Belated Happy New Year everyone, we hope you had a great Christmas.
It was a bit of a hectic break for us. Darren headed off on holiday and ended up with next to no WiFi, which was blissful, but a little challenging, apologies if you're still waiting for a reply! Oscar had a series of ailments, and had to cancel his Christmas and reschedule it for New Year's Day, while Daren bravely held the fort and did his best to catch up with a bit of a backlog.
We're now fully back into the swing of things and doing our best to keep warm in a very cold workshop.
We're about to be reminded, however, of a very warm summer's day last year, when we visited the Midlands Air Festival to film with the BBC for a new TV show. 'David and Jay's Touring Toolshed' features Only Fools and Horses legend Sir David Jason and Repair Shop supremo Jay Blades. It sees the pair travelling the country to "park up their toolshed at the UK’s air shows, steam rallies, county fairs and vintage festivals, to meet some of the UK’s most talented crafters, makers and tinkerers – as well as people who could use a little help!" The 15-episode series airs next Monday, 22nd January at 1830 and we're in the first episode. We're told it'll be on iPlayer thereafter.
Here's the iPlayer link.... https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001vkhp/david-jays-touring-toolshed-series-1-episode-1
We took along some of our completed pieces and some of our part-finished work to show how our initial 'tinkering' some 8 years ago has now transformed into a full time business. We filmed for several hours, but have no idea how much of this made the final edit - that said, we're looking forward to seeing the programme.
There was a hint of Del Boy in David's on screen banter, as he sought to steal our trade secrets before Oscar gave Jay a bit of a polishing masterclass on an Airbus fuselage section, that's now a clock. We'll be listing that on the website shortly - look out for the 'As seen on TV' and 'Hand polished by Jay Blades' banners!
It was great to then chat 'off camera' to fellow enthusiast and helicopter pilot David, who was particularly interested in what we do, having had a lifelong interest in aviation. He even gives us a mention in this BBC Q & A session about the show...
This time next year Rodney....
