LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Isambard Kingdom Brunel: Designs
built 643 days ago
Brunel's brilliance was his capacity to turn the apparently impossible into reality. During his meteoric career (he was just 53 when he died), he embraced civil, structural, mechanical and marine engineering, as well as architecture, art and design, displaying a remarkable breadth of intellect. And in an age when engineers were heroes, he was feted alongside fellow pioneers like George Stephenson, who developed the steam locomotive, and Stephenson's son Robert... an engineer. They were, after all, literally building the modern world spawned by the Industrial Revolution.
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Controversially, Brunel used the broad gauge (2.2 m) instead of the standard gauge (1.55m) on the line. This created problems as passengers had to transfer trains at places such as Gloucester where the two gauges met. While working on the line from Swindon to Gloucester and South Wales he devised the combination of tubular, suspension and truss bridge to cross the Wye at Chepstow. This design was further improved in his famous bridge over the Tamar at Saltash near Plymouth.
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After being appointed chief engineer at the Bristol Docks in 1831, Brunel designed the Monkwearmouth Docks. He later went on to design and build similar docks at Plymouth, Cardiff, Brentford and Milford Haven.
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As a children's magician, fun-loving Brunel Did swallow a coin that fell into his bronchus. When he stood on his head, it then dropped to his glottis. Facing death, he designed a coughing machine To invert him and shake him from trachea to spleen It worked (took six weeks), but the coin left Brunel
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Brunel had ... designed Brunel Manor and its gardens in Torquay, Devon to be his retirement home. Unfortunately he never saw the house or gardens finished, as he died before it was completed.
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