Today, we had a change of pace, collecting around 500 4 hole fishplates from near Dunolly.

These were generously released for our use by RTHV and VLine, as they were otherwise heading for scrap.

Using 5 vehicles and a couple of trips back and fourth, we managed to get everything hand loaded onto pallets.

The telehandler made very light work of the task back at Maldon!

In total 9 pallets were collected, stacked, strapped and transported back to Maldon.

These plates will mean we don’t need to cut quite so many 6 holers down to 4 holers, however we do still need another 1500ish to meet all our needs, but this will be a massive help.

Tomorrow’s work will be back installing sleepers, out by Rifle Range Bridge from 8.30am.

Tomorrow’s workday will involve a bit of an away mission collecting some items being scrapped by V/Line. It’s only just up the road. However, it will all require hand loading, so any extra hands would be greatly appreciated! Meeting at Maldon at 8am.

Friday ended up being quite a successful day, with another couple of hundred sleepers dropped out past Bendigo Road and distributed as required.

We even managed to get a lot of additional weedspray completed, especially around the Castlemaine area, however all the bridges and level crossings still require this, so that will be tomorrow’s task. Meeting at Maldon from 8am, breaking into a few small groups to knock over the various areas.

After a bit of a setback first thing this morning, we managed to insert 75 concrete sleepers, finishing the replacements down to Rifle Range Bridge.

Unfortunately, when the digger had the leak fixed, a couple of hoses managed to get swapped over, resulting in some surprising things operating from buttons and toggles that usual don’t! Unfortunately, it also meant the hitch couldn’t be opened or closed. Once we’d nutted out exactly which hoses had been confused, it all worked perfectly. And got a good test out in the field immediately after.

It was relatively slow going in the cutting. However, once we were clear of that, it was happening at a great rate. There’s only around 170 to go down to Brown Street now!!

Tomorrow will be a change of pace again, with another sleeper train and a few odds that need tending to around Maldon.

Meeting at Maldon from 8am