TBM on the Move

Our Dame Whina Cooper tunnel boring machine (TBM) continues to make its way home to the Mt Eden site with the team working on moving the shield this month.  

The six-piece TBM shield is in the process of being dismantled, lifted, and transported back to the Mt Eden site at night. It's at Mt Eden that the machine will undergo maintenance, be reassembled and readied to begin its second 1.6-kilometre journey to Aotea Station again.

Last month, we covered the impressive lifting of the 78-tonne cutterhead. This month, the team transported the front shield from the Aotea Station construction site, located in the heart of midtown, to Mt Eden overnight.

In the 10 second video you can see the 145-tonne front shield being transported by a truck with a 104-wheeled trailer and a second truck supporting it from behind. We moved it overnight to reduce the possible impact on traffic in Auckland and will do the same with the remaining pieces over the coming weeks.

In the video (above) you can see the TBM arriving at the Mt Eden site.

At about five seconds the station’s ‘overpass structure’ is visible in the foreground. The overpass structure will eventually carry pedestrians from the station's platform to the future North Auckland Line (NAL, also known as the Western Line) platform.

The Mt Eden team are working 24/7, carefully pulling back the gantries through the first tunnel to realign them behind the cutterhead for the second drive. In the photo (above) you can see the back of the gantries near the entrance of the Mt Eden portal. The 130-metre underground factory will be pulled across the Mt Eden site where the team will begin the process of reattaching it to the front shield and lining it up with the new tunnel entrance.

We look forward to sharing more updates as we get closer to the second drive launch.