Spending a penny

We are not an adventurous family when the fun fair comes to town.

You will not find us on the high altitude, thrill a minute rides. We can easily give the Waltzers and even the traditional Carousel a miss. One year we managed to just get through an impulsive go on the Giant Ferris Wheel, but never again.

Don't be mistaken by this reticence and deep rooted fear as we are faithful fans and supporters of the great Hull Fair, reputed to be Europe's largest travelling event, when it sets up in the city in the second week of October.

Regardless of the weather we will be there to savour the sights, sounds and smells that assault the senses on all sides.

One attraction that we always get drawn to is a specific Amusement Arcade operated by the same family business that graces Hull Fair for as long as I can remember.

As if you already regard us as a bunch of meek and cowardly beings from our avoidance of the big noisy fairground rides I should reassure you that we do not gamble recklessly as though seeking some sort of self- affirmation.

The sole purpose of our visit to the arcade is to try to outwit, beat, conquer and defeat the Penny Falls machines. Often called Coin Drop Machines they are well known as a mainstay of Fairground Culture and have been for decades if not longer.

The English versions are typically operated using 10 pence coins as the maximum tariff but our particular challenge takes 2 pence coins.

Themed on  Post-War Americana, Elvis Presley or something anachronistic as the machines are evidently ancient they take a familiar physical form.

There are three coin slots within a stainless steel facade. A formed matrix draws the coins downwards before they cascade randomly onto the upper of two sliding shelves. Adding more coins, individually or using all three slots, is with the intention of shunting the upper tier coins over the edge and onto the lower shelf. This is where all of the action takes place with the tantalising promise of  Chupa Chup lollies, Refresher chewy sweets, plastic novelties, a high denomination bank note and , yes, multiple 2p coins being pushed into the prize slot to be gathered up with relish.

Our domestic budget during Hull Fair Week includes a fund for expenses at the Penny Falls.

We each collect our plastic bank-teller bags of a pounds worth of 2p coins and make a quick but calculating tour of the bank of gawdy and noisy, self promoting machines for a likely candidate for a concerted effort at swelling the family finances.

A feeling of anticipation and excitement always takes over at this point. It is all consuming and for the duration we are oblivious to anything else around us. In truth, the rest of the fair could have already packed up and departed for their next venue without us realising.

We are immersed in the Penny Falls and yet we are normally quite a rational bunch, not easily fooled, and the first to howl in disbelief at Tv programmes where individuals fall prey to scams, fiddles and tricksters.

We are in fact being bamboozled by one of the oldest and most lucrative of machines for fairground operators.

However hard you think about or hope for it, there is no freak of mathematical probability in the progression of the coins onto the sliding shelves.

Brian Cox, the physicist would be hard pressed to come up with an explanation for the apparent ability of the 500 coins, there assembled, to display a fluidity and yet no critical mass is reached which would result in a hoped for payout.

I think that even Albert Einstein would struggle to formularise the processes at play.

We still shovel the 2 pence coins into the slots.

One of our family is the designated runner who, when the plastic coin bags start to feel lighter in our hands, makes for the Change Booth to hand over more pound coins for fresh supplies.

In spite  of our manic and, let's face it, uncharacteristic behaviour for anywhere other than the Fairground, we do accept, somewhere in our collective hearts and minds that their is no actual material or tactical way to beat the Penny Falls.

It is a clever feature on the lower shelf that heralds our ultimate disappointment.

Just tucked away within the mirrored sheen of the shelf surround, on each side, are narrow holes. They may be concealed in the Hollywood-esque designs but are actually in full and plain sight.

These voids allow accumulated coins on the lower shelf to be cleaned away periodically so that new arrivals just seem to be absorbed into the precarious pile on the lip of the prize shute.

The manufacturers of Penny Falls play on a unique selling point in that the balance between coins played and those paid out can be adjusted to ensure profitability for the operator and yet give the by now obsessive player some sense of being rewarded.

Most manufacturers recommend a retention rate to the operator of around 72%.

We fully understand that the game works against us under the phenomena of diminishing returns but we can easily wile away a good half an hour in pursuit of any ultimately elusive recompense for our financial outlay.

That thirty minutes of together family fun makes the fair special and we would not, perhaps illogically, forfeit the same experience , year in ,year out.

It is all of the fun of the Fair.