WEEK 6 - Day 23 Scaffolding and Labelling

Graham Sykes of William Anelay Ltd taking photographs inside Stove House 5 surrounded by the rising forest of scaffold poles.

Close up photographs of the upper roof trusses will be possible when the upper scaffold lifts and the working platforms are completed.

The scaffold platforms will enable us to walk within the roof space to record and label all the timbers of the roof.
The asbestos removal team will be able to reach the cement asbestos roof panels through the openings created by the removal of the plastic covered roof lights. This has be carried out carefully to avoid breaking the panels. They will be removed and bagged for controlled disposal. This work will start next week.











The vertical studding of the west end gable revealed carpenters marks pencilled onto the timbers. 'A1' is the first vertical timber of the gable end truss. Two pencil marks indicate where the first horizontal beam meets the truss.


The fifth vertical timber is pencil marked '5'.
Our numbering system was labelled up on our cad drawing last year, and prefixes each timber with a code letter and a sequential number. We also started at the south side of the west gable - so this vertical timber of Stove House 5 now has the label SH5 VT5.

Our labels are written in permanent ink on a plastic paper, securely fixed to each timber with coloured tie grips. Each truss will have a different coloured tie grip so that it can be easily be identified and located with the timber store.

You will see the racking and storage system in the timber store when the truses are taken down.

WEEK 6 - Day 22 Views from the Scaffolding

As we prepare to start the dismantling works in Stove House 5 here are some views of the surrounding area from the vantage point of our scaffolding at the top of Stove House 5.

Looking north at Marston Flashes, created in 1928 by the collapse of the Adelaide Rock salt Mine. Lion Salt Works pumped brine into the Brine Tank from brine streams 150 feet below ground. The Adelaide Works mined rock salt from a Bottom bed of rock salt at 300ft.
The Trent and Mersey Canal passes along the front of the Lion Salt Works and was used to bring coal to the works, mainly from collieries in the Stoke-on-Trent area of North Staffordshire
In 1888 the Manchester Guardian described this area as a 'black country' with baked earth and sulphurous black smoke polluting the atmosphere where no trees or grass could grow.


Looking south the distant tower of St Helens Church, Witton can be seen. Between Marston and Witton there were rock salt mines which collapsed causing the road to be diverted. The collapsed mines were used as land fill sites for lime waste from the local chemical works. Ashtons and Neumans Flashes are now landscaped as a Community Woodland with footpaths and cycle ways. This is a great area for bird watching with many wading species and exotics such as black swans, egrets, grebes and last year black legged stilts.


To the south west you can see the chemical works of Brunner Mond which uses brine and salt to make soda ash and sodium bicarbonate. The works is at Winnington, but looks out over the Anderton Lift, which connects the Trent and Mersey Canal to the River weaver. the Lion Salt Works shipped salt by narrow boat along the canal to transfer salt to waiting barges where it was sailed to Liverpool Docks for export overseas.



web links to follow

WEEK 6 - Day 21 Timber Store Completed

We left the site on Thursday of last week with the temporary timber store starting to be erected. On the Friday and Saturday the construction team completed the main erection, leaving only the roller shutter doors and internal lighting to be installed today. Work can start today dismantling Stove House 5.

The scaffolding has been completed around the outside of the building giving access to the external boards at each of the gable ends.
After horrible weather over the week end we have a calm and sunny start to the day, but the forcast for the week is for showers and rain.
The ground surface between the store and Stove House 5 will be cleaned and covered in a membrane and stone giving a firm and clean surface to work from.
The scaffolding is being inserted within Stove House 5 to provide a safe working platform from which to begin dismantling the roof trusses. The work wiill commence on Monday 7 September with the removal of the asbestos sheeting that covers the roof.

This work will be captured on our time lapse camera and posted here and on Youtube.

The removal of the external cladding boards from eth east and west gables was completed today, and scaffoldong was started inside the Stove House rising through the warehouse floor. This will support working platforms below the roof structures and around the trusses from which we will dismantle the timber frame. Watch the work at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSvI97QibJo