From: Natasa Tucev tucev@tesla.rcub.bg.ac.yu
BTW, I think Blake's actually 32 at the beginning of the series. Blake et al. must have been fighting the Federation for at least a year before they acquired Orac. Then, in 'Pressure Point', Blake says he's been gathering information on Central Control - with the help of Orac - for about a year. These are two years to be subtracted from the age the clone reports in
Weapon.
What he actually says is: "For the past year now, I've been collecting all the information I could find. With Orac's help, I now know more about Control than anyone outside the senior echelon of the Federation"
That does not necessarily mean that he has had access to Orac for a whole year, in fact it rather implies that acquiring Orac aided a data collection programme that he had already initiated.
Where and how he might have acquired information on his own without the rest of the crew noticing is open to question. Zen may have had some information. Decoded transmissions may also have been a meagre source. His remark above can be interpreted as meaning that he spent a fair while scrabbling for crumbs, and then acquired Orac at which point the whole process became much easier.
Cally makes a remark early in Weapon that suggests she was either privy to Blake's searching, or had guessed it for herself, but that Blake had yet to broach the subject to the rest of the crew.
Neil