Guy Martin in telly series

[BigVeeGrin]

Whilst cooking up me tea heard on the C4 that there's a series coming with Guy presenting about the engineering etc that made this country etc. Not sure what it's called or when!

[Kev L]

Cheers fella, got to be worth a watch.

[Wicky]

Guy Martin: Building Britain

Channel 4 Commissioning Editor for History Julia Harrington has commissioned North One Television to make Guy Martin: Building Britain (working title), due for transmission on Channel 4 in 2012.

In each episode, Guy Martin, lorry mechanic and British motorcycle racer, will help a team of volunteers restore an iconic machine or building from Britain's industrial past, and through each structure he will tell the story of a landmark in making the Britain we recognise today: the railways, the factories, the docks, the mines, the garden and the holiday.

Each episode focuses on the jobs and skills of the Industrial Revolution's unsung heroes, rather than the familiar famous names - so the ordinary men, women and children who executed the engineers' ideas.

In the first episode, Guy will help restore the most important icon of the Industrial Revolution and the machine that turned Britain into the first industrialised nation in the world - a steam locomotive. His lorry mechanic skills come in extremely useful as Guy has to work inside the very guts of the machine, but he also has to learn a new set of trades, from Victorian blacksmithing to experiencing the harsh manual labour of the notorious navvies, the people who actually built the railways. And Guy being Guy, once his 130 tonne loco is taken for its inaugural run, he can't resist using its furnace to cook the traditional 19th century train driver's meal - a bacon and egg sandwich, served on a coal shovel.

The series will also see Guy renovating a Yorkshire saw mill powered by the world's oldest surviving water turbine; overhauling one of the famous Brixham fishing trawlers which were then the fastest in the world; design his own giant fountain and rockery at the Birmingham Botanical Garden; help rebuild a steam pumping engine at a preserved drift mine which is today as protected as Blenheim Palace; and be lowered on a rope towards the crashing waves underneath Llandudno Pier so he can help preserve the most important attraction at this purpose-built Victorian holiday resort.

Commissioning Editor Julia Harrington says, "Guy Martin is a real talent and he's bringing Britain's industrial achievements to life in his own special way - with genuine knowledge of how things work, driving curiosity and real warmth. This is the story of when Britain worked, the age of axel grease, danger and hard labour, and there's no one better to tell it."

Executive producers James Woodroffe and Ewan Keil say, "Guy has a simple motivation here - he wants to help maintain the legacy of Britain's grafters. He doesn't just stand next to some machine and say 'gosh it must have been tough' like we've heard a million times before - he actually gets stuck in and has a go at the job, no matter how hard or filthy. Barely a day's filming passes where he's not covered from head to toe in soot, grime and grease and he's loving every second of it. We've had him genuinely working inside the claustrophobic firebox of a loco, straining to single-handedly move a two tonne train wheel and even eating candles, the emergency food rations of trapped Victorian miners. It's a delight to work with him and as the production continues one thing is becoming increasingly apparent: he's making graft cool again."

[tony.mon]

They're trying to turn him into a Fred Dibnah clone.
No wonder he can't keep his mind on the racing.....

[VTRDark]

Didn't hey have a show on like this recently, not long after the TT where he went to a mountain bike factory. Maybe that was a taster to see how many viewers it got.

(:-})

[Kev L]

How Britain worked starts next Sunday at 8pm if anyone is interested -

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/how-britain-worked

[VTRDark]

I shall look forward to that, should be interesting and Guy is a right character.

(:-})

[MacV2]

How Britain worked starts next Sunday at 8pm if anyone is interested -

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/how-britain-worked

Surely that's no good for you Kev as it clashes with Strictly/X wombles/Britain is Talentless or whatever...

[Chop]

How Britain worked starts next Sunday at 8pm if anyone is interested -

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/how-britain-worked

I'll have some of that.
Thanks for the heads up

[VTRDark]

Don't forget this is on tonight folks 20.00h channel 4



(:-})

[BigVeeGrin]

Thanks Carl. Sunday telly will soon be epic - Guy, Homeland, new series of Misfits coming.

[VTRDark]

That's proper that. That's proper bacon and egg, on a shovel

Top quality tele. Really enjoyed it.

(:-})

[Kev L]

I enjoyed it as well. Nice combination of social commentary and engineering skills. When is the episode on getting Harris rearsets to fit correctly?

[VTRDark]

The bit where he made the shovel where they welded it together... wow....incredible. It's great there are still a few people keeping those sort of skills alive. And what great guy Guy Martin is, puts passion into all his work and does a good job at it. A proper grafter. No matter how big or how small. And that bearing they had to make.....cor...precision engineering.

Looking forward to next week now where he make a Blue VTR

(:-})