August 18 - Day 44 - Iron Mt., Michigan

Hello Everyone,

Yesterday Donny called the manufacturer of the airbag we need for our camper and ordered one to be shipped to a parts store in Iron Mountain, MI, since we knew we would be passing through there today. We arrived at the store this afternoon, only to find that the part had been placed on the wrong truck, and had mistakenly been delivered to Ohio!

Since we had to stay here for an extra day, we visited the Cornish Pump and Mining Museum, home of the largest pumping engine in the United States.

Here is some information from the website:

Edwin Reynolds, chief engineer for the E.P. Allis Company (now the Allis-Chalmers Co.) of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, designed the steeple compound condensing steam engine in 1890.

The engine's high pressure has a 50 inch bore, and the low pressure cylinder is 100 inches in diameter. The flywheel alone is 40 feet in diameter, weighs 160 tons, and had an average speed of only ten revolutions per minute. The engine itself rises 54 feet above the floor of the room. The designers estimate the weight to be 725 tons over all. The engine's boiler required 11,000 tons of coal annually to operate. 


The pumping equipment utilized a reciprocating motion to a line of steel rods extending 1,500 feet down into the mine, with eight pumps attached at intervals of 170 to 192 feet along the rods. Each of the pumps forced the water to the next higher pump and finally out to the surface of the mine. Over 3,000 gallons of water poured out through a 28 inch the pipe every minute. A total of 5,000,000 gallons of water could be removed from the mine each day. 


The engine began operation on January 4th, 1893. The Cornish Pumping Engine and equipment were highly efficient until, in 1914, the Oliver Mining Company put into operation the largest electrically driven centrifugal pumps in mine service at that time in America. Unable to adapt to the new electric motors, the magnificent Cornish Pumping Engine, world famous as one of the mechanical wonders of the steam age, stood idle and was kept only for emergency use.

I also had some extra time to put together two more pages of wildflowers and one of butterflies.

We hope out part will be in tomorrow, so Donny can install it and we will be on our way.

Donny and Cheryl