MOTnews 58 (02/03/2005)

Want to build your very own baker's oven? Find out how at the MOT this summer!

Are you as partial as we are to the delicious fragrance of freshly stone-baked bread from an old-fashioned baker's oven? Would you like to build an oven like that yourself, but don't know where to start?

If so, the Museum of Old Techniques has something for you this summer. We are organising a "baker's oven building" workshop, during which we will practise and test out a range of handy tips and tricks. We will be covering all aspects, so the workshop will be useful for beginners and experienced DIYers alike.

The program is certain to include the following items: - technical characteristics of a well-functioning baker's oven - drawing up the basic plans - preparing the mortar - making the foundations - lining up and bricklaying the oven floor - bricklaying the oven roof

Preparations are currently still underway, so we don't yet have any firm dates to give you. If you are interested, you can enter your details at our website, www.mot.be. We will then send you all the info you need and a registration form - with no obligation on your part of course.

GRANDMOTHER'S RECIPES

In days gone by, combs were hand-carved from a piece of wood or bone, and brushes were made from soft pig hair set in a wooden handle. For us, these things are unremarkable everyday items, but in the olden days they were precious possessions - status symbols even. The handles were sometimes finished in tortoiseshell or silver, and great care was taken with them.

If you want to clean combs and brushes like these, it is best to approach the task with care. It is not recommended to use water to clean them because of the materials: the wood can split and the hairs can fall out. But our grandmothers had an economical solution for this.

Take a bag and fill it with a handful or two of bran. Then pop in your comb and shake the bag vigorously. The starch in the bran will absorb any grease, and the comb will look like new again when you take it out. Then do the same with your brush. But do not clean them both at the same time, because they could bang against each other in the bag, causing cracks or chips.

SAY WHAT?

In this MOT-news item we try to explain proverbs and sayings that have their roots in our technical history. Similar proverbs are found in different languages, but each language has it's own typical sayings. Therefore we do not translate this item in English.

KIDS news: something to tell your children tonight

Last time, we told you the history of the can opener. This time, it is the turn of the bottle opener.

Fizzy drinks are not a new invention. They have actually been around for more than 100 years. Originally, they were packaged in glass bottles. But keeping the fizz in was a problem: the CO2 would escape and the stoppers sometimes gave the drink a bad taste.

However, this all changed in 1892, when the American William Painter invented the "crown cork" or crown cap. It was a great and low-cost invention. A characteristic feature of the crown cap is that it always has 21 teeth. Thanks to its unique shape, it gives a perfect seal against the neck of the bottle. Because it resembled a little crown and it had a liner made of cork, it was originally known as a "crown cork".

But precisely because of that perfect seal, bottles with crown caps aren't very easy to open. We've all seen those movies in which tough guys open beer bottles with their teeth or by cracking them against the bar, a door, or the edge of their table. You can also prise the cap off with a piece of silverware. However, in the interests of avoiding painful injuries, not to mention spilling your drink, you're better off using an appropriate tool. Fortunately, the inventor of the crown cap soon followed up his invention with the development of the bottle opener, which makes it a breeze to get the crown cap off. Today, there are bottle openers in all shapes and sizes, but at the end of the day they all work in the same way, namely, like a lever.

The crown cap has remained unchanged for over 100 years. The cork liner has been replaced by a plastic liner, but that only happened in the 1970s. Mr Painter's crown cork company still exists, producing some 50 billion crown caps a year. This means that the crown cap is one of the most common disposable consumer items of all time.

Recently, a new competitor has appeared on the scene, because more and more drinks are being packaged in aluminium cans and plastic screw-top bottles. However, real beer drinkers are sure to remain faithful to the glass bottles for a while yet. Many of them even carry a bottle opener on their key ring.