I also had a look inside the neighbour's tunnel. It is roughly the same construction but the ceiling is quite a bit lower. Whilst it's drier, it's also quite badly corroded, all the way through the steel, in some places (see second picture).
The neighbour said that a "bunker hunter" had once pitched up and told him of rumours that the tunnels in this area all interlinked! The back of his has collasped under rockfall, so who knows! Man, people love a good underground tunnel rumour!
It also has the same wiring setup along the side of the sheeting, which the neighbour had always thought was some kind of comms wiring. In my mind this suggests that the wiring in both is original, and not a later post-war addition.
Finally, a night vision video that Dave edited from inside the tunnel (sorry gamers, no Wolfenstein to be seen) ! We still haven't started clearing yet, as I promised that I'd try not to start moving stuff around until certain people have had a look.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rc3HEAabo90
3 comments:
The oxidation of the bucket contents from green to orange would suggest that your tunnel was pretty well sealed, with low oxygen levels for much of the past 60+ years. This has probably saved it from the deterioration seen in your neighbours tunnel. The last thing you want is for it to get damp and the newly exposed steel to rust away in the next 12 months. Have you resealed the entrance to protect it from the bad weather and damp air?
My thoughts too, David. The inside is slightly damp, caused in part by condensation since I opened it.
I'm aiming to sandblast the surface rust from the steel, and then treat it with a protective seal, and probably then spray the whole lot with some sort of closed cell hard foam. I also want to get a vent open so that air can circulate.
The surface rust is fairly thick and this in itself is holding moisture, but i'm told that you can get over a centimetre of surface rust growth from each millimetre of steel.
I'm almost as excited to learn what you do with the tunnel as I am to see what nazi secrets it turns up. A private bunker system is a dream of mine. You never know when the next extinction event might occur.
Let's hope there are no complicated flying/sunken(?) freehold issues if the tunnels turn out to to be joined up to a shared underground complex. :)
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