Frame installation: Day 3

The third day dawned with delays in getting up to Kirkby Stephen, but work kicked off rapidly, with the aim of fixing all the quadrants down properly, getting the steadying brackets attached to both the frame and the joists as well as tidying up everything else and triple checking what we'd already done.

We had several holes that hadn't centred properly, so we marked out what needed to be removed, took off the quadrants affected, and set up the mag drill to correct the errors. None was greater than 1/8", and most just took a minute or two with a file.

Quadrants lifted off to allow the mag drill to sit on the longitudinal tie bar.

The steadying brackets attach to the underside of the stanchions and tie these to the joists. This steadies the frame and also supports the remaining sections of floor, which also have to be able to be lifted out, to allow access to the locking. This will be another job for the near future. For now, we have installed a temporary floor to allow safe work to paint and finish the interior.




These brackets had to be squared up to the frame and joists, set level, and through bolted to the joists. As can be expected, this took several hands and eyes to get them right!

With all the holes tidied up, and the brackets fitted, it was time to tighten up all the quadrants, aligning the nuts downstairs carefully!

Making use of copper slip on the threads, the bolts are tightened up,
keeping the nuts squared off!

In order to give us a better understanding of how the locking, block shelf and operation would work, we then fitted a pair of levers to the frame. This will allow various measurements to be checked physically, as well as allowing trials of equipment. The pivot castings bolt to the base castings between the stanchions. These base castings have slots as opposed to holes, to allow for careful adjustment so that everything ends up exactly where it should. We also learnt that some parts are not able to be swapped over, so we will be carefully identifying these!!






So, we now have the frame installed, awaiting the next steps: finalising how to incorporate the electric locks we require, finalising the locking, installing the levers and then connecting everything up. Watch this space!

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