THE IMPERIAL CROWN BATTERY.

Thames Star, Volume IIII, Issue 1733, 23 July 1874, Page 2

THE IMPERIAL CROWN BATTERY.

This battery has been stopped for a day or two, not for want of repairs or crushing stuff, but for the purpose of cleaning out the dam which being situate on the beach gets silted up with mud. This mud is sediment washed into the dam with the tide water, which holds it in suspension till it becomes motionless in the dam square. Mr. Sims, the battery manager, has erected'a pump as near the of the dam as he could ? to hoist the mud when cleaning out; it acts admirably, throwing up the mud as fast as it can be raked,to it. The rake is an ingenius contrivance— it\ is an immense, sgraper like; those used on the roads, and is carried well back into the mud, and by a rope attached to it is drawn towards the pump by the rope being put round the shaft of the belt drum. This contrivance saves about, .half the expense hitherto incurred in cleaing out the dam. I could but think that if the water, supply had been brought in sufficient for battery table i use alone^ what a large amount of money would have been saved to mine and battery owners. It must cost the Imperial Crawn Battery Company alone' nearly £J}oo per" annum for dam cleaning, letting alone the cost of pumping for the tables, and that is., a • serious item for a 40 head battery, which must «f necessity be added to the* cost of crushing; it will be a perfect boon to the Thames when tl-> c water supply is. brought m«-.: ■'• -.A '„.• :'■■./ ■' :■ :1 v.'/... ■'■■' \