The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1922-09-23
BIGGEST in STATE.
Topeka Edison Company Is In
staiIfng Large Steam Engine.
All Space in New Addition to
Plant Taken Up.
FLYWHEEL 20 Fl. IN DIAMETER
Weight of Mammoth Wheel
Is Ninety-TwO Tons.
Nine Cars Used in Hauling En-
CINE to Topeka.

The biggest reciprocating steam en-
CINE in the state of Kansas. both in
dimensions and power delivered, is
being set up in the power plant of the
Topeka Edison company, and some
l. 500 kilowatt hours of electricity
corresponding roughly to $500 horse
power, as a supplement to the other
units of the company.
The engine and its direct connected
generator. take up all the space in an
addition to the engine room which has
been specially constructed for it. The
addition is forty by thirty-eight feet
and forty feet high.
A Monster F1ywheeI.
To the layman, the most impressive
thing about the big engine is the
monstrous flywheel. The flywheel is
twenty feet in diameter, and its outer
rim or tire is two feet wide. The
wheel was shipped to Topeka in eight
. different sections, one spoke to sec
!, ton, and each section, which included
y a spoke and one-eighth of the rim'
weighed nine tons. The sections are
fastened together with keys set into
the rim of the wheel. Each key -
eight inches thick, three feet long and
weighs more than two hundred pounds.
The whole wheel when set up weighs
ninety-two tons. The spokes in the
wheel of which there are eight, arc
each as big around as the body of
man. The shaft on which the fly
wheel and the armature of the cleo
trio generator are fixed, is OF solld
steel, eighteen inches in diameter.
All Power Utilized.
The engine is of the cross compound
type, being driven by two cylinders,
a high pressure and a low pressure
cylinder. The steam having been useo
in the high pressure cylinder. is run
1T nd
the last ounce of the power stored
within it is utilized there.
The cylinders are no less massive
than is the flywheel. The high pres
sure cylinder. the smaller of the two
has an inside diameter of twenty
eight inches The low pressure cylin-
der has diameter of fifty inches
forr feet and two inches.
10th the cylinders were rebored by
Kansas City machine works when
the engine arrived in Topeka. Ma
c,,'nery was sent up by motor truck
from Kansas City to do the work. The
steel piston heads are of course OF the
same diameter as the inside OF the
hr~A cylinders. The drive rods, OF
gis"l. are several inches thick and tho
O. "fc-s have a forty-eiSht inch
cylinders drive the ponderous
Ore wheel at a speed of about sew
c7tv revolutions per minute. This.
a
= ride on the circumference of the
heel would travel at sp eed of about
.S35 miles per hour. The speed Is not
-Gally great The bigger the en-
r1e the slower the speed, and tho
g. zine which the Edison company is
tso-ting up ranks among the biggest.
They don't build many reciprocal
ing steam engines of more than 1000
horsepower. Above that point it is
more efficient to use the turbine" A.
II. Purdy, manager of the company
said. But we use the exhaust steam
fer heating the buildings onNKansas
avenue. and a turbine isn't efficient
when it comes to that"
Had u Difficult Job.
Getting the engine into the plant
was no easy job. Nine cars hauled it
from its former location in Chicago,
where it was furnishing electric power
in the stock yards, to Topeka. The
job OF getting it to the plant from
the railroad track was delegated TO
w. C. Tandy. who used house moving
machinery on the job. THE carriage
bin for bringing it up from the tracks
was between $4,000 and $4,000"
Purdy says.
AS an indication of the difficulty of
getting the engine set up, one of the
bearings had to be raised, with an
electric crane, seventy-seven times, as
it was fitted with babbit metal.
1t is doubtful just how soon the big
unit will be ready to start its work of
sending electric power surging over
z the cables of the Edison company, to
run street cars, electric motors and
Shouse lights. The engine itself will
probably be ready to run some time
before the switch board material
which has been ordered to control its
output, has beer. received, Purdy be-
lieves.
Big Piece of Machinery.
1t is a vast piece of machinery, but
1t is handled with a throttle valve
the same as a small engine. Its own
steam, in the big cylinders, will start
the huge flywheel to movin; from a
dead stop and it's speed will grad
ualiy increase-unless by accident 1t
happens to stop on dead center" with
the driving rods extending straight
across it, so that they pull directly
against the bearings. If that hap
pens, it must be started into motion
by some outside agency.
This contingency has been foreseen
and all around the rim of the wheel
stops on dead center a lifting jack will
have to be fitted into these notches,
and two inches at a time, the big
wheel will have to be rotated till the
strength of 1900 horses, imprisoned in
the big cylinders, can be brought to
bear.
The boiler capacity of the plant was
increased last year, in order to take
care of the new unit Purdy says. A
few more weeks work on the engine,
and the arrival and installation of the
switchboard material will make it
& available .or use.