Geek's Guide The Register's Geek's Guide series for explorers who love feats of tech and engineering prowess, took a trip to the European mainland to see exhibits ranging from an Air France Concorde and a Soviet Tupolev Tu-144 "Concordski" to a Buran prototype, alongside various engineering marvels.

The spot? Well there are two of them: The Speyer and Sinsheim museums, both well worth a visit the next time you're in southwest Germany.

The two museums can be accessed by driving an hour south from the closest large airport, Frankfurt, and represent an effort, beginning in 1981, by a gang of vintage enthusiasts keen to show off their vehicles. The collection has since grown to include a variety of military hardware, a good number of aircraft, and, of course, the supersonic airliners and the Buran prototype.

We spent two days at the museums and were guided around the original museum, Sinsheim, by Holger Baschleben. Baschleben explained how it all got started more than 40 years ago.

He said, "There were ten private guys who had their own cars, and they decided to bring all these cars together, not in their own private garage, but show them in a museum."

One of the enthusiasts had what would become one of Sinsheim's halls. It seemed like an excellent place to show the cars and was close to the autobahn, "and so, in 1981, we started."

The museum's collection of vehicles, almost all of which belong to enthusiasts, is epic. According to Baschleben, 95 percent of the cars on display were drivable, although their owners remain responsible for them. "They are responsible for taking care of their own cars," he explained, "and keeping them running."

While this means that Baschleben can't simply grab a set of keys and go for a joyride, tempting though it might be, it does mean that pretty much every car on show could be drivable after less than an hour of fettling.

Baschleben told us that the club behind the museum had grown over the four decades to 20 people, but connected to it is a supporters club with more than 5,000 members, many of whom keep an eye out for potential new exhibits or have skills that the museum can use.

The museum isn't just about cars, of course. Baschleben was keen to show off its collection of trains - a challenge to get to the museum since it is close to the autobahn but not a train line. Military equipment is also on show, although Baschleben quickly pointed out that everything had been deactivated and was regularly inspected by the government to ensure it stayed that way.

And then there are the aircraft ...

An Air France Concorde and a Soviet Tupolev Tu-144 are on display, mounted on the museum roof to create an iconic skyline. Both are also open to the public, distinguishing Sinsheim and Speyer from many other museums.

Baschleben explained the decision process behind how much access to give visitors. Indicating one of the vehicles in the museum, he said, "For example, if I would open this door and I would make it so that people can fit inside this car, it wouldn't be possible for us to save the interior of the car. It would take 48 hours, and then the steering wheel would be gone…"

However, the museum is not averse to opening up some exhibits or introducing interactivity. For example, a tank turret can be turned via remote controls. And, of course, it is famously possible to clamber into the Concorde and Tu-144 at Sinsheim.

The entrance to both is via a door at the rear of the aircraft after a climb up a staircase, followed by a slog up the interior. Both are mounted at an angle, which makes for an impressive display but also results in a tiring climb through the cabin to the cockpit, which is protected on both aircraft by plexiglass.

Other parts of the aircraft are also protected by plexiglass to preserve what is in situ, although it is quite something to peer at the controls of the aircraft having reached their respective cockpits. The Tu-144 is owned outright by the museum, while the Concorde was leased from Air France for the princely sum of a single Euro.

The Soviet aircraft arrived first and, according to Baschleben, Air France was so impressed with how the Tu-144 had been configured for display, it made one of its retired Concordes available.

We visited on a breezy day, and the obvious question was handling the wind. After all, considering how both the Concorde and Tu-144 have been mounted, high winds could present a challenge. According to Baschleben, the answer is well-engineered foundations that go through the museum and into the ground. However, he conceded that in another 10 or 20 years, the museum might need to reconstruct the supports.

Speyer

It is easy to spend a day or more looking at the Sinsheim exhibits, and we'd recommend budgeting for at least that. It would, however, be remiss not also to spend a day poking around Sinsheim's sister museum, the Technik Museum Speyer, which is notable for a Lufthansa Boeing 747 on display and, of course, a Soviet Buran prototype.

The policy of making exhibits accessible without destroying anything irreplaceable is evident here. The Buran is housed in its own pavilion alongside other artifacts from the space age, including a full-size mock-up of the Apollo Lunar Module. If you've paid a visit to London's Science Museum, you'll know what to expect from the latter. The former, however...

The presence of a Buran prototype - in this instance, OK-GLI, which was used for atmospheric tests between 1984 and 1989 - is not something you'd find in London's Science Museum, and the Sinsheim and Speyer team have taken care to ensure that it is at once accessible, without damaging the artifact.

Unlike the Space Shuttle on display in the US, it is possible to stick your head into the rear of the Buran prototype, where the engines would be on a Space Shuttle. It is also possible to walk behind the cockpit to peer inside, look out over the payload bay, and ponder what might have been.

We also took a look at the Boeing 747 on display, which has undergone alteration to allow visitors to view both the internal and external parts of the aircraft from unexpected angles. On a 2018 visit, we took a walk along the wing and slid down the slide from the aircraft's belly.

"The thing is with the Boeing 747," explained Baschleben, "there are so many in the world, so we could change the Boeing 747 in that way because if we destroy anything, it wouldn't be so that we destroy history.

"With the Concorde… if we were to destroy it in that way… it wouldn't be good."

Or the Buran, even though the museum owns the artifact.

Baschleben shared the story of the Buran prototype acquisition, where the museum had to get the prototype moved as quickly as possible once ownership issues were resolved. "There was a very big lawsuit," he explained. "Which was around two or three years. And it was not really clear: are they allowed to sell it? Can we buy it?"

Eventually, the money was transferred, and, according to Baschleben, "We pulled it out of Bahrain as fast as we could because we couldn't be 100 percent sure everything was okay. But we were very, very happy."

Buran and the iconic Boeing 747 display are not the only artifacts on show at Speyer. We had a poke around other exhibits, such as an Antonov AN-22, also with an accessible interior, and the claustrophobic guts of a German submarine; the U-Boat U9.

And then there is yet more hardware to look at and occasionally clamber around, as well as plenty of automatic musical instruments.

We can't recommend Sinsheim and Speyer enough. A new special exhibition covering the tuning exploits of both manufacturers and enthusiasts of the VW and Opel brands is due to open in November. It would seem rude not to plan a return visit.

How do you get there?

We flew from the UK and drove from Frankfurt Airport, although Stuttgart Airport is a similar distance away. There are also options for users of public transport.

The two museums are about 40km apart and, while you could use public transport, driving is probably easier.

And the costs?

We went for a two-day pass that got us into both museums since trying to do the two in a single day would be challenging. A two-day pass is €52 or €42 for children between 5 and 14 and includes a show at the IMAX theaters on each site, although we didn't bother with a viewing since there was more than enough at each museum to look at it.

There is also a parking charge at both museums.

®

https://www.theregister.com//2024/08/13/geeks_guide_speyer_and_sinsheim/