A restoration team at a historic Derbyshire Victorian gasworks is on track to complete an important part of its major renovation programme, with help from nearby neighbours JCB.
Engineers and apprentices from JCB World Headquarters, at Rocester and other JCB factories, have recreated vital parts of the Sudbury Gasworks engineering centrepiece – with the first phase now installed at the village centre site.
Sudbury Gasworks Restoration Trust trustee Brice Bozier, who is also an engineer at JCB, has been working with a team of engineers and eight apprentices to recreate a special metal frame which held the ovens used in the gas production process.
A JCB Loadall telescopic handler has lifted the frame into place and now apprentices are busy working on crafting doors, pipes and a furnace hatch to complete the project, ready for the grand unveiling of the Gasworks on May 20th.
The original Victorian mechanism dating back to 1874 was a feat of engineering, introducing coal into a brick oven, capturing natural gas that the baked coal released and then piping it to nearby Sudbury Hall and village homes.
Brice Brozier, Electronics and Controls Engineer at JCB, said: This is a vast project which requires a lot of specialist knowledge and skills and it is fantastic that JCB has really got behind the project. Our engineers have used CAD technology to create blueprints of the gasworks’ machinery and now the designs have been brought to life by the apprentices who have crafted the retort frame. Involving the apprentices is really a win-win situation for us and for JCB – the apprentices get hands-on experience of design and engineering, while the Trust is able to take a step closer to our goal of creating a living history museum and community venue.”
Anyone interested in supporting the restoration is invited to a Volunteer Recruitment Day on March 25. To find out more visit www.sudburygasworks.com.
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