=Power Station.=--Water is abundant at either end, and therefore
hydraulic power is the motive force employed. On the Italian side, a dam
5 ft. high has been thrown across the Diveria at a point near the Swiss
frontier, about 3 miles above the site of the installations. A portion
of the water thus held back enters, through regulating doors and
gratings, a masonry channel leading to two parallel settling tanks, each
111 ft. by 16 ft., whence, after dropping all its sand and solid matter,
the now pure water passes into the water-house, and, after flowing over
a dam, through a grating and past the admission doors, enters a metallic
conduit of 3-ft. pipes. Each of the settling tanks and the approach
canal are provided with doors at the lower end leading direct to the
river, through which all the sand and solid matter deposited can be
scoured naturally by allowing the river-water to rush freely through.
For this purpose the floor of the basins is on an average gradient of 1
in 30. For a similar reason the river-bed just outside the entrance to
the approach canal is lined with wooden planks, from which the stones
collecting behind the dam can be scoured by allowing an iron flap,
hinged at the bottom, to change its position from the vertical to the
horizontal in a gap left purposely in the dam, so causing a rushing
torrent to sweep it clean.
The chief levels are:
Level of water at dam 794.00 meters above sea level.
„ in water-house 793.70 „ „ „ „
„ at turbines 618.50 „ „ „ „
giving a total fall of 175.20 ms. or 570 ft., and a pressure of 17.52
atmospheres.
The quantity of water capable of being taken from the Diveria in winter,
when the rivers which are dependent upon the mountain snows for their
supply are at their lowest, is calculated to be 352 gallons per second.
Thus, taking the fall to be diminished by friction, etc., to 440 ft.,
and the useful effect at 70%, there is obtained 2000 H. P. on the
turbine shaft.
The metallic conduit varies in material according to the pressure; thus
cast-iron pipes 3 ft. in diameter and ¹³⁄₁₆ in. thick are used up to a
pressure of 2 atmospheres, from which point they are of wrought-iron.
The cast-iron portion has of late caused a good deal of trouble, owing
to settlement of the piers causing occasional bursts, consequently a
masonry pier has been placed under each joint of this portion. The
following table gives the thicknesses and diameters, varying with the
pressure:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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