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By the time Her majesty the Queen visited Scotland earlier
this year to officiate at the opening of the Falkirk Wheel - the world's first
rotating boat lift, work had already begun in Sheffield on the construction of a
second wheel. As work began, engineers and contractors were hopeful that they
would be able to complete the second wheel in a matter of weeks as opposed to
the five years of planning and two year construction schedule required at
Falkirk.
The project schedule for the second wheel would at first sight
appear extremely optimistic. Even allowing for the fact that all the engineering
design work had already been done and proven itself in Falkirk, all the
components still had to be manufactured and assembled in record time.
Alan Bullock, managing director of the appointed contractors
1-Off Engineers, was always confident that his company could hit the completion
deadline and commented; "… it was a great help to be working with Bennett
Associates who produced the designs for the original Falkirk Wheel. The fact
that our "Sheffield Wheel" was only one fiftieth the size of the Falkirk
original didn't necessarily make the task any easier. We still needed to
manufacture to extremely fine tolerances and at the end of the day we had to
deliver a Wheel that worked, was reliable and was also on time and within
budget. We were given a deadline for Bennett's first exhibition of the year and
managed to complete the project in about 10 weeks."
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