brian a Holt it was built as a testobject. The problem they found was that the rubber tires of the "train" would slip in damp conditions. i have no idea when jt closed
it was a rather daft idea, actually. Pushing several hundred tons of water up the slope with massive friction of the "shield" against the concrete meant that a massive 2,000 horsepower was needed to raise a boat through ten metres at the rate of about one centimetre a second. That makes for a fuel consumption of about 150 litres of diesel per upward lift (less for downhill) in order to save 45 minutes going through the locks. It was bound to be unsustainable in the long run. A far more sensible idea would have been to have two moveable basins (like giant bathtubs, going up and down simultaneously. That would have required about 1/100th of the power because of the counterbalance, and it would not have been susceptible to the breakdowns.
Tim made me come here
What kind of locomotives did this use to be?
Any idea what year it close and why?
Is it closed? I didn't know about that. Filmed this when I was passing this in 2007 and have never been back after that.
Yes we visited last month and it looks to have been closed sometime. Yours was the only video I could find of it working still.
brian a Holt it was built as a testobject. The problem they found was that the rubber tires of the "train" would slip in damp conditions. i have no idea when jt closed
it closed in 2009 due to engine failure and too expensive to maintain.
it was a rather daft idea, actually. Pushing several hundred tons of water up the slope with massive friction of the "shield" against the concrete meant that a massive 2,000 horsepower was needed to raise a boat through ten metres at the rate of about one centimetre a second. That makes for a fuel consumption of about 150 litres of diesel per upward lift (less for downhill) in order to save 45 minutes going through the locks. It was bound to be unsustainable in the long run. A far more sensible idea would have been to have two moveable basins (like giant bathtubs, going up and down simultaneously. That would have required about 1/100th of the power because of the counterbalance, and it would not have been susceptible to the breakdowns.