Some project take a long while!

A like more than three and a half years ago I designed the primary sign for Skallywag Bay adventure Park. I designed he routing files a short time later but it would be another year before we started to build two copies of the sign. That process was chronicled here.

We routed he hulls of the ships from multiple layers of 2″ thick 30 lb Precision Board.
These were glued together and hen we sculpted the details onto the two copies of the ship.

Two and a half years ago the two signs, along with hundreds of other features were carefully packed into eighteen shipping containers and then shipped through the Panama Canal to Trinidad.
Yesterday, one of these signs  was the last piece to be carefully lifted into it’s final home.

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.

More signs at Skallywag Bay

There were a whole lot of signs which we did for Skallywag Bay in Trinidad and I’e been itching to get them installed for quite some time. During my last visit to the site we got almost all of the larger pieces placed around the site. We did it using a 60′ zoom boom which is a very handy machine. I have my forklift licence for our little machine at the shop but the larger machine was a whole new experience! The key is to go slow and easy. Every move is amplified when the boom is fully extended and to reach these pieces we did just that most of the time.

The sign posts will have heavy rope work installed at a later point by someone who knows how to braid the rope and tie the proper knots.

The soil will be put into the planters around the base of the signs and the greenery will soften the look and make the signs blend better into the picture.

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.

Piece by pieceS

It is pure magic as we install the scores of features at Skallywag Bay in Trinidad. It’s been four years since we started building the fourteen shipping containers full of features. We packed the last of them into the containers more than two years ago. Now at last it is time to install everything. Today was the day to assemble two of the attraction signs. Being too tall to fit out of the shop door we built and shipped them in sections. Today was the first time we’ve seen them put together. They are every bit as we imagined they would be and will look even better when he gardens are planted!

Every piece lifted beautifully which was amazing as we could only estimate where the lift points needed to be as we fabricated the pieces. Everything fit together perfectly as well… a testament to our team’s engineering and fabrication skills.
Some of the pieces we fabricated were shipped as parts for final assemblies. These logo skull brackets were plasma cut from 1/2″ thick steel plate for each side of the posts in the train station and entrance building.They looked great welded into place!
Stay tuned for more pictures tomorrow!

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.

Assembly in Trinidad

It’s been a busy week as I headed south from the EnRoute Summit in Salt Lake City rather than heading home. In Trinidad the work on Skallywag Bay Adventure Park is continuing, with the permanent placement of the features now beginning on a large scale. It is ratifying to be doing that job after almost four years since the project began in earnest. I was in Trinidad for four days this time and great progress was made.

We shipped eighteen 40′ shipping containers to Trinidad more than a year ago. We then had to wait for the construction there to catch up to our reconstruction. Now, at last we can permanently place most of the features where they go and assemble all of the pieces, most often for the very first time. Our shop has limited ceiling height and because of this and the shipping constraints ship them in segments. This meant we were seeing the finished features for the very first time.

The trickiest installation was the arms of the Kraken. Tolerances were tight as each long arm was carefully slid into position.

The statue of Captain Skallywag was assembled in the centre of the courtyard.
The Pirate horse was the most fragile of the pieces and I breathed a sigh of relief when the lift was done without incident.
I mapped out the location of the features and also the bigger elements like the right of way for the railway. It will travel between the two halves of this shipwreck.
Most of the features we moved this time were for the adventure golf. The ‘Gruffles’, (the characters who populate this land’ live in some very creative buildings made from plundered and found objects. This house was fashioned from an upside down boat named ‘TURTLE’.

It sure was good to see the features assembled!

The largest and heaviest piece, the pirate’s ship had been placed in the unfinished pool to locate it accurately. The 12,000 lb boat was gently lifted out one last time before they finish the concrete in the pool.

While we worked elsewhere on site the concrete crew was sweating in the pool as they poured the walls and floor. The next time I am there the plinth for the ship should be done and we can locate the ship and install the ramps leading onto it.

Once my consulting and direction was done I headed home. As work ramps up in the park I’ll be returning more often. The lofty goal is to be done before the Christmas season.

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.

A long time coming!

Four years ago we started an exciting project. It’s a theme park in Trinidad called Skallywag Bay Adventure Park. Three of the rides in the park were to be built in Italy. They are off the shelf rides which we mildly customized to fit the theme of the park.

One of the rides is a spinning coaster called “Pieces of Eight”. The track is a figure eight which loops over itself. We picked custom colours and enlarged one of the loops so we could locate a spinning tower drop ride inside. We also designed some custom cars for the coaster. In order to keep costs in check we could not change the size of the car, change the seats nor the mechanics of the car. I did some concept art up to show them what we wanted.

We also routed up a master of the Piece of Eight medallion we wanted placed on the side of the coaster. This master was cut on our router from 30 lb Precision Board.
As they built the prototype of the car they sent us photos which we would mark up with notes. After some back and forth we signed off on the design and they built the coaster.  When they finished it the ride was assembled and tested before they packed it up into a shipping container and sent it on to Trinidad.
Construction of projects in Trinidad takes a little longer than we are used to in our part of the world and so the ride sat in the container for the better part of two years while the infrastructure f the park was built. This past week it was finally time to pull the ride from the containers and begin assembly.
It was with great delight I finally pulled off the wraps to get a first hand look at the ride we had designed so long ago.

The ride wasn’t quite assembled when I left but things were coming along nicely. Soon I’ll get my test ride!

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.