Re-railing and Trenching

Well today was very momentous… With one leg of the re-railing between Maldon and Muckleford now more or less complete!!

The day began with some rail straightening. With Bruce on the BUDA and John’s careful eye of the rail the kinks were skillfully removed. Unfortunately we’re down to the dregs of the rail supply, which are often ones were rejected earlier for these reasons.

The joining of the new and the existing 80lb, the last time for this leg! The old 60 to 80 lbs junction plates can be seen in the background, these won’t be needed again in this section now. Today saw 16 x 80lb rails installed, some shorter than usual but still better than what it’s replacing.

John ceremoniously drills the last hole.

And inserted was the GOLDEN Spike (in this case pink as we didn’t have any gold paint!).

Driven in, fittingly by machine to mark our development in progress.

Job done… Almost. Due to the lack of before hand preparation and the fact the digger is busy in Castlemaine, all of this work was done by hand – an astounding effort. As such only every third spike is installed, which is more than sufficient for the next week until the gang can return to finish off.

This marks a very very long commitment from our tireless gangs. And a massive step forwards in our overall track upgrade. This is truly a time for celebration as the end is now very literally in sight.

We can’t thank our volunteers enough, it’s entirely down to their hard work and dedication that we’ve reached this amazing achievement.

And on some other less glamorous news, the digger wasn’t available today as it was busy digging! (the one thing it never normally does).

The trenching has begun for the services (power, water & NBN) coming in from Walker St. to the new development.

We’ll be here for about a week digging, sanding, helping install then back filling.

There won’t be a regular Friday gang this week, however you would be welcome to assist at Castlemaine, as there are plenty of odd jobs that need an extra pair of hands at times. From 8am at Castlemaine.