Chux wrote:
you do realise that you are going to have to repaint that machinery in Martini livery if you're putting in that shed don't you Tricky?

Oh god, dont say that!!
Updates, why yes...
This is about five days old, but I thought it would be easier to just keep things in chronological order and bring you up to date. Had a huge week last week, and reached a few miletones - and I have to say a huge and heartfelt thanks to a few people for their help -->
>Mrs Treloar - my gorgeous, talented, hard working and suppremely supportive wife gave me a hand throughout the week when she could, and without her, I could not have come this far - thank you my love for everything!
>Cameron (Cazmo) - came to the rescue with a nice bit of 10mm steel plate for the crane, well done mate and thanks!!
So milestones - the power finally went on Wednesday, and the wife was instrumental in helping me pull cabls through etc. No more leads!! But, I then decided that I didnt like the sheet metal panelling (old roller door sheet) that I had used to mount the sub-board (in reality, I did it prematurely so that Chris the floor guy could do his stuff). So, I decided that it had to match the rest of the shed. So, disconnected the board, pulled out all the cables, bought some more MDF sheet and cut it to size and fitted it up:
Then, fitted it off again, and voila, lights and power:
The cable entry points will end up having a cover over them from 2.5mm alloy treadplate just for a bit of mechanical protection:
Friday the forklift showed up. Now I could move the machines from the top shed, down into the bottom shed. But, it turned out to be a comedy of errors. The forklift continually got bogged up behind the house. So, hook up the trailer, went up to the local landscape suppliers, and got a metre of roadbase. Then spent the next two hours shovelling the suff and levelling it out (broke the handle on the rake) to make a platform. The forklift still dug in so I put down all the spare sheet metal from the shed (roller door portector). This folded up like a tin can under the weight. Scrap MDF from the shed panelling worked as long as I kept the speed up. After every run I compacted it down with the X-Trail - it took all day!!
But finally, by days end, the machines were in their new home:
At the end of the day though, with no load on it, went to turn it around behind the house and ran off the end of the concrete near the washing line - irrevocably bogged to the floorboards. I just left it there overnight and tackled it the next day. The X-Trail did not budge it, so had to get the neighbours front-end loader/tractor (lucky we live on acreage!) over to help lift it out. The ground was just water-logged clay, so no wonder - clean up in aisle 6!!
Installed the crane up on the mezzanine. Thanks to Cam for providing the base-plate for the crane. There are 10x 16mm bolts holding the base-plate and crane to the mezzanine joists. Once it was up and installed, I swung on it, not a creak or groan, solid!! Just need a battery up there now and power for the battery conditioner. Even though the photo doesnt show it, it is in the pefect location and can articulate up and down and rotate through 360 deg. without hitting anything:
So now, I have lights and power, and could test the hoist etc. Painted the panelling to match the existing yesterday:
I knocked up and installed a little bit of joinery for somewhere to put the cordless phone, coffee/tea for clients and my mobile phone etc. Key hanger-up thingy for clients and shed keys:
Moved all the rest of the gear into place - finally have enough room to use the english wheel and to use my stuff without interference:
Also, the first of the suppliers sent some promo material. The colours are almost made for each other:
And finally, at the end of the day, moved in some tenants (of the non-permanent kind I hope!). Leonidas is still under the covers but El Gato is taking pride of place, and loving his new, airy, light and spacious home. Thanks once again to my lovely wife for helping me push him up the driveway and into his new home.
So today, its tackling the benches in the old shed. I did have designs of simply lifting them out with the forklift, however I built them in situ to suit each position and they will have to be fully disassembled, transported, modiied and then re-assemnbled in their new location. Time consuming, but its the only way!!
Also had a visitor last week, Cam came and had a sticky, thanks mate for taking the time to come over and say g'day. Thats three visitors so far - impressed!! More later and thanks guys for taking an interest.
Cheers,
Tricky