Author Topic: New Tractor Shed  (Read 101068 times)

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #300 on: September 17, 2017, 10:30:18 AM »
It was certainly rather wet over night Pete but no hail that I'm aware of.

Spent today adding a few electrical sockets down one side of the shed, and also three commando sockets for wander leads adjacent to the distribution panel. (A 16A single phase, a 16A three phase and a 32A three phase)

I'd intended to run the 13A sockets in Hi-Tuff with girder clips, the upright RSJ get in the way of straight runs of conduit however in a flash of inspiration I realised I could drill a clearance hole through the RSJ's and use singles in conventional 20mm conduit.

I'm short of the breaker for the 16A single phase commando socket, and a few saddle clips for the conduit - all on order and should arrive Monday or Tuesday.  I'm off collecting butchered lambs on Monday so Darren will have to just get on with things (hopefully)

I will probably leave the electrics at this stage - the sockets are really to help during Decembers scraping class but will be useful  long term putting vehicles on trickle charge.
« Last Edit: September 17, 2017, 11:45:14 AM by awemawson »
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline AdeV

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #301 on: September 18, 2017, 08:25:11 AM »
See! I knew this shed wasn't for tractors! Scraping classes indeed! Illicit educational events! Tractors, my arse!  :lol:

PS: I'm gutted I couldn't commit to coming to the scraping course :( Financially it was just too much of a risk for me at the time. Hopefully there will be future classes (again held in the so-called "tractor" shed)
Cheers!
Ade.
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Occasionally: Zhengzhou, China. An even longer way from anywhere...

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #302 on: September 18, 2017, 02:13:52 PM »
Well today proved rather too wet to play with earth so attention shifted to excavating for the entrance apron / ramp and also a trench to house the Aco storm drain channel. There is a suitable drain adjacent to the corner post of the upper Pig Palace so Darren chopped out vast quantities of my farm yard to accommodate it. The storm drain will sit between the slope of the entry ramp and the slight slope of the farm yard hopefully preventing flooding.

I took delivery of the replacement Cat5 patch panel which I installed in minutes with no issues this time, and also the circuit breaker and conduit clips so at least that's all now finished.

 
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline PekkaNF

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #303 on: September 19, 2017, 01:37:36 AM »
That big roof area is going to dump a whole lot of water on the side.

If I got it right, you have located this building somewhat higher on the site and that should pretty much take care of runoff, even if the drain is floded in torrential rain. Only problem we had with that sort of building was a puddle on 5 metres on front of it.....heavy machines moved and turned right after entrance has tendency to compact the ground.

Pekka

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #304 on: September 19, 2017, 02:36:24 AM »
Pekka you are right, huge run off from the roof, but all that water is directed to the rear of the building directly into a stream (branch of the River Line) so none comes anywhere near the farm yard thankfully.

The storm drain channel is purely to drain what falls on the yard itself and is ducted again into the stream.
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #305 on: September 19, 2017, 02:46:56 PM »
Today we started laying the Aco storm drain on a bed of concrete - ran out of balllast so play resumes tomorrow, Also exposed the land drain connection that we  will be Teeing into and inserted a swept Tee joint ready for the storm drain.

I also today connected up the compressed air having made up a support for it's termination. The air plumbing is grafted onto that already in the Woodwork Shop where I'd left a blanked off Tee 'just in case' a couple of years back. It runs round the Woodwork Shed at ceiling height then plunges down to the 110 mm drain conduit leading to the Tractor Shed. I put an isolator valve in the line for future diagnostic purposes. In the tractor shed the airline emerges from the 110 mm drain duct at floor level and rises to a 'wall plate elbow; then via a ball valve to a PCL Q/D fitting. I will in due time fit a pressure gauge at this point just as a reassurance measure as the compressor is a very long way away !
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #306 on: September 20, 2017, 11:02:06 AM »
No Darren today - no idea why - so I got on pulling pipes and cables through the duct that runs under the tractor shed floor, and outside to a manhole that I'm using as a marshalling point for water (to the pigs and chicken) - three phase 415v (for my external distribution point) and a pair of Cat5E cables (just in case!)

It was a bit like the problem of getting a troop of boy scouts across a river in the least number of moves with only a two seater canoe  :clap:

I needed three draw ropes in the duct (water pipe / mains cable / Cat5E cables) but also wanted a fourth one left in situ for future use. First I pushed my excellent cable pulling rodding gizmo from the outside manhole up into the tractor shed. Then I pulled back three draw ropes with it.

Dead easy to tangle multiple draw ropes doing this, so I lay them out first rather than leave them coiled.
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #307 on: September 20, 2017, 11:12:35 AM »
Then I attached the 25 mm MDPE water pipe to one draw rope by drilling a hole in the pipe, and secured the other draw ropes so they weren't accidentally  pulled as well.

25 mm pipe has a life of it's own when uncoiled  :bugeye:

Once pulled through I made it off to the existing stop cock in the man hole, and also completed the link loop from the Woodwork Shop into the Tractor Shed, and completed the connection in the Woodwork Shop where the water is sourced.

All a bit tight working down a man hole - no room to wield a spanner but I got there in the end.
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #308 on: September 20, 2017, 11:18:22 AM »
Then it was the turn of the 415V mains cable - heavy old reel and very stiff cable however it went fairly easily as far as the man hole. But onwards in the narrower 3" duct to the distribution point was a right b*****r needing much pulling and pushing and coaxing and cajoling. Eventually I got it through but had to leave an annoying kink in the man hole between it's entry port and it's exit port.
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #309 on: September 20, 2017, 11:22:02 AM »
By comparison the CAT5E was a doddle and behaved itself nicely. But by this time I was knackered so not many pictures.

So in summary - the water connections are finished, but the ends of the mains and CAT5e cables are as yet unterminated - a job for tomorrow - especially the external distribution box as it started to drizzle quite heavily when I was pulling the data cables so my motivation decreased somewhat to be outside !
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline DICKEYBIRD

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #310 on: September 20, 2017, 05:11:13 PM »
....by this time I was knackered so not many pictures.
I'm worn out just watching the work you complete in a day! :beer:
Milton in Tennesee

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Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #311 on: September 21, 2017, 11:04:00 AM »
Today I intended just to make off the ends of the 50A SWA cable - shouldn't be too hard - little did I know what I was letting myself in for  :med:

At the external brick built 'distribution point' the clay from the build up that the shed sits on was VERY sticky, so I cleared away a small working area and put some soft sand down to hopefully make the job less unpleasant. Then - strip out the innards of the 3 phase fuse box (which is a nasty plastic affair) - make provision for an adaptor box below it, as the wall of the plastic fuse board isn't strong enough to take a metal SWA gland , and prepare the SWA cable for making off to the gland. So far so good no big issues.

THREE HOURS later I had managed to get the gland clamp to accept and grip on the wire armour. Even by making it off in free air with the cable straight there was no way the clamp nut was going on far enough to start threading for tightening  :bang: I then dismantled the gland, and experimented with bits of the cut off armour wire - even when only a 1/4 turn was engaged of nut on the tapered grippy thing the wire was too fat  :bang:

I tried another nut - same issue - so time for the Mad Modder approach: I skimmed about 5 thou off the taper, but as the original was taper knurled I did it in steps to maintain the grip. After that it went on first time, clamped up nice and tight. Then at last I could connect it electrically and transfer to the inside end of the cable which went on with no bother in about 20 minutes flat  :thumbup:
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #312 on: September 21, 2017, 11:18:42 AM »
While I was doing this Darren arrived and completed the apron shuttering and laying the Aco storm drain

Hanson's concrete lorry arranged for 13:00 / 14:00 tomorrow so we should have an apron  :clap:
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Online hermetic

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #313 on: September 21, 2017, 02:53:13 PM »
Funny you should mention swa cable and glands Andrew, I have been doing some 2.5mm and 6.0mm swa recently, and had a real job to get the glands fitted properly, mainly due to the piss poor, only just big enough glands, with huge undercuts at the top of the fixing thread so that the locknuts, which were incredibly badly threaded, and paper thin, screw onto the gland in a wobbly angled fashion, then drop into the undercut and spin freely, meaning you have to find the best locknut you have to secure the gland to the box, and use another two at the top of the thread in the undercut to act as washers! As for getting a good firm grip on the SWA, I know exactly what you mean, they simply will not do it, due to dimensional inaccuracy which goes to the point of believing (possibly correctly) that your supplier has sent the wrong size glands. Perhaps this is why a lot of sparkies are using an extra core as earth, and not trusting the SWA to have good continuity. Did you also notice how hard the plastic insulation was to cut? I could not believe it. I started fitting swa glands about 1970, and have done it on and off ever since, so I know what I am talking about. Recently I fitted a new 3 phase dis board in my own workshop, which involved stripping back the gland and shortening the old  (1974) cable. It was a real trip down memory lane, cable easy to strip, insulation soft and pliable, gland fitted perfectly and really got hold of the swa, even the locknuts fit the threads perfectly, and no undercut to lose a locknut or two into. It is not you Andrew, we have to work with rubbish today, makes me really glad I no longer work full time in the industry!
Phil
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Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #314 on: September 22, 2017, 11:37:26 AM »
I started the day terminating the ends of the CAT5E cable that were pulled in yesterday but as I was doing it we got a call to say that the concrete lorry was 10 mins away - several hours early ! Luckily we were ready for him.

Access wasn't too bad and the lorry load ended up pretty much in the middle where needed, and Darren then shuffled it about a bit with the digger to get it in place. The 6 cu Metre proved to be almost enough - just a couple of mixer loads to finish the fill of the shuttering.After a bit of tamping. Darren had hired a long pole steerable float which proved OK'ish if a little light weight but it got the job done. Final finish was a brush attached to the pole float, and then my edging trowel giving a rounded corner.
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline vintageandclassicrepairs

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #315 on: September 22, 2017, 03:49:34 PM »
Hi All,

Quote
Perhaps this is why a lot of sparkies are using an extra core as earth, and not trusting the SWA to have good continuity

The use of the SWA screen as the sole earth conductor has not been allowed (in Ireland anyway)
for years  :scratch:

When I had a "real" job, it often included work on SWA cabling installed in the 70's
All these cables had separate earth conductors
Really glad to be out of that game now :D

Recently I was asked to change out the cable to a foot pedal on a press brake
I could not believe how skimpy the shielding and insulation is on the "new" sylflex compared to the old???

John

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #316 on: September 23, 2017, 02:58:11 AM »
Although the wire armour is being used as an earth in this run there is also an earth rod as an auxiliary earth as it is quite a long run.

It's four core cable, neutral and three phases, as five core was not available as far as I or my supplier could determine  at the time. However I have subsequently found a source  :bang:

The regulations do allow the use of the armour as a CPC and I used this rather good link as a guide:

https://gadsolutions.biz/regulations/swa-as-the-cpc


The relevant paragraphs of that article are:

The use of SWA as a Protective Conductor BS7671

The permitted types of protective conductor are listed in 543.2.1 and SWA is identified in sub section (v) as:

A metal covering, for example, the sheath, screen, or armouring of a cable.

It can therefore be verified that the SWA can be used as a protective conductor in compliance with BS7671.

However there are conditions on the use of SWA as a protective conductor defined in
BS7671.

1. It must be adequately sized to meet the requirements of section 543.2.1.
2. If the armour is used as a CPC then any accessories have to be connected to the associated enclosure's earth terminal by a separate CPC (flying lead) to comply with 543.2.7.
3. If the SWA is used as a main equipotential conductor other than on a PME system it must have a copper equivalent CSA, for CSAs over 25mm˛, of not less than half the cross sectional area of the associated earthing conductor and not less than
6mm˛ to comply with 544.1.1. If the installation is PME then the copper equivalent CSA of the SWA must comply with table 54.8.
4. Where a number of installations have separate earthing arrangements any protective conductors common to these have to be suitably sized to carry the maximum current likely to flow through them OR insulated from the other installation at one end to comply with 542.1.3.3
5. If the SWA is to be used as a combined CPC and main bonding conductor it must meet the requirements of both 544.1.1 and 543.1.1
6. Regulation 521.5.1 permits the use of a separate protective conductor to be run in parallel with an SWA cable.



There are tables in that link (above) giving CSA copper equivalent of various SWA cables and mine is very adequately over sized.
« Last Edit: September 23, 2017, 06:00:44 AM by awemawson »
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #317 on: September 24, 2017, 06:21:57 AM »
Today's task is to commission the new water feed having removed the temporary feed that was necessary to avoid pipes being damaged as the tractor shed was built.

I had tapped the temporary feed off a tap in the field, trenched across a gateway, crossed the stream by just draping the pipe from bank to bank, and brought it into a chicken shed where the original pipe had supplied water. This allowed the chicken and pigs to still have water while the build progressed. The original feed being cut and stopped off in the manhole that I'm using as a marshalling point.

However, as the afternoons job is to slice the bacon, and the flitches need to be rinsed off and dried and left to form a pellicule before chilling and slicing this had to be done first.

Then it was a simple case of isolating the water supply, blanking off the two Tee's where the two water systems were joined, then opening up a few taps and checking for leaks. However first to decide which of the three stopcocks on my distribution manifold was the right one. OK now I've labelled them  :clap:

Then open up the manhole, and mop out the seepage water so when the tap is turned on I can see if there are any leaks.

Then cross fingers and start opening up the feed taps on the new distribution system that runs from the Woodwork Shed underground into the Tractor Shed. Then under the Tractor Shed to the man hole.

Obviously my lucky day - no leaks  :ddb:
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #318 on: September 24, 2017, 06:29:14 AM »
Then it was just a case of recovering the temporary pipe and returning it to the 'pipe store' for future use.

I've left the bit that I trenched across a gate way in situ as it may well prove useful for a cattle trough in future.

OK those flitches are probably ready to pop into the freezer for a bit to stiffen up before slicing so I'd better go and do it ....
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline Biggles

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #319 on: September 26, 2017, 01:04:51 AM »
Is that your handy work on the bacon Andrew?  :drool:

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #320 on: September 26, 2017, 02:05:18 AM »
Oh yes  :clap:

Later that day I sliced and vacuum packed 540 rashers each 6 mm thick. There are always ends of flitches too short for the slicer and misshapen rashers that cannot be packed so lunch yesterday was bacon sandwiches, and although I say it myself this is a particularly good batch  :mmr: :thumbup:
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #321 on: September 26, 2017, 02:41:35 PM »
A bit of a clear up and tidy up day today. The Aco storm drain was first fully  flaunched in concrete then using my digger ground rake we sorted the big bits out of the piles of crushed concrete, filled in the trenching either side of the Aco drain, and raked the yard surrounding the apron into a semblance of level.

All this in preparation for an eight wheeler load of 'road planings' that I hope to receive tomorrow to surface the yard where we have disturbed it. The deep raking should allow the old and new to 'key' together.

I also received the plumbing bits allowing me to mount the pressure gauge on the compressed air outlet. Leak tested successfully using my soapy water spray.

I also sorted out the pile of timber used for shuttering that will double up as making temporary benches for the Scraping Class that will be held here in December.
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #322 on: October 01, 2017, 11:04:06 AM »
Having been pressing for delivery dates for the phantom Road Planings for days now, I got a text message out of the blue today (Sunday) asking if I could take delivery in 20 minutes - too right I can  :lol:

So now I have a nice big heap (20 tons or there abouts) of what look to be nice and fine road planings - only problem, Darren is busy until at least Wednesday  :bang:

Still they are at least here now  :thumbup:
« Last Edit: October 01, 2017, 12:17:42 PM by awemawson »
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex

Offline Pete.

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #323 on: October 01, 2017, 11:33:35 AM »
Have you still got the vibro-roller there to roll that lot in? Should make a great standing if it's packed down hard.

Offline awemawson

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Re: New Tractor Shed
« Reply #324 on: October 01, 2017, 12:15:42 PM »
Yes we have Darren's twin ride on one and my single roller walk behind one  :thumbup:
Andrew Mawson
East Sussex