25 February 2021 - The Wessex Water Pumping Station
Dear all,
Thank you to everyone who contacted me after the recent Newsbite. I will collate these for general consumption in the very near future.
If you have had the feeling that there has been more traffic in the village recently you would be correct. Wessex Water have had problems with some valves installed during the refurbishment of the Pumping Station and must to replace them. In order to do the work as quickly as possible they are working weekends. So more traffic and perhaps more water in the Jordan Stream, but they should be finished by the second week in March.
On the subject of the Pumping Station, John Willows, curator of the Sutton Poyntz Wessex Waterworks Museum for many years and a good friend to the village during his tenure, has sent us an update on what I would describe as ‘old faithful’, the steam engine which pumped water at the Waterworks for over 24 years.
John says that the original pumps were two single cylinder horizontal Whitham steam engines installed in 1882, with a Gimson two cylinder compound engine added in 1901. In 1934 these were replaced by a triple expansion Hathorn Davey steam engine manufactured in Leeds. This delivered excellent service until 1958 when the pumping station was converted from steam to electric power.
The Hathorn Davey engine was thought worth preserving so eventually, in 1973, it was dismantled by REME technicians, taken to their workshops at Bovington and re-assembled. In 1975 it set off for the Leeds Industrial Museum but sadly the preservation project had to be abandoned due to a fire and in 2000 the engine returned to Sutton Poyntz.
Here the asbestos cladding was removed, the engine part reassembled and stored outside suitably protected from the elements. The intention was to reinstate the engine in its original position in what is now called the Hathorn Davey Room. However operational constraints prevented this and for the sake of the engine’s future a new home was again sought. This proved to be the Internal Fire Museum of Power in West Wales and in January 2017 the engine left Sutton Poyntz for the last time. I am sure many of you can will remember the excitement as the engine was loaded onto the huge lorries for its journey to wonderful Wales.
John’s pictures show the much travelled HD engine installed in its new home at The Internal Fire Museum located in Tan-y-Groes, West Wales. It is now in steam i.e. fully operational and I think you'll agree they've done an excellent job in restoring it to its former glory. Nice to know that there’s a little bit of Sutton Poyntz in West Wales.
Stay safe
Chris