The Salamander

When I was working on contractors’ plant repair in an open-fronted ex-WD corrugated iron building (you can still see them in abandoned RAF stations), the sole form of heating that we had was a salamander stove. This had a circular saucer-shaped base with a top carrying the chimney that was provided with a vertical pipe that re-circulated hot gas down to the vessel to vaporise the liquid fuel held inside. This should have been heating oil (like diesel), but being “skint” we used old sump oil from the repair jobs.

To start it off, you got a petrol-soaked rag, poked it into the filler hole and put a match to it, smartly stepping back, for often it would blow back before you could shut the hatch of the filler orifice. The downside to the economy fuel was that, at the end of the day, we had black faces and resembled artists from a “****** minstrel show”.

One problem with using sump oil was that inevitably it contained a residue of water under the oil. This got heated to boiling point as the day went on, and you could hear it bubbling up like a chip shop till eventually it would spew a black foaming tide from the filler hole, flaming as it emerged. I had a long rod hooked at one end and a handle at the other to drag the heater outside and let it burn out. It was quite spectacular and even attracted the attention of a policewoman who asked if we needed the fire brigade. It was hot enough to burn the hair on the back of my hand even with a six-foot-long rod.

I remember one night John and I were working late repairing a dumper truck that the customer needed next day, and it was after midnight. It was bitterly cold with frost on the ground. We heard the boiling-up noise and ignored it till the flaming tide shot out. I tried to get some sand or earth to dam the flood, but it was difficult due to the frost. Luckily John had bought a cheap fire extinguisher from the supermarket, so I grabbed it but had no idea how to operate it, so handed it to John with the remark, “You bought it, so must know how to work it.” He turned it upside down and pressed the button, whereupon the gas inside shot out uselessly. So, being a very strong type, he tore it in half and sprinkled the powder on the flames and put it out.

At weekends I would go home for my Sunday dinner, but John would have fish and chips from the nearby shop together with a lad who came in as a help. We brewed up with an aluminium kettle and teapot that we used when going sidecar racing, John being my passenger. The kettle warmed up by residing on the salamander, then received its final boil by using the oxy-acetylene burner. This had two controls: the flame that heated the metal to melting point, and a trigger just under your thumb that, when pressed, blew the metal away. Ronnie, the lad, in boiling the kettle inadvertently pressed the trigger and blew a hole in the kettle, and John “played hell with him”. Calming things down, I said to John, “He is only a dozy lad and it was easily done, so use my teapot,” and departed. I duly arrived back after dinner and John said, “Do you think I was over the top in telling off Ronnie?” “Well, it is easily done and he has not used the burner before. It’s not the end of the world.” “Good,” he replied, “for I have blown a hole in your teapot.”

When a fire extinguisher salesman came into the yard, we bought one. He said things were not so bad up here compared to his previous territory down in Cornwall. Trying to sell to farmers was well near impossible. He visited one farm where the ancient man viewed him with great suspicion. When asked if he would like a demonstration, he said, “I will ask my father,” who duly tottered out from the building. After giving the “spiel”, I gathered some old straw up from the ground and, sprinkling some petrol on it, set a match to it. It was a bit more than I had bargained for, and the farmer said, “You’d better do summat about that.”
Operating the extinguisher, I put it out very quickly. “There you are,” I said. “Will you buy one?” “No,” he replied. “T’aint natural.