The Biggest Operating Rotative Beam Steam Engine at Crossness

Crossness Pumping Station at east London ( http://www.crossness.org.uk/ ) near river Thames contains four big sewage pumping engines, one of them -- Prince Consort -- restored to working condition. Besides their pure size -- length overall approximately 68 ft (20.4 mtrs) and height 72 ft (22 mtrs) they show two features of special interests: grasshopper counter beam and Corliss valve gear.
The engines are three-cylinder triple expansion engines - upgraded from single cylinder Watt engines (1865) in 1899. This means, that the steam is now used three times in the cylinders, always with decreasing steam pressure. Therefore the cylinders have different diameters (the low pressure cylinder is the largest in diameter) to compensate this fact and to develop the same force ( force equals steam pressure times piston area).
The Corliss valve gear can be seen in detail in my video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3QvNTWUOds .
The grasshopper counter beam allows parallel motion for the low pressure cylinder's piston rod. For the other two rods (air- and waterpump) exact parallel motion is not more guaranteed by the grasshopper principle and so these devices are fitted with additional crossheads. I have built an engine model with a Märklin metal set for a better understanding of the grasshopper kinematics. My grasshopper animation was done with the well priced German program Cinderella 2 (Math in Motion). Enjoy the video!

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Crossness
• biggest
• largest
• Corliss engine
• Crossness pumping station
• steam
• steam engine
• grasshopper
• beam
• Corliss valve gear
• Dampfmaschine

[lopingnoahsteam]

whats it for



[harryolynx]

@lopingnoahsteam It's one of 4 big sewage pumps, built in the second half of the 19th century, when London got the 'Big Stink' because of insufficient canalisation. I've added a detailed description and a link to Crossness' homepage. If you want to know any other detail - please ask! Cheers from Austrial

[Spudforth]

I like the pride put into its construction. The whole thing is a temple to a cleaner London, and Victoria's attempt to mke it happen. I guess the other engine was in too bad a shape to have restored?

[harryolynx]

@Spudforth No, luckily a lot of efforts is done by the restoration team to bring back all four engines into steam. 'Victoria' engine, the neighbour of the working 'Prince Consort' engine is just on a good way - you can see the restored valve gear of Victoria's intermediate cylinder in a short footage of my other Crossness video "How It Works: The Crossness Engines' Valve Gear". The other two engines have been put on hold. Thanks for watching and posting! Greetings from Austria!

[Stalin111]

These victorians surely had the right attitude towards their machines...beautiful.

[harryolynx]

@Stalin111 Yes! - and thanks for your post.

[lopingnoahsteam]

@harryolynx i really enjoy this kind of stuff thanks it was built in the 1850 i watched a documentary on it.

[harryolynx]

@harmoniumbauer Thank you very much!!

[harmoniumbauer]

Wonderful!!

[Blogengezer]

Absolutely brilliant engineering. The Industrial Revolution that made slavery obsolete and the human population explosion to manifest itself seven times over within less than 200 years. To it's detriment, It also gave birth to, and sustains the Dependency Addicted Generation...