To date, much of the work, apart from the ironwork, has been carried by a trusty band of volunteers. Now the serious work begins to address the restoration of the Red Lion slip and the Old Quay parapet. With the succesful nomination of Cornish Granite Supplies to source, cut and dress the granite, the Red Lion slip is ready for the for delivery of cut stone on Monday, 17th November.
Uncut granite boulders in stock
Raw granite boulders ready for cutting into slices.
Wire boulder cutter
The huge wire saw slices the granite boulders into long slices.
Circular saw
The slices are cut by circular saw into regular size for the setts
Laser guided
The circular saw cuts automatically, guided by the lazer light.
Cut setts
Once cut to size the setts are ready to be ‘aged’.
Surfacing work
Each sett is ‘torched’ to create a rough surface to ensure that the skip is walkable in wet weather.
Dressing the setts
Each settis then dressed by hand, on the surcae and round each facing edge.
The Red Lion slip viewed from Fore Street. Work on this section will see the installation of the granite setts. South West Water have been and tested the outfalls that run onder the line of granite quoins to ensure the source of adit drainage and outfall.
Owners of the dinghys and canoes need to remove them by Monday at the latest! See this notice from the harbour office.
Concurrently, work on the Old Quay itself will shortly begin now that the scaffolding has been erected. This will mainly consist of re-pointing using lime mortar to and above the inner parapet wall. Much care is being taken to preserve the layers of tar and pitch that cover some of the granite used in the parapet from centuries of maintaining the old wooden lugger fleet – wherepitcha dtar were used to protect and preserve the wooden hulls and decks.
Nathan and Callum from Sedgemans were back on the case last week, erecting scaffolding running the entire length of the Old Quay parapet wall. This will allow easy access for the lime mortar team to get on re-pointing the top and sides of the parapet.
