Crossrail appearing on a postage stamp

If you’ve ever fancied licking* one of Crossrail’s tunnel boring machines, then the Royal Mail has a treat for you – with a Crossrail postage stamp.

The Royal Mail is celebrating some of the marvels of British engineering from the last 50 years with a new set of ten stamps available from today.

The Crossrail — not Elizabeth line — tunnel boring machine features on the £1.55 postage stamp, although some wags might observe that with the delays, maybe it should have been a second class stamp instead.

The Royal Mail is also selling a First Day cover set with a postmark from London SW1 – the address of the Royal Academy of Engineering, or a presentation pack.

The full set of stamps feature three past winners of the Royal Academy of Engineering MacRobert Award, which also marks its 50th anniversary this year.

Included in the range of stamps are the Raspberry Pi, the three-way catalytic converter developed by Johnson Matthey, and Oxford Instruments’ superconducting magnets that enable MRI scanning.

The stamps also feature the Falkirk Wheel, the world’s only rotating boat lift, and of course, Crossrail’s tunnel boring project.

Completing the main six-stamp set is the synthetic bone-graft material developed at Queen Mary University of London by Dr Karin Hing, who won the Academy’s Silver Medal in 2011 for her work.

The Harrier Jump Jet, celebrating 50 years since it entered RAF service, is featured in a Miniature Sheet of four stamps.

* Yes, I know they’re usually self-adhesive these days.

from IanVisits http://bit.ly/2Vdn3gc