Programme Three
Jem was the master engineer behind the carpet surfing stunt, so we asked him to describe this week's MiW fave ...
I loved the carpet surfer. It was one of those ideas where a whole load of different stuff that'd been sat in my head for years came together.
What's really striking about surfing is the way the water's surface hardly moves anywhere as a big wave rolls beneath you. It's like a giant hump passing below a very slippy surface.
The experience of sledging down stairs on a tea tray was also lodged in my head, and taught me that nylon carpets are totally boardable material.
The final part was an ace plastic snowboard my sister gave me one Christmas. A series of snow-free winters had left it hanging round the flat begging for the use it deserved.
Steve's request gave me a chance to pull all this together into a new extreme sport.
My initial plan was to just drag a big smooth pipe under a huge length of cheap carpet to create a rideable ripple.The pipe idea turned into as big a steel wave as we could possibly make. Then we dragged the wave beneath as long a run of carpet as we could get hold of.
Sadly, although I thought it gave a great ride my little plastic board got dumped by Basil and Steve (proper snowboarders). But even with a 'real' board, getting the hang of it proved far from easy and not without some pretty heavy knocks.
What was your fave challenge of the week?