Excellent progress on the Musgrave crane over the last two weeks. The cross travel crab has been fitted, along with the hoist worm-gear support. We have fitted and aligned the long travel shaft and central support. It took a bit of blue engineer paint, some podging and sanding to get

What a finale to the week! On Friday, we welcomed former Copper-works Foreman, Mr Ivor Williams to the yard. Ivor who still lives in Swansea is holding a photograph of the Mechanical maintenance workers from 1964. Ivor is the one in the white coat and worked at Hafod until it

It was very important that the project used British resources as much as we could. We are pleased to announce that the new beams were made by British Steel and they came from Scunthorpe. They will soon be ready to have the travelling crane run along them once again, when

A very exciting day at  Crane Renovations HQ (aka Henderson Engineers Yard). Tom and his mighty team of volunteers were joined by Vince Thompson from Iconoclast Constructs, Birmingham. The day had arrived when we could hot rivet the cross travel rails onto the New Beams. We got off to a

The new beams have arrived and with trolleys, brute force and some excellent manoeuvering skills they are now secure in the yard ready to be primed. But what colour will they be painted ? We are awaiting a decision from CADW. Originally, the crane would have been orange but in

After a lot of heating up, hammer bashing and prayers, the Musgrave Crane’s hoisting worm gear became loose. This was the last stuck part of the crane and Tom and the team were over the moon. I particularly enjoyed the heat that the warmed up gear gave off on a

Swansea University students, past and present are helping us to restore the crane. James Hustwayte who is studying a Masters in Mechanical Engineering, Geraint Howells  who is studying a degree in Material Engineering, Gethin Phillips is in his 2nd year of Mechanical Engineering along with Nourelsabah Kamel, who has just

As each part is being restored, its fascinating to see the stamps, numbers and chisel marks that would have imprinted over 100 years ago.

This week, the team have been busy cleaning, burning, sanding and undercoating the parts. Its  a slow and steady process but the base must be right in order to put the final coat on, we want this crane to go another hundred years before it needs painting again!

Now in Tom’s workshop, restoration of key components is coming along beautifully. Check out this short video..