Bunker Conveyors

Provenance

Camera: NIKON D7000
Lens: 24.0-70.0 mm f/2.8
Settings: 24mm · f/8.0 · 13s · ISO 100
Paper: Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm

Derelict bunker conveyors stretch through the cavernous interior of Wangi Power Station. Rust coats the heavy machinery, now silent after years of transporting coal. Their immense scale fills the abandoned industrial space.

Edition

Open edition

Open edition
Printed to order, no fixed quantity. Each print is hand-signed by the photographer.

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A fixed number of prints exist. Once sold, the edition closes permanently. Each print is individually numbered and signed.

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Signed, numbered, with COA. Made to order in 10 to 20 business days (framed). Shipped in protective packaging with edition certificate, paper-stock reference and a printed care guide.

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In situ

01 PROVENANCE

Print datasheet

Title: Bunker Conveyors
Series: Wangi Power Station
Catalogue: WPS-020
Process: Giclée
Captured: 27 November 2015
Camera: NIKON D7000
Lens: 24.0-70.0 mm f/2.8
Aperture: f/8.0
Shutter: 13s s
ISO: 100
Focal length: 24 mm
Paper: Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm
Paper size: 290 × 200 mm
Location: Wangi Wangi, New South Wales, Australia
Authenticity: C2PA verified provenance →
Recognised by: Highly Commended in Multimedia at the 2016 National Trust of Australia (NSW) Heritage Awards

02 LOCATION

Wangi Wangi, New South Wales, Australia

Map · Mapbox · OpenStreetMap

03 THE STORY

About this print

The bunker conveyors at Wangi Power Station sit at the top of the boiler house, the system that fed pulverised coal from the storage bunkers down into the burner level of the B Station boilers below. The conveyors are enclosed belt assemblies in steel-cased housings, each running from a bunker outlet to a feed point above one of the three B Station boilers. The drive heads sit on fabricated steel frames, the motors mounted on rubber pads to absorb vibration. The belt itself has been removed from the runs in this photograph; the housings, the drives, and the take-up tensioners remain. Light comes through clerestory openings in the upper roof above the conveyors.

The bunker-conveyor system carried pulverised coal continuously to the B Station boilers while the plant was operating. Coal arrived at the receival yard by rail or truck, passed through the weighing system, was milled to a powder in the B Station mill alley, and then climbed via these conveyors to the bunkers above each boiler. From the bunkers, the burner-feed conveyors carried the powder down into the boilers themselves. The B Station boilers ran from commissioning between 1958 and August 1960 to closure on 31 October 1986. The conveyor system stopped on that day and has not run since.

04 FROM THE FIELD NOTES

A narrow corridor stretches deep between steel bunker walls. Tripper cars sit locked on parallel guide rails, their heavy frames coated in coal dust and surface rust. Overhead, industrial pendant lights hang from timber-lined ceiling beams. The right wall carries a row of mechanical levers, evenly spaced. Grit covers the walkway between the tracks. The air in here would taste like iron and old carbon.

Brett Patman

The series

Wangi Power Station

51 photographs

About a thousand men built Wangi Power Station, on the western shore of Lake Macquarie. They were Hunter Valley locals and post-war Italian migrants, many living in a tent city on the lakeshore through the build. By 1957 they'd put up the main building, 228 metres long and eleven storeys high in triple-brick over a riveted steel frame, with three 76-metre concrete chimneys behind it.

View all in this series →

05 SIZE GUIDE

Print sizes

The anatomy view shows what this finish is as a physical object: paper margin, mat band, frame depth, acrylic profile. The comparison strip shows how each size sits relative to the others at true scale. Click a size or a finish to update both.