The Scientific American Boy; Or, The Camp at Willow Clump Island

by A. Russell Bond

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.

Fig. 260. The Water Wheel in Action.

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.