DEVELOPMENT – BUILDING AT BLAENAVON HIGH LEVEL STATION (Step
1.4.1) – Page 3
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Progress at BHL during December 2009 (uploaded
Here are a few more images
of ‘work in progress’. Progress at BHL during
December has been rather patchy, what with Santa Specials, wet weather, windy
weather - and difficulties getting any scaffolding erected. Nevertheless, some progress was made, and in
particular, it has been possible to make some progress on the building
roof. We have had materials to hand for
some months, and they were a major source of irritation in the containers,
since it was impossible to get past them without climbing over everything. We really need to get the chimney built, but
we knew that the mortar would be washed out of the joints as soon as a brick
was laid. Due to difficulties of access
it still has not been possible to lay the last of the six wall plates, so that
in itself prevents the final roof trusses from being laid. However the roofing contractor has seen what
we have done so far and is well satisfied with what we have been doing, he only
comment was that the ‘stringers’ between the trusses what have to be taken from
the outside and put up on the inside – but we already knew that, and they were
only tacked on the outside, because at the time, a gale was blowing, a storm
was brewing and the light was failing – and that was really the end of
progress. The following weekend, snow
fell in substantial quantities, and with several weeks of very frosty weather,
the snow and ice has persisted and little or nothing has been done.
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Here are some of the roof trusses waiting to go up. They are surprisingly light in construction
– but that’s the way it’s done these days.
Their close pitching of only 400mm will allow us to fit the heaviest
slates generally available. 0628 – 6 Dec 09 |
In howling wind the first truss goes up – surprisingly easily. The joist brackets make things very much
easier. Note how the wall plates/truss
bearers project well beyond the end of the building. The roof is planned to have about a foot of
overhang, and the bearer will be sawn to length as required. 0630 – 6 Dec 09 |
Once the first joist was up, an extra four had to go up in order to
provide some stability. We could have
done more, but the light was failing and it was essential that we left
sufficient time to instal the stringers, which provide stability against
wind, and prevents all the trusses falling like a stack of dominoes. 0632 – 6 Dec 09 |
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Standing back a bit, it begins to be possible to see the profile of the
finished building might look like.
Apart from the cladding (which will be mainly of wood planking, rather
than brick), the main difference between this reconstruction, and the
original will be in the end elevation of the canopy which will be triangular
sloping back towards a valley gutter, rather than rectangular as in the
original. 0636 – 6 Dec 09 |
Industry! Volunteer Ian brings
along another truss to have the ‘horns’ cut down to size – the pile of blocks
on the right is testimony to his efforts.
Charles foots the ladder as 0651 – 6 Dec 09 |
The stringers are laid so that they form triangles from each end of the
roof. The rightmost stringer lies
close to its final position, the stringer on the left will rest horizontally
in the final fitting, with a third stringer to its left. It is possible to see that the first batch
of trusses still retain their horns – these will be cut off in situ as soon
as time and conditions permit. 0654 – 13 Dec 09 |
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The roof and canopy are held to the main structure by a series of metal
fittings. Here can be seen the heavy gauge
straps for the canopy beams, the relatively light weight straps holding the
wall plates/truss bearers down, and the clips which rigidly attach the
trusses to the bearer. These latter
are very much preferable to traditional ‘bird’s mouth’ joints in the trusses
which would have unacceptably weakened the already critically slender
timbers. 0665 – 13 Dec 09 |
Inside, looking south we can see the jungle of timbers forming the roof
trusses. It is going to need someone
of relatively slender proportions to finally fit the stringers – not elderly
persons of more generous loading gauge who currently form the bulk (sic!) of
the New Works team. It is fortunate
that the canopy beams form a useful support for scaffold planks. 0666 – 13 Dec 09 |
A few days later there was still no let up in the wet and windy
weather. Even so, this overall
southward view shows the emerging proportions of the building. Very soon a heavy LNWR style pale fence
will occupy the lower left corner of this image – a later on the building
itself will be clad with wooden planking. 0668 – 15 Dec 09 |
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Here is a three-quarter view of the building from the cycle track. On the extreme right the low wall on the site
of the tall signal box is seen. The wall is designed to allow visitors to
look in to the old locking room and may presage the building of a new signal
box. 0676 – 13 Dec 09 |
Blaenavon (High Level) platform 1 stretches northwards. Footprints in the snow are testimony to the
number of people who walk along the platform to reach the railway’s path at
the far end and which extends further north to the hamlet of Forgeside. This path is both useful and historic and
PBR is committed to retaining it. 0724 – 13 Dec 09 |
…and here, quite simply, is the view looking the other way. At the far end the railway’s private
footpath descends down to the 0725 – 13 Dec 09 |
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