Friday, August 2, 2013

That's a big tank!

Our last two water tanks arrived this morning, bright and early at half past seven - all the way from Warrnambool!

I've been quite impressed with this tank supplier - Bushman's - especially their control of logistics. I've had three calls from them in the past week - one last week to tee up the delivery for today, then two calls yesterday to discuss the specifics of our site and how to get here. I let them know about our track and how narrow it is (especially for a long truck as it winds through the bush) and the despatch manager suggested they'd send a truck only, so there'd be no problems with the track.

Unfortunately, this is what turned up...


The truck and trailer combination is about the length of a B-double - long - but the driver reckons he'd have no trouble with the winding track. The only problem is that he can't get onto it - the trailer is just too low to even make it onto our property from the road.

Plan B it is, then.


The first 10,000L tank was easy - I carried that one all the way to the top of the hill on the bobcat forks, with the tank strapped to the cage, no trouble at all.

This 30,000L tank however is more difficult. I got as far as our gate like this (with the bobcat teetering on its front wheels; the tank weighs about 450kg!) but the tank is just too wide to get through the gate sideways.

We tried turning it around 90ยบ and carrying it that way, but I just couldn't get enough leverage to get it off the ground.

What was Plan C again?

Plan C, as it turns out, is to roll the tank up the hill! Thankfully, Nenad and his first-day electrical apprentice arrived in the nick of time and gave a hand to roll it the ~150m or so up the track to the top of the hill. I'm very glad they arrived when they did; otherwise we would have had to nudge it along with the bobcat which would have probably done a little more damage to the tank.

In any case, we now have all the tanks on site, ready for Savva to hook up later today!

No comments:

Post a Comment