Falkirk Wheel

What happens when you want to transport your canal boat from the Forth and Clyde Canal to the Union Canal, but realise that there is a 35 metre height difference? The usual thing to do would be to build some locks and this is what we used to have here - 11 locks!! But it used to take all day to get your boat up or down and by the 1930s, these locks had fallen into disrepair, severing the connection between the two waterways.

A new way was needed to restore the link between the canals and this fabulous feat of engineering is the Falkirk Wheel.

Let's get straight into the interesting bit of how it works. The wheel has 2 gondolas at the top and bottom and ideally you would load a canal boat in each. Each gondola weighs a whopping 500 tonnes and works on a simple yet brilliant principle of physics - Archimedes' principle of displacement. This is where the boat will displace its mass in water, so always keeping them the same weight.

Have a butchers at it in action first with this 13 second time lapse video.

Pretty neat, huh?

You drive your boat in, moor it up and then little doors will move up, locking the water in place within each gondola. Then a press of button in the control room and the wheel starts turning.

Because you have 500 tonnes coming down, it will help push the 500 tonnes going up so it requires very little energy. In fact a single transport takes the same power as boiling eight kettles!

Then you simply unmoor your boat, wait for the doors to open and you're on your way. From entering the gondola at one end and leaving at the other is probably around ten minutes rather than a full day with the locks.

Then you head along the aqueduct and through the 180 metre long Rough Castle Tunnel which passes beneath the Antonine Wall, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The Falkirk Wheel actually only lifts the boats by 24 metres, but as we mentioned, the Union Canal sits 35 metres higher than the Forth and Clyde Canal, so you do have to traverse a couple of additional locks to get right to the top.

Now the great thing is that you don't need to have your own canal boat to have a go on the Falkirk Wheel. There are daily tours taking you up, through the tunnel and then back down again with lots of information from the captain. Head over to the Falkirk Wheel website to book your spot.

The two boats are suitably called Archimedes and Antonine.

Archimedes - Named after the ancient Greek mathematician and engineer Archimedes of Syracuse, whose principle of buoyancy and displacement is fundamental to the operation of the Falkirk Wheel.

Antonine - Named after the Antonine Wall, a Roman frontier built in the 2nd century AD where the boats will pass under through the Rough Castle Tunnel.

The Falkirk Wheel was designed by a team including engineers from British Waterways and architects from RMJM. Its striking, futuristic appearance was inspired by a double-headed Celtic axe, with smooth, curved lines that give it a pretty distinctive aesthetic.

It was fully constructed and assembled at the Butterley Engineering plant in Derbyshire, before being dismantled and transported to Falkirk in 35 lorry loads. Upon arrival, it was reassembled on-site into five sections, which were then lifted into place.

The Falkirk Wheel was designed as part of the Millennium Link project, a major initiative to restore Scotland's canal network. The boat lift was officially opened by Queen Elizabeth II on 24 May 2002

It's a fabulous contraption and you can wander around the complex and watch the wheel in action. You can also walk up to the top of the aqueduct and through the tunnel too.