Solace Day 3. Lift Bridge.

Today we are on the Llangollen Canal.  Technically I think the Llangollen branch of the Shropshire Union Canal.  One of the unusual features of this canal are the lift bridges.   Rather than build a ramp and the usual arched bridge in many places it is a platform can be raise.  They are mainly on footpaths tracks and minor roads.  Where the road is busy they have been modernised and work by electric and hydraulics.

The blip shows Clickychick getting some exercise by hand winding one of the minor lift bridges.  The process is as follows:  fit your windlass (sometimes wrongly called a lock key) on to a tapered shaft.  Then you wind and wind and wind.  The turning of the windlass works the hydraulics and the piston on the struts raises the bridge.

It sounds easy!  The sheer number of turns needed (owing to the low gearing) makes it quite a work out.