From Stanton to Stanley Pontlarge, the quest continues

Monday 16 September

Not quite the last day at Stanton, but it's getting very close. Counselling is being sought to help with the emotional impact of moving out of our welfare cabin with its tea and coffee supplies. Monday saw Alastair, Dave and Nigel doing some finishing off and tidying up jobs. The outer wall on the downside had the concrete backfill added and the new gully drain was finished off. 

Dave and Nigel load  more concreting ballast
(Photo: Alastair) 

Dave tamping the concrete behind the outside wall
(Photo: Alastair) 

Layer of scalpings covering the new gully drain run
(Photo: Alastair) 

Then the clear up got into full swing 

Nigel and Dave take away the 600 mm pipe chopped off the inlet
(Photo: Alastair) 

Spare bricks taken up to the yard
(Photo: Alastiar) 

Thursday 19 September

Complete change of scene today, down to Stanley Pontlarge to investigate why Culvert 28A is flooding our neighbour's field when it rains. We discovered a problem down stream under the main road back in 2016. The road culvert has collapsed and it hasn't been repaired yet. That didn't explain why water was flowing out of the ground upstream of the nearest inspection chamber though.   

While on site, the vegetation was cleared. 

Culvert 28A down side before 

Culvert 28A after Andrew has visited 

Dave cutting the grass off the downstream chamber
(Photo: Alastair) 

Once the grass was cleared the hole where the water was escaping was dog out, it led to an underground run, the CCTV was used to see how far that went. 

Michael uncovers the chamber lid while Stuart checks the direction
of the underground watercourse
(Photo: Alastair) 

Underground watercourse 

The camera can save a lot of digging, we tracked the watercourse back to a tree and then it goes downhill. 

While this was going on, Dave did some more clearance along the fence line. 

Dave with the flail
(Photo: Alastair) 

An attempt was made to CCTV the inlet pipe in the chamber, it failed as there was too much silt. 

CCTV captures the attention 

As luck would have it, we had brought the gully grabs, that meant we could clear out the chamber. The 6' grab needs some teamwork as the emptying takes some long arms or someone else on that end. 

Teamwork, Dave fills the grab, Andrew lifts it out and Michael empties it 

Truck loaded with spoil from the chamber 

Clearing only took us to below the 4th step 

As a temporary measure we added some concrete rings to raise the level with the intention of making it easier on our next visit. 

Teamwork again with 80 Kg of concrete ring
(Photo: Alastair) 

The down side inlet chamber is in much the same state as it was on our t last visit, 

Down side inlet chamber
(Photo: Dave) 

The cause of the flooding looks to be a joint between a 300 mm and 450 mm pipe just upstream of the chamber. the water is backing up from the collapse under the road and taking the least line of resistance to escape.  

Culvert 28A upstream pipe join 

The downstream pipe has another join just beyond the chamber, this is from 450mm plastic to 6" salt glazed (SGW) pipe. Added to this is a silt build up in the downstream pipe, again due to the road culvert.  

Culvert 28A up side, downstream pipe 

The spoil removed was recycled along to Culvert 33B to landscape the upstream chamber that we build almost a year ago. It seems strange coming back to see Dixton Hill as it was the backdrop for a lot of the work last year. 

Dixton Hill in the sunshine 

Culvert 33B down side chamber 

Spoil transfer 

The truckload doesn't seem to make much difference 

Culvert 28A, 3 rings added to bring it up to ground level 

Culvert 28A, lids added 

Next phase of the Culvert 28A job will be to get an excavator in so that the pipes can be repaired and the joins made watertight, then get a jetter to flush the silt out. 

Last stop for today was a reconnaissance visit to Culvert 24A at the Royal Oak, Gretton. The plan is for a major rebuild on this and Culvert 24B to reinstate the down side headwalls and make the up side safe by piping the flow to the fence. 

Dave and Andrew looking for blackberries 

Culvert 24A up side 

The clearance contractor has flailed the area along from Working Lane, this has exposed a counterfort drain with a leaning retaining or head wall. This looks like another task to add to the list of jobs while we're in this area. 

Strange bit of wall uncovered