Maintenance day: Mark making some parts

Monday’s are maintenance days here at our mill. Typically, because we had to divert the flow of water through our hydropower scheme today, the skies opened. This must be the rain we were forecast to receive yesterday.

Divert it we did, which with the new improved sluice gate mechanism now takes about 3 minutes when it used to take thirty with two men. A huge leap forward. If we ever have a flash flood warning, anyone can now open the sluice gates to reduce the possibility of the village flooding. Maybe the Parish Council should buy me a pint?

To give you an idea of the flow rate, the sluice and the hydropower scheme have approximately 10 one cubic metre, builder’s bags full of water passing through EVERY SECOND. The water is diverted into an overflow channel. When work is complete, the sluice is closed and the water flows through our turbine. You would not want to fall in!!!

We carried out our maintenance and then I went to see Mark at a local engineering firm who is making some more pieces of kit for us. Here he is cutting a steel plate for another part of the hydropower scheme.

Maybe I should have blipped us getting soaking wet☺

Thank you for your comments on the sluice gate blip yesterday. Tomorrow I am heading to Surrey to see my mum, it is her birthday on Wednesday. I will try to keep up with your comments. Thanks