Jeff (dp): The playing field was far from level each time. The sub episode had them having the penalty that applied to us 2x what applied to the other team. In the steam episode, they stopped things, had us wait, and didn't allow us to get the pit out of the way while the other team welded. (contrast with the beach boys continuing while Chaos crew welded muncher back together) In the fireboat episode, the course we designed for was not the course they ran us on. (never mind that it took tools to open the flag box.) We also were not allowed to test/work on our machine while the crew was in a panic getting the brothers pump to work at all. (we would have changed the drive arrangements had we time to test).

J: Wow. That does seem a bit one-sided. Were the teams unfriendly?

DP: The teams were uniformly wonderfull. Some of the crew was great. All the evil things you have heard about TV producers is understatements. You can tell your friends in that biz, they stab you in the chest.

J: Ouch. Now tell us how you really feel Jeff. Let's take the three episodes one by one. First, what problems did you face in the submarine episode?

DP: They needed their americans ugly for domestic consumption. The british cut is even more derisive. We didn't have the parts crisis's they attributed to us, we had a "would do" motor in the first 30 minutes, and the final in the first hour or so. In fact in one scene where they have a voiceover about "no motor", you can see it on a "test stand" with prop mounted. The other team did have a real problem with missing parts -- the regulator on their air tank was a very special one, and they couldn't find it on the build day. They had a bunch of the crew out looking for it, and were about 15 minutes away from chartering a plane to bring the only one in the country down from Scotland when it finally turned up. And while the NERDS did have a "loose cannon" on the team, it wasn't me.

J: And what about the steam car?

DP: Finding a gearing system that was sturdy enough for the task. Other than that, deaing with the suspension windup at startup. Otherwise it was very straightforward. We had a good time, finished building early, and it was a neat topic. And the Robin is (in my opinion) one of the 10 ugliest vehicles ever sold.

J: What are the other nine? Just kidding. What about your final machine, the fireboat? Any difficulties there?

DP: Well most of the build was straightforward. We did lose the services of Crash for the better part of an hour because he got sprayed in the face by the heater core which leaked (when Crash and Cathy drove over to weigh the thing) and needed some first aid. The problem with the fireboat came on the testing day. They lengthened the over-water movement part of the course, and shortened the distance to the fire. They also scaled the fire size back by treating the wood with fire-retardant rather than the gasoline we were promised. (the flames you saw were essentially all from the propane heads, the wood wasn't actually burning)

So all our efforts at building a high power pump at the expense of propulsion were misdirected. (the brothers had a good boat, the TV crew had them build better paddles on the test day while they were trying to get the pump to work.) The brothers made a significant design error, they didn't gear things down low enough, and their check valves floated. They got it below the 300 rpm cavatation limit, but the check valves were good for 100 rpm at best.. Notice how the two hoses had very different output? The crew could only get two of the very fast check valves, so they only fixed one side. (both sides were that bad originally).

Had we known how wimpy the fire was going to be, there were other options we discarded as not up to the task, but actually would have been fine given the actual contitions. Would have saved hours, leaving time for fitting a propellor, or other sorts of propulsion.

J: That's really too bad about that. In a famous scene (during the steam car build) you presented Cathy with 'The Hackers Dictionary' which explained some of the terms you guys were using. Was that planned by you or the producers?

DP: My idea. There had been some discussion of our slang during the sub build, and it occured to me that a copy of the dictionary would be a fun thing. So after we won, I bought a copy, and proceeded to leave it at home. I did some running around, and found a copy in London, the day before the steam car build. The only thing the TV people were told was "have Cathy call us on our slang".

J: It certainly made for great TV! Had you won the fireboat competition, you would have advanced to the inter-series Dragster. How do you think you guys would have done in that show?

DP: Not sure how we would have done. Depends which track (v8 vs bike) we got assigned. Likely we would have been assigned the V8 as americans, so it would have depended on the luck of the transmission. If the transmission hadn't broken, it would have been a rout. (The people who devised the challenge had the mistaken idea that you needed 4x the power for double the weight.) With the broken transmission, we might have had a better solution that didn't limit top speed as much. (I would have argued for selecting second gear by means of welding the selecting mechanisim in place.) The Megs are tough, they are great fabricators, and not bad as designers... But they aren't great as designers, they did put the beam the wrong way in the car crusher. (and they didn't deal with getting the rotation wrong on the pump...)

J: Too bad we'll never know. What about going back? Have you been asked & would you?

DP: We have not been invited back. They didn't want any returning teams. (the UK did allow a team that lost in their first round back, but didn't want any teams that had done more than one show to return.) Despite our treatment by the production team, we would love to do another show. Possibly a rematch with the brothers, or our own shot at the Megs. Since George isn't coming back, it wouldn't have to be the UK series, but robert would be a lot of fun too.

J: Since you mentioned George (Gray, US co-host) what did you think of the US series?

DP: I find George's tone an insult. And what happened to the lecture moments? Its about teaching, not competition guys.... Have since talked to a bunch of the team members, and they seem like realy great people. Tell TLC to organize a "reunion" (for the emmys perhaps???)

J: Good idea! Thank you Jeff for the time to talk about your experiences. I'll give you the final word on what ever you'd like to talk about.

DP: As to americans taking things more seriously, a lot can be laid at the feet of the editing. It didn't help that the US shows filming schedule didn't allow enough time for jet lag. Yes, it does affect how you approach things if it was a 10 hour plane flight instead of an hour or two on the train to get there.