WHEN John Thynne picked up a thermometer at a car boot sale for 25p ten years ago, he had no idea it would lead him to a place in the Guinness Book of Records.

But the 52-year-old is now celebrating his own entry in the famous book after amassing a collection of 270 over the past decade.

John, of Manor Road, Southwick, was urged by friends to contact Guinness and is now celebrating his inclusion in the next edition.

His record-breaking collection contains clinical and industrial gauges - and the number is still rising.

But John will be saying goodbye to his collection next year after

deciding to donate it to a local school as part of a millennium project on the weather.

All but two of the thermometers work and, thanks to John's restoration efforts, most of the gauges agree on the degree.

John said he had not come across another collection of thermometers, despite attempts to contact other enthusiasts, and not even the British Museum had as many examples.

John does not drive,

so he keeps the collection in his garage, leaving

just enough room for a workbench to restore them.

He said: "People think it is just mercury, but there are lots of different types.

"My favourite is a Swiss thermometer. It cost me 25p at a car boot sale and dates back to 1850.

"It is a bi-metal type and is in the shape of a fob watch. Its insides are so complicated that it even looks like a Swiss watch."

Despite John's passion for the temperature indicating gauges, his wife Sylvia thought him a degree strange when he became hooked on his past-time.

John said: "Sylvia thought my hobby was a bit odd at first, but now she is quite into it.

"She is supportive because I am planning to donate the collection to a school or make it public, so she sees there is a reason to it.

"It also gives me a chance to calm down by restoring them. When I am hot under the collar I let off steam in the garage working on the thermometers."

John believes the collection is worth £2,000, but explained that the value of the pieces decreases when he restores them.

He first became hooked on thermometers when he had to fix them in his job as a quality inspector at a flight simulator company.

John said: "I have picked most of the thermometers up at car boot sales. I never usually spend more than three or four pounds on one.

"A friend of mine said I should call Guinness to find out if there is a record for this sort of thing. When they heard about it, they sent an auditor down and later I heard that I had the record.

"They had records for the number of prunes you can eat, the number of beans you can count and things like, that but not one for thermometers, until now."

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