe theory applied to the behaviour of a dog A free bone is offered to the first reader who can correctly determine the function which generates this surface, without looking at the October '74 issue of Futures in which it appears. Entries (on the back of a dog meat wrapper, please) t o Maior Canis. Phi Do. our veterinary correspondent,

In Berkeley, California, 55 education experts, school administrators and psycholQgists listened to a scholarly lecture by a Dr FOX on 'Mathematical Game

theory applied to physical education'. In a survey afterwards 45 of t h e 55 said they found the lecture clear and stimulating. 'Dr Fox' then announced that he was an actor and had been talking a load of rubbish.

'rv camera watching you. They're so powerful that you can read the time on someone's wristwatch storeys below on the street'. Radio 88 also says there have recently heen reports in the Swedish dailies about police plans to coordinate their 'security' activity with that o f various other groups.

the plans involve the large numbers of security men employed by hie Swedish firms. Some reports say tliat the plans entail the unification of all these groups into a regularised unit with its own hierarchy and information pool. Colonel Stirling and General Walker, please note.

Foxed!

PROPERTY SPECULATION tion or Nuclear attack? Alas, it almost certainly is not. Dedicated army watchers

lies buried on the Northerly ds, sewage compressors Still, t h e Depots would ntion a total of mo

say, the world's first noisefree underground pop festi-

ohone tapping .. - in the last Undercurrents, you won't be surprised t o hear that overseas phone calls from the United States are syste atically monitored by the National Security Agency (NSA). What is surprising is that, according t o information leaked to intelligence Report, a Washington magazine, the NSA now has a computer programmed t o switch on to cue words sue as 'dope', 'marijuana' 'Mao' for evidence of radic political or drugs activitie We didn't think their voice recognition Systems wer quite so well advanced. According t o Intelligent Report'scorrespondent (a former NSA worker, Wins1 Peck) NSA has been cave dropping on private lines the late 1960's but until recently, the decision t o record was made on the bas of who was calling whom an what country the call was placed to. The monitorin transoceanic telecom tion began as part of programme to collect c mercial intel1igence.wh now considered t o be eq importance to miiitar diplomatic informatio

nothing i n a positive t o either Socialism or Ca

Ill,Anarchism, the Albion The Customs, who I don't see getting a knocking review in UC - I'll d o one free - charge w f t y Â£for exactly fuck all. The V A T mothers here i n Britain get Â£1.3 Iretaii price is â‚¬13.1 again for exactly fuck ail. a v i d l y Soviet Socialis o m the completely thereby entraining a lot o f constructing the world's

s good. How about Plutonium sniffer

an check out the

Smialism=Marxism? Dear Undercurrents

own private market, so the Soviet Union uses Eastern Europe and Cuba.

then I can get either Scienc

As for internal repression, the Soviet Union indulges i n

n o pun intended) of Marxist

e appears t o be a misapension on the part of one

i n that meaningless expression 'class struggle'. For the purpose of this missive, I am going t o make some assumptions which I hope do not strike people as being too outrageous, indeed too

currents entitled 'Behaviour Modification' was an eye-openr , check out the far more barbaric and inhuman treat. ment That seems t o be prevalent i n Soviet mental hospitals. (Contact: The Working Group for some of the most ' magazines ever t o pop t my letter box. There isen i n the few I've got t o keep busy if I retired today! Your enthusiasm is itfw-

liquid columns i n each case. re is one exception to this and that is the use that can made of the hydraulic ram

theory only, you would be playing into the hands o f people like Aims Of Industry

zine. spoiled a little f o us:

on Socialists who

ion is an untenable o that has t o be done t o

nV good people can't v alienate prospectiv

uld learn further about amateur ectronics or T V . We are very disappointed. You aazine holds nothing of interes is We do not like nor do we ree with the contents or the pies you cover. We herewith turn the unwanted and unliketi gazine and would appreciate return of our 35p.

;t the word ou

atmoral Avenue ockton-on-Tees, leveland TS17 7JP

;ear of the future, of course,

BE DAMNED a t e my subscnpurrents and for of the year's monded or donated a t i o n Society'. ,as you do, that many s need changing in this ty of ours; however, one which I prize highly is freedom of speech which r magazine seeks to undere. In a democracy a man p e a k his mind. The time subversion is under a repres-

n d certificates for those statons who work t o help make he weekend happen. But there will also be sessions on lmics, Alternative Ener Sources, Women's Issue education, The En"ir0 Decentralized living, Ham Radio's Future, and Other 'erns we share. ideas is One Of the 'pen u p Our shacks and share this ham radio weekend with others. Some sessions will use single sideband-only, and some radio teletype, hut many of the sessions will utilize Slow t o permit Weakers to scan illustrate their weekend "open house" to the local ham members, and maybe even to the whole town as well. It will be a perfect chance t o show off what SSTV can do, and t o show off a serious use of ham

r Schofield is presumably erring t o the letter in UC7

ut Well are needed for mtor duty, and to I,0 t speakers (either in t h ck or via phone patch). ow-scanners willing t o conrt slides and photos to SSTV tapes are needed fly; if you know one 'doing" people workard a better future in eld or other, See if he as a won't The rdinator of this effort Brink, wA"BKR. If e t o lend a hand, conon 3898 KHz and Thursday nights acific time, or Sunnoons on 14253 at noon. (If ham radio fails You. his address is RFD 2, Box 301B, Port Orchard, Washington 98366.) HE RTTY TECHNICAL

n,erits, '*

wouldn't have printed that letter. Perhaps Mr Schofield it? Surely free speech logical! implies freedom even for those who advocate its abolition?-Ed

give A T a bad name. Maybe my definition

..wjhen /he foil,,^ radio amateurs would like to o f f Ã the ufe 0 ,he,, c~lmp otfiers. Certain of them a h have access to informati orem of ititeres people with experience t i c 1 f i e l d If asked, hams _.Ã attempt ,Ã .,,.vide information via radio in the co e g o r i e listed Contact individ uals directly to make arrange-

~ , of ~us is~capable h of serv. ing miniature, radio acce sed information scrvicc, hi,, the types of informatiou you have xm mere is bound to be at least one or two areas of personal knowledge. For starters, on what .~ subject do you have more than If a printed word netfive books? In addition, you ham radio, or comprobably have access to knowputer access tie-ins via ham ledgeable friends and neighradio, turn you on, contact Mitt Nodacker, WA7TFE. Mitt bors. See if they'd be willing t o sent out a newsletter a couple share their info via ham radio. of weeks ago o u t l i i the LL - 3 7-41~&5, technial problems to be over. come, mentioning sources ,f RTTy suggest. ing a onc..a-week RTTY get. together on the air as soon as a few people have even a crude mp, write him at gox 8557, pocatello, Idaho 83209 and him for a copy of the news-, (send a stamped envelope). Copthorne Macdonald (WOORX) INFORMATION AND 516 N W First Ave STATION SHARING Rochester, Minn. 55901 USA Much of the New Direc-

advert in UC6 for a community based on the ideas of BF Skinne

~oufidtibie Weft Coast

us having a license and a sta ion in the Mothercolumn along with some basicinf tion. This list will be acc panied b y the following

day.

8:mp.m. PDT

,,,,

Undercurrents 8

IT IS YET another of the paradoxes o f our quasi-Orwellian world that Doing-itYourself can simultaneously be Big Business. But Doingit-Yourself, in the eyes of the vast majority of the companies who booked space at September's DIY Exhibition at Olvmpia. means little more than the

and quality control checks .-a tir and laborious business in any case What DIY ought to be about w summed up admirably on one o f t slogans in the Chinese handicraft pavilion, which extolled the virtu of "Maintaining independence and keeping the initiative in our own

elimination of the need for final assembly

if articulated, could

One of the few genuinely amateur, truly Do-it-Yourself stands at the show. The Popular Flying Association demonstrate how you, too, can build and f l y your o aeroplane. Not that Iliich would regard the DIY-aeroplane as a particularly convivial tool, but the PFA at least seems free of the instant, packaged commercialism of the majority of exhibits. Enthusiastic, too.

mmed up: " Keep the custo pendent on us as suppliers; e marketing and advertising in our hands, and for God's sak on't let them do too much f o r t h lves, or they might realise that o refully-packaged kits aren't reall

Do i t Yourself. Be Your Own Boss Start Your Own Business, Bv the manazine that ecently told its readers how they rofit from exploiting cheap prison labour- the 'Business Ideas Letter'.

It can be pretty lucrative t o prey on the insecurity of strike-worried middle cl consumers. Pay Ă&#x201A;ÂŁ2 for a low power Jermyn invertor f i t can just run the tell a few lights) and you can at least be entertained while you freeze to death during the forthcoming minerslgas wor electricity workers1 pinko commie bast next blackmailing wage battle.

DIY Exhibitions could ever demonstrate

DoitYourself canoe building. One other apparent bastion of amateurism and nthusiasrn amid a sea of money grub product pushers.

Now here's a piece of DIY-Technology the world really needs: the magnetic window cleaner that cleans both sides o f thi

e Markets are Briskand the Prices are Ie". Not a slogan one would have expectd t o see on the Chinese pavilion. Has the umerist rot really set i n even in China? 'ntaining Independence and Keeping t h ative i n our own Hands and Relying on r own Efforts" . That's a bit more like

sheeting instead of glass, and in having tosite the roof i n a position where it is overshadowed by a steeply rising hill for a good part of the day. Doubting sceptics have only t o put their hands in the trough at the roof base after only half an hour or so of sunshine to realise the potential of solar power. The gentle trickle of warm water over your fingers is highly sensual , and highly recommended. Next on the Biotechnic agenda is a heat pump. John Clemeau reckons i t might just be possible to develop a heat p on the evaporation, rather than the vapour compression, principle .wh would have the advantage of no mo parts.Theoretically, the efficiency

be evaded somehow. Any ideas? BRAD, the 'Biotechnic Research and Development' community set up by Robin Clarke and a dozen or so friends in 1972, prefers to be known these days as 'Eithin-y-Gaer' -the name of the Welsh farm where the group has settled.

ore traditional heating system. a Jotu! od burning stove, made in Norway ry efficient, but costs about Ă&#x201A;ÂŁ70 '

n water trough where rain f side of roof glass gets caugh ain water collection has been t BRAD this year, as the farm's has dried up. Woe betide the who flushes a lavatory omposting toilets havent been ailed yet, though a rustic privy in the garden does the same job,rnore draughtilyl

.......

oof space behind the solar collector. espite 3 inches of polystyrene, it get

The change of name symbolises the change of emphasis which the community has undergone over the past couple of years, a change which culminated in Robin and Janine Clarke's withdrawal from the community a few months ago. Robin apparently felt that the group's role should remain largely as he originally envisaged it at the beginning as a communal research centre, aiming to develop a new kind of science and technology that would be valid 'for all men and for all time'. The others, however, felt that they needed to get their heads and their own inter-personal relationships straightened out a good deal more before they would be ready t o start telling the world what to do.

Those, at any rate, seem to be the two sides to the conflict concerning BRAD'S future. But the issues are complicated by the frictions that arise in any closequartered community, and are probably impossible for any outsider either to understand or explain. Robin and Janine, however, seem eager to start out onanother similar path soon as possible - only this time they're hoping to avoid some at least of what they see as the 'mistakes'of the BRAD experiment Meanwhile, back at the Farm, the community's huge solar roof has become a major symbol of success, following the cover story wnteup in New Scientist by Philip Brachi

View looking down the mountains, to the side of Eithin-y-Gaer.To the right is a twin Savonius rotor 1 oil drum type), which spins merrily but which will need another type of pump to drive if it is to do i t s water lifting job properly. The , , present Archimedes screw system isn't too satisfactory.

John Wood's little black box, which controls the solar roof. !t compares temperatyre of water at the roof with temperature in the storage tank, and when the former i s greater than the turns the circulating pump I below) John will be giving full circuit detail of a simplified version of the Box in the next Undercurrents.

Undercurrents 8

The National Centre THE SOCIETY for Environmental Improvement Limited, a registered Charity, was set up in the Autumn of 1972 in the role of link orqanisation between big business and the environmental movement. I t s Chairman i n Gerard Morgan-Grenville; other directors include Michael Bray, who controls Stuart Wrightson Ltd., reputed to be the second-largest insurance company in the world, Diana Eccles, and Timothy Jones. Gerard Morgan-Grenville is an industrialist who, with his brother ,runs a stainless-steel processing plant, Chichester Stainless Steel, and a company dealing in fancy glassware and china, Dexam International. The Society has managed t o attract quite a few famous names as its patrons: Lord Annan, Provost of University College London, Lord Robens, former Chairman of the National CoalBoard, Sir Bernard Waley Cohen, former Lord Mayor of London and Roy Jenkins, the Home Secretary, are just a few of the notables who dignify i t s letterheads. The Society's brief history has not been without incident, however. I t s first full-time Director ,Peter Whiteley ( ex-Cassells publisher and husband of Lady Angela Whiteley) quit i n 1973 because of a disagreement with Morgan-Grenville. And in June 1974, Steve Boulter, the Society's Technical Manager, was fired b y Morgan Grenville ,allegedly because he had, according t o Morgan-Grenville,'lost the confidence' of his fello workers at the Centre, and because he had taken up a part time at University College, London, while s t i l l working for the Socie Boulter contends that he was dismissed because he expressed di with the direction i n which the Centre was moving at the time --towards a more inward-looking community, instead of the outgoing technical advice centre which he had envisaged. Thot trend has now been reversed. Boulter also says he took his part-time lectureship with Vorgan-Grenville's permission, and that it gave the Society access to valuable University facilities in any case. The dispute, which at one stage became so acrimonious that Boulter was offered a one-way ticket to the 'States ( he i s a US citizen) i n lieu of his notice money, now appears to have been settled -.at least financially. But Finance lies at the heart of the Centre's problems at the moment. Big Industry, originally envisaged as the source of most of the Society's funds, could hardly be shorter of cash these days. The initial Â£50,00 which started the Society off two years ago (supplied by a backer who s t i l l insists on anonymity) will hardly last much longer. And with a figure of Â£200,00 being talked about as the sum needed to renovate all the quarry'soutbuildings, set u p engineering workshops and provide living accomodation o n site, the Society for Environmental Improvement will need a lot of money soon i f any of i t s original grandiose ambitions i s to be realised. In this interview, Gerard ^organ-Grenville the aims and ~hilosoohv

What are the historical antecedents the project? How did you yourself g interested i n the environment and in alternative technology? Well, I came through industry - I ed i n industry for twenty odd ye became involved in questions o trial pollution and then, on the n g side, became involved in try make marketing forecasts. As a resul of this I began to feel that a nu of factors were going to influen pretty decisively the buying pat of people in the Western world T led me to look at the whole resourc syndrome. I think - o n a slight1 parallel course - I came to the t through conservation. I ' m a paint by hobby and I constantly perha have a slightly over-sensitive eye things that have been spoiled. Th a straight way in which quite a lot of people have come into the envir mcnt movement -they have just been concerned by pieces of litter they have seen on the street and gradually they equate that paper with not being Just a visual eyesore but with a waste of paper. Then they realise that paper in fact requires an incredible quantity of timber lust to produce Then they see that it is not recycled, and one thing leads to another. But one of the things we've found at this centre i s that almost no two people have come here for the same reason. The industrial activities that you were involved in led you t o realise that there was going to be a resource shortage? Yes, i t made me realise that we were in for an apparently endless period o f steeply rising prices. This gave one - i f for no other reason, because one's livelihood depended on it - a fairly vested interest in actually determining whdt wds going to happen in the future How did this concern of yours for the environment and the rapidly-approaching resource and energy crisis o f industr cohere into the National Centre, and initially to the Society for Envir tal Improvement - how did tha Before: the old quarry outbuildings were in a chronicallv-dila~idatedstate

vas at about thetime when Gerrv Leach was oublishine his memorceship Earth'. That woke up a people to some o f the facts and T h u s in my case i t gave a great petus to a feeling that was probably Iready there, and I startedlooking round and reading things and talking people and travelling about a bit and

on your letterheads these days - h o w did these people get involved i n your society? Well, i t was a deliberate policy. A lot

a large number of people who head industry, government, large organisations, who are every bit as aware as are

which are perfectly obvious, they are sort of frozen in their particular positions, and can't easily move. So one of the things that we set out to do t some funds, and as you know got

me. Then we spent about a year just oking at the whole environmental

ce suddenly and this centre was n as an idea, and very shortly after-

or were there any other people at the beginning who got involved. did start it, but I regard myself as partme conductor of the orchestra. I have fairly silent role in the thing - the eople upon whose skill one depends any sort of success are the players he orchestra and most of the work en done by other people -such a ge number of people that I think it

walk. To try to make this a bit more

the more effective, more intelligent people i n various departments. This pohcy is construed by some people to mean that we get huge hidden subsidies, or that we are a sort of professionally-infiltrated department of the Establishment, or even that we're funded by the CIA - a l l sorts of funny ideas.. Furthermore, I think one needs to realise that the people towards the top of the pyramid are vastly more effective in lerms of what is done than the people at the bottom of the pyramid -this is absolutely obvious. Therefore if you can enlist the support of the people at the top, you've got a chance of achieving, by conventional means, really worthwhile things. I t would be naive to think that someone like the Duke of Edinburgh isn't an incredibly powerful figure in the country. No . matter undt anyone's \ I C * S might oe on the munarch\ and i t s o\crtunes, I in'nK most pc-up c In [he countri rcalisl- that nc. as an i n d \ i u ~ a . is , simpi\ ij man c:ugn[ 'n d pos:tion who is tr) :ng to do the best ih:ng oy toe (oh hc'i gi~t,wn ch i s a pri'tty ~n~'nv:abic one. Thcrcfori; he is snmconc wnose 5\ mpatny s most 'iijluaolc to the uhu.c AT muiement, i n d he 'someone who is w a l i n g across this pretty delicate bridge which we are in the process of putting up. There is possibly a greater measure of responsibility shown a t managerial level by people who work i n business than i s generally appreciated.. I think that people perhaps at the lower end o f today's pyramid fail to appreciate that some of the people who control industry are i n fact highly intelligent and fairly wise, fairly farseeing individuals. Sebastian de Ferranti, for example, who's the chairman of Ferran

A small, experimental solar water heater.

This small Pelton wheel may soon be harnessina one of the waterfalls at the

Gerard Morgan-Grenville stands outside one of the disused cottaaes. t o be converted

',,

View from one of the Ideal Home windows.

wish to come here and help, and we've cot his solar cells simply because he believes in what we're doing. His brother, Boswell (sic) de Ferranti, has actually spent a lot more time and money than anyone else trying to develop heat pumps, because he thought they were a good thing. I wouldn't deny his competence, or his intelligence or his sincerity. What I would be worried about is that he will seek solutions t o the problems o f society in such a way that those solutions will continue t o imply Fcrranti and roughly the same kind of industrial structure that there is now. For instance, a structure with companies owned by shareholders rather than owned by the people who work for them, a structure where you have private enterprise rather like we have now rather than some kind o f possibly municipal or local ownership.. small cooperatives and that kind of thing. Sebastian de Ferranti will want t o see tots o f solar cells coming off the Ferranti production line. Sincerely, he may believe that it will be better for society -and i t might be a bit better - b u t it won't be as good as i t could be if the people were working on these things themselves. Even though that might be less efficient. I think that you've got to remember that high technology develops from high technology, and somebody like Ferranti is a high technology wizard. Now, we agreed earlier that high technology i s i n principle, desiriible because i t can free a lot of people from nastv, reuetitivc lobs Solar cell-i , are in the forefront of today's technology, and i f a firm like Ferranti which has the resources can produce these things by means o i high technology, I think there's a place for them. I'd be delighted if people like Ferranti make solar cells, provided that the people who are working on those solar cells are not exploited in any way,provided that their jobs are interesting and they can see the end product of their work, and that the production of solar cells itself isn't an ecologically-wasteful process that uses up too many natural resources and isn't inordinately profitable. I think these are the dangers. But it must be a more intelligent approach to try to devise an alternative system for living which i s valid, before you throw away everything that you've got dt the present time I t would be very naive to think that out of the chaos, phoenix-wise, a wonderful new era will arise, where everyone can do their own thing, I t just doesn't happen that wav, and history shows that the ~

~~~~

far as I'm concerned, i f we can show see yourselves starting t o manufactur that there are alternative ways o f these things on a small scale? living which are socially good, and Yes - we have done just that, environmentally good - that just in The problem now i s to find so terms of the science o f the environwith prototype facilities to ac ment they are sustainable -then make it, and maybe we can then the more intelligent people at the it to a small manufacturer - it's th top of the pyramid will start to take sort o f thing in fact could be mad a real interest. I think that there's far a garage for a royalty. We migh too much talk at the moment and ourselves that way. But basically, not enough doing. There arc hope to f ind ourselves by 'gate thousands of communes around money', and through publications. the country, far more than are recorded. But they are unbelievably fragile, and they don't really add up to a saleable philosophy for mankind in the latter part of the 20th century. Some new and obviously workable way of living in a community has got t o be discovered. But some commun.ities . probably have discovered it, just by having the right combination of people.. I've done a round-up, and they're very rare. The ones that survive .-funnily enough, the same ones that have survived throughout the centuries tend to be the religious ones. I think a very important point to realise i s that we've got an external interest here at the centre whereas most communities are internal - they're interested in their own survival, doing their own thing. O f course we're interested in that too, but we are also here in Straight as a die. The old quarry railw been re-laid, and i s now used for trans order to serve people outside, a fact building materials round the site. And which has already been very valuabl in producing solidarity among the people here. There's a crvine

piece of wood or getting on with each other. To turn towards the future of the Centre, dre you hopiiiy that i t will become rcldtively Ă&#x201A;ÂĽiclf-sufTicient Yes totally in energy, and as for food, well, by virtue of the fact that we haven't any money, we're vegetaria and we'll grow most o f our vegetables We hope to get a piece o f land in due course where we can grow wheat We want to make quite a lot of things ourselves all our outbuildings, and so on

Old fashioned slate cutting guillotine, a legacy from quarrying days. Still works, though.

vegetables, calculated from

Controversy report I mentioned is incon-

el, chemical fertilizers, pesticides, e feeds, medical supplies and drugs for livestock - is as difficult t o calculate as is the health value o f the exercise, nutritional quality and sheer pleasure of growing your own.

n analysis o f the statistics in Dudley mp's The Land of Britain (Longans 1948), suggests that of the com-

or land classified as agriculturally non-

Architectural Association, 1974) that according to recent studies, 'nude

in England and hill-land in Wales. I am n o t suggesting everyone lives on little rectangles. Our natural resources could never be equally divided i n this way: they are the common wealth of the people. We must share the access to and the care and use of these resources, Some people grow food better than

irrational technology like non-use employment, can only continue i f cheap energy substitutes are availabl through the exploitation o f overse

shoes better than the ga important point is tha be close t o their resou communities, and awa

access to land -either o f their own o rented from the community at minim charge. The most direct way o f solviri our current economic crisis is for peop to demand an increase in the s i ~ ean

the British seem increasingly incapable of producing at home. The country's present economic strategy, based on the assembly o f energy-extravagant luxuries, cannot continue t o support our nation in a world where more than half the people are poor and

community decision t o end the distribution of all such primary es. (See Lawrence Hills' proposal Fertility Gardens in J u l y l August's Association {ournai, 1 974). Individuals have more power

are now beginning to be experienced by the industrialised countries, and mass unemployment is forecast.

energy like coal and oil. Such expl tion cannot be justified. There is no need for able-bodied

The feeling o f isolation, political imp tence and the practising of double-

Use of Land for Food Product! According to the figures already (and Shewell-Cooper in The Complete Vegetable Grower; Faber paperback, 1974) two people can grow their fruit and vegetables they need on 418m2 of land. (approx 40m x 1Dm). Shewell-Cooper describes the cropping of the plot and suggests that cultivation will take 288 hours a year (an average of 5% each week). Since these figures refer to a diet where protein is supplied by meat, the area will have to be cropped very intensively if enough protein is to be grown from vegetable sources (legumes and cereals). The experience needed t o do this successfully may take years to acquire, and i t may be impossible for a beginner with a garden suffering from weeds, and pest to produce and store enough food. Food production varies greatly with environmental conditions such as climate, extremes of weather, soil fertility, pests and disease, as well as the skill and knowledge of the cultivator. Diagram 1 shows a possible way of using a one-third acre plot which I hope to try soon. An area 1 Om x 16.5m i s taken for the dwelling, which will be described i n a later issue of Undercurrents. Next to this i s a small orch containing bush and tree fruit and, t help supply protein regularly, freerange laying hens. To the south of dwelling is a crop rotation scheme four 130m2 plots. South o f the orchard are another four 130m2 plots which can be cropped with grass and clover, or with potatoes followed by wheat. Wheat harvested from this area (just under 1/8th acre) at an average yield ( 1 % tonslacre) should be enough for 500 one-pound loaves. As a reeuiar supplier of protein (milk, yoc$urt and cheese) a goat would be useful but feeding would be a problem on oneeighth of an acre though goats can be fed on comfrey, kale, swedes, turnips fodder-beet, mai~c,nettles, docks, hedges and a small pasture of herbs and white clover. (See David Mackenzie's Goat Husbandry, Faber and Faber, 1970).

nother method is to divide the land strips; a continuous cropping sequence for 3 years on one strip might be: Beetroot in May, followed by Spring Onions i n October, Cabbage i n April, Swedes in mid-August, then Broad beans i n mid-Nov, April sown Tomatoes plant. ed out in June, and in October either Broad beans again, or winter greens and lettuce, early Potatoes in Feb, after which we can start again. The Henry Doubleday Research Association's experimental 'Survival Garden'at Booking, Braintree, Essex, should reveal important information on the rotation, cultivation and harvesting o f highly productive and nutritious crous from small areas of land, as the

fertility is by Sward Gardening, develo ed by Tony Farmer from suggestions ' Andre Voisin's Better Grassland Swar (Crosby Lockwood 1960). This tech described in greater detail in an acco panying article, is being tested at the Henry Doubleday Research Associatio Rows of vegetables are surrounded by complete ground cover of white clove . When the leguminous, nitrogen-fixing clover i s cut or mown, iust like little strips of lawn, nitrogen is released into the soil when the roots die off. Associated with the clover are large numbers of earthworms, which benefit the soil by adding secretions of carbonite of lime to the leaves and soil that they digest and excrete. Even better results are obtained i f a surface mulch o f leaves, animal manure or compost can be applied. (Lawrence Hills wrote an article on sward gardening in the Aug/ Sept 1974 issue o f the Ecofoqist.)

Aerobic Composter Toilet Experiments My own attempts to design a toilet to recycle organic materials for garden fertility began in June 1972. Aerobic composting (ie decomposition in the presence of air) seemed to be the simple and natural way of conserving these materials safely. A small PVC-lined hardboard container was constructed along the lines of a miniature Clivus unit. It was 20" high and covered 1% x 4 feet o f floor. The top had an air outlet at one end and a squatting plate, cover and air outlet at the other. The whole top could be removed lor inspection. Below the squat-plate a row o f inverted channels, cut from plastic pipe supported the compost materials and allowed air to flow below, around and through the mass, drawing off nloisture and any odour through the experiment progresses. (See the vent pipe to the outside air. The unit Association's Dig for Surv/voi leaflet, was divided into two compartments price 3p). by a bulkhead, one beingthecomposting part and the other the receiving No-Digging and Sward Gardening Systems part for finished compost. A layer of There i s evidence that regular inverting soil was laid in the bottom o f the toilet or digging damages soil structure and to absorb excess urine. I t was intended disturbs beneficial soil organisms to such to lift the squat-plate end o f the toilet an extent that neither may ever get a after use, so that the bottom sloped, chance to settle down into an optimal allowing the compost to move slowly CROPPING AND ROTATION state. James Gunston's Successful downwards. In practice this unit was found an unsuitable shape and size, The aim of crop rotation is to prevent the Gardening Without Digging (Stanley but the problems experienced taught build-up of pest and disease and to balance Paul, 1960) though not organic, has an one more about the process than could interesting section on intercropping, is out demand for plant nutrients over the land. Diagram one shows a rotation where only possible if the soil can be kept rich be learned from a more perfect proto. the legumes are grouped together on one with plenty of fertility and humus, and type. plot. The following year see root crops this means regular applications o f The Cornposting Process on this plot and brassics the year after. compost. But can a closed system Though every human produces faeces However this type of cropping may not garden supply sufficient compost? make best use o f your land. The conservation of all oraanic and urine, a certain amount of care i s . Try to keep the land productive materials (faeces, urine, vegetable needed in their handling. - Our intestines trimmings etc) will make iin important ecessary overlap the harvesting and and faeces contain large amounts of contribution, but additional mdterial anting of crops, but try not t o gro hdctcr~asuch as E coii, Barriers within e same tvve of crou on the same la mav still be needed. the body retain these bacteri twice in one year One alternative way of building soil they are normal and useful.

stinal parasites such as worms can

to each unit of nitrogen, a compost mass with a 30:1 ratio is ideal and will quickly break down. Plant and vegetable and increase their surface area. As the decomposer organisms use carbon for energy and nitrogen (plus some carbon) for cellular protein, the amount of carbon i s reduced

he purpose of the cornposter i s to in these materials safely, to

s after defecation risks infection faecal diseases, whichever form toilet they use). The compost must

higher than 30:l will take longer (more generations of micro-organisms

extent t o which we waste energy and nutrients must be considerable. Food is a scarce and valuable resource. Fortunately, many foods do not require cooking (though meat. fish and potatoes do). Haybox cookery the placing o f the heated pan and contents into a well insulated container certainly saves energy but Is no good for vegetables, which, i f cooked a t all, should be steamed over almost boiling water t o conserve their vitamins. Though people say that foods are easy to cook in vacuum flasks, I have ofte but without much satis

My first composter was used from February until September 1973 (1 1 0 times). In April, analysis of a sample of compost from the unit revealed a rather wet but useful end product -. moisture 64%; Nitrogen 1.82%; Phosphorus 3.94%; Potash 1.75%;and a C/N ratio of 9.1: 1. Two more composters have been built and are presently in use. Composter 2 (see diagram 2) is installed in a friend's flat at floor space. Steps are needed to mount the toilet. Inside, four grids of ^A" diameter tube support compost materials as they move gradually down to the Eggs are a high protein food which require cooking to neutralise the avidi

Composter 3 (see diagram 3) i s a smaller toilet, 19" high, 16" wide, 20" deep and like C2 is made from 12mm chipboard. C3 is used by a number of people i n a Covent Garden studio. It incorporates a stirring

a cold composter will be slow. In the composting process, microorganisms (bacteria, fungi and moulds) feed on the materials, transforming' them through molecular changes into nutrients suitable for uptake by plant

To encourage them, I am writing a composting manual, which should be published soon. Pathogen destruction in low-temperature cornposters and prevention of fly-breeding are two aspects which need study. There are

of carbon to nitrogen i n the materials

their own units. Old fridges, surprisingly, make ideal composters, once you've added a seat, cover, air venting and ,

nts require nutrients with about 10

Energy, Economy, Nutrition

water i s 60Ă&#x201A;Â° and the eggs are

a flask so that such water can be

grated roots and apple, shredded cabbage and runner beans, sproute wheat and legumes, chopped nuts, tomato and lemon, with

s shelters from Zeppelin bombing

ttacks was hit upon. At the time, the

tunnels were com~letedbv 1917. The11 e s t i l l exists and, inter aha, i s used il. The so-called les, other art treasures, and disnitarie'i cowered i n these tunnels 0 -as Zeooelins elided above. I n 1917. one of the twin tunnels of the Piccadilly e branch from Holborn to Aldwych s closed. 130 feet beneath the street, s used as shelter accommodation IPS. After the First World War, al stations were closed, or rebuilt. These were: Piccadilly Line, Dover Strect, Down treet, Brompton Road rthern Line, City Road, South

ntral Line, British Museum I n the second world war, Down Street tion was used for the Railway ExecuCommittee's bunker. I t was also by Winston Churchill and his family o s umber whilst the blitz destroyed the workers' homes in the East End. t Dover Street, London Transport's gh-ups resided, 80 feet down. Control staff of the Great Western Railwa in a bunker in the Bakerloo stati Paddington, whilst the Emergenc Engineering staff of London Tr used part of the uncompleted Dist express tube beneath South Kensington. The War Cabinet used a 'citadel' beneath Hampstead i n the old, never completed tation of 'North End' or 'Bull and Bush' at the deepest part o f the tube network, between Hampstead and Golders Green stations I t is, however, the new sections built 1940-43 that need further scrutiny, as these formed the core of the svstem now in existence The deep shelters built on the Northern Line, and used for public shelters were'- Clapham North, Clap ham South, Belsize Park and Stockwell. Those constructed for government use, and retained to this day, were: Clapham Common, Goodge Street, St Paul's, Chancery Lane, and the special underground telephone exchange at Kingsway. Goodge Street is closely connected with the complex of tunnels beneath the GPO tower, and was used

th the platforms of existing erground stations. The ostensible was to connect them up to form

'--/"

I'm; spirit 01 Spies for Peace

lives on. Undercurrents recently received a pamphlet r o m a arouo called Anarchist?

details the s e c r e t Government bunkers and tunnels under London, and explains their counter-revolutionary role. This article i s a slightly

Just part of the Post Office's intricate tunnel network that runs under London. the Postal railway from paddington t o Whitechapel via Mount Pleasant they were connected up anyway, either on initial construction, or subsequently. A new station was built at Highgate (Archway) for the extension Park on the Northern from Line, and tunnels were built at Aldenham. These sections, planned i n the 193540 otan o f London Transport, were never opened, on the lame excuse that these areas were now green belt and did not need underground stations. Nuclear War

insb bur^

government had built 4bunkers known as 'Citadels': The Admiralty Blockhouse, Pall Mall; Citadel telephone exchange near St Paul's; The 'Rotundas' in Horseferry Road, Westminster, the ground floor of the Department of Education and Science in Curzon Street. Also erected at the time were a number o f steel framed office buildings i n New Oxford Street, and between the Strand and the Embankment. These were intended to be bomb-proof strongholds, and were connected by tunnels - on the admission of Winston Churchill himself. The Post Office constructed a network of cable tunnels, beginning in 1939. The first 'run' was 100 feet below the surface, to the south of and parallel with Holborn, linking Holborn telephone exchange with St Martin's Le Grand and Faraday House. At the eastward end i t divided, the southern branch ending beneath Citadel telephone exchange, at the north east corner of the Faraday building. Citadel has walls of solid concrete 7 feet 5 inches thick, its own artesian well (like Kingsway underground exchange), and was built in 6 months in 1940. The tunnel was 7 feet in diameter, lined i n the main with concrete. The 'experimental' use of concrete for tunnels made great publicity when London Transport b u i l t ' the Victoria Line 20 years !at (see below). Another GPO tunnel ra from Trafalgar Square (where they are building another 'new' undergr railway, the Fleet Line) to the Ro at Horseferry Road. Post Office tunne grew in length continuously. I n 1941 there was 1 mile; 1942, 1% miles; 1945, 3 miles; 1967, 15 miles. In the early 70s, a new tunnel was driven beneath the Thames a t Waterloo, and Tunnels, connected t o the bunke network, run from Croydon in th south to Hampstead in the North

shima and Nagasaki, war was different,

a cable run, later expanded for p

formed war into the annihilation of whole cities at a stroke. The government, having constructed shelters for itself, dared not allow them to be used for express tube lines, let alone shelters

tunnels were enlarged in the 19 Bicycles are used in the small bore tunnels, and electric cars in the lar bore tunnels for rapid communica Intimately linked with

Undercurrents 8 ment has been constructing own tunnel system since the nd world war. There is good evie that the Victoria Line tunnels e constructed,in 1942, not 1960, the concrete lining adopted (releasing vaiudbie metal for the war effort) is a pointer to this. I t links many important telephone exchanges, including the GPO tower and Buckingham Palace (which is linked by tunnel with Heathrow Airport). The GPO tower, though over 600 feet in height, is not built in the conventional manner, on piles driven deep into the ground - it rests on a concrete 'raft' - a necessity caused by the multiple tunnels beneath it. Chapman Pincher, i n the Daily Express in 1959 reported (28112/59) that the government were building a new bunker in the country to replace the ten miles constructed after WW3 below London, as those could no longer withstand the latest H-bombs. Thus, the system was admitted to be useless in a full-scale nuclear war. The Government, however, continued to extend the system. An attempt was made to abandon the Piccadilly Line from Aldwych to Holborn (which has been single track since 1917). Regular passengers made representations to London Transport, and the plan was dropped. In 1965, an act o f Parliament was made authorising the construction of an extension of the Aldwych line to Waterloo. This has never been done. Much redevelopment has occurred at Waterloo, and part of the abandoned

tion between Office Blocks and subterranean government establishments i s well-defined. Centre Point, empty for nearl y ten years, is strategically placed above the tunnel network. Thousands o f gallons o f oil were delivered t o it at the height ot the fuel crisis, ostensibly to 'heat i t to stop condensation'. It went straight down into the bunkers. A similar block exists at London Bridge railway station, built directly above a tube station, which was rebuilt at the same time. This links up with the old City and Southwark Subway t o the city o f London. Other blocks and complexes are connected t o the tunnel system. Government ministry and police offices are all connected. At the end o f the Whitehall system is the Citadel in Horseferry Road, and a massive comulex of offices. For example, the Police National Computer Unit, Romney House, Marsham Street, the Home Office Police Department, Horseferry House, Dean Ryle Street, and the Parole Board, Romney House, Marsham Street. This complex is connected by tunnel with the nerve centre at Whitehall where Ă&#x201A;ÂŁ3,000,00 was spent on 'renovating' 10 Downing Street in the 1960s. From Whitehall, a tunnel runs to the Waterloo Complex (the Shell Building, etc) another to the Victoria redevelopment, via New Scotland Yard. The Victoria redevelopment tunnels are linked to the Victoria Line. The main Whitehall tunnel runs northward to Trafalgar Square, where i t connects " with the Fleet Line bore, constructed

f^l

beneath Square in the 1950s. underground the Post TheOffice tunnel station, t oruns Leicester where from the

Hampstead stations both had rebuilt in the 19405, the old 1

University of London and possibl British Museum, both nearby. In t early 1950s, tunneling was carried from a shaft near Tavistock Square. Several Government departments exist

to Tottenham Court Road undergro station, where i t links with the tunn from Trafalgar Square. Centre Poin

More detailed sketch-plan of Gove

K .City of London L .Waterloo Complex

%s?

Northern Line Central Supervisory Control Room i s situated. The Leicester Square tunnels were built in 1940-43. From Leicester Square, the tunnel runs MUTS. to connect under Centre Point with HALL WMN Mrfriuuo the tunnel from St Paul's t o Euston. This tunnel begins somewhere around Euston. The evidence points to its UvalivWf KOAD commencement at Camden Town Diagrammatic plan of tunnels known where the standard twin 16'6" sh to Anarchists Anonymous with tunnels were driven in World Wa localities. The tunnel, if connected, run Kingsway Tram Subway at Aldwych Euston via Mornington Crescent was converted into a road underpass. station, which narrowly avoided In theearly 19705, the Post Offic closure in the mid '60s. Half o f the built a tunnel for 'cable runs' und tunnels at this station are not used for theThames at Waterloo, connectin passengers - at least. Euston station was up the 180-feet deep emergency te completely rebuilt between 1961 and phone exchange at Waterloo. 1966 The underground was rebuilt at Underground lines built, but never opened, this time, and the Victoria ~i~~ was include the Bakerloo Line extension, connected up The tunnel runs from commenced at the Elephant and Castle Euston to the GPO tower, whose main in 1950 southwards to Camberwell, as a purpose i s microwave commun~cation replacement for the heavily trafficked from Museum telephone exchange, to tramway routes Subsequently, massive the Sub-Regional Controls (see below), air-conditioned office blocks have been military basesand bunker networks.

?&2'

S~.PAUL

Eastwards from Holborn, the tunnel runs under the air-conditioned office block 'State House', the Meteorological office, near the Daily Mirror building, to St Paul's, where it loints the Post Office complex. A northward branch runs to the Barbican, connecting with various abandoned parts o f the Northern city underground railway and the offices of the Department of Health and Social Security at Finsbury Square. There may also be links to the vast underground refrigerated warehouses for meat at Smithfield The southward tunnel from St Paul's connects the (literal) Citadel telephone exchange with the Central Electricity Gencriiti Board's national grid control Len at Bankside, the Supplies Di the Department of the Envir

io station: the most practical' methods of operation ethics of independent radio what are you broadcas

then discusses the general desirability and practicality of operatin communications systems i n a 'post-industrial' low-technology environment.

OPENING UP THE AIR WAVES Why Are You Doing It? There are numerous r to communicate; let's them. nt 1) You are part of a P and you want to corn subversive plans to your mates. Well, don't use radio, whatever You do. The only potentially secure system would use narrow-beam UHF and microwaves, but the practicality of this is low .-unless you work for a big communications company. 2) More sensibly, YOU just want to talk to your friends, but You don't see why you should have to use the telephone network, or you don't want to help the Post Office as a matter o f principle (who does?). I n this case, your best bet is probably the Short Wave bands. You can communicate over long distances with a very low power - in fact, the â‚¬1. transmitter in UG', with a couple of modifications, (reducing the number o f turns on the coils by about one-third) works very well indeed. You obviously need a short-wave receiver for this, but once you're down there on the shortwave band, you'll probably find a lot o f other people with the same ideas. At one time there was a network of stations all over the country, ail illegal, on about 6MHz. However, they got raided, this being the biggest problem involved in the use of radio in this country. 3) Alternatively, you want to provide, with the help o f a few friends, an independent radio service for the ge public, and especially for people lik yourselves who resent the degree o f control exerted on existing radio co munication, whether governmental, as in the case o f the BBC, or capitalist as in the case of the commercial stations. There is a lot of demand for an 'all-dav

certainly. Or an up to the minute cornmunity news service. The trouble is, the Post Office won't like you doing it, and you'll probably end up d o i n g t on Sundays only. A Medium Wave station i s the obvious choice, as lone as you choose your frequency carefully. And for your listeners' sakes, get a .. get one made specially i f you have to -because there are few things more likely to put your listeners off than a variable frequency radio station that starts on 300 metres and five minutes later is on 255. Apart from which, it's unethical . because you cause interference to other people who have as much right to be there as you have. 4) The last possibility I am going to consider i s that you want to set up a radio station playing good music of whatever sort, with some attempt a t drama, news, documentary presentation ~erhaps., . with the accent on Qi/&v. Sound ouality, nrogramme quality basically trying to meet, and beat, the

need sound equipment as good a can get, and a good transmitter o ting on VHF, of course. Unfortunate the VHF transmitter described in UC7 won't do - it needs to be more stable, for a start and unfortunately, that means more complicated equipment. You'll probably need upwards o f Â£2 electronics unless you have industry. ,ome Amates broadcast-quality in the transmitter can be constructed around a stable 10.9MHz (or thereabouts) tuneable oscillator, followed by a phase modulator, doublers and amplifiers up to the final frequency of 88-97 MHz or so I n my opinion, there is no point in using the VHF band unless you want to do it properly, and that means using the best there is available. My advice would be to stick to the Medium waveband unless you're willing to spend a considerable amount of time, and unfortunately, a good deal of bread too. But i f you are prepared to go into this side of 'People's Radio' You could bring a very large number of people a great deal of pleasure, information --and, in return, their support when the time comes. A power as low as 8 Watts will cover London from a suitable location (it's been done. . . see later). This leads to another question What Area Do You Want to Cover? If you are on Medium Wave and living on a housing estate, you can quite easily cover the estate with a simple aerial like the 'Emergency Aerial' described in UC7. You may also appear on everyone's television sound channels as well. I f this occurs, or i f you find the signal i s travelling too far, tune the transmitter tuning for theminhimum dip valu meter. Then tune up again until either at the required power, or just before the interference starts. This type of interference is due to Harmon; ie, multiples of the broadcast freque cy - that happen to fall within the T V

50-watt transistor VHF transmitter and cassette machine.

~ nw d r e nut an the dir long enough for detection tu be I kel\ in thc beginning. A number of other stations sprang up on another wavelength, A medium-wave transmission i n progress. 197m. The 197 metres 'Helen Broadcasting Network! was organised band or the T V I F (intermediate Frewith, eventually, at leasta dozen quency) band. The best way of getting stations doing pre-recorded programrid of these troubles is by fitting a further . mes in rotation, every Sunday, for coil and capacitor in the anode circuit half an hour at a time. They to of the BufferIDriver stage as shown in changed 'location' every week, Fig 1 and tuning the capacitor for eventually the 'locations' (as th maximum output. (Substitute Fig 1 for houses were known) ran out, a Fig 4 in UC7). Hopefully, however, this stations began to use the same plac modification will not be necessary. more than once, or even for se i f you just want to cover the block successive weeks. The PO finall you live in or your housing estate, and struck, and a number o f prosec you tune the transmitter up until you ensued. The network eventually are using sufficient power fie not more came disorganised and fell apart, than you need) you will be relatively safe a number o f the stations, including from Post Office interference unless the now-famous Radio Jackie, decided you're causing interference and someto go i t alone, initially from further one reports you. So don't tune in to locations, but eventually going another station and try and block it out; 'Mobile', with equipment powered though you may succeed in your back from car batteries. Consider what room, it'll only be a nasty whistle next this, one of the most effective means door. Not only is it a nasty thing to do, of high-power regular broadcasting, but legal stations are often running entails. A medium wave transmitter, 5,000 times the power so you won't get almost always using valves, must h very far. Keep an ear open for empty a device to convert the 12v DC fro spaces on the band at the times you a car battery to 250.350~DC to intend to transmit. Once you've found one supply H T to the valves. Either a try and set up regular times of broadcast, rotary converter (inefficient, available and stay on your chosen spot on the dial. from surplus shops) - o r a transistor Soon you will find the station being inverter (up to 90% efficient; either purchased via ads, or home constructIked about, and you'll gain listeners, lc may initially mistake you for ed - see articles in Wireless World o One and, liking what they hear, and similar magazines) can be us n again. I f all goes well, you may VHF transmitters are usually tra ide eventually to increase the power, sistorised throughout, so this pro doesn't arise. Program nd show the rest o f North Cheam what ey've been missing. Or South Lond recorded, to enable pla Manchester. But beware! Don't tr portable cassette mach run before you can walk. You then need to fin oing to try to cover a sizea For Medium Wave, a site that is low ou wilt have to adopt a far ore likely to bcdamp) will give phisticated strategy. I t will t earth, which i s essential in this ganisation, a good loyal staf f operation. I t should also be bly held together in with two tall trees a suitable emocratic group str (quarter-wave) distance apart - - but ce o f dedication, plu don't worry too much about getting ace a few risks. Remc this distance bang on, as the 'pi-network' are breaking the law; on a MW transmitter will tune almost ything Preferably w t up the aerial Id be fined up to Â£40 months for a first offence. T few davs in advance. Choose a site

It will also he useful 11, h.ivi.' on? or t u o q o ~ p of s two pcop c cruising round the area i n cars. They will soon get to know the sort of places where the PO hide their vehicles (usually private cars) d o w n quiet sideroads, etc. Quite often the PO men will be in o or two cars only (the police prefer t keep out of radio piracy work unless they're forced into it, apparently) unless it's; large raid in which case your vehicle-borne lookouts should prove their worth by informing you well in advance. You might try walkie alkies for this, but preferably not 27 MH types - the PO must have sussed these by now. But you may find that your transmitter blanks out the walkie talkie at close range. Walkie talkies are also illegal, which means that your lookouts can all be prosecuted instead o f just wandering away as innocent bystanders The minute the PO are seen (you'll soon get to recognise your local 'Man' and his various borrowed cars) you should switch off and get the gear out to a waiting car. You and the driver should know the safest way out. You can sacrifice the batteries they're no problem to replace and the PO don't want them much anyway. So, with luck, you'll survive. One word of warning, however. Those Post Office officials are Human. Not only that,sorne o f them are quite friendly. Talkio them by all means (as Ions as neither of you are 'on duty'). They may ' - h e got to know you t c well i f you've been slow cnou~h. viously you don't admit an:!thin; but on't be nasty to them either. Most of em are just doing their job (there aren't many fanatics left) and i f you are nice to them, they will often be considerate to you. T ' T ~may, for instance, iust go out to close y o u down (ie you

cfi --

Van

---

6V6 100K

O,OIÃ‡

see them, take tiic gear and scram; they go home after looking round a bit) as o~onsedto raidina fvou see them " vou , ,, take the "ear, are met by 20 policemen rapidly converging on your spot from every corner of the fieid, with your look. outs all rounded up. You are led to olice station, hot transmitter in hand,

a commercial station, God rest his oul) devised a brilliant VHF drive unit, along the lines 1 described hi^ was subsequent. oughly earlier, y upgraded to produce a lovely ompact unit running off 12 volts

New monitoring vans have been introduced by the Post Office requires a splitter box to feed the two aerials from the transmitter; it also requires a certain distance between the

which reflects bacbradiation from the radiator into a forward direction. This reinforces the forward signal and reduces the signal wasted in tke opposite direction. A simple dipole, the radiator without the reflector, radiates in a niore-or-less figure-of-eight pattern.

vew unusual to find usable high <faces available, all from transisto from 1 2 volt car batteries.

aring equipment and staff. They all t up a group called the 'London

one night per station) until quite

recently, hi^ isa fundamentally good method of running a VHF station becausepooling of gear and bread can lead to a very sophisticated setup. (The group hopes to return soon with stereo - that's practical, too). I was part of Radio London Underground -. as far as I know we were the first to use Dolby noise reduction on radio in the UK. We also specialised in a varied format; trying to get as near to the aims described i n section 4

London for a night each a 2 years. This i s how we

in the centre of towns. However, Radio nvicta, a London-based VHF soul

they almost certainly know more or

his previous lines, he'll be on to you like a shot. It can take him as little as 25 minutes on a good day (medium waver' daylight). VHF at night can take up to 1 hour or more. Anyway, don't be tempted to use the same location twice, although you may get away with a 'mobile' site more than once if it's dark and you're on VHF, Depending on the site, you will need to get your VHF aerial high up. I n some place5 YOU can get away with slicking the pole in the ground and tying i t to a fence to keep i t upright, as long as the pole is at least a couple of metres long to minimise interfering with the beam path (otherwise the radiation will

This i s to ensure thatthe signal leaves the aerial in a horizontal plane with 'horizontal polarisation' because at least 75% o f your potential listeners receiving aerials have horizontally polarised too. BBC V ~ is Fpolarisedthis way and rtey chose this method because i t travels

Ã£Ã£tfi a transistor radio with a moveable teiescopic piace aerial horizontal and tune to a BB which

arks

either way --

the set for best reception. Now move the aerial until i t i s in a vertical position. The signal will almost vanish (unless you live down the road fro,, trdn5mittcr,, This is difference your listeners will experience i f you

commercial radio. Many static have any ideals at all, and were

f i ~ a1

L the centre of a town, but no good if you want to 'beam in' from a hill on the outskirts. r..

sues

The actual site you choose for VHF will obviously depend on your locality, but a main criterion is to get as high up as you can. A good rule is: 'You should be able to see the entire scrvice area on a good day - from a suitable site,' even if this is the top o f a tree. VHF is very much a line-of-sight business, and even a small hill in the way will throw a large 'Shadow'. The BBC publish technical data sheets for all their local stations and VHF trans. mitters, and i f one of these is in your area, a study of the appropriate sheet will give a good idea of VHF propagation. These sheets can be obtained free from BBC local stations; or from Local Radio Information, BBC Broadcasting House, London. The Rest Time to Broadcast Broadcast at night; it's less obvious. Although a VHF aerial i s relatively compact, compared with metres of MW aerial wire, it still looks strange peeping out of the top of a tree. The PO can't get very close to your station on bearings alone, either on MW or VHF. I n the former case their receivers get swamped, and in the latter case they pick up all sorts of confusing reflections from nearby trees, buildings, etc. Either way, they will arrive in the area and look out for your visible signs; aerials, lookouts, etc. They will probably find your particular tree more by luck than judgement, and in the dark they might not find it at all. Trouble is, of course, that you can't see them very well either or at least you wouldn't but for the fact that they use large torches and make a hell o f a lot of noise crashing around in the bushes. Lookouts should be stationed as described for Medium Wave. and the same generally apply. You can spot the H F tracker vehicles quite easily e they cannot track you with a

with a large multi-element aerial on top (the more elements, the narrower the beam width). These vans are usual. ,I ~ 4 0 with windows in the side, They are painted green or yellow. They may come on their own, but if you're particularly successful they may well have some private cars as back-up vehicles, so look out for them too. Equipment As I said earlier, I personally don't believe VHF i s worth considering unless you are ready to do it properly. RLU used to produce programmes which even surprised BBC monitoring station staff (one of them used to write to us) who assumed we used expensive reel to reel recorders on site whereas we in fact used chromium diox' replayed on a cheap Philips Generally-speaking, these m are excellent for on-site repi visible in the photo on p21) as Ion take the output from the low 1e socket and not the external spea socket, as the amps in the speaker drive stages aren't quite up to standard. This means that you need high quality audio stages in the transmitter, but the average phase modulator requires very little power so this i s no problem. Basically, if you produce good quality programme and record it on good quality cassette recorder, you will be able to use minimal equipment on site, which is, of course, a big advantage when i t comes to an emergency. One unfortunate fact about the 'pirate' radio scene (at least on the entertainment front, excluding 'revolutionary'stations) has been that almost without exception the stations have

form of a visit4rom the Postman and ~-. -. \ a stiff fine. A t anyrate, there aren' ~

many of them left now. (presumabl they all grew up). Let's assume that the people running acommunitY radio station are doing so out of a desire to be of some service to the community the people of their area - by giving them the sort of programme that they want to hear in a way that is non-commercial, non-profitmaking (you'd never make a profit out of it, anyway), and controlled bv the listeners. This means an efficient system of feedback between the listeners and You, the operators, I t is no trouble to ask a friend to act as a mailing address some of the 'free radio' organisations do this also (though only some; keep the Free Radio AsSoc' ation, for example; they can get raided and lose important data to the PO - like your addresses, for example). I f a friend is running your mailing address, i t is very unlikely that he will be raided (I don't think it's ever happened to anyone yet) although they may steam your letters open (no matter; you'll probably be reading them over the air anyway) and possibly even listen to his phone (they're in rather a good position to do it). So don't just ring him up and tell him you're broadcasting from the common today and how good does i t sound? If your friend wants to sit at home during the broadcast (or your staff can d o it in rotation), then why not give out a telephone number? This will give your listeners an immediate means of telling you what they think, plus invaluable instant reception reports. But don't keep any transmitting gear on any premises that they know the address or might know the address of. And don't do dnv tests or broadcasts from there either. Keep your names secret too, use pseudonyms on the air an'd k e e ~vour real names unknnwn

ercurrents 8 I

to anyone outside the group. You may get contact from other, similar roups; solidarity is the name of the ame, but be careful at all times; them on neutral ground, and when you are sure they're OK, t tell them unnecessary informaSimilarly, any potential new embers of the group should be nown personally by at least one of ou. I suppose all these precautions e standard practice to most 'underound' groups, but the point i s that

lectromagnetic communication offers st opportunities for information, ucation, entertainment and even vernment; not only today but even ore so i n the society of the future hich would presumably be i n the m of small villages or similar-sized al self-sufficient communities. But the present methods of comnication (Radio, T V or Telephone I require very sophisticated technogical processes to provide the active mponents (valves or transistors: gh quality contacts, etc). o we can only have our radio and ision if we feel that its great use. ess justifies the equipment and ocesses involved in the manufacture n f live components. My personal opinion at, taking into consideration the fact one small plant could not only proe standard parts for the entire untry, but also make things like lightIbs (especially if valves rather than sisters are chosen as the standard e electronic element - - which is a approach in view of the less corn. ex procedures involved), the processes Id be justified. Radio, certainly, d be the backbone of community hing, information, and some aspects ertainment. Television is less easily ed; its visual functions could ly be covered by printed or u what if society collapses catasphically - perhaps, because of

s famine? would electromagnetic unication he possible in a society no high-technology industrial base? asicaily, yes. I f you can s l i l l make the ts, that is. Wire is no real problem ere may well be a lot of it lying about d besides you can easily recycle the f f - i t only has to conduct electricity; oesn't necessarily have to be of ular cross section. Hence you can aKe coils, insulated with paper or organic varnish Resistors are little

would certainly work, as w o ~ ~ l d

Certainly, too, telephones would be practical; a small hand-operated 'exchange' running out to self-energised transducers or carbon microphones would work very well in a small community. When it comes down to it, the only problem about radio i s the active components; the valves or transistors. Transistors require the production of a pure crystal of Silicon or Germanium. This is usually done in a very high vacuum, and this fact, plus the necessity of extracting the silicon or germanium in the first place makes such devices imnractical. Valves, however, are a different matter. They again need a vacuum, but not so intense. Some friends of mine are trying to construct a workable vacuum pump entirely out of natural or easily-processed materials I will be interested to learn if anybody else manages to do this. I assume glass will be available; experiments would have to be made in the field of metal/ glass seals, but I see few difficulties

in this part of the operation. HI-tech modern valves use adevice called a 'getter' to remove the last bit of air after the envelope has been sealed; this consists of a small amount of Barium which is ignited by baking the tube after sealing. The Barium combines with the remaining air and condenses to form the characteristic 'silvering' often visible on the inside of the envelope of a 'good' valve. I doubt i f this is practical, so low-technology valves will not be as efficient as they are today. But they will work. In fact, the radio valve manufacturer may well be a craftsman, producing wonderfully intricate fine-wire electrode assemblies in a remarkably small space though not as miniaturised as today because the poorer vacuum requires greater electrode spacing to avoid flashover. They would probably last almost indefinitely, merely requiring a return for re-evacuation every few months or a new envelope if dropped.

Subregional Controls known t Anarchists Anonymous .Warren Row, Kidderminster, Hatch, Bawburgh; York; Presto Kingsbridre; Cambridge; Readin Dover; Tunbridge Wells; Carlisle; Lincoln; Macclesfield; Mexborou Bishop's Waltham; Melton Mowb

RSG's In 1959, i t was discovered that, due to the vast progress made by the Nuclear Powers in atomic weaponry develop. ment, H-Bombs were now large enough to wipe out the London tunnel system. The Government pumped more o f our money into creating a system of underground bunkers throughout the country

-.the Regional Seats o f Government. hen the RSGs were exposed by the spies for Peace in 1962, they were in their infancy. Bunkers at Portsmouth, Dover and below Wentworth Golf Course had been used in the war as communications centres for co-ordinating military activities. The bunkers were intended to be seats o f Government after the nuclear holocaust had wrecked the status quo. In a way, they were a protection for the government against the people, a haven of the old order in the wreckage created by that same order.'In the worst possible situation, the inmates would be the Sole ~urvivors - a country of policemen, soldiers and civil servants! As well as the RSGs (now renamed Sub-Regional Controls), there were 'hardened' telephone exchanges - at Birmingham (Anchor), Cambridge, Manchester (Guardian), Coventry, Tunbridge Wells, etc. These were supposed to be operational even if a near miss had been recorded from an Hbomb. Along with those, the microwave communications system, codenamed 'Backbone' was to link all these together.

Continuedfrom page 1 7 and Wokes, in Plant Foods For Human Nutrition (May 1968) point out that giotrongenic substances in the Brassicas and sulphur-containing vegetables combine with iodine and inhibit thyroid gland function. Soy-beans are also associated with thyroid problems. But seaweeds such as kelp, and to a lesser extent onions and cabbage, contain useful amounts of iodine. The oxalic in Spinach, rhubarb and beetroot leaves are known to combine with calcium, making i t unavailable to the body. So much for Popeye. Iron i s also affected. i n Turnip greens, on the other hand, calcium availability is almost as high

vitamin C increased by 60%; B1 by 3 B2 by 100%, B3 by 90%; B6 by 1OOOo Pantothenic acid by 80%; Biotin 100%; and Folic acid by 700%. To sprout, put a handful of, say wheat (use only organically grown food; do not use seeds that have a mercury dressing) into a jar, cover water and soak overnight. Next m drain off the fluid (it contains usefu vitamins;'only soy-beans must have t water discarded) and transfer thesee to a tray, rinsing and draining well Sprouting for Nutrition each morning and night for 3-4 days Sprouting greatly increases the vitamin, when they are ready to eat. Sproute mineral, fat, enzyme and protein conwheat can also be crushed and baked tent of seeds and legumes. Researchers into biscuits in a solar oven. found that after 3-4 days sprouting of wheat,

continued from page 20 several Stationery Office buildings and the Rampart trunk telephone cxchan One branch runs cast to London Bridge Station,and connects with way tunnels. The other, wester1 branch runs to Waterloo and th Greater LondonCouncil's head at County Hall. From Waterloo, beneath the river i t goes back to Whitehall, from which another tunnel runs to Victoria (see above). This links the Foreign and Commonwealth Office's Communications and Elecironic Security Department, Scotland Yard, London Transport Headquarters, Westminster City Hall and the Board of Trade.

Continued from page 18 times as great as that of the next best host . - good meadow grasses. A bacterium living i n symbiosis with the clover produces nitrates which are stored i n the clover roots. When the clover green is clipped, a certain percentage of the root mass is thrown off, complete with nitrogenous sacs - a sort of underground fertiliser. lhe And here liesOne key which a sward-harbours while naked soil does not: the bodies of the bacterial

Possible Other Subregional Potter's Bar; Watford; Bath, ,

In London, the tunnel system expanded, and is till being improv Not for abandonment was the syst It is useless in a nuclear war, so its existence cannot be justified on the grounds of National Security. The only war in which it would be use{ i s a civil war, when the governmen could dive and batten down the hatches whilst the army came out of the underground military vehicl park beneath Hyde Park and dealt with the rebellion. I n direct comm ication with the military bases outs1 London by the sabotage-proof GP tower microwave system, they be virtually-invulnerable, excep continued on page 45

as from milk. Phytic acid in wheat, oats and maize make calcium and iron unavailable but this disadvantage can be overcome by 'sprouting', as I will explain in a moment. The tryptophan inhibitor Trypsin' in soy-beans prevents the digestion of proteins. All imported soy-beans are steamed at high temperature to destroy trypsin - . but again, sprouting will also do the same thing.

Another benefit to be gained from a living sward is increasedporosity. of the turf grow round The and through a piece of soil and compact it to such a degree that it resembles a soft pebble, ThEn the hair roots die off and decompose leaving fine pores in the pebble or 'crumb' as the soil would haveit. ~h~~~pores have a power^y.ary effect as, once they fill with water, it requires temperatures greater than 100 degrees Centigrade, or centrifugal force amountatmospheres to drive the ing to

Previous to applying the sward system my garden required about t weeks in the spring to prepare - - t clear and sow. Now i t requires five days. Maintenance during the year (clipp etc) is about the same as i t would take to hoe a garden of this size growing exhibition vegetables, and last year's can be expected to continue. What the long term results will can only guess. Whether the sward will ever sup

f drought could accomplish this. The once the soil has reached a h i d fertility, of continuous croppin

Undercurrents 8

EARTH

is achieved by the addition o f a sufficient

. No fuel i s required for processing

particles throughout the mix, producing

which i s another point i n favour ' ing the earth wall, now that will no longer be a cheap com-

a homogenous mass of differing particle

sizes. In this issue 1 intend to deal With

monolithic earth walling technique and ich consists of compressing soil ost conventional materials. Simple 'unstabilised' metho

match the perfurmanc stone. However, with This i s no ordinary suburban house: it's a fine examp lithic earth walls, built by the Ministry, 1919.

puddled methods and also because o f its relative ease and speed of erection. Building constructed using Pise are found in abundance in the province of Lyons. France, where i t has been used for centuries, but i t is not very well established as a traditional walling material in other areas of Europe, with the exception of Catalonia i n Spain, and Germany's Rhineland. Improvements in Pise techniques have been made by a few pioneers who have experimented by deviating from traditional lines, testing new types of shuttering, implements and material. To build economically in Pise, suitable soil must be found on the site, and the equipment kept as simple as possible. The speed o f erection depends on the ease with which shuttering can be taken down and reset in position. Consequently much of the work of improvement has been concentrated i n this direction, particularly in the USA. 1. Shuttering Traditional varieties of wail formwork have been heavy and cumbersome, requiring a lot of bracing, and alignment. Having to use these forms is more than enough to discourage anyone from building a monolithic earthwall, but recently a number of improvements have been made. At Texas Agriculture and Mechanical College lighter weight plywood has been substituted for the heavy planking usually employed. And the Commonwealth Experimental Building Station in Australia developed a roller form with detachable wooden clamps, after finding that the old types of shuttering required three men working for one and a half hours to dismantle, reset and 'plumb'. Their roller shutter averaged eight minutes for the entire operation, and required only one man. A combination o f these two improvements is shown in Pi", wish the addcd improvement of detdchdblc hinges which allow thc construction of corners at any angle using only one set u f shustcring. Contractors Dan and John Magdiel, again in the USA have developed an all-metal form for their own use ,tnd now manufacture i t for sale. The shuttcrinsiis ;d after the completion

Undercurrents 8 -

(a layer o f walling) by a lever which loosens the sides o f the form. The M die1 system also eliminates the bothe and expense of having to use a swiv corner form. One straight section i s simply rammed at right angles to and over another, i n much the same wa a 'quoin' of brickwork. 2. Method of Construction. The walls are built off an impervious base wall to prevent rising damp and the splashing of rainwater from damaging the base of the wall. The formwork i s placed in position, taking care that i aligned and true, and the prepared s i s placed between the shutter of about 100mm. The layers are then thoroughly 'tamped' use of a ramming iron. The first strokes of the rammer should be given close t o the sides of the mould but afterwards should be applied to every other part of the sur- , face. The ramming stroke should leave hardly any imprint on the soil when the soil is properly compacted. The shawe of the iron will varv with the type of work. For rammed chalk ' work a 'heart' shaped rammer i s recommended, but for most types of

I be inferior and will require a larger

n be commenced as soon as th

to the lower courses. As soon as the walls are erected to a height to receive beams, joists or rafters, these may be placed on the ewly made walls the instant they re completed. The work may be

best results, because the fine soil era' fill in between coarse particle>, Soils with too hiyh a percentage of one particle size (clav, silts or sands) are considered unsuitable unless they are blended with other soils or 'stabilised'.

Fig 1 Rolling Formwork. (from Ken Kern's Owner Built Home.), soil flat rammers weighing between 3.2 and 5.5 kg are generally used. The soil should be moist but should not contain too high a percentage of water, as this produces swelling under the blows of the rammer and a stroke i n one place makes the soil rise in another, making

Too much aggregate (g sand) will produce crumb1 the bindinvgent i s clay, t binder will produce shrinkage and cracking. Generally clay is responsible for the compressivestrength of a soil, while sand reduces shrinkage and

the'soil dries out in the shutter. ing between the shutters each layer

used without the addition of stabilisers are preferred. All soils with between 40%and 75%of sand will be suitable, the best results being obtained with

ould be a sandy clay loam cont rounded pebbles passing a 25mm siev with 18% colloids (clay) 6% silt, 33% sand and 43% gravel passing a 25mm

although above this point stre goes down.

ash a sample in the following way: A large tin 15 to 20 litres capacity s filled to a third of its depth with the sample. Sufficient water i s added to be able to stir the sample, without spilling, to form a soil suspension. I t is left for 1 minute and water containing soil particles i s poured off. The procedure i s repeated until the sample is sand. This test i s crude but t i i n in a soil. The-sample is generally taken from a twice quartered heap ensure that it is representative. Another test for good ramming soil is to make a series of blocks 400mm x 200mm x 100mm from the soils to be used. When dry and hard, place them on t h e ~ o u n dat an angle of 4S0 so t h the rain washes the long surface. Afte a couple of weeks the hocks are chec ed and if they have not disintegrate or cracked excessively i t may beta that the soil is satisfactory for ram A soil that does not pass this test mus be mixed with a stabiliser or blended with a suitable soil before i t is used. A minimum working strength for soil to be used for rammed earth allowing a liberal factor of safety, i s 1.97/mm2. Tests after 30 days on soil sped of varying compositions to be used rammed earth construction (mixed with 11% water content by weight) gave the results shown i n Fig 2.

Compressive Strength sand 2 clay sand 2 clay sand 4 clay 1 sand 1 clay

1 shale 1 K shale 1 shale 0 shale

Preparation of the Soil for Building The soil should be extracted from about 600mm below the surface and thrown to exclude particles larger than tho passing a 25mm sieve. Make sure th the mixture does not contain clods,

Undercurrents 8 Here i s another i n the 'Systeme D' range of French windmill designs. Numbers 6 and 9 in the series were described i n Undercurrents 6, and i n this issueDerek Taylor gives details of windmill number 1, a multi-blade machine which can be used either as an aerogenerator or for pumping applications. But even t o those interested i n building a different kind of windmill, the information on tower construction wilt probably come i n handy.

Many Blades make

perates the pump.

e tail vane or rudder.

height have to be slit with a saw on one side of the angle iron, 500mm from one end, so that they can be bent t o form the box at the top of the tower. (Figs 1 and 2). Two o f the posts are then joined at the bottom by a 1.500m cross-beam, the ends of the cross beam being drilled to f i t the bolts or rivets for assembling (Fig 3). The third post i s bolted to the other two cross beams in a similar manner. Because of the inclination of the angle posts the bolts should not be fully tightened during assembly but only when the three posts have been joined so as to obtain a perfectequi-

posts at the level of the slits secured with bolts or rivets. The intermediate cross beams, of fixed like the others between the posts (these could also be fiat iron). The bolts are then fully tightened and the whole structure is tensioned

with cable ties stretched between each module of the tower, in diagonals on the face of the structure (we Fig 3). For these tension wires, holes need to be drilled i n the angle iron and the wire well stretched. The base of the pylon ciin be fixed; but to be able to maintain the dynamo, lubricate the bearings or carry out repairs, it i s more satisfactory to have a system that will hinge down. For this reason the foot of each post is extended by adding a piece of f l u

slot fitting onto the rim and the strap riveted to the disc. Th inclination is shown on fig 6. o f the bicycle hub is replaced steel axle (A) about 400mm l o will have to be turned on a lathe that i t will fit the hub.

iron drilled with one hole at the bottom and two more holes for riveting it on the end o f the post. These pieces of iron fit between two similar pieces placed in parallel and immersed in a concrete pile. These two pieces of flat iron are also drilled so that a

pin or iron rod will f i t through the three holes. This will behave as a hinge joint as well as anchoring the foot. (see fig 4). Remember to make all the hinges turn in the same direction (fig 3). This will enable you by releasing one of the legs of the tower by withdrawing the pin, to swing the tower downstheother two legs forming a hinge. Two ropes are fixed to the top, to manoeuvre the pylon up and down.

The Rotor The motor system of the windmill can be made either from scratch or from a bicycle wheel with hub, spokes and rim intact. A rear wheel is more suitable so as to have a hub with a cog wheel. The first job is to fix to the wheel a

lat iron ( C , Fig 5 ) of circular some 300m diameter, 20mm thick, by bra~ingit On to the spokes. Onto this diqc will be fixed the ends of the blades (P) which will be slit togrip onto the rim (1). The blades are made of sheet aluminium or iron 8 to 10mm thick, cut as shown in fig 7,600mm long and 400mm wide at the blade tip and 10Omm wide at the hub. A strap 20 x 20mm i s fixed on the hub end o f each blade to fix i t to the hub disc. Make 12 identical blades, curve them, fold over the fixing strap

Turntable The dynamo (D) or alternator in an aluminium, or mild steel wood box reinforced by two 'U' sh flat irons (U) fig 8 on which the ax o f the wind wheel is fixed by two "8 block bearings (C) riveted or bo the box. The box i s drilled in l (E fig 9) for the passage of a v axle (F fig 8 ) , rotating betwee bearings (B). Fig 9 shows the con tion of the box, the dimensions o will depend upon those of the dy or alternator used. The reinforcin 'U' i s also drilled at pointsT. The s metal forming the box i s riveted or we ed to the 'U'and will have two rem able or hinged sides to allow for in tion of the dynamo. The front of will have el hole at point P (fig 10) permit the passage of the end o dynamo axle. Under the box, a point where F goes through an i ring or disc made of rubber or P is glued (with something like Aral a brass ring rotating contact, whic connected to the positive of the d ( i f the system i s 'negative earth' The top of the pylon i s capped b riveted sheet iron triangle i n the cen of which i s the bearing (Fig 11) sup ing the orientation pivot (F). A spri contact (K) or brush (preferably car and in an insulated case) is fitted so a to ensure contact with the slip ring when the box is fixed on. An insula wire is connected to the contact (K and from there to ground level and t the positive connection on the batte Remember to connect the negati\ the dynamo to the structure, and. structure to the negative battery terminal The cog wheel on the bicycle wheel i s connected via a bicycle chain to a cogged wheel fitted to the axle of the dynamo or alternator. The ratio of the number of cogs on cdch wheel will depend on the rotation speed of dynamo used (This type of windmill i s not idedlly suited for electricity production so a low-output dynamo will have to be used. I f a car alternator or dynamo i s chosen, i t will have be rewound to 'cut in'at a l o w r r otherwise, an increased blade diam of about 4 metres will have to be used, with additional strengths to the blades towards the tip ing of say, a couple of ho

has riveted additional rib X, which also supports the second bearing for the shaft B, on the end o f which is a crank l ~ h i c hactivates the lever of the pump. The reinforcing metal 'U' is centred on the cap o f the tower. The axle or drive shaft A o f the wind-wheel rotates between two pillow block bearings as before and the drive is still transmitted by cog wheel chain to the cog wheel on the end of The crank wheel at the other end of B consists of a flat metal disc, welded or riveted to shaft 8 , which has a lug D riveted to it. This lug, as

this plate, rivet, bolt, or weld 1.250 metres long pieces of gle iron, so that the overall length the tailplane is 1 650 metres g 12). The front 150mm of these ieces are sawn as in Fig 12, and hese ends are riveted, bolted or elded to the bottom and top of e protection box.

axis to cope with changes in wind direction. The difficulty is overcome by using as support for the rotating section a ball bearing with a large enough interior diameter to allow for the movements of the rod E. In this situation the exterior ring of the bearing wilt be fixed to the upper cap on the tower. The interior ring i s fixed to the fiat iron U, in which a circular hole has been cut. The pump itself should be in the centre of the triangle formed at the base of the tower, and is supported by a frame K fig 2a. The piston o f the pump I, i s extended by a bar H, which is then joined to the flexible stirrup coupling F fixed to the bottom of shaft G. The pump I is kept upright and in the centre of the base of the tower by three timber members at level N (fig 2a) locking it in position. The pipe or tube I from the well or water source has its outlet at the tap L to which is connected the pipe for distribution to the domestic water supply system, reservoir or irrigation scheme. Fig 3a shows the whole system modified for water pumping. (translation from the French original text by Diseree Liewellen).

DMILL NO 1 RIGGED TO RIVE A PUMP e o f windmill is best utilised as owered pump because its e flat blades will respond to very ind speeds, but do not perform I in higher wind velocity. windmill as described so far e to be slightly modified in to drive a reciprocating suction p Fig 1 shows the modified

74 Eoliennes, Systeme '0' by J Raphe Societe Parisicnne d'tdition, 43 Paris Xc, France. ( I n French and now out of print).

i t i s rotated by the wind wheel via the chain drive, activates a rod E, made of a round or flat iron and drilled at the end to allowfor the passage of the lug, which is shaped fo fit. The other end of this rod is coupled to a stirrup flexible coupling F, which is mounted on the end of a transmission shaft or rod G, which slides in a sleeve coupling or rolling contact bearing P, mounted o n a plate at the level M on the pylon. This rod G can be of hardwood, bamboo, or light metal tube. In the case of a wooden shaft G, the section that reciprocates i n P should be clad in a metal tubular sleeve, One of the more difficult problcms in this construction, i s to allow

inued from page 28 Id be carefully regulated as i t controts the durability and resistance to cracking. A simple test i s to sift a sample of soil into a pan and oven dry it. Place 10kg of the dry soil into a flower pot or similar container having a hole in the bottom. Place the pot in a pan containing 1.2kg of water. Through capillary attraction the earth will absorb all the water. The uniformly moistened soil will now contain about 12% moisture, which is the maximum amount of water allowed. Light sandy soil of low colloidal content should contain from 7% to 10% water. The water should be added gradually to distribute it evenly throughout the mix. When soils are to be blended or stabilisers added these are mixed dry before the water is added. ~ l t h o u g has a general rule vegetable matter of any kind i s excluded from the mix, some authorities suggest that 12%o f straw may be added cut to 75mm - 100mm lengths to reduce cracking. This might be adopted where excess shrinkage is anticipated. work should be covered along with the

between courses. Another met to lay barbed wire in a zigzag

ance. Inequalities of expansion contraction in the earth and co are likely to cause cracks, When are exposed the weather will enter

thick to secure good thermal properties and protection against the passage of water - although this may be reduced with the use of a stabiiiser. Since Pise walls require this kind o f thickness, they are generally not used for internal partitions. Chimneys and Openings etc Chimneys have been built in the past

have been developed to stabil' waterproof earth walls after t

with Pise de Terre: 1) Shuttering should be simp easy to take down and reset. 2) Projections should be avoided this complicates the shuttering. 3) Organic matter should be ext from the soil before ramming.

min contain a mixture o f gravel and clay. The ideal soil wou

soils may be blended or stabilise

as soon as the walls are comple 8) A wall about 2.4 - 3m high

REFERENCES

not dry out too quickly. Vegetable Matter A German writer on the subject recom. mends a mix consisting of 1 part of stiff clay, and 1 part sharp sand, 2 parts of broken stone (the size of a small apple, The stone i s used to restrain shrinkage to take the place of straw as a binder. Burnt clinker i s an alternative to stone as i t i s inert and will not react chemically with the soil. No parot's or organic matter should be tolerated as this renders

the shuttering used, and the speed of erection goes down drastically. Openings are formed as the work proceeds and timber fixing grounds are rammed into the jambs t o form fixing for door and window frames. The lintels are placed over the openings and the wall is carried across, although adequate bracing should be inserted to support the lintel while the wail is rammed over it. I t i s possible to cut openings out o f Pise walls which i s useful when carrying out alterations.

ised Earth' Country Life, 2nd Editi 1947. Describes traditional techniq Szcelkun, Stefan: Survival Scrap List. Brief summary of traditional fOrms~ Of testing Of making cement blocks and i n situ. Patty, Ralph L & Minium L. Rammed Earth Walls for Farm

Inter-American Housing: his was done by embedding planks

Power Obtained Wii~dmillperformance may be investigated under the Betz (Gottingen, 1927) momentum theory, which deals with the decelerations in the air traversmg the windmill disk. The column of air arriving at the windmill with a velocity V i s slowed down, i t s boundary is an expanding envelope as shown below.

/-n

~(1-2o)

-'--y

by Cliff Collins

Y DIFFERENT types of windmill ave evolved through the ages, but ith the development of the aerofoil opellor for aircraft in the 1920's, and e commercial availability o f storage tteries, came the 'low solidity' mills he solidity is the ratio of total blade rd to circumference at any given us), used for the generation of ectricity, The blades or rotor were ed by the actual wind Id exceed it by 6 to in such 'aerogenerators' ially for the more sophisticated er mills, accurate and detailed ed measurements are necessary. he fact that the power in the wind i s rtional to the cube of its speed this a prime consideration in nerator design. Otherwise, most ormation (such as wind roses, prevailg winds etc) can readily be found in any good Atlas or fromthe Meterological

AIR TM'EQSING WINDMILL DISK

The diminuition of the velocity at the windmill disk may be expressed by the use of an 'interference factor', a From energy and momentum considerations, it can be shown that. behind the windmill, the factor increases to an ultimate value of 2a. Energy i s obtained from the wind by slowing down the air. Disregarding rotational and drag losses, the work obtainable from it per unit time P, is: P = 2ilR2. pV3. a (1 - a)2 where V = velocity o f the wind R = disk radius p = the mass density o f the air (air pressure) The power originally contained in a cylinder of air of radius R isgiven by. Po = /;.pAV.V2 = '/;pAV3 where A = an area through which the wind passes thus

P = %WR* O V ~

Because of aerodynamic imperfections in any practical machine and mechanical losses, the power extracted is less than that calculated above, so that in practice, the multiplying factor may not be greater than about 0 4 rather than 0,593 The Rotor Reduced to its simplest terms, the propellor-type windmill consists o f a number of blades disposed radially around a shaft, to which they are attach ed, and which lies parallel to the wind direction so that the blades rotate in a plane approximately normal to this direction. The rotor i s carried aloft by a supporting tower and provision is made for it to orientate or 'yaw', so that i t can be held into the wind, and for its rotational speed to be controlled, The power developed by the rotor then has to be transmitted to the machine to be driven. The blades of the rotor are usually shaped to follow one of the conventional aerofoil designs whose aerodynamic characteristics are known - such as the one below (adapted NACA 4415). ~ " 1 ~ L ~ ~ " s*,,,""a:, " ~ p ""d

.r.,?

L*:.,.:

Ley." A -

Â¥-.

,'G!

. .

i t can be seenthat the power obtained .,.J ,#.*$I isa maximum when a = Vi, i n which .," .,,: :35 : case P is 16/27 (or 59.3%) o f the power R, ,',.>,6> oriy,iiially in the air. R' :,Wf; This is the total power ava/loble in Having decided upon the chord length, the wind for extraction, but actually multiply nand D by this figure (eg only a traction can actually be extracted, multiply by 100mm to give the acrofoil The density, p, of the air varies a little with and with the atmosp~cric section dimensions fo6,a blade width (chord] o f 100mm). Note, one side o f conditions but it is reasonble'to acceot the blade i s flat. the value of 1290 g/m3. The blades may vary in number from Using a multiplying factor of 0,593 . two to twelve or more, may be tapered (59.3%). the general formula for dcteror o f the same chord width throughout, mining the maximum amount o f power and, may be of plane form or twisted. extracted by an ideal aerogenerator i s Their pitch may be fixed or variable P(kW) = 0,593.k.~.V3 and they'may either be rigidly mounted P = 0,593.0,00064.~.V.3 or allowed to 'cone' or 'drag' to relieve ie P = 0,000364:ffR2.~3 the stresses set up by rapidly changing where wind speeds. R = radius o f swept area by Aerodynamic considerations The underlying theory assumes that the = wind velocity (m/s) whole of the active surface is moving at the same speed v, when met by d wind V. The combination of the two speeds P.P.~. m f S * I . crt $la tork dia d t o ?.rt results in a relative wind speed V R making %

-.--

The important lactors to determine . the highest wind speed (and crefore the maximum stresses upon he rig), the duration of calm spells, he prevailing wind, and ihe mean annual wind speed. This article is an edited versit eaflct published by the Polytec of Central London's Department o Architecture, for the National or the Development o f Alternative

. ~ . ,.r34

>,B,

3,Ã£

1.5

:..,>

,,,

an angle of att; ickgwith the surface and producing lift (L) and draa (D) forces perpendicular and parallel respec-

ich are available from scrapya it is important to check the perf ance curves of these, for often t RPM's needed are far above thos

the speed v for an elemental section of the blade at radius r isgiven by:

along the blade to i t s extremity at radius R when v = 2 m N . Thus, for a wind speed V, uniformly distributed over the rotor surface, both the magnitude and direction of the relative wind velocity will vary with radius r. This means that the useful lift force L, per unit of the blade surface will vary with r.

PC _.

220-240V at 50 Hz,and one m careful to ensure that there i s n mission lines. To gain versa the 12V system it is necessary be kept proportional to the wind speed, optimum power would be obtained, but this is impossible to achieve in practice, firstly because the inertia of the rotor is high and secondly, the wind speed varies over the swept area.

...-----

possible lift and the smallest possible drag. To extract optimum power at each succeeding section along the blade, it is thus necessary that both i t s shape, and the blade angle which its principal axis makes with the plane of rotation, shall be varied to suit the peripheral speed X r N , the greater the angle which, for any given wind speed, the relative wind will make with the plane of rotation. It follows, therefore, that to maintain the best angle of attack, the blade angle should vary continuously along the blade and should be greatest at the root and least at the tip.

A = tip angle of attack R = tip radius (f> =angle of attack for radius r the air is proportional to the Power

ms to exist between solidity at 0.7 the blade tip radius and the tip speed ratio for maximum power coefficient, a rotor with a low solidity having a maximum power coefficient

loss o f energy,

The difficulty in using AC equ ment i s that the alternator 'needs t run at constant RPM's in order to

There are two basic types of battcri 1. Lead-acid; as used in cars, these the least expensive and have a typic lifetime o f 750.1 200 cycles. The can discharge or charge at high r they should in fact never be mo

where

n = number of blades c = chord at 0.7 o f the blade tip radius D = diameter of swept circle

is the case with: 2. Nickel-cadium batteries: these

laminar-flow blades (DragILift ratio

= 0.005 approx) i s about 0.51 with an open rotor hub and about 0.535 i f the hub i s 'fairedSie enclosed by a streamline surface o f revolution which enables power to be extracted from the wind meeting this hub area. The maximum occurs at a tipspeed ratio of about 1) .5 although the loss o f efficiency

does not damage them. Batteries should hold a reservoi for 12 times the hourly output of the generator. All batteries store DC only. The con. version of DC to AC (to use standard equipment) requires the use o f rotary or static inverters. Rotary inverters are in general cumbersome and unreliabl can easily be made up) compared highly efficient, they are very expe (eg 2kW output: Ă&#x201A;ÂŁ75approx). Some form of voltage regulator will be necessary, to ensure that a constant to the batteries. The regu prevent any flow of curre

Hermetic seal

, '

by Peter Sommf r ed me to see the analysis of words and their meanings as the supreme skill - the that the education given t o most o f us in only way t o really understand the the West has been designed t o suppress any notion o f transcendance i n our world- problems involved in understanding how view. Slowly some of us are attempting the world can be 'explained'. I was encouraged t o become a cosmic exile, t o fight our way out of our 'intellectual a brain apart from the rest of nature, heritage' without losing all contact with carefully and rationally observing and what we fondly describe as reality. It's hypothesising. But, it doesn't always not all that easy. My own intellectual training encourag- work like that.. .

AY, SOMEONE will try and show

t distinct cultural formulations:

MAGIC =SCIENCE CIENCE = MAGIC, MAGIC = TECHNOLOGY

in 1962. Then came Jacques EllulS fiercer political critique in The Technological Society, published here i n 1963. I n the light of these and many other criticisms, i t may be thought that we have now liberated ourselves from the idea that science is value-free. But just as those scientists whose sole concern was 'pure knowledge' and those technologists

which this will happen, I'll suggest, will not be at all 'scientific'. I ' m increasingly persuaded that it i s our worship o f science itself -the belief that, given enough talent, time and expenditure, most things can be explained and the mechanism of the way the world operates revealed - ~ . that i s the real source o f nonsense. This magic: science: technology relationship. I n the past few months I've had to own up to myself that there is, on many occa-

trap. A dedicated band of scientisttechnologists, with their ideals firmly fixed on the concept of spaceship earth

er half o f the western world. These ngs, because the majority o f users do

might have i s whether, individually collectively, the items are good or .. white magic or black. n t i l the early sixties science and nology were seen as the magic that

uum for total knowledge by the gent application of a faultlessly logical

First Lewis Hcrber's Our

own magic alternative technology offers alternative progress. It is because this notion of progress

has long carried articles worrying that A T has no coherent core. I would argue that it cannot have, because A T i s about technique. The most it can offer is that Lhrough its application by individuals, by action, sume o f the

whether one should even attempt to create a steady-state 'ideal' lifc-style, as opposed to devising a temporary strategy for existing, evolving, and

of this article I'll be conjecturing that AT may have, ior certain individuals,

mechanistic explanations of everything, An allowance in one's world view for mystery and magic, I've discovered, can greatly enrich it and even permit a fuller 'explanation' of whdl it i s ail about. Until recently, my problem hasalways been that the great 'modern mystics of our time. whether Asian or Ccntral Amcricdn gurus, zappcd-out ex-scientists or drop-out academics have never been able to articulate to my satisfaction

This arlicle i s an historical and modern view of magic and i n particuldr one of the great suppressed sysiems of worldexplanaliun H m e t k i s m . I could have started from 'I number o f beginn. i n s : during the prucs-ss o f trying to readjust my idei.ss I looked at .-ittitudcs towards fringe science Kirilian photot;riiphv 2nd ESP in particular. Whilst writingreviews of 'M Kowak's Where the Wustc~/uridEnds (which I probably over-condemned) and David AUa'nulh,e Tvchnolouy, I Di~kson'5

have been (he p l ~ ~ it> e

book review

i t i i the iiuihor, not the reviewer who

Lndercurrents 8

discovery of what has been happening to the History of Science lately., I t seems that a redefinition of 'science' has led to a redefinition of the concerns of the 'history of science' and that has led to of great figures from the past who'are usually labelled as 'scientists'. These new developments are what persuaded me that our own tests of what we bclievc in are false. AlterPI~'~ native technology and P C O Science needs to know about the quality of transcendentalism i f i t i s not to prove unsatisfactory 'Until recently, the history of science was a story of success', begins Jerry Ravetz in his remarkable article in the 1974 Encyclopaedia Brittaflica. "The triumphs of science represented a cumulative process of increasing knowledge and a sequence of victories over ignorance and superstition; and from science flowed a series of inventions for the improvement of human life". But it's not only scientists who are Inherently interested in the new and in 'progress'. Historians of science, who only really started chronicling the'main events in man's discovery of the physical and biological world i n the late 19th century, have also been curiously concerned with validating the belief that, once scientific method had been propounded (an achievement ascribed to Francis Bacon), progress was smooth and automatic. Even Thomas Kuhn offers only a modification of this idea i n his notion of paradigms. Scientific discovery isn't altogether even-coursed affair, he says. Ordinary scientists work within a framework of beliefs - theparadigm . and essentially all they do is to provide a n elaboration on the basic idea. However, after a time, certain inconsistencies in this world-view appear and, after a period of paradigm confusion, a rcvolution takes place, ? new paradigm emerges and scientists continue to elaborate on that. The usual example quoted is the breakdown o f Newtonian explanations for planetary motion and gravity and their modification and replacement by Einstein's Special and General accounts of Relativity. Most histories of science aren't even as sophisticated as this. What they near!y all do i s to assume a certain definition of what science is and what scientists do. Bernal, in his Science as History and

the notion is also implicit i n Bronowski's The Western Intellectual Tradition-and Richie Calder's Man and the Cosmos. As. a result, they all go back through recorded history looking foractivity -rheY that is recognisab~y then pass that off as a truepictureof

i n their original settin

to control it. This sort of history of science

look shows that this sort of history is only an account of unalloyed success if one chooses to ignore certain movements and activities which operated closely to what we would now recognise

their activities and comment o n the I n a completely different area of history o f ideas, Norman Cohn's splendid Pursuit o f the Millenium d cribes the great waves o f peasant

ifonly because it created a ~ronowski'sAscentof Man, was the fa^ that Newton wrote far more on

the 11th century Christian, where 'excommunication' was not just a

to return for a Millenium. Hopes fo better,life could only be rcalised thr

Religion and magic are scarcely a few decades dismissed from our wor view, but where are the historians of

as an aberration or'patronisingly say that he had an 'enquiring' mind, but that wouldn't really be good enough. Walter Page! sets the criteria for a 'new'approach to the history of science: "Instead o f selecting data that 'make sense' to the acolyte of modern science, the historian should try to make sense of the philosophical, mystical, or religious 'side-steps' of otherwise 'sound' scientific workers of the past - 'sidesteps' that are usually excused by the spirit, or rather 'backwardness', o f the period. I t is these that present a challenge to the historian: to uncover

might have lived in a world almost a remote as that inhabited by the med eval millenarian who would give up a on the rumour that a Saviour was to b found in Antwerp, or perhaps Leyden or Budapest.. .?

Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford. Over th last eleven years she has published fo amazing books on some o f the 'sidesteps' o f the Renaissance, concent on the chief one, Hermeticism. L o

movement, from which so many of at today passes for 'the occult' seems o stem, and which was one of the preeit an inconvenient one, o f four books have to be taken r: they are not a coherent seence in that they do not present a aightforward exposition o f her views d conjectures, but represent a eveloping stream of interpretation. he books are: Giordano Bruno and the rmetic Tradition, The A r t of Memory, eatre o f the world, and The Rosicrucn Enlightenment. ss Yates's approach seems to be ct, obscure, and scholarly i n the of the word, and one reason spect she i s so little appreciated side a fairly limited, though influenI, academic sub-community is the fact t her main concerns in each book are immediately obvious and her very areful marshalling of evidence seems t first sight trivial. Theatre o f the id, for example, appears to be an mpt at reconstructing Shakespeare's tre - a worthy but limited reject for a historian to work on. The ening chapter takes us straight into examination o f the records o f the rary o f Dr John Dee, the English naissance magus, best known populars the court astrologer and magician, Elizabeth I. Frances Yates has taken s man, who i n his time had the eatest library in England at his ortlake house - he had gathered iscarded books and manuscripts fro monasteries purged by Henry V travelled extensively, and had ore books than the Queen, an obleman, or Oxford or Cambri iversities - and sets about se knew anything about the classic t e r on architecture, Vitruvius. Vitruvius was the man who codified the classic precepts o f architecture hat buildings should offer not only helter and places for ceremony, but hould also be an image to man and be oportioned accordingly. Enough i s known about the plans for Globe Theatre to say that i t was intended to have more than a purely functional appearance i n relation to building techniques then available. It was to be some sort of metaphor for the world - hence its name. But really Dr Yates i s hiding her main concern, which i s to give some hint of the character of Dr John Dee himself and t o rescue him from the category into which sensationalists have placed him. She i s inviting - the reader to admire her scholarly 'soundness' as she takes us through a form o f the 'know your host by his books'

game which most o f us play on first entering someone's home. By the device of apparent obscurantism, albeit written with more excitement than one might believe possible in the circumstances, she gives us an insight into the preoccupations o f this remarkable man. Dee was interested in the Cabala, in alchemy, and in summoning up angels. He obviously saw the theatre and masque as some form of magic. But he was also the author of a Preface to the 1570 English translation of Euclid's geometry in which he ranges over all the mathematical sciences and strongly encourages their further development as being basic to the advancement of science. Dr Yates claims that as a manifesto for science, Dee's Preface was much more important than Bacon's Advancement of Learning published thirty-five years later, which, together with his New Atlantis, is traditionally regarded by historians of science as the basis of the Scientific Age. I t i s at this point that the obscurantism disappears and.although I never thought that the all-powerful view o f science would crumble in the face o f

an apparent footnote in theatre history, in fact for me i t has. How does one reconcile the image o f a halfcrazed lunatic juggling with occult rubbish with a powerful prophet o f science? Theatre of the World goes on to make i t s conjectures on the likely appearance o f the Globe (it did mirror the world, but the astrological and hermetic one'of Robert Fludd, not anything else) but i t also shows us how far traditional historians of science have misled themselves, the public, and us, by being unwilling to examine inconvenient facts, I n the traditional exposition, the Middle Ages were dominated by the Church's upholding of Ptolemy (which gave, among other things, an earth-centred view of the universe) and a suppressed belief in sympathetic magic. Then came the Renaissance, scholars read Plato, looked in the heavens, saw that i t was more likely that the earth went round the sun, and the scientific age was born . . . The inconvenient element in this exposition is the total absence in it of any account of the Hermetic Tradition of knowledge. i t was withm this that

Dee worked, as did Kepler and late on, Newton. Almost everything th today passes for the western 'occ i s a degeneration o f Renaissanc cerns and dates from Macgrego Mathers' "Golden Dawn" mov of the 1880s. The Hermetic traditi interposes between Mediaevalism a Modernism but i s important sti because it attempts to cope wit mysteries that still remain. The Hermetic Tradition was avowedly the cult o f t h e lost knowledge of Hermes Trismegistus thrice great Hermes, the Egyptian priest-god, Thoth. To appreciate his cull one ha to dispose of the,nution that man has always looked forward in his search for knowledge. In the later Mediaeval

forms of truth in the ancient Latin and Greek texts and wondered i f there were not truths to be found in Hebrew mystical writings like the Cabala, they also had great hopes of the Corpus Hermeticum which was said to be of ancient Egyptian origin and hence older than any other known source of knowledge. Hence Cosimo di Medici ordered Ficino, already about to translate the works of Plato, to tiicklc Hermes first, which he did in 1463. The Pimander which is a Hermetic Crfriesi'i was taken as evidence of the

material, which was regarded as being contemporaneous with Moses. I n fact, later textual criticism of the Corpus reveals that theindividual pieces were probably assembled between 100 cc and 300ce by the Gnostics, though Dr Yates has obviously changed her view over the last few years and now thinks that the actual sources and ideas almost certainly have Hebraic, Chaldean and Persian elements. Modern occultists, of course, have no doubt. The point here, though, is that these texts were believed and a t precise ly the same time and in the same way that Plato's ideas were spreading among Renaissance scholars, the Hermetic ideas were also gaining currency. Ficino himself wrote interpretations o f Her-

meticism and his contemporary Pico della Mirandolla brought in a revised contemporary Cabala from the Hebrew mystic tradition. By 1533, HC Agrippa had produced a widely influential guide to this new combined philosophy in De Occulta PhJiosopbia which i s today regarded as one uf the great occult source books. Dee, of course, had a l l these books in his library, but there i s little doubt that it was not only traditional 'occultists who knew about them. I t is this aspect which interests Or Yates, me, and I hope anyone who really wants to examine the nature o f scientific and religious belief. Hermeticism divides the universe into

and the intellectual. Agrippa says eac world receives influences from the on above it, 'so the virtue of the C e descends through the angels in intellectual world, to the stars ' celestial world, and thence to t tial elements and all things composed them'. Magicians aim to make the s progress upwards, and draw the vir o f the upper world by manipulating lower ones. Agrippa says they try discover the virtues of the element world by medicine and philoso celestial world by astrology and mat matics, and the intellectual world study o f the ceremonies of religio The Renaissance magus i s thu magician and occultist of sorts, b is trying to manipulate the world good effect - hence Dee's concern summoning up angels is not real 'equivalent'of the witchtwarlo summoning up a familiar. Dee summon up angels because he w t o find out about the upper world. T Hermetic world-view is thus ab series o f animistic corresponde and many o f the early discove 'science' can now be interpret attempts at validating this worl Here i s an extract from The Em Table which gives some idea o f hermetic mystery: True and not false, exact an true, what is below is analagous what i s above, and what is above analagous to what is below, f o r t fulfillment o f the miracle o f the unique whole. Similarly, as all thin arise from the unique Beginning, by means of that One. so all thin born arise from the Same one, thr the processes of adaptation. His father i s the Sun, his mother t Moon, the wind bore him in its w and the Earth was his nourisher. I him the source of every form in th whole universe. His power i s comp if i t i s turned'to the Earth. Th wilt separate Earth from Fire, subtle from the dense, quickly and with great ability. He goes from Earth to Heaven and returns ag to the Earth, and receives force from higher and lower sources. 1. I n this way you will possess t glory o f the whole world. 2. And darkness will fly from yo 3. I n this lies the potent power o strength. 4. I t will conquer everything sub and i t will penetrate everything dense. 5. So is the whole universe creat 6. From i t comes all miracul adaptations, based on the sa 7. That is whv I am called Herm

the idea of science that he acquired during his education is only one of many and that it is a product o f temporary circumstances. The latter include the presence o f nearly autono. mous centres o f research in universities, large scale application o f scientific results by technologists, and the independence of scientific research from politics and religion . . . the dominant style of work o f the early twentieth century was reductionist: investigations were concentrated on the artificially Newton's concern with gravity and the attraction of bodies came from the same inspiration as that of Gilbert.. . it all

achieved in the laboratory. . . almost all the philosophy o f science in this period assumed that a real science is one modelled on theoretical physics. The prestige of this style i s shown by the many attempts to extend it to the human sciences (see Liam Hudson's engaging Cult of the Fact for its application in psychology). Its limitations, as now seen, were centred i n a dangerous ignorance of the facts and principles of the behaviour of the natural envirRavetz might have gone on to point out that theoretical physics is presently going through an enormous upheaval. The investigation of sub-atomic particles has now revealed so many conjectural forces that we are. in practical terms, not much better off than John Dee for an understanding f how the world works. So the equations about Science and Magic, and Technology and Magic

concile ourselves that we will never derstand' or 'control' ourselves or

14 and 161 5. The Rosic a later form of Hermetici

Millenium. Bacon's contem-

he earth is a giant lode-stone in

restatement of an ancient Hermetic This has been a whirlwind tour. Dr

history, of Renaissance politics, and the History o f Art are good aids, though fortunately she writes well enough to to change one's beliefs in Science and about the period during which 'imper-

I'll conclude by going back to Jerry Ravetz and his Bfitannica article.

from science or f r ~ ~ a l t e r n a t i v e technology; 1 rely more on instinct and feeling. Only, unlike some, I'm not going to try to write about it. Roszak, iilly,~ e a rand i Castenada have tried to My intellectual 'training' came i n the analysis o f words and their meaning. My curiosity is undiminished, but now I know certain things cannot be articulated. I have yet to find a satisfying form o f mysticism, yet my contempt (because that i s what it was) for those who have has become much less strong. I ' m still unlikely to take a crash course in Indian or Chinese mysticism, devote myself to podgy boy gods, attend sabbats, or try to improve my mastery of Hebrew to ascend into the Cabalistic

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tree, but I've found my own certainty and humanist scepticism sorely tried in the past few months. And all because, like those readers of exploitative occult books and followers of new religions, I too feel cheated -cheated because what I believed to be true about my historical intellectual antecedents i s manifestly false. 1 don't believe in the value of alchemy, practiced today, any more than I ever did, but now I trust my own scepticism less and realise that my anxiety to fit my perception of the world into the mechanical 'scientific' worid-view too eagerly has possibly cut me off from certain things. . . Which in a bizarre way brings one to Alternative Technology. One of the

effect it has on those who become involved with it. The process o f thinking about and creating practical l i f e styles that are alternative to the 'consensus' without the aid of the conventional 'alternative' dogmas, and the questioning of almost all one's fundamental beliefs, seems to guarantee an inner change of some sort. The starting points may be different and the end-products, in terms of human beings with varying world-views may be different, but changes (and in some cases transcendance) are common. The individual concerned with conservation of the environment discovers his political perceptions are taking him towards anarchism, the disaffected scientist moves from shunting psychedelicised rats through m a m to hydro-

ment.

know about Dr Yates's work, you read her books not take my word

consist of a series o f promiseswhich I you through a series of locked doors.

ist, an alchemist, a Yogi? I n the end there i s no longer any mystery, there never was one anyway, but the process of investigation of the mystery has caused a succession of self-questions which have so changed the individual that he has now achieved what he s

matter what he calls himself or that what he needs to know for his own satisfaction. Are we all really on a mystery trip. Have a good time building windmills. solar traps and shit-houses..You never know where it may lead . . .

rench: Routled

at was 'the Scientific Rev01

and when you've read some of th Objective Knowledge: An Evolut

o f Scientific Knowledge, Ka

tried to invite you to read a few books

ex o f Possibilities, Volume 1 and Power Published lointly by Clanose Publishers, 2 Blenheim Crescent, London W11 and Wildwood House, 1 Wardour St. London W1. Paperback (Â£2.50or hardback (Â£5.95') ntic Work, whichever way you took at it. Physically, it measures 13% inches (343mm) by 10 inches (254mm). The paperback (ersion is over half an inch thick, and [he hardback proportionally larger. It has taken a large number of people ivery long time to prepare, and whilst it has its shortcomings (about which more later), the overall impression is that it was welt worth the effort. The aim, as the Introduction states, was 'to reassemble and cross-reference information. comuare and contrast

.the good wholly overwhelms the bad.

Undercurrent, 8

. . devising ever simpler ways of monitoring hazards,

Bread: an assessment of the British bread industry. The TACC report (Technology Assessment Consumerism Centre). Â£1.2 (including p&p i n UK only) from Intermediate Publishing Ltd, PO Box 6, Kettering, Northants. GOVERNMENT HEALTH WARNING: WHITE BREAD MAY DAMAGE YOUR HEALTH You've never s e n that on a packet of bread, but arguably the warning ought to be there, and advertising of white bread on T V should be banned. The caseagainst white bread is still in its infancy, perhaps at about the stage the cigarette argument had reached 20 years ago. But even the suspicion that white bread is going to give me gut cancer i s enough to put me off. Like a lot of people, of course, I've known for years that wholemeal bread is better for you. I've even followed the research of Burkitt and Painter as they linked one after another of the diseases of affluence with our low-fibre diet based on refined flour and sugar. But until I read the TACC report Bread I was quite happy to eat what they call 'technological bread' whenever its convenience, its lack of messy crumbs, and its suitability for electric toasters recommended it. I now can't bite into a womble sandwich without thinking of a long list of additives which, though they're probably not exactly poisonous, are revolting to think about. Considering the strength of TACC's scientific case, the actual proposals they make are pretty mild, with phrases like 'requires review' and 'further research'. Where TACC calls for a Monopolies Commission investigation and for a full

demanded an immediate ban on certain additives and a positive scheme of support for small local bakers, Granted, a team largely based, as TACC is, on Manchester University Business School is not going to go beyond liberal, reformist proposals. But even within those limits they could have been a lot fiercer. Their report begs comparison with the CIS 'anti-reports'and I'm

more human production syste

There are also a few questions to which I still want to know the answers Why do wholemeal flour and bread cost more although they have actually been through less processes than their refined equivalent^ Would they be cheaper i f they were produced and distributed in the quantities that white bread and flour are now? What happens to Happy Monday's loaf when Hdppy Tuesday comes along - i s it fed to pigs, made into sausages, or ground up and mixed with

local bakers tailor the sup their perishable produc o t demand more accur huge distributors ca pesticide in 'techno ful to TACC for a clear sum of the scientific evidence, an also for their sensible handlin that thorny question which cerns not only white bread b tobacco, automobiles and he what do we do when people 11 and want something which obviously isn't good for them?

DANGER:work at men Work is dangerous to your health. kannc Stellman and Susan Daum. Vintage Books, Random House, NY (Distributed i n UK by Pandemic) Â£1.25 The Haifardsof Work. Pat Kinnersley. Pluto Press (Unit 10, Spencer Court, 7 Chalcot Road, London NW1) 90p. Both booksare concerned with attaining proper health standards for wor not just the minimal health requi to keep The Machine working. To help workers i n gaining more control over their working conditions, and in changing them, both are as clear, simple manuals. Manuals to train people to deal effectively with hazardous work situations, to knowledgeably with so-called and t o assess precautions. Detail technical information is presente in an easily usable form. The books differ in the emp they give to various aspects. Kinnersley's deals not only with physical and chemical hazards, but also with the patterns of work, and the legal and

system, and the personal tragedies involved, his book i s unsurpassed. Little more needs to be said; b y now everyone should have a copy - it's been out nearly a year. Stellman and Daum concentrate much more on the scientific aspects, so although the book i s American,

human body and i t s responses. also list hazards according to occ tion. Details are not only given o to control pollution at source, b ventilation systems, and but also on methods of sim measurement and monitori and chemical hazards. I t i s emphasised that this is a struggle, as much as a sci A brief description of the spe demands made by the Oil, Chemi and Atomic workers, well with' context of US legislation, poin way for what can be done. he same message - to mak demands and to take action equally to the Britain's new & e Health at Work Bill, which is rep1 general recommendations, but o no clear definitions of practical I But when you've bought, read digested both of these books, w else can you do? The term liber technology applies not just to win and telephones, but to devising eve simpler ways of monitoring hazard

People in the US, concentrate on need for workers to organise arou

Aerospace, the Vinyl Chloride issu the midwest workers fight, and ho

ILLING ZOMBIES or SILENT REBELS e Private Future by Martin Pawley hames and Hudson, 1974.

~~~d~~~ ~ by chael Velli compiled and edited by rraine and Fredy Perlman d & Black, Detroit 1972

IF YOU TAKE either of these books to bed, with you, be prepared for a sleepless night; they both gave my head a whirl it's not seen for ycars. in privatefuture, pawley looks all the targets o f contemporary rddical criticism and examines them with rare freshness and rigour, but his conclusions are distinctly those of one who cannot separate his wonderment amidst modern hiTek Kommodity Kulture from his common love of humdnity. His most tenuous and controversial assumption is that people in today's western world know what ishappen,ng on a profound level and that they understand in secret what they cannot press publicly They know that the dim f a commodity culture i s to smash unity and replace i t with isolatio d thisprivatisation is what they hat i s why they continue to supper such a culture By cataloguing a mass of

powerful air of reality to some far fetched ideas that fuelled my adolescent imagination. He uses such techniques -- expressed i n exciting, journalistic quick-fire prose t o package his thesis and to turn up the

In Manual For Revolutionary Leaders, Hi, on the other hand, makes the ssumption that whilst pcoplc are not on he wholeconscious of what's happening, they are progressing towards a point of detonation by practice - practice of individual acts uf rebellion and ofexperimentation with appropriations o f the productive nature o f :i.i-ii:iology. This i s the way in which the IndustriallCapita! Revolution happened: by the gradual 1 extension o f bourgeoispractice. Only then did Usury become Banking

1 1 !

ted with full colour collages on alternate pages and is - apart from the leaders' quotes which are essentially boring -full of droll humour and precisely-articulated ideas. To return to Private Future, Pawley is arguing people want (and, ~ that what ~ are working towards achieving) i s a society arranged so that one doesn't take the good with the bad but a non. society where one keeps aloft continually on illusions, ideas, and images. A world of fantasy. Consumer society is a form of barter for dreams. Private activity that does not need or lead to any tedious responsibilities (especially social) 15 what is desired. The public realm,the space between the private citizen and the government, i s being evacuated in therush to the comfort o f privacy, and the sector left becomes a wasteland of environmental terrorism. I t is only the previous culture and morality that holds us back from sinking into our own individual euphoric and troublefree day dreams. Perfect peace, at one without the world. It is the commercial that is legitimised by the

and extortion become Marketing. What developed within feudalism was not a consciousness, an~ ideology, or even ~ lan organised revolutionary movement, but rather a practice, a form of social behaviour which undermined and ultimately overthrew the piety, the gallantry, and the sovereignty of earlier forms. And this is how the detonation o f all the possibilities of the productive forces in the hands of politically self-determining individuals is happening - is happen'"9 lhe gradual extension o f PoweredPractice After laying Out this thesis 1" a brief historicdl expose, Veil1 goes on to discuss in two parts how the revolutionary leader can take over such a dangerously detonating situation and create the conditions for the instatement of organised power centres, in the form of workers councils, proletarian dictatorships and the like

anus/ F~~ ~

icy represents. The issues are merely a

native opportunities for

Come t h e r e v o l ~ t i o n ...

f l.r-f-i-d- .~, .~. c i. . . - vire.verw v vnnt -.-.~-,

Without revolutionary leadership, continually changing responses t o continually developing productive forces move towards chaos. Without revolutionary organisation, attempts of individuals to realise their self powers to the level made possible by the productive forces move towards anarchy. i n the first part Velli takes quotes from revolutionary leaders and cuts in passages of his own critique, using a system o f negation marks and typeface changes to drive his point in. The second part begins with a lighter and extremely funny scenario of revolutionary situations (essential reading for all aspiring lead and despairing disciples). He then g to complete the manual of aversion

AII

Personally, I can't take that first assumption about everybody knowing where they are s i n g deep down inside, considering the perverted state of our currently available information sources. But the book certainly wakes you up from the daze of imrnersion in mass media. Back at the Manual there arc many points Velli makes that clarify a lot o f the conclusions that are conlinuallv cropping up in discussions and articles. For example: the point at which state power is classically seized i s the time in which the populace voa/tate with indecision and fear after the old order has been sprung into the air but before the mighty burst o f independent creative enthusiasm has begun to explore the myriad possibilities of modern productive forces, ?hi5 is the short period in which people hdve l-o throw oft' the mass psychology of dependence that has p e r --'red the'r lives for years. Intermediate ., tcchnologies can be used to illustr?te in practice the impermanent nature of this dependence and the enormo

we're

going our separate ways to super zombieland!

some material missing right at t beginning. As for further readin

Methane (Atomic Rooster's Here) by Steven Sampson, edited by Andre Mackillop. Â£1.60 72pp.

bridge, Cornwall. THEREIS quitea lot of useful ma i n these books; but there is somethin peculiar about them -apart from t h orthodox inadequacies, of which more anon. I t i s as i f they were written by a team of schizophrenics. They keep umping from one thing to another, and making bafflingallusions ['atomic rooster's hire', for example) which left me at least wondering whether I'd missed something along the line somewhere.. . The Hydropower book has some useful material, basically oriented to small-scale installations. I t shows the basis for flow calculations; has plans for DIY dams, and overshot wheel and turbine construction (reprinted from Popular Science); lists River Authorities; gives form letters for ascertaining the legal status of a proposed hydro installation; energy conversion tables; and helpful, if repetitive, remarks from a practicing hydro-engineer. I t has a bibliography of sorts, but i t i s unannotated and is mostly devoted to things other than hydropower Of the 13 items on hydropower, eight are about old watermills, two are sources from which most of the designs in the book arc taken (although i t doesn't say so), two are basically about big-scale hydroelectric practice, and the remaining one is nothing to do with hydropower at all, but the autobiography of a Victorian cartmaker Another complaint that must be made concerns the amount of space 32 pages scattered throughout which has nothing to do with hydropower, but i s given over to advcrtisements (often repeated over and over again); articles on nuclear reactor safety, oil advertising and solar energy; those schizophrenic cartoons; and more that can only be described as padding. The Methane Book is most usefully a zoo catalogue of different types of digestors, agitators w d feed systems, building on two classic articles by Ram Bux Singh and Golueke (alth it is hard to tell where the original end dnd the editor's additions star

tried i n British conditions, and my guess is that most o f them would produce hardly more power than

ge scale. There is a free posterversion o f LID'S gas-conversion prints that appeared in Undercurrents No 6 - n i c e l y printed. There is less off-the-subject material than in the hydropower book, but again there i s an awful lot o f padding.

I f AT is ever to be more than

VB No 3 i s an AT special - don't miss it. Ekologiskt Byggande 1: Metodi Teknik, Eko-nomi och Levnads ('Ecological building: I: Repo Trip; methods, techniques, e and lifestyles). Eko-Bygg Gruppen, Teknista kolan i Lund, Architecture Dept BOX725, S-220 07 Lund, Swed Jannbaereren No 2 Summer 197< This is a report (basically writ rhis is a far-out Norwegian freaks' by Hans Nordenstrom) of a visit nag covering political/ecologicdl Britain i n the spring of 1974 by a tlternative/mystical topics. It's group of staff and graduate stude iery good and there's plenty of i t at Lund Technical University - 70 pages, without the covers Â¥Eke-Bygg('Eco-build'). For I'm sorry I don't know what dinavians. it must be the best g Vunnbaereren means - can't find to what's going on in Britai he ruddy dictionary anywhere). I t starts with an introdu Most of the articles are local and the principles of ambient-energ original, but there are also transladesign in building, and a descrip tions o f important articles from of Eko-Bygg's research programm ather languages i n many cases including plans for a test-house. probably the first into a ScandiThe account of the visit to navian language, which i n itself Britain covers work at Cambrid IS a very useful service. The price and the Architecture Associati af a single issue might seem high to Us Street Farm House (the cover s (10 NKr) but you get a lot for your picture of Graham Caine's famous money and no adverts (yearly sub i s sculptured toilet seat, which i s wh. 50 NKr). This issue had articles On makes peoplelinger so long in the communes and reviews of the COW ITDG; the National Centre for mune movements in Norway, DenDevelopment of AT; BSSRS; a bi mark, Sweden, and USA; several articles communal squat; and a report o on organic and biodynamic farming; meeting o f the UK section of th others on farm schools; translations of International Solar Energy Socie an interview with Murray Bookchin much of the material ofwhich is (from Undercurrents, we suppose7 we reproduced. There are drawings a ripped i t off from Alternative Sources photographs, and lists o f address of Energy - long may i t recirculate') magazines, booksand other pub and an article by George Woodcock tions. on Anarchism and Ecology, a prosePS- Vsnnbsreren m poem story; article on making a fibreelass greenhouse; and two allegorical

IPECIA L SCANDINAVIAN 1ECTION in honour of the fact that our ild friend Per Janse gave us a l u g in Doyens Nyheter the other lay, and Undercurrents can now ie purchased i n Stockholm at the jook-Cafe (BokCafe), Drottningt a n 19).

whom the taxes themselves being extorted. However, by ptitious means, the whole paratus has been pieced together. e majority o f people in Britain not know o f their existence eirexist. y even refuse to be!' mething ce Yet refusal to be1 es not make it cease t ' rely allows i t to fun e itself unhindered a m e against the people, and have ith similar results - the presen let. Undoubtedly, there i s degree o f error, but the nnels are known to be accurately cribed. The whole sham of demotic government in Britain i s exposed hollow lie by these bunkers, built out the public knowledge, from blic money, to Protect public Servants inst those who are conned into the lef that they have elected them The vings of retired Colonels and generals er the supposed threats to 'public er* can be ignored by the govcrw A few strong-arm men are the r of the Walkers and the Stirlings. tcning down the hatches is the swer of government. Five years o f r a n d revolutionary action in n Ireland has been weathered s system, and the forthcoming ers predicted by all the pundits scist and communist, Liberal and Y, Labour and Monarchist,republiand anarchist, are well anticipated ationai Seat o f Government But .1" rcddcrs are inufi'nni; that ihc fuvcrnmcrn, h.ivc cun-.iruciet.ibunkcr-i

wrong. When it was realised that the Neston. At Corsham, the largest of undcr-city bunkers were no longer safe the four underground factories built against nuclear attdck, the authorities in World War 2 is still ready for made provision for their survival by emergencies, Â£2,000,000 having building the National Seat of Governbeen spent on i t 1940-43. Important Navy ment, deep underground and a long armamentsresearch a'ld administration is ~ IOther I , way from malor city-taigcts Bath or Chelt found at F ~ ~ ~Bath. enham appear to be the most likely NSG excavations may be in the Forest 01 Dean sites They are both within rapid At Chinnor, i n the Chilterns, the ss of London by rail and motorgovcrninent is excavating a massive (Bath M4). At Cheltenham, there new tunnel -ostensibly as an exwo possible sites, the Government perlment in tunneling for the Channel Communication Headquarters being Tunnel. t likely candidate, as it backs What You Can Do limestone escarpment which The concerned citizen will ask 'what 00 feet of vertical cover in a can I do about this menace to liberty?' nd a half. Even this, of course, is They arc, by their nature, sabotageugh for protection against a 50 proof, even proof against a small or 100 megaton nuclear weapon. At, nuclear weapon The interested citizen and near, ~ ~aret a number h of sites should document and publish anything which may house the NSG. Box tunnel, he or she can find out, from whatever sambard Kingdom Brunei's mastersource is available, Anarchists Anonypiece of engineering on the western mous hold anti-copyright on this of ~ ~ i t~ i ~~ houses h~ 1 many , publication. Please republish it whcresecrets. There are 4 sets of points ever you can write to the local press, TV, radio (they all know already, but (he tunnel, leadingthrough are prevented by D notices from steel gates into the interior o f the hill. publishing) - it will show them that Above, in the village of Hawthorn there is outside knowledge. Complain which had important telecommunicato your local MPs and councillors tionslinks built in W W ~ , are Demonstrate at known bunker entranbomb.proof covers on the ventilation ces and distribute literature. Explore shafts of the tunnel. The RAF base of the London underground. There are Rudloe Manor i s also on the hill, many passages you can walk along that complete with its microwave comarc not on normal pedestrian intermunication tower. Hawthorn is full o f changes. Try doors on the Underground many other military establishments too many for even the incredulous you can always claim you have lost sceptic to dismiss Near to the village your way. Goodgc Street, Holborn, IS t k H-bomb proof security deposit Leiccster Square, Trafalgar Square are at Neston, where, i n a stone quarry central stations which need investigation. called Goblin's Pit, Wdnsdyke SecurThe main thine i s to publish and dis. ilics stoic lei-nrds ol cumpaniei. Â¥icminatinfermiltion. Tne marc people 01 s any impurMdsi B i i i i i h ~ i m p t i n ~ e thdi kr~oi\,i h c bittcr.

orror prob searching expose of Undercurrents finances. LIKE EVERY0 Undercurrents has been knocked sideways by inflation. To try to hold our costs down, printed this issue on much Ii paper. The print bill has still g up, but by 'only' about Â£8 sine the last issue. T o have printed issue on the same paper as be would have cost us an extra Â Using lighter paper also means save our postage (5p instead of Also, as subscribers will notice, we are now using wrappers instead of envelopes for copies sent by post.

WHERE THE M Many readers have told u s that at 35p Undercurrents seems too dear. 'After all', they say, 'it only cost about lop a copy to print so you must be coining it, mustn't you?' We wish it were true: but unfortunately 'small' in the magazine, game is not only 'beautiful', it is expensive. We have to recover the cost of our overheads from a sale of only 8,000 copies every two months (don't laugh - this is what we plan to achieve next year) instead of for example - Old Scientist's 66,000 copies a week. So though Old Scientists' overheads are, at a guess, twenty times ours, the overhead cost per copy of Undercurrents is four times that of Old Scientist. And at present the disparity, with Undercurrents coming out, er, irregularly and selling only 5,000 copies, is even worse. Nor do we have pages and pages of paid advertising to pad out the paper and contribute to the overheads. Our aim over the next year or so is a modest one: to establish Undercurrents as a motithly niagii/ine ~ i t h a full lime editor and .a .-ir:iilation 01'

The surplus is only about 0. debts incurred

Undercurrents Planned Monthly Budget Income per month Subscriptions Postal Sales Newsagents Bookshops

1500 2000 at 2 8 . 5 ~per 35p copy 2500 at 45% of 35p = 15p 2500 at 60% of 35p = 21 p

(weighted average income per copy: 22p) TOTAL INCOME Costs per month Paper: 8000 copies Print cost for first 6,000 Print cost (including paper) for next 2,000 at 6 Op PRINT COSTS Editor's Salary (including national insurance etc) r, Other Staff salaries " Contributors' payments Typesetting Promotion and advertising Office Rent and Running Costs Expenses (travel, meals, etc) Postage Other Costs (insurance, legal accountants fees etc) 0

uickly and with no hassle. We be in two ways: the marginal cont

From the letters we get, exception finance has th hand, however much we 111

nd, we have t o pay 'on the nail'. present we reckon we need a he gap

. A quarter

ly issues. The problem is that t o finance a monthly we need about another Â£2,00 in working capital. Some of i t we may be able to borrow at commercial rates. from our

even on only a 6,OOOcirculation. and we have the use of your Â£ for a while, as working capital.

THE PROBLEM OF DISTRIBUTION Many readers write t o tell us of the

of Undercurrents Ud. A

The Other Branch

Arjuna Wholefoods 12, Mill R d OXFORD East Oxfor Advnrttsr - -Books 3 4 Cowley Rd. Maxwells 9-10 St Clements MANCHESTER Orbit Books

John Carlyle 3 6 Albert Rd, G42 A F & J Barmt 178 Bvres Rd. G 12 LEICESTER Black Flail Books 1 Wilne Leicestef University Bookshop University Rd. BRIGHTON Symposium

st.

ubtic House Bookshop

LEAMINGTON SPA, Warwicks. B,,$t0W 4 Bndewell Alley NORWICH. Norfolk Mushroom 261 Arkwnght St NOTTINGHAM Ultima Thule Handyside Arcade Percy St NEWCASTLE.0N-TYNE Dave Taylor 8 The Crescent PURBROOK Herts Andrew D Douglas 2 Wellington St Stoke, PLYMOUTH

Grass Roots Bookshop 178 Oxford Rd, M.13

OOkShOP The Fourth Idea

Bookflair Mount St. M.2 Clapham Pk Rd, SW4

Architectural Association Bookshop, 36 Bedford Square, W C l Freedom Bookshop 84b Whitechapel High St, E l Mandarin Books New College Pde, NW3 flobinson & Watkins Cecil Court 19.21 (off Channg Cross Rdl London WC2 Rismg Free 197 King's Cross Rd, WC1 CAMBRIDGE

EDINBURGH John Selim 23 Launston Place, EH3 Better Books 11 Forrest Rd. EH1 BIRMINGHAM Tapetus Bookshop 201 Corporation St Prometheus Books 134 Alcester Road, Moseley, B13 Birmingham Peace Centre 18, Moor St. Rinawav. - . 632 Bookshop 632 Bristol Rd, Sally Oak B29 BATH Seanghts Bookshop L t d 9 New Bond St Place, B1 Bath Community Workshop l a The Paramon 81

BRISTOL 1 Christopher Pitts 27 St Thomas' Hill CANTERBURY, Kent Bogus 21 Princes Avenue HULL. E. Yorks O u t of Time Hvde Park House King X Road King X, HALIFAX EJ Archer 13 Coronation Walk KEIGHLEV, West Yorks News From Nowhere 9 Sefton Drive LIVERPOOL 8 lnhn tharirlin -- ". -" 19 Anlaby R d HULL

B m t i f u l Stranger 6a Hunters Lane ROCHDALE, Lanes Cleveland Wrecking Yard 175 Newcastle St Burslem STOKE ON-TRENT Spice Island Osborne R d SOUTHSEA, Hants John Smith & Son Stirling University Bookshop STIRLING Red Light Books 202 Derby Rd SOUTHAMPTON Rare & Racey 166 Devonshire St SHEFFIELD Conservation Books 28 Bearmod Rd WOKINGHAM, Berkshire Posse Mount Farm Escnck YORK EIRE Rea's Bookshop St Stephens Green Dublin Eblana Bookshop Grafton Street Dublin Eco Shelter Group Dept o f Psychiatry University College Earlsfort Terrace

their trade comes from only a d o ~ e n titles. They cannot be expected to carry an unknown title except on a sale-or-return basis, and then only if it is heavily promoted. Even the large chains like Smiths are only really interested in about fifty titles. Undercurrents is just too small to, bother with. We are fortunate that Moore Harness have agreed to distributt the magazine, even on a limited scale: usually commercial distributors don't want to know about a magazine unless its circulation is more than 20,000. These, gentle readers, are the commercial facts of life. The magazine trade is a free market - if YOU can afford the entrance fee. If.

an issue after we'd come to re1 them, that would bankrupt us,

So that's why we want you to subscribe, dammit! MR SMUG THE CENSOR There is one other objection to using the retail newsagent system. As readers of Time Out, Private Eye and Socialist Worker will know, W.H. Smith and Son, who own or supply most of the large newsagents in this country, insist on their lawyers vetting

it for their imprimatur before print it. Any comments on th

Northumber'and

ly Distribution Manager of Private Eye, precisely to get round this formidable obstacle. Socialist Worker issold on subscription or in the

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MO* OWW.~~XP9 Piit>h!A t*\set/w\. ........... _ I W s e d . . . . . . ../nft^lf^~r/w,. ....\~)~ds,-tobeUMU+Â£ LM f'!AMÂ£................-... - ....-. ADDRESS-- - - .- - .- - .- - .- - - - - - - .- ..- - . PRINT YOUR AD. I.\ BLOCK CAPITALS,ONE NOW i'N EACH 8 0 X

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you, we're hoping to get about the same nett amount back as we would have got from a straight distributor. But if you don't feel like being a salesperson, why not just take a few copies round to your local newsagent or bookshop? They'll ask for a 25 to 33 per cent discount, usually, and they won't pay you until they've sold the copies, but the few coppers you'll make on the deal will at feast pay for your bus fare.

NAME

ADDRESS.

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......................... ......................... 1 enclose a chequelpostal order f in Payment for.. copies Of Undercurrents Number at 2 1 a~COPY. (Minimum order, 10 copies). I understand that Unde currents will buyback any copies which I return in good condition ~ co~v. at 2 1 per

....

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