Pulley Work

Tuesday 4th Nov.

More concreting was the order of the day today.
Ready for action with the PWay trolley

A double pulley wheel set and a single vertical pulley wheel are required at signal B8 (advanced starter at Childswickham Bridge).
So we prepared a substantial concrete block to mount these using some of the concrete cable troughs as shuttering (we have plenty of these to play with) - they should be removable once the concrete has set. I think we got a bit carried away with the size of the excavation  but we should have enough aggregate to fill it with a few added brick ends.

But first to get the height for the concrete right for the pulleys using the nylon rope. The wire for the home signal will cross under the track through a plastic tube which will be then be buried where the up main used to pass which is now used as an access roadway. Another concrete block will be required here to turn the wire through 90 degrees.
The stakes for the signal wires will then continue over Childswickham Bridge and along the opposite side of the embankment to the Home Signal.

So, many barrow loads of concrete later (all laboriously trundled up from the mixer at the end of platform 1 on the trolley), we have a concrete block with the two templates containing the studs for mounting the pulleys.

Picture quality not too good I'm afraid - it was getting quite dark by this time and the flash doesn't seem to have done much for the image. 

Other stuff going on today was the feeding of some more signal wire through the rollers southwards - John P wrestling with a new coil - it really is awkward to deal with :

And Peter W on the end threading it through. This wire will operate the signal on the bracket behind him. There will probably be another pulley required here to get the wire in the correct alignment (another concrete block?!)

Neil C and Keith L disappeared southwards to do some cabling work - installing feed wires to the rails for track circuits.

Curly