Rock Nook Mill, Summit (Littleboro)

Visited by Ojay, Stepping Lightly & Bungle666.

Rock Nook Mill, situated in the upper Roch valley on the edge of the Pennines and alongside the Rochdale Canal.

Not massive amounts of history that I have been able to gleen in a short space of time, but here is what I have managed to find out.

Built in the 1840's and aquired by Forthergill and Harvey in 1910, as a cotton yarn and cloth manufacturer Rock Nook Mill is an odd looking stone building and quite unique in appearance as far as cotton mills are concerned.The Mill has 4 floors, and a basement which is still in use, as the other side of the mill which was extended in 1898 is very much 'Live' and in use, as it was when we visited.

In 1987 the business was bought out by Courtaulds, and since occupied by Tygaflor Ltd, producers of lino flooring. The mill now stands empty and has been stripped by the pikey's and looks like a more recent haunt for the local bagheads (lovely). That said the place is trashed to be fair, however there were one or two interesting features.

Once inside we started from the top down, I was soon up in the water tower with S.L. before I carried on the climb up to see the Braithwaite tank, whilst Bungle went for a wander around the 4th floor.

After a short while we all met back up and carried on our mooch of the place, stopping for pictures on the way....

EXTERNALS

INTERNALS

Inside the Water Tower

Braithwaite Tank

Various floors

Office window

Laboratory, Pfft this was really pathetic

ChemicalZ

Machinery lift to all floors

World domination; This is Stepping Lightly's secret headquarters

Is this Lift Surfing?

Down to the Engine Room, and Rope Race, sadly no boilers or steam engines left

Lovely tiles

Rochdale Canal; Locks alongside the Mill

Er, whats all this, I can't climb down?

Oh well, better take a closer look....

Thanks for looking

Barnes Convalescent Hospital, Cheadle

Visited By Ojay & Thompski.

Building started in 1871 and was completed in 1875, constructed entirely of local brick and situated in the rural setting of Cheadle.

The main building is Grade II listed, and although originally a hospital for wounded soldiers during WW2, was mainly used for geriatric care. The doors finally closed in 1999. It was eventually sold in 2001 to Reality Estates and rumoured that the main building will be converted into flats with the rest of the land occupying houses and more flats.

The irony is that 'Reality' bites and due to the recent slump in the housing market, yet another Manchester site remains untouched and likely to be for some time despite what others may say!

Having spent the last 2 weeks underground, it was decided that we would do some overground stuff, infact TBH I had already done a few visits earlier in the week, so was more than happy to oblige when Thompski fancied a mooch... As usual we had no plan and it was soon decided that we head on over to Barnes to see how the development of luxury homes was progressing.....PFFT! I think Reality homes may have dropped a big bollock, having said that the £10 Million price tag is pocket money considering how much they will reap once the economy picks up.

We didn't have much time, so it was a case of in, few photos and off to the next venue. In any case this place has been done to death so no point in endless repetitive photo's which we seem to keep seeing of late.

Externals

Internals

Red Barn Drain

Visited By Ojay & Stepping Lightly.

This has been on the list for a while now, but with one thing and another it's just ended up on a back-burner until lately.

So one pissing down evening what better to do than pop into some drains?

This has to be one of the more interesting drains I have visited lately, in terms of construction it appears a right bodged job, with varying shapes and sizes of crumbling brickwork, concrete and stone. On the way out S.L. pointed out one huge crack along the section underneath the main road; collapse seems innevitable at some point. All in all it was a reet old interesting mooch.

As the place kept changing shape along the way, so did the formations and various mineral deposits. In parts very stoopy and others more than stand-up-able.

The larger 'Egg shaped' section upstream is VERY SLIPPY and provided ongoing drain0r comedy as we took it in turns to slide around the gaff!

Anyway on with the pics, I give you Red Barn.......

The Outfall

2100 RBP, Upstream

and easily walkable for some distance

before we reached this larger brick chamber with surface water feeding into the system

One of the Manhole chambers along the way. (Note these are counter sunk and double manholed under a field with the top sections flooded & bolted).

Carrying on upstream the RBP begins to shrink to around 1500

before joining this short section of RCP (Even more of a shrinker)

and then emerging into this super stoopy weird brick shaped section for around 300 yards.... A real back breaker.

where suddenly it joined up with this much larger 'Egg shaped' brick tunnel.

Stepping Lightly, doing a bit of pointing

Another 200 yards of sliding around on un-safe brickwork and a serious failing of the rucksack we arrived at this stone section, which was in my opinion the most interesting and best part of the drain

Eventually the drain shrinks to a 3 foot RCP at the end of the stone section, to which marked the end of the mooch.

Thanks for looking