El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1901-03-02
The Mesa Wells
of The G. H.

As the visitor to FIT. Bliss reaches tn
foot o. the steep approach tothe leve
top of the mesa upon which the Tor
is situated he hears popping that set
him to guessing whether the soldier
have fallen out among themselves ant
are fighting it not or are indulging il
promiscuous pistol practice. But whel
the level is reached the discovery il
made that the sounds emanate from
big square building with four cupola:
a short distance off to the right of the
approach. The building is the pump
house over the mesa wells of the G. H
& ;. 4. railroad company and the
popping sounds coming therefrom are
the explosions from four large gaso-
line engines by which the pumps are
propelled.
The finishing touches of all the work
that Will be done at these wells for
some time are being put on today. The
company has a two acre tract of land
and has it fenced in. The wells are
sunk III tins lot and above the wells is
erected the pump house, while at the
south end of the lot is a nice four
room cottage for the pumper to live
in. Near the pump house are two large
tanks and between them and the cot
tage is the oil house, a sort of cellar
in which the gasoline for the engines
will be stored.
TIL pump house is sixty feet square
and the plate is eighteen feet from
the ground. The wells form a square
and are under the four corners of the
building. At each corner of the build
ing. directly over each well a cupola
rises TO a height of forty-five feet.
The object of these cupolaS is to give
room in which to raise the pipes or
valves out of the we'll when repairs
are needed.
The four wells are each 295 feet deep
aud ten inches in diameter and are
cased with ten-inch pipe. Each well is
fitted with Downie double-acting
pump with a capacity of 5000 gallons
per hour. Each pump is run by fif-
teen-borse power Champion gasoline
engine. The pumps and engines are
set on solid foundations of concrete
seven feet thick. The pump house floor
is of concrete and is six inches thick.
The popularity of the pumps with
which these wells are fitted is that
each has two valve plungers, one of
which is going down while the other
is coming up. BY this arrangement
the column of water in the pipe is con-
stantly moving upward. hence the ca
pacity of these pumps is greater than
The ordinary ones. Each piston makes
thirty five strokes per minute, which,
as it is double action, equals seventy
strokes per minute.
The double acting pump is an old
invention, but was never success I'M
til J. W. Downfe, a Pennsylvania, in
vented the system upon which these
pumps are worked and which is as fol-
no far vUh
lines the well is seven-inch pipe and
On the bottom of this pipe, near the
bottom of the well is a strainer of the
same diameter and eighteen feet long.
Within the Seven-inch strainer is what
s called the working barrel, in which
he valves work. The working barrel
S four and a quarter inches in dame
.er and six feet and a half long. On
he bottom of the working barrel is
mother strainer. two feet long. Inside
# the working barrel are the two val
res. one working within the other. the
hunger of one being round pipe and
ne other a square rod working with
q it. and these are enclosed to the sur
ace in the seven inch pipe. I
The part of the pumps above the sur ]
ace is easily slidden out of the way
rllen it is desired to remove any part
eneath the surface, and the house is l.
o be equipped with a hosting engine
Or the purpose of lifting out any of :
he Underground apparatus. Each pump !
also fitted with lever by which it
lay be instantaneously thrown out of
ear and will stop without the engine
eing stopped or the belt thrown off.
The gasoline engines, like all the ma
hinery with which the wells are equip !.
ed, are latest improved, one improve Z
lent being an arrangement to keep =
he cylinder cool. Around the cylinder =
{ each engine is a jacket enough larg- Z
r than the cylinder as to allow space
Dr. water to pass all around the cylin- c
er. pipe runs from one of the v
urge water tanks which stand near q
he pump house and through it water c
conducted to the enclosure around G
he cylinder and passes out and back f
lto the wells. thus always keeping t
old water around the cylinder and O
eeping it at normal temperature.
Near each engine. just outside of the h
is a gasoline tank of 100 gal e
IN capacity. Pipes connect these with a
he gasoline cellar and the gasoline is v
umped through these pipes by a hand d
imp in the cellar. The gasoline tanks T