STEAM ENGINES AND WATERWHEELS

[Stanley]

One of the stock jokes about engine tenters was that their choice of coal was governed by how well it burned on the fire at home! There used to be a lot of choice, the various pits competed with each other. Famous seam round here was the Arley seam in the Burnley coal field. The rumour was that this was what was burned in the royal palaces.... The best coal I ever had was during the three day week when we got a load that should have gone to Bankfield, it was Sutton Manor (LINK) it was a lovely clean sample that burned like candle ends with very little smoke and ash. Our usual coal was Brodsworth from Yorkshire but in the latter days we were put on open cast. Despite this it wasn't bad stuff. The grade of all of them was 'washed singles'.

[Stanley]

I watched a terribly badly researched programme lauding the advantages of diesel engines and stating that they took hours to get running at the start of a day's work. In the case of stationary engines, total rubbish. Properly managed I could start Bancroft engine well inside ten minutes in a morning if necessary. The only oil engines I ever saw powering textile mills were the one at County Brook installed by Brown and Pickles and the one at Glasshouses Mill, Pately Bridge, to augment the water turbine.



The traces of the site of the oil engine at Glasshouses Mill....

[Whyperion]

From memory most steam pumping engines would take around half to two hours to get up to efficient running, which is about the same for road and rail locomotives. I wonder if steam engines are actually better running 24/7 when possible, to avoid thermal expansion/contraction in boilers and running gear ?

[Stanley]

The governing factor in starting is whether the boiler is up to pressure and the engine kept up to temperature. In terms of longevity boilers suffer most from quick steam raising or big intermittent demands (Like a brewery heating large vats of liquid). Big changes in pressure stress the metal, that's why an boiler on engine duty is so long-lived, always kept at the same pressure even overnight if it's a Lancashire that has been banked.

[Stanley]

I found myself giving this reply in another topic where it didn't really fit. It was a response to Ian's question asking for clarification of some of the aspects of steam versus diesel as a prime mover in different applications particularly in textile mills.


Ian. it's horses for courses. It all depends on the application the prime mover is intended for and the resources needed for repair/maintenance. Put very simply, diesel wins hands down versus steam for road transport because it is easier to get ready for duty from cold and steam locomotives are very inefficient thermally because they have no condensers. I don't know the comparative figures but would guess that in efficiency terms alone, a diesel could be twice as good as steam. The same applies to rail.
Marine diesels are more attractive for propulsion because once adequate manufacturing and maintenance facilities were established to cope with the higher standards needed to make and maintain them they took up less room in the vessel because the boiler space became available for cargo. In terms of thermal efficiency the advantage will not be so great because the last steam driven ships were reasonably efficient, especially the very modern steam turbine vessels.
Large land based stationary engines are a different kettle of fish. Apart from their great mechanical advantage that they deliver full torque on the first stroke, obviating the need for any clutches or gearing, once 20th century standards of manufacture and efficient valve gear had been achieved, their efficiency was a matter of boiler efficiency and mechanical losses due to friction in the mill gearing. Large Lancashire boilers could easily maintain 75% efficiency if properly run and maintained and calculations of friction loss in millwork routinely reached efficiency levels of 80%. You still needed this millwork even if you installed a diesel and to the best of my knowledge no normal diesel has ever been made that can seriously exceed 50% thermal activity without complications like heat recovery from their exhaust as in Combined Heat and Power. Add to this the fact that repair/maintenance facilities were easily available Like Brown and Pickles in Barlick) and the fact that once installed and the capital costs written off, because of their longevity and reliability, the engines became even more efficient in economic terms and so there was no incentive to change to diesel even in new builds in the 1920s. A very few mills, like Shiloh, used steam turbines but they were only marginally successful and never became popular.
The only serious alternative to drives in mills was electrification, at first by installing large motors on the line shafts and retaining belt drives in mills with existing machinery and later by individual electric motors which had advantages in flexibility of siting machines as they didn't need to be near shafting. After WW2 the National Grid had to be modernised and extended and to make that economically possible consumption had to be increased so the National Fuel Efficiency board was formed and actively persuaded steam engine users that electricity was more economical and flexible. Faced with a backlog of repairs after the hard days of the war many mills converted and almost all regretted it because they found that individual motors were not as good drivers of looms in particular as the old belt drive from steady speed shafting. Many firms found that economically they were far worse off for two reasons. First the electricity costs were higher than they had been promised by the NIFE men and second, and this was the killer, they still needed their boilers for heating and process. It was only then that they realised that so long as they were running a boiler, steam used for driving the engine was so cheap it beat electric power hands down because electricity at the point of use from the National Grid is only about 20% (or less) thermally efficient. And yes, if you have followed this, if you have to run a boiler for other purposes it is still cheaper to run a steam engine driving shafting or an alternator especially with the more efficient modern boilers which can easily reach 85% efficiency. The big problem is that the support infrastructure (Brown and Pickles et al) and the manufacturing expertise has been destroyed.
I hope that clarifies the matter.

[PanBiker]

Indeed Stanley and thanks for that. The why's and wherefores aren't immediately apparent when you think (in the case of Bancroft) when it was established. I suppose it was lucky in that the maintenance and support infrastructure was still in place at the time even though the writing was already on the wall to some degree. It answers my question anyway and I can now see why we have James and Mary Jane as opposed to the alternatives.

[Whyperion]

For road/ rail use the fun of turning a diesel sideways, adding gear clutches, and stuffing it underneath the chassis created some wonderful awkward maintainance problems. I don't know if modern DMUs have this more solved now, buses run turbo small diesel engines, which I understand are more efficient, and less slightly less prone to shaking at idle.

[Stanley]

There is a lot more to it of course but if you put your car in the equivalent gear to direct drive, top gear, and press the starter you'll see the problem straight away. Marine engines get away with it because at starting rest when you start it the propeller isn't offering any resistance. This massive availability of torque on the first stroke with full steam pressure occasionally led to trouble in cold weather when the lubricant in the millwork bearings was thick and producing 'stiction'. The power could shear the crank pin off. The cure was to start the engine turning with the barring engine which was in effect geared down by the fact it had a small pinion acting on a much larger gear ring on the flywheel.

[Stanley]

Victoria Mill at Earby had a long shafting drive to reach all parts of the extended site. On a cold winter morning the system had to be turned slowly by the large barring engine in the foreground for about half an hour. Then all three boilers had to be fired to blow-off point (180psi) before attempting to start. It often took over an hour for the shafting to be brought up to full speed. If the barring hadn't been done and full steam put on for the first stroke it is almost certain that the crank pin on that first power stroke would be sheared off.

[Stanley]

Moss Shed engine was very heavily loaded as well. Even on a good morning the governor never got off the pedestal until breakfast time when all the bearings had warmed up.... Evidence of Walt Fisher whose father Stanley ran the engine for many years. See the LTP transcripts.

[Stanley]

I was lucky at Bancroft because we only had half a shed of looms running because the industry was dying. That meant I always had enough power and none of the disadvantages of being overloaded. This meant I could concentrate on getting the best economy out of the engine and boiler and all of what I did was devoted to this end which kept me in the management's good books.
We occasionally had a bit of light entertainment.... One day I got a call on the ship to shore from the office....

"Sidney asked me if I would look at the office heating, he said that George had tried to improve it but hadn’t done any good and could I have a go. The only way they could keep warm was by lighting the coal fire in the office! I had a ferret round, found what I thought was the problem, put it right and went back to the engine house. Half an hour later Sidney was on the blower from the office, he asked me to get up there as quickly as possible. When I went in it was like an oven, the thermometer was reading 85 degrees and all the windows were open! Sidney said “I think you’ve cured it!” and I told him that the fault had been that the steam trap on the end of the line had been fitted the wrong way round twenty years ago! All I had done was clean it out and reverse it! It took me a week to get the steam adjusted to just the right level but there again, I was in good odour in the office."

I know that takes some believing but it's a true story. Never ever underestimate the capacity for stupidity some people demonstrate...

[Stanley]

The fireplace in the office at Bancroft that was used to supplement the heating. This was in 1979 during demolition of the mill.

[Stanley]

Bancroft weaving shed in 1975. The object of interest here is the 2" steam pipes strung across the shed at low level. Supplied with steam at boiler pressure this was the heating system. If you think about it, this system relied on convection to transmit the heat so it all went up into the roof, the coldest part of the shed! Heating the sparrows. Many people have criticised this method of heating as stupid and it is true that it was grossly inefficient but the old manufacturers weren't stupid, there was a reason for it. The purpose of the weaving shed was to produce cloth and a sure way of making weaving difficult was to dry the warps out. In sheds where fan assisted thermoliers blew hot air down to the level of the weavers this was exactly what happened and the weavers had to drape wet cloths over their warps when they finished at night, if they didn't, weaving was just about impossible the following morning because of broken warp threads. This system of overhead pipes was a compromise between getting the shed to legal temperature (memory says it was 50F at starting and 55F after an hour) and preserving the 'weavability' of the warps.

[Stanley]

John Plummer and I took turns at coming in early in cold weather to warm the shed. You had to be careful when putting the steam in. The drill was to open the by-passes on the steam traps, they were all on a manifold above the boiler which collected the condensate and dropped it down to the hot box in the cellar so we put all that good feed water back in the boiler, then put a crack of steam on and wait until the condensate was coming back hot before opening up to full pressure. You could monitor each feed by feeling the drain pipes, they soon told you when steam was coming out and not water. The reason for this was that if you didn't you got terrible water hammer in the pipes and paid the price in increased maintenance. Done carefully there was no problem.
Steam traps were of course designed to pass water and not steam but they couldn't pass it fast enough through the trap hence the use of the 1/2" by-passes.

[Stanley]

The really discouraging thing on a cold morning was the fact that for the first hour of heat in the shed, the thermometers at eye level sank lower and lower as the heated air rose into the roof and forced the cold air down.....



We had a few fluorescents in the shed as pilots. It was a cold eerie place in there early in the morning. John and I both hated the job.....

[Stanley]

Ernie Roberts reckoned the shed was haunted. This was a common belief among the weavers. Ernie reckoned that one of the flagstones at the back of the shed was a re-used gravestone. I could see why he believed this but the ghost never bothered me..... Mind you, the shed in semi darkness was a scary place if you let your imagination run away with you. I was always more comfortable in a warm engine house with the lights on!

[Stanley]

When you were on early turn steaming the shed in winter all you had to do was tend to the boiler, making sure the hoppers on the stokers were full and the water levels OK (this took care of itself because all the condensate returns were coming back into the hot box in the cellar and being automatically pumped back to the boiler). Apart from trips into the shed to check the thermometers it was a matter of sitting in the warm engine house. The only constant sound was the groan of the firebars as the Proctor Unit Wide Ram Stoker did its job across the yard and the gentle hiss of warming steam going into the HP cylinder and forward to the LP to keep the engine warm and prevent any nasty surprises when starting because of condensate or cold beds expanding too fast. There were occasional thumps and bangs as the fabric of the mill warmed up, you'd be amazed how a building talks to you if its perfectly quiet and you really listen. Newton and I often talked about this and we both agreed that the difference between a good tenter and a bad one was that the good man was constantly aware of everything that was going on, it was a state of mind. I've always believed that this applied to wagon driving as well, you were always reading the road and the traffic, feeling the wagon talking to you and taking appropriate action. I often wonder how many modern jobs encourage this frame of mind......

[Stanley]

I think that once you have trained your brain to be on the alert it never leaves you. Despite hearing loss I am still very much aware of any different noises.....

[Stanley]

Susan did this pic in 1977 when she visited me in the engine house at Bancroft. Quite a usual event, ten minutes sleep at a time! The thing was, and John Plummer used to test me regularly, he could waken me by making a slight noise and I immediately woke up. Evidently my monitoring didn't stop when I nodded off..



Joan did this one of me running Ellenroad engine.....

[Stanley]

What is not generally understood about the power plant at the mill is that while the boiler insurance was statutory, it had to be inspected and passed by a qualified surveyor from the insurance company at least once every 14 months, there was no obligation to insure the engine itself. At Bancroft we had a general 'loss of profits' insurance which kicked in if the mill was stopped for more than 72 hours because of breakdown and the only proviso was that the engine tenter should be competent and the surveyor satisfied that the plant was being run properly. This was his decision and the only other rule was that apart from very short breaks, the engine tenter should be with the engine at all times. Our surveyor never raised any problems about me or the engine, in effect he relied on me to alert him if anything was looking like a potential problem. If he had any doubts he would have raised the matter with the management but whilst I have evidence this happened in some cases, I always passed inspection! Very satisfying because the surveyors, often ex-marine engineers, were very highly qualified men. Ours used to ask me what we needed to strip down at the annual inspection and on at least one occasion I found a problem he had missed, wasting away of the bolts connecting the swan neck to the boiler at the point where the blow down valve was situated. He told me later he had been asking for all the swan necks on his boilers to be taken off, new bolts fitted and internally checked for erosion thinning the walls down. He found many had the same fault I had spotted.



Dennis Sterriker from Rochdale Electric Welding building up the eroded flange on the swan neck in 1977. Later, I worked with Dennis at REW and he was a good man. I've seen him work miracles on boilers welding patches into them.

[Stanley]

The management once surprised me by informing me they were setting a new insurance company on because they were cheaper than Vulcan. Their surveyor called for a pre-inspection visit to let me know what he wanted taking off the boiler for inspection and basically he wanted every fitting off. I told the management that the reason they were cheaper was that they were going to want the boiler rebuilt every year and if they had any sense they would go back to the Vulcan. They saw the light and I never had any interference again.....

[Stanley]

In 1976 Wild's garage provided a worker's bus night and morning. This was the end of the day. Funny thing was that the bus usually left before I stopped the engine!

[Stanley]

It was winter when I made that Pic. Doesn't the engine house look good with all the lights on! It was still running of course, I always ran until stopping time even though the shed was empty. In the end the management bought a Bedford van and ran their own transport, that way they could guarantee what time it left.



Weavers using the new transport in 1977.

[Stanley]

The van was driven by Ernie, the cloth-looker, and he never left until stopping time so the van soon paid for itself because the firm got up to ten minutes extra weaving time five days a week. The weavers soon got used to it and while it was a step down from the old bus they liked it because in many cases Ernie dropped them at their door. He used it as personal transport as well so win win all round!

[Stanley]

In the 1960s, in common with a lot of other mills, Bancroft ran a 'Housewife's' or 'Moonlight' shift from 6PM to 10PM five days a week to get more production. Many of the weavers told me that the money usually went to pay for running the car that the weaver's husbands used to pick them up after finishing the shift....
It had finished before I started at Bancroft in 1972, good job!