THE MIDDLE LANE

TGTV script editor Sam Philip enters the think-ubator of materials science

Back in the Second World War, the Royal Navy experimented

with building warships from a mixture of sawdust and ice. Initial tests showed the mixture, known as Pykrete, to be as tough as concrete but half the weight, shatter-resistant, and able to absorb artillery fire.

Pykrete was also, as it transpired, a terrible material from which to build warships. In a not-totally-unexpected twist, it turns out, when exposed to an above-freezing environment – like, for example, the sea – that icy sawdust has a tendency to become… watery sawdust. And then, shortly thereafter, a small pool of soggy sawdust floating in the ocean. But nonetheless, it’s Pykrete thinking we need in the automotive world right now. Because it’s high time we took a look at this whole ‘building cars out of metal’ thing.

I understand, back in the early days of cars – when the only other options were tree, straw or dung – why metal made sense. But technology has progressed. Mankind has been to the Moon. We’ve discovered the Higgs-Boson (though I’ve always held it really wanted to be found, hiding in the only place we were looking). We have self-service checkouts that work nearly 30 per cent of the time. We can do better than metal.

Because, let’s be honest, metal is a terrible material from which to make cars. Metal is heavy and hard. Metal rusts. Metal dents. Metal steadfastly refuses to return to its original shape after being lightly reversed into a low-level concrete bollard.

BMW was on the right track a few years back with the Gina concept car, a spaceframe wrapped in what its engineers called “an elastic, water resistant, translucent man-made fabric skin”, and the rest of us called “Spandex”. Bold thinking, undermined only by the fact Gina could be broken into by a thief with some toenail clippers.

So Spandex, not quite. But – and look, I’m just throwing ideas out here, let’s not get hung up on the details yet – I’m thinking: custard. Not fresh, hot, liquid custard, obviously – that’d be ridiculous – but congealed, bottom-of-the-school-dinner-vat custard. Think about it. It’s cheap. There’s a near-infinite supply, not least at the bottom of every school dinner vat. And, as a thousand YouTube videos of stupid people running across pools of custard will attest, it’s a non-Newtonian fluid. Basically the harder you bash it, the more solid custard becomes. Perfect for bodywork.

Crash into custard lightly, it’ll act like a liquid, absorbing you in its pillowy embrace. Crash into custard hard, it’ll act more like a solid. Custard is the breakthrough our cars have been waiting for. Right under our noses, and on top of our desserts, the whole time.

I realise additional research may be required here. Particularly in the fields of (a) making custard stickier, to prevent it sliding straight off the car, and into a custardy pool beneath, and (b) making custard less delicious, to prevent it being eaten by hungry foxes and the like. But hey, it can’t be a worse starting place than icy sawdust, right?

“I’M THINKING: CUSTARD. NOT FRESH, HOT, LIQUID CUSTARD – THAT’D BE RIDICULOUS”