 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
Haven't written much lately because nothing much has been happening. My crew has been split up and I am back to the stairs at T3 on Monday. As of this writing I am going to take Aaron Bray, Beto Santillian and Eric Jackson with me to the stairs. Going back to the stairs is great. (it's inside and winter is upon us) We have 2 or 3 weeks left at T3 then on to T2 I guess. That should keep us busy until Jan or Feb. A little about the stairs. Since the towers are poured-in-place concrete, all the stair iron is attached with wedge anchors. And because there is no room in the tower the stairs have to be built from the top down! We are using a 6' Spyder scaffold with 2 Spyder motors (like window washers use). To hoist the pieces up in the tower we have a 2 ton air tugger mounted outside the tower door. We lay out and drill all the holes for the wedge anchors and then start at the top on the north side and install all the outside landing support channels. The we move the scaffold over a couple of feet and put in the inside channel and the grating for each landing. Next we move to the south side and start the process all over. When we are done on the south side all the landings are in. We have to install the landings from the top down too. Now all that is left is to put in the stringers. Move the scaffold to the center of the tower and take it up. The stringers are sent up on the tugger line and mounted between the landings that are already installed. Works pretty good.
We have some very good Ironworkers on this job. There are the Spinola brothers, John on T3 and Joe on T2. Each ran a crew during the spinning and are involved now with setting the cable bands. Working with John is Steve Maricich, a guy known for his quiet demeanor - NOT ---But a great guy and a good ironworker too. Bob Russel is working with Joe He had John Pendleton working with him and we all know what happened to him.
I have been experiencing technical difficulties that have prevented me updating the web page. Sorry bout that!
OK, here is what is going on right now. After the main cables were finished, work started on the cable bands. These are
two piece cast steel saddles that wrap around the main cable and are held together by high strength bolts. They are
used to act as saddles for the suspender cables and to position them along the main cable. This was quite a process
as the cable bands are several hundred pounds apiece. The bolts (at least 1 3/4") were tightened with a hydraulic wrench
that required a pump using 440 volts. The hauling line was used to carry the bands out onto the mainspan. The hauling
line is a 5/8 cable attached to a big electric winch on the pier of the T3 that goes up the tower to a snatch block then
out over the main cable to the top of T2 into another snatch block then down the tower to another electric winch on the pier
of T2. This, of course, means that to make the cable move you need someone to run the winches on both towers. One pays out
while the other pays in. We attach the car to the hauling line then start the process and away goes the band down the
mainspan. On the sidespan we use the "jigback" winch. This is an electric winch with two drums on the same shaft. Only
one drum at a time is powered, while the other is braked with a hand brake. A 5/8 endless cable is attached to one drum, up
the sidespan, across the top of the tower, down the other sidespan and attached to theothere drum. That way you can pay in
with one drum and let the other drum out slowly with the brake and anything attached to the cable goes with it. When you
want to go the other way you switch over the drums and away you go.
Eddy Myer's crew on T3 Mainspan (Justin Smith, Gil Martinez, Kenny Miller, Javiar, Carlos and JP), Jeff McCuen's crew at T3 Sidespan Joe Spinola's crew on T2 are installing the suspender cables. These are the vertical cables that attach to the bridge deck sections. They are about 2" in diameter and there are 2 of them to each cable band. This uses the hauling line and jigback line just like the cable bands. Since they are starting at the low point (mid-mainspan)they are starting with the shortest ones.
I talked to John Spinola the other day, and he said his crew was in the process of lowering the footbridge by letting out the cables that hold them up. I don't know how much they are going to lower them, but it can't be more than 2 or 3 feet. I asked "Why are you lowering the footbridge??". He explained - When the bridge deck sections are raised into place, the weight (they weigh between 400 and 600 tons apiece) will deflect the main cables down. The footbridge is underneath and separate from the main cable so it will be in the way when the main cables deflect. I never thought of that!
Don Vick and his crew (Dave Davidson, Scott Seymour and Quentin Blevens --- there may be more but I am sure of these guys) are at the yard on Mare Island building thetrolleyy frames that will span the width of the bridge and sit on the main cables. These frames will be used to house the strand jack system that will lift the bridge deck sections from the ship. They will be able to travel along the cables to hoist all the sections across the straits and on the side span too.
I am holed up in the towers at T3 so it's possible I have some of the crews wrong and of course I am sure I have missed quite a few.
So much for what everyone else has been doing. My crew (Dan Quillere and Devin Scott) are installing three platforms in the west leg of T3.
Guess I have been a little bit lazy about updating this page. A lot has happened in the last month, so I'll fill you in. If you go to the picture page you will see some pictures of the cable bands and suspender cables installed. During the holidays some guys took some time before the road decks get here. Of course I was not one of them. I have never been one to take off work much. I went to Vegas with my wife in July that should hold me for awhile. Dan Quillere took a couple weeks to go to Vegas for the holidays so that left Devin and me to hold down the fort. One less hand slows down the process.
There are a few handrails that don't line up in the stairs on T3. We started fixing them but got shut down by CalTrans because there is no WeldProceduree set up for welding pipe on the job. Dan and I showed them that we can fix the problems so that they are as good,if not better, than the shop, but of course that is not good enough. My new boss, Dave Gill, has the welding engineer working on getting us a WeldProceduree.
On Friday 1/10/03 had one of the strangest incidents I have ever had in 25 years in the business. We were in the shack on the pier of T3 at about 7:15am on a very cold and foggy day. Dan said something like "Who is that?", so I looked out to see a young man talking to Pat Meehan. He had no hat, a wet sweat suit and torn socks with no shoes. I told him it was not safe for him to be here on the pier and that I would escort him to the top. As we walked off the pier it became clear he was very disoriented and very cold. With that I took him into the shack and gave him a pair of boots that have been in the shack for a year. Everyone on the pier helped get this guy dressed with the abandoned clothes laying around in the shack. After talking a bit to him I got his name. He insisted on being called Tom Sawyer, but admitted it was not his real name. I asked if he liked drugs but it became clear he was very limited intellectually. He said he had been on the pier all night. After warming him up a bit so he would stop shivering, I took him up the stairs to the office. On the way I called Roy who called Duwayne Bahnson, the safety man for the company. By the time I got to the office the paramedics were on their way and got there about 10 minutes later. Vallejo police also responded as well as an ambulance to transport "Tom". He was very cooperativee the whole time. Kind of a bizarre way to start the day. I never heard another word about Tom, but he seemed to be in good hand when he left in the ambulance.
A little later Dan, Devin and I went over to T2 to start the stairs. Delbert the elevator operator pointed out a very green substance pouring out of the drainage pipe near the base of the 1927 bridge. You can see a picture here. After this photo was taken the sheriff, fish and game, and fire department arrived to investigate. When we got off, they had heard about the pictures from Delbert (who had also taken a couple) and asked to see them. They were testing the water and thought it might be some kind of dye. But they said it definitely was not antifreeze like it appeared. You can judge for your self. (UPDATE: After a few days Del heard that the county says the green stuff was dye used by the water district to test the pipes)
A walking skate is a "square u" shaped heavy plate frameapproximatelyy 7 ft long, 2 1/2 ft wide and 2 ft high. Inside the frame are threehydraulicc rams with large round feet to push against the ground to pick up the load. Once the load is lifted the load is pulled in the direction of travel and the u shaped frame slides over the three rams. The rams then retract and the frames lands on the ground over the rams, supporting the load. The rams are then lifted and they slide forword under the frame. They are then lowered and pick up the frame and the load. This process is repeated until the load is in place.
I have used the trapeze system of laterally moving a suspended load before, of course, but never with this much weight. It works like this. The deck will be lifted with the 4 strand jacks and when they reach a predetermined height, they will stop. Twopennantss (stands with apennantsat each end) will be attached to decks near the strand jacks at the north end of the deck. They will be raised off the deck and attached to the main cable at the same distance to the north of the north strand jacks as the north strand jacks are from the south strand jacks. Two more pennents will be attached to decks near the south strand jacks. They will be attached to the cable bands that the north strand jacks are attached to. This will, of course mean that all four pennents are at an angle. The strand jacks then lower the deck until the pennents get tight. As the deck continues down the deck will start to swing to the south as the pennents take the weight. When the pennents have all the weight, the deck will be directly under them and will have moved to the south.
