Situated in Perthshire, Earn Railway Bridge is situated in low-lying land and is prone to severe flooding. A major refurbishment programme of the bridge was carried out in the summer of 2007. This refurbishment included strengthening the existing steel-arched bridge sections, by installing 28 tonnes of new tubular steel sections and carrying out a wide range of weld repairs.
Millar Callaghan carried out a full survey of the existing steelwork to allow, not only new steel sections to be fabricated from heavy steel tubes, but also to identify any existing defects in the structure. While our workshop went into full fabrication and rolling of the new tubular sections to match the existing arc of the bridge, our inspectors and welders were removing and replacing existing welds and cracks on the bridge.
When the new steelwork had been completed and all welds had been MPI or UT tested, the steelwork was hot metal sprayed before it was painted to full Network Rail specification.
During the day, new holes were marked and drilled on to the existing arched steelwork. To allow the new steelwork to be installed without disrupting the rail service, most of the installation work had to be carried out at night using a rail mounted crane which was located on the railway lines.
On completion of the contract, a full quality package was handed to the client containing full traceability for all consumables, materials, NDT inspections and paint film thicknesses.
