...of this that was posted on TOL

(If you don't know what TOL is, ask your grandad)

I don't remember who posted it, so if it's yours feel free to claim it!

"A document has come to light which explains just why a Caterham chassis is over 14567 times better than any other seven, not to mention 10 times more expensive.

“Caterham Cars factory manual.

Chassis

As befits a car of this standard, ordinary steel will not do. The very best iron ore is to be found at the north north western corner of one mine in outer Mongolia This needs to be mined by left handed Maori lesbians, who are the only ones sensitive enough to handle the ore to maintain it’s perfectness.

The mining it’s self is done with solid silver tea spoons, which are replaced at two minute intervals. The ore is placed in velvet boxes and drawn to the surface by unicorns. Private Boeing 747s whisk the ore to Geneva where each nodule is hallmarked before being wrapped in silk and given to a courier who flies into Caterham HQ by helicopter.

A new smelting plant is built every day to ensure no contamination takes place, and when sufficient ore has arrived the steel ingot is made. The ingot is 15 feet high and 20 feet wide as it emerges. The very best steel is, of course, right in the centre of the ingot, and teams of vastly experienced fitters use a progression of finer and finer hand files to reduce the size to 25mm square. (Incidentally the filings are melted down and sold to Westfield)

The steel now needs to be hollowed out and this is done in the 30,000 square foot “hollowing shop” The steel bar is levelled and aligned at 42.65 degrees north (True north, they still laugh in the shop about the day that a young apprentice aligned the bar to magnetic north and they had to throw away 16 miles of tube and shoot the young man in question through the head!)

The process it’s self is long and complex. Teams of seaside landladies look at the material to be removed in the sort of stern way that they look at people who tracked mud through the hall. This removes a tiny amount of steel from the area by “psychic transference”. Sometimes mothers who are disappointed with their daughter’s ballet exam results are brought in to speed up the process.

Eventually, a mere 8 years after the process began there stands a pristine “tube” Mig welding wire is produced in a similar way in Cuba by rolling the steel on the thighs of virgins.

Next comes the chassis jig. 600 tracking lasers scan the positioning of each tube, correcting for temperature, the curvature of the earth and the operators dental records. They’ve settled for an accuracy of plus or minus one gazzilionth of a millimetre, which the foreman wittily says is “Near enough!”

The “Chassis boutique” is an accurate full scale model of St Pauls cathedral with marble floors, sculpture and a canteen. The welders themselves are called “Les operatuer du mig” . With their famous uniform of tuxedo, stiff collar and bow tie they place the tubes and tack them whilst dancing a special foxtrot composed by John Williams specifically for the purpose, their pristine white cotton gloves a blur of industry. When the chassis are tacked they are inspected by scanning electron microscope before being passed back to Les Operatuer for final welding. Each weld takes a week or more using a welding unit which is the only item of industrial plant visible from space. The quality control department step in next and it’s at this stage that most chassis are thrown away. Only one in 200,000 chassis pass on to the next stage – polishing.

The polishing emporium is the size of six football fields and staffed by dwarfs with hands shaped like polishing mitts. Specially bred at their own farm in Togo, some have been Poilishistas for many generations, some recalling the days of “old Mr Caterham” in the 1920’s. The chassis move seamlessly through, getting more and more highly polished as they go until they are too shiny to look at with the naked eye.

Paint is next, and although most people think that the chassis are powder coated, they are in fact painted in the traditional manner in the “painting bazzar”. Using tiny brushes made from the eyelashes of the Sumatran camel (females only) the paint is dabbed in tiny patches all over the frame. The paint’s recipe is a closely guarded secret passed down through the ages, although it is know to contain plutonium, gnat’s blood and the tears of children.

When the chassis is finished it wrapped in taffeta and a large bow of satin is tied round the scuttle area and it is despatched to the customer.

A spokesman for Caterham said ”We cater for the more discerning customer, especially those with a poor money/common sense ratio”

“Either that or we use the same steel as everyone else, welders from the job centre and charge a lot more for it…………Er…….no not that……….”

Cheers

Chris

TOL,that brings back memories (is it still going) i dont remember reading that,maybe it was after we were both expelled?

I chose to leave.

After they booted me off.

No sense of humour them yanks

Cheers

Chris

And that's the truth cos it's on t'internet. It's from the sales brochure isn't it?

Haven't heard mention of TOL for a while, never on it myself though.

'incidently the filings are melted down and sold to westfield'

didnt someones westy crack last week....

I thought it was very amusing, but would have been more so if it had been much less exaggerated. Whoever wrote it started off with a good idea but just went completely OTT.

John

Has anyone given Westie's a map of where to get the ore ?

[Edited on 25/10/08 by TOO BADD]