Meall Nan Tarmachan

NN53NE 39 58483 36983 (From NN 57422 37374 to NN 59970 38928).

The remains of this aerial cableway can be traced for more than 3.5km across the SE shoulder of Meall nan Tarmachan. It was used to transport stone from the quarry at the mouth of Coire Fionn Lairige (NN53NE 38) to the Lawers Dam (NN63NW 28), during the construction of the Breadalbane Hydro-Electric Scheme in the early 1950s.

The W end of the cableway lay immediately S of the quarry, where an inclined plane, solidly built of rubble reinforced with iron rails (BL00 986; NN 57422 37374), drops steeply downhill from a levelled loading platform towards a line of concrete piers, about 40m to the SSE. From these piers (BL00 990), which may have supported both the cable pylons and the winding machinery, the cableway turned sharply to the ESE, striking across broken moorland for about 1.1km to NN 58483 36983, where an arc of concrete plinths set with threaded bolts (BL00 1429) marks the point at which the route swung to the NE, continuing across the moorland for over 2.4km and ending at NN 59970 38928, about 200m short of the dam.

The line of the cableway is indicated by at least 29 rectangular pylon stances, two lengths of excavated trench and several heaps and spreads of stone. In most cases the stances are spaced at intervals ranging from 40m to 150m, but where the line crosses broad burn gullies they are up to about 200m apart. A few gaps are wider still (up to 358m), but in those instances it is likely that one or more stances have been destroyed. At each end of the route, and at the point where the line turned to the NE, the stances are constructed of reinforced concrete, from which protrude the threaded bolts that secured the pylons. Between these points (which are the only points accessible by vehicle) the stances have a more rudimentary construction, each comprising a frame of timber sleepers filled with earth and rubble. In some cases the sleepers still hold the bolts that secured the pylons. The two trenches (BL00 684-5) lie towards the NE end of the cableway, as the route descends the hillside to the S of the dam. Each of them measures about 60m in length and each appears to have been cut as an expedient to allow the cableway to negotiate a slight rise in the terrain. Finally, the spreads of stone appear to be the result of spillage from buckets along the route; they are particularly concentrated at and immediately after the point where the route turns NE.

Debris from the cableway is scattered across the hillside, especially on the E-facing slope towards the NE end of the route, where lengths of iron rail or fragments of pylon (including pulley wheels and iron ladders) are scattered as much as 500m off-line. Attempts appear to have been made to bury the equipment after dismantling it - at NN 59148 37816, for example, a pit, capped with rubble, contains pieces of iron, metal plates, insulators and other debris (BL00 1205). The best-preserved pylon, however, lies at NN 59081 37757, beside its timber stance (BL00 1201) and immediately E of the footpath to the summit of Meall nan Tarmachan. The pylon is in two pieces (BL00 1200, 1202). The main section lies in an open shallow pit to the SE of the stance, and measures 7.6m in length and 2.1m square in section at its base, tapering to 0.22m square at the top, which is fitted with a T-shaped bracket. The gantry or cross piece, which would have been attached to the bracket, and would have held the pulley wheels, lies on the other side of the stance and measures 2.3m in length. The pulley wheels are missing, but examples lying elsewhere on the hill (e.g. BL00 597, at NN59627 38226) show that each wheel assemblage comprised an A-frame, 3.3m in length, holding four wheels each measuring 0.7m in diameter.

(BL00 589, 597, 612-3, 615-7, 619-24, 664, 680-94, 986, 989-99, 1200-7, 1217, 1231, 1235, 1239-42, 1410, 1418, 1420-3, 1427-30, 1495-6, 1498-9)

Visited by RCAHMS (ATW, AGCH) May and October 2000