Preparations To Install Last Roxburgh Turbines

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 29055, 18 November 1959, Page 14

Preparations To Install Last Roxburgh Turbines

(New Zealand Press Association)

DUNEDIN, November 17. Preparations for installing the final four generators at Roxburgh are now well under way. Already almost 200 yards of concrete have been poured on the floor of the machine wells in the uncompleted half of the powerhouse. About 10.000 yards of concrete are to be poured as the generator components are fitted into position. but the work is detailed and will extend over a long period. When the last of the first four machines went into operation late in 1956, the main part of the scheme was complete. Even the steel penstocks for the final four machines were in position on the face of the dam. All that remained to put the station in full commission was the installation of the final four generators and turbines in the powerhouse. As the machines and their surrounding concrete form the actual floor this left half the powerhouse with aeep gaping wells where the machines are to go. &rSt three of the new are scheduled to go into

operation during 1961, and the last will follow early in 1962. Ministry of Works gangs began concreting at the base of No. 5 generator well late in October after a road for trucks had been built to the rear of the powerhouse and an entrance was cut through the wall of the building. The concrete is being mixed in a small batcher and poured into buckets which are carried by truck to the powerhouse. They are lifted with the powerhouse overhead crane and tipped where required. The neighbouring No. 6 well is being cleaned out in preparation for concreting. Carpenters have completed the first major piece of formwork round which concrete will be shaped. This is the formwork for draught tube. The draught tube is. at the rear of each turbine and ranges in diameter up to 18ft. Its purpose is to expel the energy-exhausted water back to the river after it has passed through the turbine. Electricity Department’s,

supervising engineer, Mr G. Robertson, arrived at the project today from Wellington to supervise the installation staff. Much of the department’s work to date has been assembling the many components ready for their individual stages of installation.