Thanks to the good weather progress continues steadily, and we thought it worthwhile to visit the two main sites to see what was happening. Here is our today's report:

Bridge 1, Broadway

As you can imagine with the end very much in sight on this important bridge, the activity on the numerous small bits of steel repairs still to be done was fast and furious today. One welder advised us that, in a couple of hours this morning, he had completed welded repairs to 9 of the, by now, famous joggled stiffeners, but had another 12 to do.

Cutting the new backs of the joggled stiffeners

 The last “major repair” of the north cross beam, mentioned yesterday is now all complete (see below), and virtually all bolts on all of the repairs on the entire bridge had been fitted, although a few still had to be “torqued up”.

 

The north cross beam in place. Look at all the bolts!

After the many deck plate holes had been sealed up with welded plates, occasional rain showers resulted in remaining odd drips here and there, revealing the location of missing bolts and further unnoticed small holes. These have now all been dealt with and the deck itself is now virtually watertight, even without the waterproofing in place. The several overlapping thicknesses of plate are not yet “caulked up”, so to have achieved that situation is a really good. The waterproofing is yet to be applied, but will now have a very good base to start from.

 

A few skilled blows with a hammer....

Another member of the Brunswick team was taking off the remains off the bottoms of the old balustrade, ready for the new one - fabricated off site - to be fitted.

Bridge 5, Little Buckland

The cycle of installing shuttering, then pouring concrete, then stripping shuttering is also moving towards completion.

The top lift of shuttering, started yesterday, is almost complete on the south abutment:

Final layer of shuttering going up on the south side.

Meanwhile, back filling the void behind the north abutment was well in hand today, and the ground level is now high enough for the ramp to be reinstated, so enabling lorries to bring the fill right to where it is needed:

 

Filling the void again behind the north abutment.

Consolidation is going on with the remotely controlled vibrating compactor:

 

A remote controlled compactor! Wouldn't you like a go with this?

When the fill gets up to the top of last Monday's concrete pour, the installation of the top lift of shuttering will then be done on the north side. The current forecast is for both top lifts to be poured on Tuesday (after the bank holiday) and this will then complete that task. Those pours will have to be done with a pump again, because of the height and access difficulties.