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St Abb's Head Lighthouse
St Abb's Head Lighthouse stands on the cliffs at the rocky promontory of St Abb's Head, near the village of St Abbs in Berwickshire. A signal station was established on the cliffs before 1820 and the facilities were shared by Trinity House and Her Majesty's Coastguard. The Northern Lighthouse Board recommended the building of a lighthouse at St Abb's Head after the sinking of the ''Martello'' on Carr Rock in 1857. The lighthouse was designed and built by the brothers David Stevenson and Thomas Stevenson and assisted navigation before and after sight of the Bell Rock and Isle of May lights disappeared from view. The light began service on 24 February 1862 and initially used oil to generate its light, it was converted to incandescent power in 1906 and to electricity in 1966 and finally automated in 1993. Before automation the lighthouse was staffed by three full-time keepers whose duties included keeping detailed weather records. The lighthouse has two km of single-track tarmaced ...
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Berwickshire
Berwickshire ( gd, Siorrachd Bhearaig) is a historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area in south-eastern Scotland, on the English border. Berwickshire County Council existed from 1890 until 1975, when the area became part of the Borders region, with most of the historic county becoming part of the lower-tier Berwickshire district. Berwickshire district was abolished in 1996, when all the districts in the Borders region merged to become the Scottish Borders council area. The county takes its name from Berwick-upon-Tweed, its original county town, which was part of Scotland at the time of the county's formation in the twelfth century, but became part of England in 1482 after several centuries of swapping back and forth between the two kingdoms. After the loss of Berwick, Duns and Greenlaw both served as county town at different periods. The low-lying part of Berwickshire between the Tweed and the Lammermuirs is known as "the Merse", from an old Scots w ...
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Inchcape
Inchcape or the Bell Rock is a reef about off the east coast of Angus, Scotland, near Dundee and Fife, occupied by the Bell Rock Lighthouse. The name ''Inchcape'' comes from the Scottish Gaelic ''Innis Sgeap'', meaning "Beehive isle", probably comparing the shape of the reef to old-style skep beehives. According to legend, probably folk etymology, the alternative name Bell Rock derives from a 14th-century attempt by the Abbot of Arbroath ("Aberbrothock") to install a warning bell on the reef; the bell was removed by a Dutch pirate who perished a year later on the rocks, a story that is immortalised in " The Inchcape Rock" (1802), a poem by Robert Southey. The main hazard the reef presents to shipping is that only a relatively small proportion of it is above water, but a large section of the surrounding area is extremely shallow and dangerous. The rock was featured in a one-hour episode of the BBC's '' Seven Wonders of the Industrial World'', which told the story of the Bell ...
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List Of Northern Lighthouse Board Lighthouses
This is a list of the currently operational lighthouses of the Northern Lighthouse Board (NLB). The list is divided by geographical location, and then by whether the lighthouses are classed by the NLB as a 'major lighthouse' or a 'minor light'. Former NLB lighthouses now disposed of are not included in the list. Scotland (except principal island groups) Major lighthouses Minor lights * Ardtornish * Bass Rock * Cailleach Head * Cairnbulg Briggs * Corran Narrows North East * Corran Point * Craigton Point * Dunollie * Elie Ness * Hestan Island * Holy Island (Inner) * Lady Isle * Little Ross * Little Ross Beacon * Loch Eriboll * Loch Ryan * Longman Point * Oban NLB Pier * Sandaig * Sgeir Bhuidhe * Sula Sgeir * Turnberry The Hebrides Major lighthouses * Barra Head * Butt of Lewis * Dubh Artach * Eilean Glas * Flannan Islands * * Hyskeir * Lismore * Monach * Neist Point * * Rinns of Islay * * Ruvaal * Scarinish * Skerryvore * Tiumpan Head * Ushenish Min ...
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List Of Lighthouses In Scotland
This is a list of lighthouses in Scotland. The Northern Lighthouse Board, from which much of the information is derived, are responsible for most lighthouses in Scotland but have handed over responsibility in the major estuaries to the port authorities. Many of the more minor lights are not shown. A lighthouse that is no longer operating is indicated by the date of closure in the ''operated by'' column. Where two dates are shown, the lighthouse has been rebuilt. Nearly all the lighthouses in this list were designed by and most were built by four generations of one family, including Thomas Smith, who was both the stepfather and father-in-law of Robert Stevenson. Robert's sons and grandsons not only built most of the lights, often under the most appalling of conditions, but pioneered many of the improvements in lighting and signalling that cut down the enormous loss of life in shipping around the coasts of Scotland. The table may be sorted by any column by clicking on the headi ...
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Diesel Engine
The diesel engine, named after Rudolf Diesel, is an internal combustion engine in which ignition of the fuel is caused by the elevated temperature of the air in the cylinder due to mechanical compression; thus, the diesel engine is a so-called compression-ignition engine (CI engine). This contrasts with engines using spark plug-ignition of the air-fuel mixture, such as a petrol engine ( gasoline engine) or a gas engine (using a gaseous fuel like natural gas or liquefied petroleum gas). Diesel engines work by compressing only air, or air plus residual combustion gases from the exhaust (known as exhaust gas recirculation (EGR)). Air is inducted into the chamber during the intake stroke, and compressed during the compression stroke. This increases the air temperature inside the cylinder to such a high degree that atomised diesel fuel injected into the combustion chamber ignites. With the fuel being injected into the air just before combustion, the dispersion of the fuel is ...
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Hot Air Engine
A hot air engine (historically called an air engine or caloric engine) is any heat engine that uses the expansion and contraction of air under the influence of a temperature change to convert thermal energy into mechanical work. These engines may be based on a number of thermodynamic cycles encompassing both open cycle devices such as those of Sir George Cayley and John Ericsson and the closed cycle engine of Robert Stirling. Hot air engines are distinct from the better known internal combustion based engine and steam engine. In a typical implementation, air is repeatedly heated and cooled in a cylinder and the resulting expansion and contraction are used to move a piston and produce useful mechanical work. Definition The term "hot air engine" specifically excludes any engine performing a thermodynamic cycle in which the working fluid undergoes a phase transition, such as the Rankine cycle. Also excluded are conventional internal combustion engines, in which heat is added ...
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Foghorn
A foghorn or fog signal is a device that uses sound to warn vehicles of navigational hazards such as rocky coastlines, or boats of the presence of other vessels, in foggy conditions. The term is most often used in relation to marine transport. When visual navigation aids such as lighthouses are obscured, foghorns provide an audible warning of rock outcrops, shoals, headlands, or other dangers to shipping. Description All foghorns use a vibrating column of air to create an audible tone, but the method of setting up this vibration differs. Some horns, such as the Daboll trumpet, used vibrating plates or metal reeds, a similar principle to a modern electric car horn. Others used air forced through holes in a rotating cylinder or disk, in the same manner as a siren. Semi-automatic operation of foghorns was achieved by using a clockwork mechanism (or "coder") to sequentially open the valves admitting air to the horns; each horn was given its own timing characteristics to help ...
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Incandescence
Incandescence is the emission of electromagnetic radiation (including visible light) from a hot body as a result of its high temperature. The term derives from the Latin verb ''incandescere,'' to glow white. A common use of incandescence is the incandescent light bulb, now being phased out. Incandescence is due to thermal radiation. It usually refers specifically to visible light, while thermal radiation refers also to infrared or any other electromagnetic radiation. Observation and use In practice, virtually all solid or liquid substances start to glow around , with a mildly dull red color, whether or not a chemical reaction takes place that produces light as a result of an exothermic process. This limit is called the Draper point. The incandescence does not vanish below that temperature, but it is too weak in the visible spectrum to be perceptible. At higher temperatures, the substance becomes brighter and its color changes from red towards white and finally blue. Inca ...
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Isle Of May
The Isle of May is located in the north of the outer Firth of Forth, approximately off the coast of mainland Scotland. It is about long and wide. The island is owned and managed by NatureScot as a national nature reserve. There are now no permanent residents, but the island was the site of St Adrian's Priory during the Middle Ages. Most visitors to the island are daytrippers taking the ferry from Anstruther in Fife, although up to six visitors can stay at the bird observatory, usually for a week at a time. The only way to get there is by ferry; the journey takes 45 minutes from the small harbours of Anstruther and Crail, and also from North Berwick. As of 2015, around 11,000 people visit the island each year.The Story of the Isle of May National Nature Reserve. p. 23. The island is closed to visitors from 1 October until Easter to prevent disturbance to the large number of seal pups. The Scottish Seabird Centre at North Berwick has two live cameras on the island, w ...
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Thomas Stevenson
Thomas Stevenson PRSE MInstCE FRSSA FSAScot (22 July 1818 – 8 May 1887) was a pioneering Scottish civil engineer, lighthouse designer and meteorologist, who designed over thirty lighthouses in and around Scotland, as well as the Stevenson screen used in meteorology. His designs, celebrated as ground breaking, ushered in a new era of lighthouse creation. He served as president of the Royal Scottish Society of Arts (1859–60), as president of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (1884–86), and was a co-founder of the Scottish Meteorological Society. Life He was born at 2 Baxters Place in Edinburgh, on 22 July 1818, the youngest son of engineer Robert Stevenson, and his wife (and step-sister) Jean Smith. He was educated at the Royal High School in Edinburgh. Thomas Stevenson was a devout and regular attendee at St. Stephen's Church in Stockbridge, at the north end of St Vincent Street, Edinburgh. He lived with his family at Baxters Place until he got married in 1848. He the ...
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Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, the North Sea to the northeast and east, and the Irish Sea to the south. It also contains more than 790 islands, principally in the archipelagos of the Hebrides and the Northern Isles. Most of the population, including the capital Edinburgh, is concentrated in the Central Belt—the plain between the Scottish Highlands and the Southern Uplands—in the Scottish Lowlands. Scotland is divided into 32 administrative subdivisions or local authorities, known as council areas. Glasgow City is the largest council area in terms of population, with Highland being the largest in terms of area. Limited self-governing power, covering matters such as education, social services and roads and transportation, is devolved from the ...
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David Stevenson (engineer)
David Stevenson MICE FRSE FRSSA (11 January 1815 – 17 July 1886) was a Scottish lighthouse designer, who designed over 30 lighthouses in and around Scotland, and helped continue the dynasty of lighthouse engineering founded by his father. Life He was born on 11 January 1815 at 2 Baxters Place at the top of Leith Walk in Edinburgh, the son of Jean Smith and engineer Robert Stevenson. He was brother of the lighthouse engineers Alan and Thomas Stevenson. He was educated at the High School in Edinburgh then studied at the University of Edinburgh. In 1838 he became a partner in his father's (and uncle's) firm of R & A Stevenson. In 1844 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh his proposer being David Milne-Home. In 1853 he moved to the Northern Lighthouse Board. Between 1854 and 1880 he designed many lighthouses, all with his brother Thomas. In addition he helped Richard Henry Brunton design lighthouses for Japan, inventing a novel method for allowing them ...
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