A friend wonders what this device is, found in an alcove in a corridor of his
workplace: http://www.michaelhowe.org/images/IMAG0003.jpg

He's pretty sure that pipework isn't actually connected to the gas, and he's
not in the maintenance department, so this is pure curiosity!

--
Selah

In message , Stephen Gower
writes
A friend wonders what this device is, found in an alcove in a corridor of his
workplace: http://www.michaelhowe.org/images/IMAG0003.jpg

He's pretty sure that pipework isn't actually connected to the gas, and he's
not in the maintenance department, so this is pure curiosity!


Its for underfloor heating - ha ha


--
geoff

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember Stephen Gower
saying something like:

A friend wonders what this device is, found in an alcove in a corridor of his
workplace: http://www.michaelhowe.org/images/IMAG0003.jpg

He's pretty sure that pipework isn't actually connected to the gas, and he's
not in the maintenance department, so this is pure curiosity!

Could be for anything.
Perhaps there was a need at one time for a large heated container of
water /soup /tar /who knows.

Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:
We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember Stephen Gower
saying something like:

A friend wonders what this device is, found in an alcove in a corridor of his
workplace: http://www.michaelhowe.org/images/IMAG0003.jpg

He's pretty sure that pipework isn't actually connected to the gas, and he's
not in the maintenance department, so this is pure curiosity!

Could be for anything.
Perhaps there was a need at one time for a large heated container of
water /soup /tar /who knows.

you folks are just too young.

That's simply an upside down COAL gas ring (I reckon) that probably used
to simply heat a kettle and keep the tea warm.


Before central heating you didn't want to get up and go to the freezing
cold kitchen and crack the ice on the milk bottle and come back to the
one room you could afford to heat, (to the point where undervest,
shirt, v-necked waistcoat pullover, a rug over your knees and a jacket
and blanket round your shoulders and fingerless gloves could just about
avoid hypothermia*). So a little gas ring by the Radio, listening to
Hancock's Half Hour, and some Tetley tea bags, and milk in a jug, with
plenty of sugar lumps, made the evening survivable.

*it was known as dying of cold then, and a lot of people did.

The Natural Philosopher wrote:

snip

Before central heating you didn't want to get up and go to the freezing
cold kitchen and crack the ice on the milk bottle and come back to the
one room you could afford to heat, (to the point where undervest,
shirt, v-necked waistcoat pullover, a rug over your knees and a jacket
and blanket round your shoulders and fingerless gloves could just about
avoid hypothermia*). So a little gas ring by the Radio, listening to
Hancock's Half Hour, and some Tetley tea bags, and milk in a jug, with
plenty of sugar lumps, made the evening survivable.

*it was known as dying of cold then, and a lot of people did.

Are you sure tea bags were sold in those days? I'm now 64 and I don't
remember tea bags until much later. I remember the bloody cold and
frozen insides of windows though :-(

Dave

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember The Natural Philosopher
saying something like:

That's simply an upside down COAL gas ring (I reckon) that probably used
to simply heat a kettle and keep the tea warm.

Yes, and?
It's at his mate's place of work, not his house. Perfectly feasible it
was used for tea - I recall plenty of places where a gas ring was in
constant use for tea, instead of its installed-for purpose of heating up
tar, soup, dishwater, etc.

dave wrote:
The Natural Philosopher wrote:

snip

Before central heating you didn't want to get up and go to the
freezing cold kitchen and crack the ice on the milk bottle and come
back to the one room you could afford to heat, (to the point where
undervest, shirt, v-necked waistcoat pullover, a rug over your knees
and a jacket and blanket round your shoulders and fingerless gloves
could just about avoid hypothermia*). So a little gas ring by the
Radio, listening to Hancock's Half Hour, and some Tetley tea bags, and
milk in a jug, with plenty of sugar lumps, made the evening survivable.

*it was known as dying of cold then, and a lot of people did.

Are you sure tea bags were sold in those days? I'm now 64 and I don't
remember tea bags until much later. I remember the bloody cold and
frozen insides of windows though :-(

Dave
you are probably right. IIRC teabags were in in the late 50's


here you go

http://www.tea.co.uk/page.php?id=4

1953 in the UK the first Tetley Tea Bag!