Lateral Thinking Pays Off
The River Till is a modest river which plays a major role in Lincoln’s flood defence strategy. At times of high water levels sluices can be opened at the main control site, inundating a designated flood plain to the north of the river so minimising flood risks to the town.
Once the risk has passed, water is pumped back into the Till. This water naturally brings with it debris from the flood plain which, allowed to build up on the weed screen, would reduce the efficiency of the pumps.
Since the site was inaugurated in 1988, weed clearance has relied on a team of up to 4 men manually hauling a heavy rake up the 5 metre weed screen, a physically demanding task in anyone’s book. The Environment Agency decided that such practises were no longer acceptable and approached UK manufacturer C W Engineering for an automated solution.
The elevated location of the pump complex posed its own challenges regarding the dump area. The installation of a standard in line weed screen cleaner would have called for major civil engineering work including 6m piles and extensive reinforcement of the lorry access to the dump area.
This problem required lateral thinking!
A site appraisal with C W Engineering working closely with the EA’s MEICA Engineers developed a cost effective design that would remove the need for ground works on the Bank Edge. The solution would be a 90 degree L shaped system delivering the debris to a convenient collection point with easy lorry access. The resulting innovative design has been inaugurated and is running smoothly to plan.
The weedscreen cleaner was fully tested, mechanically and electrically, at the factory before installation and Jim Fowler, Technical Specialist MEICA Dept of Environment Agency was impressed when each leg base plate lined up precisely with the anchor bolts installed by CW Engineering, this allowed the structure to be installed within 1 day. May Gurney completed the ‘civils’ under instruction from C W. These included concrete foundations for the weed screen cleaner and the new dump area. C W Engineering was also responsible for electrics: field wiring and control panel design and installation plus preparation of CDM historic drawings and documentation.
Initially the system will be ‘exercised’ once a week for 12 months to thoroughly prove the system, then just once a month. Since 1988 the pumps have operated for just 400 hours but any future threats will be met with greater efficiency… and a lot less back ache.
Dickie Dye said “We offer extremely good value for money especially as the only English manufacturer of weedscreen cleaning machines. This project has allowed CW Engineering to demonstrate the flexibility and skill levels which we have achieved through many years of water course management work. We can now cover all stages from concept drawing, mechanical manufacture, electrical field wiring and panel design and manufacture and excel in one of the most important areas: after sales service.”
