Our small Carbon Paste Plant (site) model 5' x5' , built to plan the new office building, new 558 building, and some new gallery layouts. 

When the new Carbon Paste 558 building was planned by Alcan, building the model of it, was a huge project, that took us well over a year to complete.   It was started in our Richmond workshop, by building the main structure of "sandblasted" Plexiglas strips, representing the steel structure.   About 8 feet long by 7 foot high, as I remember.   All major bins, hoppers and some machinery were built and installed in our shop, before moving the complete operation to Downtown Vancouver, for  Stage   2.

Stage 2 was to move everything to Monenco Consultants  in downtown Vancouver, where it was installed in their drafting office.  Adding the piping and cable trays was the next job, and as the drawings were fed daily to us from their draftsmen, our crew of 5 model builders, fabricated and installed it, into the main model.   In this way the draftsmen could come and measure available space in the scale model, and then design the piping etc accordingly.  If we had a problem installing it, we would consult the draftsmen, and he would make the necessary changes, to make it work.   

Back at our workshop in Richmond, another team of model builders were constructing models of the equipment, bins, and hoppers etc., which were shipped down to Vancouver each morning, to be installed in the model.    

Model completed, the next job was to ship it to Kitimat, for installation in the new 558 building control room, to assist the engineers in the installation of machinery, piping and the like., as well as a staff training tool.

Unfortunately, not a very successful road trip, the model was very badly damaged in transit, and within no time at all, myself, and 4 of our staff were on the plane to Kitimat.  Cannot remember exactly, but I think it took us close to a month, working 7 days a week, about 8 to 10 hours a day, to get the model back to it's original condition, in time for the scheduled opening date of the new Carbon Paste 558 building. 

 Our first sight of the damaged model when we arrived in Kitimat

Trying to stay serious, which was difficult with my friend Simon in the rear.   He's not looking too productive here....... but we all worked so very hard to complete this project on time.   It was certainly no Holiday !

Barry trying to stay awake on one of the many very late nights.  

difficult to know exactly where to start, but getting it back in shape was a real priority, in order for it to be of use to the Alcan engineers, who were under pressure to get their paste building on line as fast as possible.

  Barry and Fred at work in the model repair room.

Weather conditions in Kitimat at that time of the year made traveling about difficult.  Mark Sampson, the other member of our model repair crew, and myself at the Kitimat site.