Station Rd Replacements

Onto the 4th November, and we're really into the trees now...

There is an Alpha 1 in there, somewhere!

I opened the column door, and was greeted with a pleasant surprise - this column had been entirely refitted in 2002, by someone with 'JPS' as their initials - now, I wonder who that could be...

The sling was fitted to the new column, as before. Notice the combination of large branches and overhead telephone wires - this removal was going to be fun...

The column had to be manoeuvred very carefully around these obstructions so as not to cause any damage. At least it was only 8 m - imagine what it would be like if someone tried to fit a 10 m! Hang on, that's what was going to happen:

And finally, the column is vertical!

I then realised that I hadn't taken any pictures of a column being wired up, so the following few pictures show how this is undertaken in a modern column:

Firstly, the cut-out is screwed to the backboard.

The column itself is then earthed from the cut-out.

As the service cable is CNE (Combined Neutral and Earth), the lantern's earth and neutral cables are wrapped together and fitted to the neutral terminal in the cut-out.

The lantern's live cable is then fitted.

Finally, the fuse carrier is fitted and the circuit is complete. Hopefully, the lantern should then momentarily activate, before the cell works out whether the light needs to remain lit or not.