Brunel's Other Bridge Bristol Swivel Bridge 2014

Brunel Swivel Bridge Project Photos July 2014

Cleaning and painting rusty areas (in progress)
Unbolt and release the centre pintle casting (in progress)
Jack up Bridge a few inches (in progress)
Free up north tail wheel (done)
Release two rotation cables (done)
Lower bridge onto its pintle and track
Free the pintle thread, rotate bridge a small amount and return to present position
Locate and obtain copies of drawings and past reports. Write a conservation plan
Seek letters of support

No experience needed, all equipment provided, and you'll get really involved in helping to save Brunel's Other Bridge.

Contact Maggie Shapland (Maggie.shapland@gmail.com) if you wish to help.

The A team- Geoff, Maggie and Mike

Erecting the hoist again to lift the third turntable wheel (south west)	We also erected a shelter as thunder and lightening was threatened
Wheel pit full of water ready to clean out, clearly demonstrating the problem	So easy with a hoist
Demonstrates how much mud stuck in wheel holes	Bailed out the water, now for the mud. It was hard near the end and had to be chiselled out. When was it done last time?
Geoff got his endoscope out once we found the drain hole (it went down 400 mm)	Nice clean pit
The remains of a large, decayed (? softwood) bearer can be seen in the photos. (The white stalk visible is a root, with a wood-louse on the end).	Then the skies opened but our tent kept us dry
	Inside hub and bearing
	Outside hub and bearing in worse state

Lots of help so lots done on a lovely sunny day. Arms and legs strewn around all over the place

Last wheel being lifted out of the water.	Lots of woodlice and spiders this time. Bearings in good order
Why the wheel pit needs draining	Mike helped Maggie bail out, followed by Bob. Each pit seems to generate about 3 buckets of water and hard mud
Bob enjoying the work	Maggie doing the last wheel
Usual hard mud that needs chiselling out. When we found the hole. It was only 6 1/2" with a solid bottom and was full of a strong smelling steam grease or oil	Outside hub and bearing good condition
Geoff having checked the hole with the endoscope put liberal amounts of grease on and we put the caps back on	Bob then did some measuring
Mike Bone and Martyn Hart cleaned the pintle base and cleaned and checked the nuts	One can either sit down or lie down.
Clean pintle base	Mike's clean hydraulic pit
If one gets a sneaky look at the suspension bridge, one notices an electricity point	And an unusual view of the boats going home from the Harbour Festival. This wheel definitely provided good view points of everything on a lovely sunny day
So we had something to drink and shared a joke with Mike who was in one of the hydraulic pits cleaning it out	Harbour master could not fit any more boats in the lock
Marilyn and Mary turned up and we all had a meeting and talked about the future	We were also treated to a display by the Pyronaut. Wonder if the ferry passengers hot wet. A good end to a very productive and varied day