Wider Steam Collection
There are also a number of other steam items of interest – including an Ashworth Fire Pump, Marshall Engine and Tangy Engine as well as drive pulleys throughout the Mill.
The Ashworth Fire Pump
This duplex steam pump housed in its own building outside the boiler house has a “banjo” type rod mechanism, It drew water from the leat by the water wheel and pumped it into the hydrant main around the mill site, also up the rising main in the main stair of the mill building.
Although it is badly frost damaged it has been reassembled to appear to be in working order.
The Marshal Engine
The inverted vertical engine at the far end of the beam engine house was built by Marshals of Gainsborough in Lincolnshire and features a Pickering governor making it suitable for generating.
It has been connected to a converted DC electric motor used as a generator and demonstrates the conversion of steam pressure to electricity.
Tangye Engine
No history is known of this small horizontal engine built in Birmingham. It seems to have been in its present location for a long time and is assumed to have driven the carpenter`s lathe, drill and grindstone.
Beam House Engine Drive Pulleys
You will notice various flat belt pulleys above the beam engine, these were installed after the original beam engine was scrapped. The twin pulleys above the sway beam against the side wall were driven by the Pollit and Wigzell engine next door and drove the overhead shaft by the cylinder. Flat belts then transmitted the power down to two generators on the floor where the beam engine is now.
The Three Cylinder Feed Pump
In the corner of the boiler house is the original Pollit and Wigzell boiler feed water pump that was supplied with the engine and boiler as a complete installation. It is driven by a “fast and loose” flat belt pulley system from the compound mill engine. It has suffered frost damage at some time but we have patched it up enough to be able to pump cold water from the condenser waste up to a header tank in the roof This tank then supplies the water heating tank on top of the wall beside the 1910 boiler by gravity.
