This is the 12000 horse power engine the "River Don" Engine mentioned by Stanley. It was built to power the rolling mills that made armour plate for the "Dreadnought" class of battleships. It's last job was rolling plates for the first generation of nuclear reactors. It weighs 400 tons and produced a maximum of 12000 h.p. These engines were designed purely for power and for quick reversing, economy never came into it. My picture doesn't do it justice (for some reason the side view didn't post!).  But you can see it for yourselves at the Sheffield Industrial Museum at Kelham Island near the centre of Sheffield. They only run it for a short time, but when they reverse it, the ground shakes! 

I was so shocked by actually managing to post something, that I forgot the other picture! As a total contrast, this is also a surviving vertical engine, and like the River Don engine it also has 3 cylinders. That is where the resemblance ends, this machine is a triple-expansion water pumping engine. Designed to pump water to various London reservoirs, it and it's twin, were expected to work 24 hrs a day for months on end with the maximum economy. Together with the pumps, which are part of the structure, it weighs 800 ton, twice the weight of the steelworks engine. But it was designed to deliver a fraction of the horsepower, just over 1000 hp. Very much "horses for courses" with steam.

You can see this engine in action at the periodic open days at Kempton Park waterworks museum in London.  

Last Weekend I went back to a site that I first visited nearly 20 years ago. Back then it seemed unlikely that the site, or it's engines would survive. I was wrong.

In 1983 Coal Board contractors had got as far as removing the roof from the second winding engine house when the Local Authority got the site scheduled. The NCB put a fence around the site and left it to rot. This was the scene in 1988.

This was the North winding house which still had it's 1904 Lillishall winder in situ.

For 10 years the site stood derelict, and then a group was formed to try and restore the winders and surviving buildings. As they told me on Sunday, it has been a struggle, and they have had some grant help, English Partnerships restored the engine house roofs, and the surviving chimney. Their main asset has been a pool of local volunteers who are Coal Board trained engineers, including one chap who worked on the engines when they were running.

Even now there is no running water on site and they have to generate their own electric. The boilers are long gone, and steam is something for the distant future. However they are  restoring both engines to a condition that will enable them to steam.

As an example of what can be achieved with enthusiasm, skill and a bit of luck, here is a view of the North Winder, the one that stood for years with no roof on the house.

Stanley, when looking at all the pictures, don't forget to take Jack for a walk.

Walter

Hi Stanley,

Another question 

When I was a youngster about 50 years ago, I used to go and watch an Engine at a Mill in Oswaldtwisle.  The mill was called Clifton and the other mills around were Paddock, and Moscow Mill., and John Bury's Union Mill. Every few months or so on a Saturday morning  the " Indians " would arrive to clean the flues on the Lancashire Boiler. We used to call them the Indians because of the dust mask and turban like head gear. Fred Atkinson was the Engine Tenter I was wondering would you know what happened to that engine ??  Would it have just been scrapped when the mill closed down ??. The Governor used to fascinate me just watching it spinning round, of course I never knew what it was back then. The Engine used to be immaculate and the Boiler Brass was always gleaming, even though the boiler was coal fired. This would have been around 1957/58 period.

Charlie Sutton on the right and Jack, his mate on the left, ready to enter Bancroft flues in 1977.  Daniel Meadow's pic.

Morning Stanley,

Thanks for that picture, I think we should have called them Bandits not Indians !!!! I will watch this space once again thanks

I got mail this morning....

Stanley,

Clifton Mill was built for Messrs. J. & J. H. Entwistle in 1911. They were a firm of cotton waste spinners and weavers who moved to this mill in 1911 from Cocker Lumb Mill, Oswaldtwistle. This was a fairly small concern with variation over the years of between 3,000 and 5,000 mule spindles and 100 to 220 looms. I have no record of an engine here and hence most of the main engine builders can be eliminated since I have lists of their engines. In Mike Rothwell’s loose leaf paper on the IA of Oswaldtwistle dated 1980 he says that the mill had a tandem compound engine ‘probably by Pollit and Wigzell’. If this was the case then the engine must have been second hand since it is not in Pollits order books. This is a possibility since a surprising number of engines were bought second hand through machinery dealers.



Geoff

Thank's Stanley

I have the right Mill, it was always refered to as Entwisle's. The mill lodge had some of the largest goldfish (carp) I have ever seen in my life.