Britain turns up the heat on homegrown ceramics for hypersonic missiles

Britain has taken the first steps towards producing its own ultrahigh temperature materials, regarded as vital for applications including hypersonic vehicles, space, and advanced propulsion systems. The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) says it invested in Cross Manufacturing Ltd, based in Bath and Wiltshire, to …

[Paul Herber]

Homegrown ceramics

'homegrown ceramics'

Britain is always on the lookout for a better teacup.

(ooo yes, milk, no sugar, thank you)

[Doctor Syntax]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

Sugar, no milk. Ah, that's better. A nice cuppa.

[I ain't Spartacus]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

Sugar, no milk. Ah, that's better. A nice cuppa.

Doctor Syntax,

Don't think I've met anyone who has black tea with sugar.

I'm a Whoopi Goldberg myself (black nun).

Paul Herber being a Julie Andrews (white nun).

[EvilDrSmith]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

Black tea with sugar - I think it's a Russian / central Asian thing? Certainly not that unusual, though perhaps not so common in the UK.

I have been known to resort to it, when the office milk supply runs out.

[Aladdin Sane]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

I prefer NATO standard - milk, 2 sugars.

[werdsmith]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

That’s a tradesman.

Absolutely any tradesperson that comes to do a job wants milk 2 sugars. One day somebody is going to ask for something different and I’ll have to immediately throw them out because they have revealed themselves to be a charlatan.

[Aladdin Sane]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

Tradies only have 2 sugars? When did they stop having 5?

[I ain't Spartacus]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

Paul Herber,

I think we've got the teacup problem solved. And have done so for decades, if not centuries.

It's the teapot lid that is the problem! I've broken maybe one teapot in my life, but at least 6 teapot lids. This is the reason I transitioned to a stainless steel teapot 3 years ago. But here, we have the solution. Given our historical military investment into tea making facilities, I shall be deeply disappointed if this vital research isn't completed as a matter of priority.

On a less serious note, I'm surprised the aerospace and/or motor racing industries didn't have this tech already. I believe they've made the UK one of the leaders in carbon fibre tech. I bet they'll be thinking about using it in future.

[how have El Reg still not got a teapot icon?!?!]

[Doctor Syntax]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

The British Catering Industry Standard Teapot is guaranteed to dribble when poured irrespective of whether it has a lid or not.

And have you checked out the Cadogan teapot?

[I ain't Spartacus]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

Doctor Syntax,

Never heard of the Cadogan teapot before. Now I really want one!

[Eclectic Man]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

I am perfectly satisfied with my Wedgwood Hibiscus teapot and other crockery, thank you very much.

https://www.wedgwood.com/en-gb/collections/all-collections/hibiscus/hibiscus-teapot-40003912?srsltid=AfmBOopg35qmkuyXkcf5otWMFLwnpriq31iYEs65DquxuwLk0hRYl3jl

I bought my lot after realising, on retirement that all my home 'drinking vessels' were mismatched mugs, so I splurged on some dishwasher safe posh porcelain. Fortunately I bought mine a year or so before the 20% price rise.

As for tea, if brewed properly it requires neither milk nor sugar. Those are only necessary if the tea has been stewed and is therefore full of obnoxious tannins. I humbly suggest that those who need milk or sugar experiment with different temperatures and lengths of brewing their tea, and decant it, once brewed into a second teapot* so that it does not stew.

*Oh yes, I brew in a stump 'teapot for life' ( https://suki-tea.com/collections/teapots?srsltid=AfmBOooGDzNUsBPRA3NwGXHLN-mpMZse699FixarXjnFgmaxrRQAaQaC ) and then pour from my Wedgwood, we Brits may have lost an empire, but we still have our standards. (Where is the 'I'm a snob' icon when you need it?)

[Millwright]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

I'm surprised you don't have a selection of pots for different teas. Here my morning brew (keemun and lapsang 2:1) is in a traditional Brown Betty (though blue) and my afternoon darjeeling in an old but serviceable porcelain. Green teas in Chinese cast iron and herbals in glass.

None of these produce a great deal of tannin, especially when brewed at the correct temperature, and none need more than one rounded teaspoon of leaves.

I find many of your Earth customs quite strange.

[Eclectic Man]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

my morning brew (keemun and lapsang 2:1) is in a traditional Brown Betty

But in that case, where do you keep your purloined diamond? (As in 'Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance most Fowl')?

Our Earthling customs may seem strange to you, but yours are out of this world!

[werdsmith]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

The standard British catering teapot stainless steel version does dribble down its outer edge if you don’t properly commit to the pour.

[Blue Pumpkin]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

All I can say is BS 6008 (now ISO 3103 ) as well as other indispensable Ig Nobel prize winners from 1999 : "Physics takes the biscuit : the optimal way to dunk a biscuit" and "Pouring flows : a teapot spout that does not drip"

[Bebu sa Ware]

ISO 3103

"ISO 3103 was produced by ISO Technical Committee 34 (Food products), Sub-Committee 8 (Tea)."

If there were any lingering doubt whether the human population of Earth is actually descended from the survivors of the Golgafrinchan B ark this ought to allay any such misgivings.

"Ireland was the only ISO member country to object to the standard, doing so on technical grounds."

Unless those grounds were tea's ethanol content (absence of), an unexpected outbreak of sanity.

[Mast1]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

"Britain is always on the lookout for a better teacup"

For that it appears that we first have to thank a Mr Thomas Frye, the person who put another composite ceramic "on the map": bone china.

Nearly 300 years later Britain appears to have achieved a step change in performance...... (OK ignoring ceramic composite turbine blades)

I like this "white heat of technology" [0] aspect of progress. Not that a tea cup ever had had to survive 1000 C......

[0] First delivered in a party conference speech by former Prime Minister Harold Wilson in 1963.

[Doctor Syntax]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

Wilson's white heat was more of a white flag - "we'll just buy from the Yanks instead".

[The Organ Grinder's Monkey]

Re: Homegrown ceramics

Maybe that's why I initially misread it as "funding from the McD's Chief Scientific Adviser". Simultaneously terrible & credible?

[Eclectic Man]

Re: Homegrown ceramics - aside heating mugs

Not for the faint hearted:

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2026/mar/12/you-be-the-judge-should-my-housemate-stop-warming-her-mug-and-then-pouring-the-water-back-into-the-kettle

I'm shocked, truly shocked!

[Outski]

Re: Homegrown ceramics - aside heating mugs

Just don't mention the toothbrush!

[SnailFerrous]

Surely it would be simpler to outsource this and all other military equipment research and procurement to Fisher Price. Their products are known by all parents of small children to be utterly indestuctable and should easily survive hypersonic speeds and explosions. The bright primary colours may take some getting used to for a military more used to muted khakis and greys.

[werdsmith]

Unfortunately Fisher Price would be like depending on Lockheed Martin for Trident and F35. They are American to the core and owned by Mattel.

But Chad Valley? Hornby? Now we're talking.

[Doctor Syntax]

Forget missiles. Just scatter Lego bricks on the battlefield. Probably against the Geneva Convention but who takes any notice of that these days?

[Mast1]

re "scatter lego bricks"

Yes, but for maximum effect you will need to persuade the opposition to take their boots off first.

I once saw a 2x2 white lego brick embedded in concrete on the roadway of a Greek island. It was the first time I had seen it used as an alternative aggregate.

[Aladdin Sane]

Lego is for amateurs. Try a 3 pin plug for real pain.

[David 164]

My friend toddler pulled out a plug socket and place it right where he step out of bed.

He still limping from it, 2 weeks an counting.

[Bebu sa Ware]

Try a 3 pin plug for real pain.

I think the technical term is "caltrop."

[elsergiovolador]

We could just buy containers of Lego and drop them from the planes at the enemy.

[werdsmith]

Luckily for Denmark that they are such a strong arms industry.

[Aladdin Sane]

Bombs are probably cheaper. Though the thought of soldiers stopping fighting to assemble Lego is amusing.

[Doctor Syntax]

An energy-saving suggestion. Just use the raw material. The heating on re-entry will fire it in flight.

[I ain't Spartacus]

Cover your reentry vehicle in a paste of Weetabix and milk. Heating during ascent and re-entry should bake it into a coating harder than any substance known to man. Weetabixium! Which is 10x stronger than Unobtainium - and then we can leave those giant Smurfs in peace at last.

[Paul Herber]

It was in fact invented in France. They called it Huitheurebix due to the time in the morning when it should be eaten.

[Bebu sa Ware]

Huitheurebix

Bugger!

I actually searched for that being curious how long ago the Frogs came with that horreur… then I pronounced it my head — right. Very drole.

I hated the stuff as a kid - it was either too dry and took the skin off the top your mouth or too soggy - like sodden cardboard which it tasted like, either way.

I always imagined it was a peculiarly Australasian atrocity but with a slight change in spelling I now understand it is also concocted in the UK and according to WikiP, inflicted on another 80 nations.

[elsergiovolador]

£350,000

How do you set up a facility with that? That barely covers salary of a one skilled engineer, their equipment, insurance.

[Steve Davies 3]

In six months time...

Breaking news.

Cross Manufacturing has been acquired by a US (or Chinese) Tech Giant and all production in the UK will cease immediately. 500 people will lose their jobs as a result of this deal.

They won't say that the Directors have decamped to a tropical island to enjoy their golden parachutes.

SOP for anything that is designed or developed in this country.

[Korev]

Re: In six months time...

No idea why you got the downvote, it's a well-known problem for the UK

[Steve Davies 3]

Re: No idea why you got the downvote

Thanks for that vote of confidence.

My dad lost his job when Mr Gannex (Harold Wilson) canned the TSR2 and we bought the Phantom F4 instead.

I could list many other technologies that we pioneered that were either canned by Whitehall or given to the USA.

We have sold a few things to the Yanks but they prefer to steal it instead.

[David 164]

With the developement of laser weapons, light weight cerematics for missiles might become neccessary for most air to ground or ground to ground missiles in the near future to last long enough to get through to the target, even for drones. So not only do we need our own supply source, we need it on a scale international partners probably haven't got a clue we need it, an even if they could supply it, they probably couldn't supply us with enough, Ukraine going through 100k drones a year.

[jonathan keith]

Think of the civilian applications!

Tell you what - this sounds like it might be really useful for some sort of hypersonic SSTO spaceplane project. Something that could Take-Off and Land Horizontally, perhaps using a novel propulsion technology like - oh, I don't know - a Reaction Engine. I don't suppose anyone has any plans for a project of this nature?

[Haynomonous]

As is tradition

With that level of funding, I'm going to assume that it's two blokes in a shed (fairly big shed), which is as we all know where the best British designs come from.