Just inside the initial entrance

rather tidy walling appears to be preventing a collapse

This ones a bit of a squeeze

It was at this point that we got all excited..... we stumbled across 'things'.. remnants of previous mining process, these became the focal point for several of my pictures


Remains of an old bogey


The difference between 2 levels


Bit of a moody shot into a right hand passageway


Another squeeze and clamber

Another arty shot of my focal piece


And finally a blur of our 2 intrepid explorers

Hartford Mill, Engine House, Boiler Room & Chimney - Visited By Ojay & Hidden Shadow.

Built 1907 by the Hartford Mill (Oldham) Co Ltd. The Architect was F W Dixon, there were 120,000 spindles and power was provided by a very impressive 1500 hp Urmson & Thompson engine which was powered by the mighty Lancashire Boilers.

Having visited this mill numerous times over the years, I have never managed seem to get close enough to the old Lancashire Boilers.

The last time I went back to take photos of the Boiler Room, Engine House & Rope Race and was actually sealed in whilst inside.

It's now become a standing joke with [/Bnugle] as each time someone visits this place we get the "FFS, You didn't get any pictures of the Boilers?".

And he has ribbed me for far too long for being to lazy to get back and get some shots :D

So [/Bnugle] this threads dedicated to you, but joking aside there are very few examples of Lancashire Boilers left now in the Northwest, regardless of condition.

I met up with Hidden Shadow as he had managed to forget he had a holiday booked off work and turned up in favour of exploring :rolleyes:

That sorted we headed off for a mooch about, and called in at Hartford Mill along the way.

Now, I'm beginning to think that HS is some kind of bad omen when it comes to exploring derelict sites, as each time he goes somewhere, the Pikey's are ever present.


FACT: We had a previous encounter at DH Mallalieu's earlier in the year, and more recently he came across an axe wielding pikey at Borough Mill :eek:

Today was no exception, as we made our way to the engine house, there were 3 blokes climbing out of the Boiler House, they even had the nerve to ask us what we were doing FFS! One of them was carrying a clipboard and trying to act all official, but I think the Fosters T-shirt gave that one away!

"I fucking hate Pikey's"

They soon f@@ked off as we climbed into the Engine House, his parting comment was "It's dangerous in there" - "No Shit Dickhead".

We took a quick look around the Engine House first, only to discover the pikey's have now stole all the railings and gatry's from the roperace...

Next up was the Boiler Room, I spent a good 10 minutes taking pictures in here whilst HS basked in the sun.

After I had finished I went for a quick mooch about the back of Boiler No.2, I managed to squeeze through a small hole and now appeared to be in the Flue.

I was a bit of a stoop for 6ft but eventually I could stand up again. Ahead I could here a strange noise and the was an eerie breeze blowing through. As I turned to the left I saw a big shaft of light, Bloody hell this is incredible, I was now stood inside the chimney. I stood in amazement for a couple of minutes before going back to inform HS of my findings.

We both headed back and I took a couple of shots before leaving.


In your Mills...


Pictures Of Engine House - Taken on previous visit





Lancashire Boilers, since been converted to store Oil, hence the Asbestos lagging covering them













Inside the Boiler Room



Flue



Inside the chimney








Thanks for looking :thumbs

The Cunard Building was the third building to be constructed at the Pier Head on the site of the former George's Dock. Located between Brunswick Street and Water Street the plot was acquired by the Cunard Steamship Company in 1914 as a site for the company's headquarters.

Construction of the building continued through World War I with completion in 1917. The freize around the upper part of the building is carved with shields of WWI allied countries.

Built in the Italian Renaissance style the building is constructed of reinforced concrete clad in Portland Stone with an Italian marble clad corridor on the ground floor. Marble from the same Italian quarry being obtained in recent years to refurbish the building's lift cars.

The building is now owned by The Merseyside Pension Fund with accommodation let to a variety of business and government tenants as well as providing conference facilities which are available for hire. However, much maritime memorabilia remains whilst the building accommodates around 1200 employees. Whilst the building was in the ownership of the Cunard Steam Ship Company, the ground floor provided public facilities including booking offices and waiting facilities for first class passengers.


easily got to be one of the best things ive seen/explored in liverpool to date this place was a pure mini museum with letters of correspondence to the queen,shipping logs,safe keys etc etc far to many to mention...this place had it all and not to mention the war bunkers ,that just topped it...and of course a little look up on the roof

visited with kevsy21





first place we came to was this long corridor the basement store rooms now used to store documents for the different companies that use the building.
right through the middle lies a concreted over narrow gauge railway track this was used to move heating coal and passenger baggage from entrance hatches on the Strand.



at the bottom and through a set of double doors lies a side door,inside lies part of the remainig george's dock wall (this is facing the strand side of the building) the white stuff is sea salt residue



just near to this also is the remains of the first class passenger access only the stairs remain the rest was covered up



multi faith prayer rooms,this was located just before the secure vault room



next the secure vault rooms ,this room was used to store passengers baggage that was of some value



the best part for me was this..a vault containing various items from when the building was in use as the cunards headquaters..what was inside was simply unbelievable...what a cracking lot they were



wow wtf kev get in here and see this..a desk in the middle of the room had a seal stamper and ship key box with various items in,also at the other end letters in a tray recovered dating from 1936 and a shipping log in the middle



shipping log



this was inside the ship key box on the table,a letter with an original cunard seal on it



letters in the tray on the desk (moran towing & transportation co ltd new york)



film reel couldnt work out what this was for



various ship keys line a rack on the wall from cunard ships



other stuff recovered,various paintings,and letters relating to queen mary



other paintings and also various letters and tickets and luggage notes.....it would take days to read through all the stuff in this room



ohh and not forgetting a bar of cunard soap...this was something i didnt expext to see it was quite a surprise



various books also recovered...a few books to mention were municipal buildings preston (foundations and drains) 1930
also walker art gallery quantities and dimensions volume 1+2 mainly all architecture books



leaving the vault room behind we headed for the luggage storage rooms











various ruggage racks with different ship name labels still attached to them..various liner documents now rest in these racks

Mumps Bridge Demolition, Oldham.



Oldham's iconic landmark bridge over the Mumps roundabout has been demolished to make way for a new Metrolink terminus.

Constructed in 1860, and standing proud at Mumps roundabout in Oldham, Mumps Bridge proclaims that the town was where the tubular bandage was invented in 1961. Oldham’s small, but invaluable contribution to medical science came as the result of a partnership between local firm Seton and a cotton manufacturer in the town.

Since then, the tubular bandage has become common place in hospitals and doctors’ surgeries across the world. The advert across the bridge has always been a much-loved local landmark.

It was a bridge too far, as history was made over the bank holiday weekend as a massive operation was underway to dismantle the bridge, with a huge 1000 tonne crane to lift sections of the bridge out of place.

Earlier last week preparation work began before the 150 year old bridge was dismantled.

I took the opportunity to climb up during the daytime whilst I still had the chance. This proved tricky due to the amount of workers on site, however I still managed to get a few shots without getting busted.

On Friday evening Bnugle kindly picked me up after he'd finsished work so we could watch the mother of all cranes being setup.

No less, A 1000 Tonne Liebherr LTM 11000 DS, which I belive is one of the largest mobile cranes in europe and at a hire cost of £40,000 per day this was going to be an interesting evening.

The mobile section had not long setup when we arrived, the rest was waiting on several specialist articulated vehicles and was constructed over the next few hours.

Having watched the crane being erected, we decided to call it a day.

The next morning I headed on down on my own as Bungle was working. I managed to watch them cut out the'deck'of the bridge and prepare the sides ready for the final demolition.

By this point the local media & press were all over the place as I managed to setup camp once again for the next few hours.

Just as they removed the final piece of deck, the heavens opened, so I jumped in the car and headed home for a while.

Later in the evening Bungle was on his tea break, so I met up with him back on site whilst they prepared to remove the sides of the bridge in this final stage of demolition.

After much cutting the bridge was still in place and sadly Bungle had to get back to work before he had chance to see them remove the first side.

Even more cutting later, there was loud applause as the workmen retreated and the crane revved up ready to lift out the first remaining section of bridge.

1000 Tonnes and a few minutes later only the Left hand side was moving LOL. It was quickly lowered back as the workmen returned for yet more cutting...

Another repeat of the above step and the bridge still wasn't for moving, maybe this was a sign :rolleyes:

Even more cutting and a good 15 minutes later the mighty crane revved once more, this time the bridge lifted with ease, it was a strange sight having travelled both under & over it many times during the years, and one which I will never forget.

I managed to capture the following Images of the demolition, and also a link to a time-lapse recording of the entire weekend.


Chop chop.....


Built in 1860



I climbed up on the bridge on the Thursday to get some final shots of the bridge & loopline





Looking up from the road



We watched the crane being put together on Friday evening until the early hours





Jib arrives



Jib being fitted to crane



Bungle hadn't had a chance to climb up onto the bridge, so I suggested we go, despite the amount of workers around, we still managed some cheeky shots








The next morning I went back to get some more shots


Liebherr LTM 11000 DS



With the crane fully built, the workmen had already cut, chopped & removed the decking from the bridge, here they remove the final piece





The final section of decking is lifted out,



and chopped up



Preperations are made for the final sections to be cut free and lifted out by the mighty crane



The final cut is made



before the first section is lifted out



and placed on the ground for chopping up



It was strange seeing the bridge no more, especially being an integral part of the towns infrastructure for 150 years and an iconic landmark.

FINALLY - A TIME LAPSED RECORDING OF THE DEMOLITION

> C L I C K - H E R E <


Thanks for looking :thumbs

After having nothing to do at home and not much to skate Myself, Sui & OneByOne all jumped in one car and headed to Liverpool.

After some fairly effortless climbing we managed to get high enough up to get some decent photographs, shortly after the first rooftop OneByOne reached the ripe old age of 20...

History:

Yorkshire House – Built in 1926 and recently having a £2million refurbishment spent on the building it was originally the Yorkshire building society but had been empty for a number of years. It now houses 25,000sq ft of office space over seven floors with additional underground parking.

Oriel Chambers – Designed by Peter Ellis and built in 1864 the grade 1 listed building was the world’s first metal framed glass curtain walled building. With its large windows it was often named "an agglomeration of great glass bubbles" and "a great abortion" which lead to the architect Peter Ellis to only design one other building. Bruntwood now own the building with contains 3,000sq ft of office space which they purchased for just over £5million.





















We all agreed that we haven’t really seen the city from the commercial district so it made a good change.

Thanks for Looking, Gone...

Origin Crane, Manchester - Present Ojay, Millhouse & Doc-P.

Occupying one of Manchesters prime development sites the Origin cranes stand tall above the city.



I have passed the site many times, looking up and debating whether I should climb one of these beasts.

Tonight was that night. The area was bustling with piss heads & party goers, and as we stared up at the cranes one last time we new we would have to be quick as both cranes are in full view within the busiest part of Manchester.

The crane we chose, was the largest of the 2, a Wolffkran 100B Tower Crane with an underhook height of 63.8M (210ft).

Once in the site, we didn't hang around, straight up without stopping. We didn't appear to have been spotted on the way up either.

A short time later we were up, the views were stunning. We took a few minutes taking it all in before we grabbed our cameras for some shots.

Within 5 minutes a Police van had pulled up and then continued to circle around the majority of the time we were up there, turns out they hadn't seen us and paranoia was kicking in :eek:

It was quite chilled, watching the City buzzing below our feet, you could easily spend hours up here.

We grabbed a few shots and decided to get back down and out of the site as quickly as possible, not outstaying our welcome so to speak.

As we got about halfway down, I looked across and there was some guy stood at the back of a long line of Taxis on Whitworth St. staring right at us, we carried on down, and when I next looked there were now a few other taxi drivers stood watching us LOL.

"Fuck it, keep going and GTFO".

That we did, within minutes we were down & out of the site, heading back accross the City.


Some photos....




















Shouts to Millhouse & Doc-P for a memorable climb, so glad I finally got my arse up there, I'm sure the guys will agree :thumbs