Bridge beams was the flavour of today.
Muckleford Creek had a failing inner bridge beam, much like the recent Winters Flat Bridge beam job.
However instead of just changing the inner beam, we installed a temporary steel beam to support the decking, while both beams were removed to ease replace the failed inner one.
This method proved far superior, taking much less time and effort than we’d usually require.
The beauty of this method was it allowed the remaining good beam to become a template for the replacement.
It also allowed us to drill the holes exactly in a convenient location for once and check out the beam as required to match it’s neighbour.
Using the digger to re-install the beams was a breeze. Only very minor tweaking was required to get all the holes to align and bolts installed.
With the exception of needing to make a few new bolts to account for the slightly thicker new beam, it all went together like a big kit.
And of course a bit of a settling load from the digger confirmed all was well, before the steel beam was maneuvered out of the bridge and placed into storage ready for next time.
Seeing this method has saved us about a day and we’re all geared up to do woodwork, tomorrow we’ll be tackling the failing platform coping at Muckleford Station. Meeting Maldon 8am or on site from 8.30am.
VGR Civil Blog 