Chapter 46

THE WATER WHEEL.

Summer found us again on Willow Clump Island with heads full of new ideas. Bill had come across an old copy of Ewbanks' "Hydraulics" in the school library. It was a book describing machines of the ancients--principally devices for raising water. Rather dry reading, I thought, even though it was a wet subject; but Bill seemed to find it absorbingly interesting. I came in late one afternoon, after a glorious game of baseball, only to find Bill poring over the yellowed leaves of the "Hydraulics" as fascinated as most fellows would be over a detective story. It exasperated me to note that he thought more of this old book than he did of our baseball team.

"Bill," I exclaimed, "what's got into you? I can't for the life of me see what is so entertaining in that prehistoric book."

"Oh, go way. Don't bother me," was the surly reply.

But I wouldn't be put off that way. Quickly I snatched the book from his grasp and threw it out the window.

"Now, sir," I cried, "maybe you will kindly explain to me why you persist in studying that old volume, to the neglect of our baseball team."

"Don't get so excited, old chap," he replied. "That book is all right. I'm studying up some new schemes for next year's expedition to Willow Clump Island. Why, there are lots of things in that old book that we can make." And he proceeded to unfold his plans, sketching out some curious designs of water wheels and pumps.

By the time school closed for the summer Bill had thoroughly digested that volume, and was ready to reconstruct many of the ancient machines.

THE WATER WHEEL.

Our first work on reaching the island was to erect a water wheel, or "noria," as it was called in the book, in front of the camp. It had been a great nuisance to keep our filter barrel full. Every few days we would have to form a bucket brigade, passing pails of water up the line until the barrel was filled. Now Bill proposed to do away with all this bother and let the river do the work for us.

SURVEYING FOR THE WATER WHEEL.

We first determined the height of the upper filter barrel above the level of the river. This was done with our surveying instrument, which was set level with the top of the barrel. We sighted with the instrument to a long pole that was held upright at the edge of the water. The pole had been marked off into feet with white chalk marks, and on sighting through the sight holes we found that the hairs came in line with the eleventh chalk mark. The top of the filter was, therefore, 11 feet above the level of the river. Bill figured that it would be necessary to construct a wheel about 15 feet in diameter in order to raise the water to the proper height.

TOWERS FOR THE WATER WHEEL.

First we built the towers to support the wheel. One tower was 16 feet high and the other only 10 feet. The large tower was made something like a very tall and narrow saw-horse. Two stout poles 17 feet long were flattened at their upper ends and nailed together, with the ends projecting about a foot, as shown in Fig. 251. At the bottom these poles were spaced 8 feet apart by a cross bar, and about 9-1/2 feet from the bottom a pair of boards were nailed to opposite sides of the pole to serve as supports for the axle of the water wheel. Another pair of 17-foot poles was now similarly fastened together and then the two pairs were spaced about 12 feet apart and connected at the top and bottom with boards.

At the top two smooth boards were used and these were nailed to the inner sides of the projecting ends, which were tapered off. In this manner a V-shaped trough was formed. The boards were firmly nailed together at their meeting edges so as to prevent them from warping apart. A diagonal brace at each corner made the wedge-shaped tower very substantial. A number of cleats nailed to one of the poles provided a ladder by which we could mount to the top of the tower. The shorter tower was a three-legged affair, made of three 12-foot poles. At first two of these were flattened and nailed together at their upper ends, and they were braced at the top and bottom. The third leg was then nailed in place and braced by cross bars connecting it with the other two poles.

THE WHEEL.

We were now ready to make the wheel. From Lumberville four 1/2-inch boards, each 3 inches wide and 15 feet long, were procured; also a bar of iron 3/4 of an inch in diameter and 2 feet long. At the center of one of the boards a block of wood 4 inches long and 4 inches in diameter was nailed on for a hub. A 3/4-inch hole was now drilled through this hub and the board. Holes were also drilled into the other boards at their centers. Then they were all strung onto the bar and spaced like spokes at equal angles apart. Bill had figured it out some way that the ends of the boards should be just about 5 feet 10-1/2 inches apart. When the boards were all arranged we nailed them together at the center, and connected the ends with narrow tie boards, as indicated in Fig. 256.

THE BUCKETS.

Eight large tomato cans were now procured and fastened to the spokes at the ends on the inner side, that is, the side the hub was nailed to. We couldn't very well nail on the cans, so we punched two holes in the side of each can and then secured them to the spokes by passing bolts through these holes and the boards.

THE PADDLES.

Then we cut sixteen paddles of the form shown in Fig. 257. Eight of these were 12 inches long, and the rest measured 18 inches. A slot 3 inches deep was cut in each paddle of just the right width to slip over the tie boards. The shorter paddles were fastened on just back of the spokes, and the rest were secured half-way between each spoke. The paddles were braced by stretching a wire from one to another all the way around the wheel.

THE RECEIVING TROUGH.

Our next task was to nail the receiving trough in place on the higher tower. We set up the towers on land and mounted the wheel between them with the axle resting in the crotch of the short tower and in a deep notch cut in the cross boards of the larger one. The cans on the wheel faced the larger tower, but the hub at the center and a block nailed to the larger tower spaced the wheel far enough out so that the cans did not strike the tower as they revolved. We carefully measured the distance between the spokes and the larger tower, and then built a square trough of a size to just fit into this space. This trough was nailed across the end of the V-shaped trough on top of the tower, but a notch was cut in the side so that the water would pour from the square or receiving trough into this V-shaped one. The square trough was about 8 feet long and its sides were 12 inches high; but at the ends we had to cut them down to a height of but 6 inches, so as to permit the cans to pass without hitting them.

SETTING UP THE TOWERS.

Our filter was located nearly 20 feet from the end of the river, and in order to get a good current of water to revolve our wheel we had to place it about 15 feet from shore. This necessitated building a trough line 35 feet long. Ten feet of this line were already provided in the top of the tall tower. This tower was now set up in place with the legs firmly wedged into holes excavated in the bottom of the river. The legs on the shore side were sunk a little deeper, so as to tilt the trough slightly shoreward. The outer end of the trough was about 12 feet above the level of the water. We needed but one more tower to support the remainder of the trough line. This tower was built like the first one, but was much shorter, as it was erected on land and the level of the trough at the top had to be 5 or 6 inches lower so as to make the water flow. We connected the towers by another V-shaped trough section. This we nailed to the under side of the first trough and to the inside of the second trough. The latter was then in the same way connected by a trough section with the upper filter barrel. We now rigged up our shorter tower about a foot from the taller one, wedging in the legs so that the top came level with the slotted boards of the other tower.

MOUNTING THE WATER WHEEL.

Then came the task of mounting our wheel in place. We were working in a pretty strong current and found it no easy matter. In the first place, the wheel was floated down to the towers, but there it got jammed and we couldn't lift it up. One of the paddles was broken and a bucket wrenched off before we could disentangle the wheel from the towers, and then the wheel was carried quite a distance down-stream before we could drag it in to shore.

Our next attempt was more successful. This time we anchored the wheel so that it just cleared the towers, then fastening a couple of long guy ropes to it, we raised the wheel on edge, while a boy stood on each side holding the ropes to keep the wheel steady. The anchor rope was now slowly paid out and the wheel was rolled in between the towers. This done, the wheel was lifted up and the axle rod was pushed in, with the ends of the rod resting in slots of the boards on the tall tower and in the crotch on the shorter one. To prevent the axle rod from working endwise out of its bearings, we nailed pieces of wood across the crotch and the slots against the ends of the rod. Then we cast off the anchor rope and our wheel started work, the cans dipping up the water as they were carried around by the wheel and pouring it out of the top into the receiving trough, from which the water flowed down into the filter barrel.

COOLING THE FILTER BARREL.

The trough line was very leaky and a great deal of water splashed out of the buckets. But for all that, within a few moments our barrel was full and overflowing. We hadn't figured on its filling so rapidly, but we soon found a way of utilizing the surplus water. It was led to a half-barrel in which we washed our dishes, and from there it flowed through a ditch back to the river. The water for the wash barrel was taken from the top of the upper filter barrel. But we let the lower filter barrel flow over so that it would be kept wet on the outside. Our filter was fortunately placed at a point where a good breeze struck it, and we shoveled away the earth that had been piled around it so that the wind playing on the wet barrel evaporated the moisture, making the water inside very cool.

THE CANVAS BUCKET.

This same trick was used for cooling our drinking water whenever we went off on an expedition away from camp. We had a heavy canvas bucket, the kind used on ships. We would fill this bucket with water and then hang it up in the wind. The water seeping out of the pores of the bucket would be evaporated by the wind, and this would, in a few moments, make the water inside delightfully cool. Such buckets may be bought for $1.50 to $2.00 apiece, but ours was a home-made affair, and made somewhat differently from the store kind. The canvas used was the heaviest we could find. A piece 9 inches in diameter was cut out for the bottom. A ring 7 inches in diameter, made of heavy brass wire, was laid on the canvas, and the cloth was turned over it and sewed down the inside of the ring. For the sides of the bucket we cut a piece 14 inches wide and 23 inches long. The upper edge was strengthened by a piece of light rope held in place by hemming the cloth over it. The lower edge was now sewed to the bottom, just inside the wire ring and then the ends of the piece were joined, completing the sides of the bucket. The bail of the bucket was formed of a piece of rope fastened to the roped upper edge of the bucket.

But to return to the current wheel; the day after it was completed, when I went over to Lumberville for the mail, I was met by old Jim Halliday, who wanted to know what sort of a rig we had out on the river. I told him, and after a dint of much persuasion, induced him to take a ride back in the scow with me. He had never visited our camp and hadn't realized how handy we were with the tools, because, with the exception of the current wheel, all our work had been done on the opposite side of the island. We made him a guest of honor, showing him over the whole place. The bridges struck him as remarkably clever, but what pleased him most was our current wheel.

"I swan," he said. "Ef that ain't jest the thing I have been awantin' for the past twenty year. What'll ye sell me the hull plant fer, boys?"

MR. HALLIDAY'S WATER WHEEL.

We thought he was fooling at first, but when he had assured us that he was in earnest, Bill told him that we needed our own plant, but we could build him a similar and even better current wheel for any amount he thought it was worth to him. The figure settled on was six dollars (a dollar apiece) for our work, Mr. Halliday paying for the material. It was not a large sum, but it seemed a lot to us, and considering the scarcity of money in that region it was pretty generous pay. We built Mr. Halliday's current wheel just like our own, except that the paddles were much broader, and instead of using cans for the buckets Mr. Halliday supplied us with small dinner pails. The method of fastening on the pails is shown in Fig. 263. A stick was nailed across the end of each spoke and the bail of the pail was held by a screw eye threaded into this stick. The pails would hang straight, holding all the water without spilling a drop until the receiving trough was reached. This trough was fastened high enough to strike the bottom of the pails as they went by, tipping them over and emptying them of their contents. From the trough the water ran directly into a large cider barrel and from here was carried through a pipe to Mr. Halliday's barn. A stopcock was here provided so that he could turn the water on or off, as he desired. The use of pails was a great improvement on tin can buckets. Fully three times as much water was poured into the receiving trough, because not a drop was spilled out on the way up.