This weekend sees Eadon Consulting celebrate its 7th birthday. Over the past 7 years the company have seen huge growth and have worked hard to build a solid reputation and team to be proud of. To mark the occasion we take a look back over our 7 most memorable projects – as voted for by Eadon’s engineers.

Lower Hatea Bascule Bridge

The Hatea River crossing, which is also known as Te Matau a Pohe, is a rolling bascule bridge which was launched with the aim of helping to ease congestion within the city of Whangarei, Northland, New Zealand. The multi award winning bridge, which amongst several articles also features in a screen advert, is the only operational one of its kind in New Zealand and one of a very few for road traffic in the world. Eadon assisted the main contractors with the design of operating equipment and mechanical elements.

Leadenhall Escape Hatch

The Leadenhall Escape Hatch was designed to conceal a fire escape route from the basement level of the iconic Leadenhall building into a 30m tall ground floor atrium. Eadon Consulting carried out the design of the bespoke, London based project which encompassed many elements. The hatch lifts in the event of a fire to allow the use of the staircase underneath and is opened by a pair of hydraulic cylinders. The route also incorporates a handrail mechanism, the design of which was particularly challenging

Margate Scenic Railway

Eadon Consulting carried out the design of a timber bogie used as an integral part of the rolling stock for the refurbished Scenic Railway at Margate Dreamland. The scenic railway, which is the oldest roller-coaster in the country, was burnt down in 2008 and was subsequently restored as part of a wider £18 million project. Eadon looked at the reconditioned drive shafts of the rope haulage mechanism and also assisted with the design and analysis of several bogie types for the new trains.

Great Belt Gantries

Similar to other projects we had been involved with, Eadon Consulting were employed to carry out the design of Cable Crawler gantries for the Great Belt Bridge in Denmark, the third largest suspension bridge in the world. The Cable Crawler gantries, which act as working platforms that straddle the main cable of a suspension bridge, can crawl up the cables from bridge deck level all the way to the top of the main towers some 254m above sea level.

ROV Garage

Eadon Consulting completed the detailed structural design calculations and full fabrication drawings for a Garage Type ROV tether management system. This all stainless steel garage is used to deploy Forum Energy Technologies XLX Work Class ROV and is required to operate in severe offshore conditions. The garage underwent successful testing both in the factory and offshore during sea trials.

Merchant Square Bridge

Famous for its fan shaped appearance, Merchant Square Bridge is a pedestrian crossing at Paddington Basin. Planned as part of the Paddington Waterside development, the bridge forms part of a commercial, residential and leisure quarter in the heart of the City of Westminster. Eadon became involved in the project when they were approached to take part in a design completion in early 2012. Working with Knight Architects and AKTII, a design was submitted as part of a design competition and was subsequently successful. Eadon were tasked with producing the detailed mechanical design supported by exemplar electrical and hydraulic specifications.

Grimsby Booms

Eadon Consulting were approached to carry out design work for 3 restraint booms that would make up part of a floating pontoon system in Grimsby. The steel booms, which each weights around 43 tonnes and is 34 metres in length, were designed to anchor the 2400 m2 pontoon in place and are articulated at both ends to allow for tidal movement. They also feature a lightweight walkway to allow for access to the dolphins, which act as fixing structures for the whole pontoon.  The large range of articulation required, severe fatigue environment and the need to provide safe access conspired to present a tough but rewarding engineering challenge.