OPERATIONS are expected to resume within a matter of weeks at the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo) Uitvlugt Estate factory, West Coast Demerara.

Works are currently being done to replace the factory’s damaged #1 mill turbine gearbox, which failed some 29 days ago. It brought works at the facility to come to a screeching halt.

According to Estate Manager, Yudhisthira Mana, the fabrication of the two parts vital to the operations of the facility is coming to a close with one part being received late last night and the second part just past the 60 per cent complete mark.

“The part that was damaged in the factory is one that is over 50 years old. It is one that normally don’t be on ordering and safe keep because it’s rarely been damaged, and so to say just have one on standby to replace, we don’t normally have that,” he said.

Mana noted that to even source a unit for the machine, Nexus Engineering had to do “reverse engineering” because there was no technical blueprint that could have been used to replace the part of the 50-year-old machine.

“As we speak, we would have seen both parts of the gear that is under repair, one is about 60 per cent completed, and the other one we just got through last night to build it. Since the part failed, GuySuCo engineers and Nexus Engineering Company, we are all working together 24 hours a day to get it right,” Mana told the Guyana Chronicle.

He disclosed that even as operations at the estate remain halted, decisions were taken to ensure that those persons who were affected by the disruption can still earn from the estate.

“We at GuySuCo, we care for our workers, so while this was going on, everybody within the system we were offering some sort of work, so they can earn a bit; at least five days’ work we were offering them so it’s not a case where they were totally out but some would have been opting to do it and some opting not to do it,” he said.