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07 Nov 01 - 10:43 PM (#587972) Subject: UK: Please explain "bodger" From: Mark Clark I saw an on-line article from the Guardian with the headline “Band of bodgers”. In my experience, a bodger is an itinerant chair-leg turner, a definition that is reinforced at The World Wide Words Website. Some years ago I met Don Webber, a genuine Welsh bodger, at a woodworking show in Chicago. He travels about with a spring-pole lathe making chairs for people right on the spot. So why is the word bodger used in the Guardian headline about broadband cable? Thanks, - Mark
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07 Nov 01 - 10:47 PM (#587978) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain From: Jon Freeman Mark, a bodger is someone who doesn't do a job properly - lashes it up somehow or other. Another usage would be to say something like "I did a bodge job on this". Hope that helps, Jon |
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07 Nov 01 - 10:54 PM (#587987) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain From: Sorcha Ah, relative to "botched" then. As in "botcher/butcher". Thanks, Jon. |
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07 Nov 01 - 11:05 PM (#587994) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain From: Jon Freeman Sorcha, that prompted me to get the dictionary out. From "The Chambers Dictionary": bodge (colloq) variant of botch (vt and vi); (shakeps vi) prob varient of budge. n(colloq) a piece of poor or clumsy workmanship; a clumsy worker (also bodger). The dictionary also gives Mark Clark's definition of "bodger" as a separate entry and notes [origin uncertain]. Jon |
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07 Nov 01 - 11:19 PM (#588000) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain From: Mark Clark Jon, Thanks very much. I did an Atomica search on your word “bodge” and discovered it means saboter or sabotage in French. I suppose that's the connection. Now I wonder why Mr. Webber seemed so proud of calling himself a bodger? The quality of his work was excellent. - Mark |
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07 Nov 01 - 11:22 PM (#588002) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain From: Mark Clark Judging from my preceding post, it would appear that I'm a bodger at HTML.
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07 Nov 01 - 11:25 PM (#588004) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain From: Jon Freeman Mark, I suspect that Mr. Webber enjoyed the two different meanings of the word - sort of like "everyone (at least UK) knows the poor workmanship meaning of bodger but I'm a real bodger and a craftsman as well..." - if that makes sense. Jon |
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07 Nov 01 - 11:42 PM (#588010) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) OED gives a "traveling dealer; pedlar, in addition to those above. Also a patcher of old garments (16C.) |
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07 Nov 01 - 11:42 PM (#588011) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Sorcha But does "budge" relate to budgerigars (parakeets) or "move over", i.e., "budge it, bud"?, (grin) Ain't semantics wonderful? |
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08 Nov 01 - 12:07 AM (#588019) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Mark Clark Jon, I suspect you are correct. Mr. Webber writes for woodworking journals and teaches his craft in Northern California. - Mark |
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08 Nov 01 - 12:48 AM (#588037) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Murray MacLeod While I would agree that the verb to "bodge" has the connotation of doing shoddy work, I have neither read nor heard of a shoddy worker ever being described as a "bodger". Sounds like Guardian new-speak to me. As Mark has said, a bodger was a turner using a pole lathe. They were not chairmakers, they were turners pure and simple. They supplied the chairmaking industry with the components of a chair, legs, stretchers etc. and they worked in green (unseasoned) wood. They were mostly based in the beech forests of High Wycombe in Buckinghamshire which was the centre of furniture making in England. One possible explanation of why "bodging" came to be synonymous with poor quality work may lie in the fact that the spindle diameters and the corresponding bored holes do not have to match exactly, the movement of the wood across the grain as it dried provided a sound mechanical joint, and this was very much a matter of "eyeballing ", so I suspect that "bodging " a job originally meant doing it "near enough" instead of measuring precisely, and that the term later came to mean poor quality work of any description. Btw, anyone who has not seen a pole lathe in action should try to see a demonstration by a bodger at a craft fair. It is one of the great low-tech inventions. Murray |
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08 Nov 01 - 04:34 AM (#588097) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: GUEST,Brian Mark. The word 'bodger' has several meanings. The itinerant chair-leg turner reference is correct. It has also been used for anybody who 'bodged' out wood (cut wood) and used it to make articles of use. In each case a bodger was a skilled workman. In High Wycombe in Buckinghamshire, which at one time was a predominantly furniture making town, the name more recently got used for anybody that worked in the furniture making industry. Again, a craftsman. The more recent usage of the word 'bodger' is indeed as a shoddy workman, and I believe, has originated from somebody who does a 'botched'/'bodged' job. It's a case of words changing their meaning over time. The more recent usage of 'bodger' has been around, to my knowledge, for at least twenty years. It is not invented by the Guardian. I hope this helps. Brian |
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08 Nov 01 - 06:16 AM (#588113) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Ringer I think that use of the pole-lathe relies on the woood being green and sappy. Doesn't furniture made on one of these tend to warp with time? I can imagine all the chair-legs falling out... Back to the main point of this thread, I remember once going to an auction of an old and decrepit farmhouse with a friend. We looked round very circumspectly, 'cos there was a 6-inch gap between the edge of the floor and the wall where subsidence had caused movement. "Hmmm," said my friend, "I should avoid this place if I were you: it'll need tons of bodging-paste to make it good." |
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08 Nov 01 - 06:49 AM (#588122) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Bob Bolton G'day all, My dad, being a turner in te furniture industry used the disaraging sense of bodger. Once factory and water/steam/engine/electric powered lathes - in factories took the work of 'small masters' like bodgers, it was necessary to demean them. In fact their product was vastly superior. The billets were split to size ... so they ran straight down the grain, with none of the offset that comes from running a relentlessly sqare saw cut through a tapering log. After first splitting, the billets were crossstacked to dry and given the first turning to rough shape - then stacked again. They were nearly dry when finished and quite stable ... and dead strong, for they ran with the grain. The factory product might look a tad better (even exhibit more "interesting" grain), but it was never as strong or stable. Regards, Bob Bolton |
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08 Nov 01 - 07:01 AM (#588124) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: GUEST,Brian Bald Eagle. Yes furniture made with green wood does warp. That is the point of making it with green wood. The furniture was made in such a way, that the stress caused by warping caused in each joint to pulled against others to hold the furniture together without using glue. A couple of points worth noting. The wood was split along the grain, not sawn, as it is today. We now keep our homes warmer and use central heating. It causes a much drier atmosphere and consequently dries and shrinks the wood more. Furniture made the old way wouldn't last so well now. If you ever visit High Wycombe, go to the Furniture Museum, it is small, but worth the visit. I was born and raised there, and some of my family worked in the industry. So, I have gained a little knowledge on the subject, but not much. Brian |
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08 Nov 01 - 07:13 AM (#588127) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: GUEST,micca at work and no one has mentioned Michael Flanders use of the word, in the song the Rhinoceros " and pity the poor Rhinoceros with the bodger on his bonce...
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08 Nov 01 - 07:50 AM (#588137) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: GUEST,Brian The furniture was made in such a way, that the stress caused by warping caused in each joint to pulled against others to hold the furniture together without using glue. What? Burble, burble, Spit! The furniture was made in such a way, that the stress caused by warping made each joint to pull against others to hold the furniture together without using glue. Does that make more sense? Brian |
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08 Nov 01 - 07:57 AM (#588140) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Greyeyes The Flanders meaning is mentioned in the World Wide Words site that Mark Clark provides a link to above. It's some kind of pointed instrument, possibly similar to a dibber. According to the same source the use of the word applied to wood turners only dates from the end of the C19, while the more common meaning of incompetent mender of things may well be derived from the middle English word "bocchen" which is linked with repairing or patching. This is confirmed by the OED, whose earliest reference to wood turners is in fact early C20. Bodger has references going back to mid C16. Interestingly it is the word botch or botcher which is the original, references to this variation go back to Early C14. Bodge is almost certainly a dialect development of botch. The original meaning was simply mender or patcher of clothes. The inference of a job badly done is a relatively recent development. There is no reference in the OED to the Michael Flanders pointy instrument definition. |
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08 Nov 01 - 08:05 AM (#588142) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: GUEST,KingBrilliant Bodger = my dad |
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08 Nov 01 - 10:48 AM (#588232) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Clinton Hammond The first time I heard the word was on Junkyard Wars (Scrapheap Challenge) and the senae I got was that a bodger was akin to a "jury-rigger"... To kinda get the job done with the best available stuff... I certainly wouldn't call Bowser Munson's work 'shoddy' to his face... ;-) |
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08 Nov 01 - 10:51 AM (#588234) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: wysiwyg Well I am sure you will all be glad to know that on Junkyard Wars, BODGING has been restored once again as a term of high honor. It can now apply to planning and executing any creative, unorthodox design menat to get a job done, especially if it involves welding together things that must be safe and strong but not necessarily lovely in every detail. Machines of all sorts one can hardly imagine are happily and lustily bodged up by proud, self-proclaimed bodgers industriously bodging away on various ingenious solutions to challenges, on a weekly basis. Copious amounts of tea seem to be required, hoisted in large, stainless steel cups the size of paint cans. I think the US counterpart for the way the word is used on that show would be jury-rigged or jerry-built, neither of which I can quite account for as to origin or precise original meaning. ~S~ |
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08 Nov 01 - 12:24 PM (#588294) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Ringer I think I remember having heard that "Jerry-built" originated in WW2. Jerry, of course was (reasonably affectionate) British slang for German (the non-affectionate equivalent being Hun). Anxious British householders, wishing to tell whether an approaching bomber was "ours" or "theirs" would tell the difference from the engine-note: the Jerry bomber (having been built by a nation not renowned for its engineering skill - that's meant to be a joke, Wolfgang) would not be able to synchronise its engines' speeds exactly, so the several engine-notes would "beat", giving rise to a characteristic mmmMMMmmmmmmMMMmmmmmmMMMmmm drone. The English bombers' engines, of course, were perfectly synchronised. And, I think, if you believe that, you'll believe anything. |
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08 Nov 01 - 12:38 PM (#588304) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: GUEST,Penny S. (elsewhere) Bald Eagle, I've been told about the beat of the engines by people who were around and to whom the difference was important. It isn't like the RAF fliers eating carrots story. I was also told, though I don't know the background to this one, that Jerry-built referred to Jericho - ie, a huff and a puff and the work would fall down. Penny |
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08 Nov 01 - 12:48 PM (#588315) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: GUEST The phrase jerry-built can be traced back to 1869 so is nothing to do with German planes, 'tho I have no doubt it was used in that context during the 2nd WW. The OED is uncertain of the origin, Jericho is one possibility, a specific builder's name is another, and a specific building project in Liverpool a third. |
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08 Nov 01 - 12:54 PM (#588322) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: GUEST,Greyeyes Sorry, that was me from a different place. |
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08 Nov 01 - 12:56 PM (#588323) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: John J He (or she) who bodges. John |
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08 Nov 01 - 01:06 PM (#588329) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: wysiwyg Well, let's at least take care not to mix these all up so that bodgees are said to have been jury-built. What the hell is "jury-rigged" then? Is that a sailing thing? Oh I forgot to mention duct tape-- Junkyard Wars bodging can involve lots and lots of duct tape. Also PERHAPSproperlky called duck tape, although I'm agin it, ~S~ |
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08 Nov 01 - 01:07 PM (#588331) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: wysiwyg Well, let's at least take care not to mix these all up so that bodgees are said to have been jury-built. What the hell is "jury-rigged" then? Is that a sailing thing? Oh I forgot to mention duct tape-- Junkyard Wars bodging can involve lots and lots of duct tape. Also PERHAPS properly called duck tape, although I'm agin it, cuz it's made from a sort of fabric like a fabric called duck. (And why is it called duck?) ~S~ |
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08 Nov 01 - 01:27 PM (#588344) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: weepiper It took me ages to work out that what Americans call Duck Tape is the same thing that I know as Gaffer Tape. |
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08 Nov 01 - 01:51 PM (#588373) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Ringer Hmmm, Penny: my engineer's antennae (admittedly somewhat rusty, now) cry "BS". I, too, have heard the story from those who were there at the time (my parents), but I am sceptical none the less. Either the German engineering was inferior to ours or ours was so much inferior to theirs that the English bombers' engines were so wildly off-synch that their beating was too rapid to hear. Both of these sound unlikely to me. I remember, long ago, my physics teacher (also there at the time) saying that it was an urban myth (or words to that effect). |
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08 Nov 01 - 01:52 PM (#588374) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: GUEST,Phillip BTW, it's duct tape, not duck tape. It's intended use is to seal the joints of sheet-metal piping, (ducts) used to conduct warm air from furnaces. In North America it's pretty heavy duty stuff. Very sticky and strong. The Canadian comic, Steve Smith, has made a cult following of "the handyman's secret weapon" on "The Red Green Show". What we call gaffer's tape in North America is a lighter-duty version of duct tape, usually siver-grey but sometimes black, a little cheaper and used to tape down mic cords, cables, etc. at a gig.
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08 Nov 01 - 02:11 PM (#588403) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: GUEST,Greyeyes I don't have access to the full OED until tomorrow morning, but from what I can discover at a lesser library jury-rigged is a derivation of jerry-rigged, which may have been influenced by jerry-built. One source suggested it was coined by British troops in WWI to describe captured German trenches and their contents. |
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08 Nov 01 - 02:15 PM (#588411) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: wysiwyg Yeah, the REAL duct tape is... indestructible, almost. The sticky goo never goes away, either. If ya want a job bodged right, use duct tape! Airplane wings, submarine fittings... every home and car must have it. Duct tape is in the industrial supply department. Duck tape, on the other hand, is the lighter stuff sold in the housewares section, and comes in all sorts of pretty colors, like the oilcloth for covering tables used to be available by the foot on a roll at the ten-cent store. It was called simply Cloth Tape. But now it's called duck tape, and one of the colors is a silver meant to make you take it for DUCT tape, and the rolls are big and look a lot like duct tape, how they package it. It's covered in shrink-wrap plastic so you can't feel the texture, and duct tape has a whole different feel. Duck tape is good for small projects but it won't float your boat. So..... jury-rigged, anyone? Our kids moved out and took all the damn dictionaries... ~S~ |
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08 Nov 01 - 02:44 PM (#588438) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: wildlone I bought some "duck" tape thinking it was like duct tape, IT IS NOT! I used it to fix a split in my motorcycle seat aand when it got wet the cloth just fell off leaving the glue behind, so now I have glue on my behind. dave |
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09 Nov 01 - 12:46 AM (#588784) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Mark Clark I knew this already of course but it still continues to amaze me when I see how highly educated and helpful everyone is around here. Thanks to all. In checking things out, I discovered I owe Don Weber an apology for adding the gratuitous second “b” in his name. Mr. Weber published an article in American Woodworker magazine (c. 1996) on his spring-pole lathe. What was interesting about his lathe was that it used bungee chords instead of a spring pole. (In the pictures, the bungee chords have been replaced with a bow.) Later, he publish an article on building a bodger's shaving horse. I knew a shaving horse was necessary equipment for building green-wood chairs but I didn't realize that the shaver was also a bodger. In case people are interested, I did manage to locate pictures of Don Weber's lathe and shaving horse taken by somone who attend a conference at which Mr. Weber spoke. Also, Atomica has this to say about “jury-rigged.” - Mark |
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09 Nov 01 - 04:21 AM (#588830) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Greyeyes Further to last night, according to the full OED there's no connection between jury-rigged and jerry-built. Jury built, as Mark's link above states, is a naval term deriving from jury-mast, which is simply a term for a temporary mast which has been damaged or carried away. The earliest reference is 1616 so we can discount the WWI story. The OED has no verifiable evidence as to its origin. |
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09 Nov 01 - 05:10 AM (#588843) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Greyeyes That should read jury-rigged, not jury built. |
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09 Nov 01 - 11:35 AM (#589009) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: wysiwyg Right, as used correctly, they are not related, but people mix them up all the time. ~S~ |
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09 Nov 01 - 12:22 PM (#589039) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: GUEST,JohnB Not to be confused with a "podger" which is what you use to find holes with. In the engineering sense, or cruder in some circles. JohnB |
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09 Nov 01 - 05:21 PM (#589267) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Snuffy Isn't that a todger, John? |
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09 Nov 01 - 06:35 PM (#589318) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: Gareth Reality check. - synchronisation of aircraft engines was designed to cut vibration and thus crew fatigue of bomber aircraft. In 1940 (see the carrot myth - deliberate misinformation) The Luftwaffe still believed that UK home defences used sound location - hence the deliberate desynchronisation of engines over the Uk to try and confuse the sound locators. Checking with relatives who were old enough to remember, a desynchronised beat was believed as German - though the odds were it was one of ours. Gareth
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09 Nov 01 - 08:32 PM (#589431) Subject: RE: UK: Please explain 'bodger' From: harpmaker In "our neck of woods" Yorkshire,UK. "Theres nowt wrong with a bodge-providing its done properley" |