On Aug 6, 8:32, Joe R. wrote: ago tools customs but I've not had any trouble recently, but here are three instances from the past. I used to fly regularly from Edinburgh to Belfast in Northern Ireland, or to London. On one occasion I was taking a pre-production Acorn Archimedes to demo in Belfast, but since I was flying I didn't take the monitor. Needless to say, that was the time security (actually, Special Branch) asked if they could see it working to prove it was a computer (didn't look quite like a PC), and eventually I had to dismantle it to persuade them. Once (late 1980s) I was travelling to Belfast with just a briefcase and small shoulder bag; in the shoulder bag was my toilet bag, spare shirt, socks, etc. In the toilet bag was the usual toothbrush, etc and a teaspoon and a small scalpel. The young lady operating the security scanner took about a 5 millisecond glance at the blurry image and said would I "mind leaving the scalpel behind, please." We compromised -- she kept the (detachable) blade. Last one: travelling from London back to Edinburgh I arrived with just a few moments to spare, only to be stopped by security who spotted my small toolcase in my bag. All the tools were OK, though they insisted on pulling most of them out, but they took everything out of the small side pocket until they found a small ziplock bag containing the rather grubby damp sponge for my soldering iron. "Would you mind telling me what this substance is, sir?" -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York