Talk:Box Tunnel

message: This needs to be pinned down as either true or false -- after all, it's a simple mattter of fact. Unless we can find an expert, I say we send a delegation of Wikipedians to camp out in situ! ;-) -- Tarquin 17:31 Sep 30, 2002 (UTC)
:As I said on Talk:Isambard Kingdom Brunel, I'm not hanging around in the middle of a high-speed railway line at any time of the day or year. Angus Buchanan, whom I quote in the article, is Emeritus Professor of the History of Technology at Bath, and is presumably contactable there. If you have access to an academic library, you may be able to read the correspondence in NCE that Buchanan mentions. I think one page I passed by while googling the question implied that the light shining down the tunnel would be murky at best with the diesel fumes (can't find it now). http://chemcomm1.clic.ac.uk/ticket_holders/b.html includes someone who claims to have seen the effect. Two things are certain: there's no proof that IKB did it deliberately, and the alignment of the tunnel is roughly in the right direction. --rbrwr
:I've done a few back-of-the-envelope calculations, with help from Heavens Above and other sources, and I think that the sun must shine down the tunnel on one day or another in (approximately) the second week of April. Whether it is usually (or even ever) on the 9th, I don't know. Is there an astronomer in the house? --rbrwr
I'm not convinced. Partly because I've heard some academic whose name I wish I could remember saying it's a myth. Partly because it just smells of myth. And most of all -- if it's really true, why has no-one produced a photograph of it? -- Tarquin 18:19 Oct 2, 2002 (UTC)
:I wish you could remember his name, too. Excellent question on the photograph, though. Here's one (alleged) answer and here's another. It might be worth searching out a collection of NCE. On the other hand this one gives a published source saying that it happens about a week later. Not that I believe anything I read on Usenet, y'know... --rbrwr 18:58 Oct 2, 2002 (UTC)
It was one of the lunchtime lectures I used to sometimes traipse along to when I was at University College London -- he was probably from the civil engineering department. Those usenet links are very tantalising...! -- Tarquin
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A visit to Bristol reference library has left me none the wiser:
William Adams (ed) Encylopaedia of the great Western Railway  says:
:One of the two days in the year when the rising sun shines through the straight tunnel bore is close to Brunel's birthday, but does not coincide with it, despite the legend.
Muriel V. Searle Down the Line to Bristol  quotes a contemporary source from 1842:
:On Saturday the Box Tunnel presented a most splendid though singular appearance caused by the shining of the sun straight through it, and giving the walls a brilliancy, to use the expression of an eyewitness, "as though the whole tunnel had been made gilt."
April 9, 1842 was indeed a Saturday, though it's not clear that that is the day being referred to.
O.S. Nock Great Western in Colour  repeats the story without any proof, which isn't very useful to us. The newer edition of the Guinness Book of Railway Facts and Feats doesn't mention Box.
--rbrwr 15:27 Oct 6, 2002 (UTC)
:At least this remembers that it would happen twice a year. It's often said it happens only on IKB's birthday, which is obviously false. (BTW, going by the analemma on my wee globe, the other day would be Sep 5, more or less.) Kwantus 23:03, 2005 Jan 16 (UTC)
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Jeremy Clarkson, in his Great Britons 
programme on IKB, said that the "latest 
research" shows the effect is visible on April 6 - the only thing on
the British railway network that arrives early. It's still just a rumour,
though. --rbrwr
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I went to the library of the UWE in Bristol and searched their collection of the New Civil Engineer as far back as 1992 without finding the photograph referred to here. Oh well, keep looking. --rbrwr
----
I've done the calculations, and the sun definately does not shine through the tunnel on his birthday. And it's not as simple as him omitting atmoshperic refraction either. I'm looking to finish an article that probably won't be published anywhere. If it is, I'll point to it from this article. Peter Maggs 17:09, 15 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Here's an online ref: Box Railway Tunnel and I.K. Brunel's Birthday - a Theoretical Investigation by Atkins, C. P. in Journal of the British Astronomical Association, Vol. 95, NO.6/OCT, P.260, 1985.    Misalignment of the tunnel is approximately 1 degree, and full illumination can occur on April 7 (April 6 on leap years). The conclusion is: "These not insubstantial discrepancies from the actual alignment would suggest that there had been no deliberate attempt at Solar coincidence on Brunel's part." Meters (talk) 22:11, 23 May 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: Brunel's birthday

message: Am I the only one that considers the latter part of this article to be something of a conspiracy? Especially the end which basically equates to: "... which totally obscure the view of the tunnel".
While this might be fact, why is this relevant other than to support a conspiracy theory? Just wondering if this is acceptable or otherwise Worley-d 23:16, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I see what your saying but it is actually true. Inside box tunnel is a vast nuclear bunker, see Hawthorn, Wiltshire     Bailo26 3:40, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Secret Tunnel... Conspiracy?

message: I have been looking at some old images of the East Portal online. 
Brunel's sketches at http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http://www.brunel200.com/images/great_western_railway/jpegs/great_western_railway_5.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.brunel200.com/great_western_railway.htm&usg=__QlqBtGmHzxCwFgCp_gtMfxXqo_g=&h=271&w=199&sz=9&hl=en&start=100&sig2=eE68DK8mEaks7pFqehwFHA&zoom=1&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=SIUJ9I5rsnR8bM:&tbnh=113&tbnw=83&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dbox%2Btunnel%2Bimages%26start%3D80%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26ndsp%3D20%26tbs%3Disch:1&ei=DgPFTO-LGozi4AaLzMG6Aw
which shows that (as one might expect) he also intended the East Portal to be grand and Classical, if less so (because of restricted space) than the West.
I suggest that he did not originally intend the brick lining to come right to the entrance - this should be taller and lined by the rusticated stone, as in the upper sketch. Though the lining was there by c.1905, as shown in the photos at
http://images.francisfrith.com/c10/450/45/51493.jpg
and
http://eshop.wiltshire.gov.uk/gallery/eshop/postcards/boxtunnel.jpg
Perhaps the strengthening was needed when the quarry branch was added?
On the basis of these images I wish to revise the opening paragraph slightly.
8474tim (talk) 04:39, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  East Portal 

message: The old images mentioned above show that the quarry siding already existed at the turn of the century, so was not newly built in the 1930s as implied. See also
http://www.aditnow.co.uk/cache/Box-Bath-Stone-Mine-Archive-Album/Box-Bath-Stone-Mine-Archive-Album-001.jpg
and
http://www.willys-mb.co.uk/images/strategic/box-tunnel.jpg
(I assume that the Strategic Steam Reserve stuff is another Wiltshire hoax to go with ley lines, crop circles etc.)
8474tim (talk) 04:57, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Defence Use 

message: In this collection of engineering drawings, this drawing is a useful illustration of the longitudinal cross-section of the tunnel to show its steepness and its relation to the landscape. As it is dated 7 July 1838, it must already be in the public domain. Can it be used in the article? cmɢʟee☎✉  12:29, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tunnel drawings 

message: There isn't much information here about how the tunnel was constructed  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.0.114.138 (talk) 11:38, 2 December 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Construction 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: I have recently published the results of some research on the possibility of Brunel having deliberately aligned the tunnel to the morning sunrise on particular dates. The article can be seen here http://www.mirlibooks.com/isambards-gift.html I invite comments; editors may wish to link it to the main article. Peter Maggs 08:12, 30 December 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: I would guess your signature doesn't match the format that SineBot looks for when deciding to add the unsigned template. You can opt out by following the link to SineBot's user page and following the instructions there. --rbrwr± 12:16, 10 April 2017 (UTC)
replies: text:  You are typing in a signature, but instead of that you need to type four tildes and Wikipedia will recognise them. Near the top of this page when in edit mode you get the message "and remember to sign your posts by typing four tildes." and it shows you what tildes are. I can't include that here because it will convert them to my signature. Afterbrunel (talk) 09:39, 27 August 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  New Theory