This afternoon, we took delivery of Patricia at Western Depot, all 20.5 tonnes of narrow beam dredger, which arrived from Eynsham in Oxfordshire. Originally built in the 60's for BW, she has seen little use in recent times and is fully operational, however, there are a number of jobs which will be needed before she can enter service. An assessment of the work will take place shortly.
An 160 tonne crane performed the lift, which took a fraction of the time taken to prepare the set up. The dredger consists of a bog standard JCB back end. The bucket will probably be replaced for a clam shell type, which has worked so well on our other dredger.
Work will take place out in the car park where she now rests. The job's list will probably grow as we uncover the inner details of the craft. As you can see, she is self propelled.
There are 4 hydraulically powered feet which are deployed prior to dredging. The metalwork could well do with some serious TLC, the rams will also require a referb'.
