Making a big gate

[Shawn Pixley]

I need to step up my game I guess. I saw this on the "How do they do it?" show on the Science Channel.

Not complicated but impressive due to sheer size. I would have thought they'd be constructed of metal by now.


Not really neander these days but impressive nonetheless.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=tD5wtd36NHc

[Jim Koepke]

I would love to have their cut offs. Could make some nice honking mallets out of that.

This might work better as a link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tD5wtd36NHc

jtk

[Shawn Pixley]

Thanks for updating the link. I post from a tablet, and forget that that might be sub-optimal for others. The actual show showed more and also the gates in operation on the canal locks (8' drop).

[Winton Applegate]

Thanks for posting that. I had a great time watching it. Welding and everything !

The crane / truck is called a hyderlift. (actually probably hydrOlift but they said it “hyderlift”) Not sure about the spelling but I grew up around them. There were always several in “The Yard” down at the place my Dad went to work. A heavy construction company. My Dad was a Steam Fitter for them. On Saturdays I used to go with him. He would yack in the office for what seemed like days and I would clamber around on all the locked down equipment in the yard and look for cool treasure in the gravel in the yard and in the gravel inside the multi story supply sheds. Just bits of cast off metal junk but it was treasure to me. It was a wonder I never fell and broke my arm or something all the “dangerous” places I got into. Not even a scratch as I remember. I must have been six no more than eight.

I loved it in the scene where the mortising machine operator was practically shoveling chips out of the huge mortises.

[Chris Hachet]

That was awesome!

BTW, think of the Roubo you could build with THAT timber....

[Shawn Pixley]

That mortising machine was a beast. Consider when the lock gates were frst made they were cutting those by hand.

"Daddy, what did you do all day?" "I'm beat. I cut two mortises."

I love these things. I have never had the opportunity to build a heavy timber building. I designed a couple, but no actual fitting of the wood. I would really like to build a Japanese timber building.

When I was last in Kyoto Japan, we visited a shrine that had two major structures. One was open but the other was under renovation/construction. These buidings were probably 35K sf floor plates. The contractor built a temporary building around and over the temple under construction. The workers could then work sheletered to the elements but with enough space to fabricate the new timbers. The Japanese often build these buildings in a way that the structure can have elements replaced without destroying the surrounding elements.