Restoration Blog

Pat's Progressed

With our girl at Ebley now, it is a case of meeting at Western Depot and carefully organising what it is we wish to do and then making sure that no widget is forgotten before heading off.

Today, two jobs.  'Fitting' some holes into the clam shell bucket, secondly, attending to the fractured flexible exhaust coupling on the engine.

Cutting holes required the services of the mag' drill and that, in turn, required the services of a rather large generator as the drill was rated at nearly 2kW.  A wheelbarrow at WD was commandeered to gather the bits together for the work plan.

The steel on the clam shell was quite easy to drill, which made the task that bit easier.  The drill pattern used on Dredger No.5 was adapted, since our bucket is 150L and No.5's is 250L.  On completion, we grabbed hold of a bucket load of weeds from the canal surface and observed the draining process in fill swing.

Down in the engine room, our assessment of the exhaust coupling fitting resulted in us removing the existing one for modification at WD.  It was not possible to get the replacement to fit without the services of a proper workshop.

Our thoughts also turned to a transit hanger for the boom, a sketch produced.  Not too difficult to fabricate, but it might be possible to acquire one from somewhere from an old JCB 3CX.

Here's the piece, if you know of one going spare.