Work starts on WD Barn Extension
Work starts on WD Barn Extension
by: Steve P.
Last week saw Bob A’s team complete the cladding at the rear of the barn extension despite the torrential rain and hailstones on Wednesday. This side is now secure so the focus could now move onto continuing the depot clean-up and completing installation of the ducts and wiring for the new alarm and telephone cables.
Monday this week saw Bob H back on the mini-digger to complete the trench across to the long container allowing Steve an Ian to then install the duct and refill the trench, with the wiring being installed on Wednesday after some time untangling blue string and trying to work out the best way to feed and draw the wires through.
Bob A’s team started work on the foundation for the steelwork at the front of the barn which will support the roller shutter doors, with 5 holes being dug which will take the main upright steels. Most of the steels being used were the ones “discovered” on the old trailer when the canal side of the depot was cleared out before the barn rear wall was built. Although not the ideal sizes they are plenty big enough for the job and save us the expense of buying new steel beams.
These uprights will then have a lintel beam installed across them before we can construct the front to rear steels that will support the roof beams. The new roof will be higher than the old one, with a single slope to the back so that the forklift can enter by the 3m high roller shutter doors to lift and move any large or heavy parts being worked on.
Chris, Jeff and Mike have taken on the task of cutting the steels to length, and preparing square plates at the base to mount onto the screwed rod foundation pads. This involved extensive use of the forklift to move the parts around with heavy duty cutting and welding; by the end of Wednesday the four foundation frames had been built, and should be concreted into place next week.
John D’s team along with Richard continued the big clear up with the storage container roofs being cleared of pipe and other “potential” materials being stored there – this now needs to be sorted into materials to be kept or disposed of and the good items moved into Prentice’s field before the new containers arrive.
By the end of the week the barn and depot had never looked tidier, and next week we can start to remove the old barn ready to install the new steels, and to tidy up the whole site ready for the new containers to be installed and existing containers reorganised.
