395 Comments for Toronto Power Company Generating Station

You are seeing fairly low voltage control wiring. The bundled wires are tied with waxed twine. It was called "looming", and is a lost art. Wiring was routed and bundled, neatly, then tied in a continuous process with the waxed twine. It had to look uniform and neat. Once the nylon or plastic wire ties (tie-raps or similar) came on the scene, the use of the twine and the art of "looming" was lost.

BTW: I estimate these units at about 15 megawatts apiece given their age and size of the stators. 15 megawatts would provide power to about 1500 modern homes. 15 megawatts needs about a 20,000 shaft horsepower turbine to turn the generator. I've worked on hydro turbines of over 300,000 shaft horsepower, and those are over 40 yrs old. This plant had big units for its day, but that was a long time ago. These are little guys by any standards.

Thank you for posting this gallery. I am an oldtime engineer who'se worked in hydroelectrio plants for many years. Last month, my wife wanted to visit Niagara Falls. We rode there on our old BMW motorcycle. A lot to be said for riding a long trip on a motorcycle you;'ve owned since it was new some 34 years ago, and which has parts in it you;ve made in your own machine shop. We got to Niagara Falls and had a wonderful time sightseeing. We did see the old powerplant in the distance and I really wanted to know more about it. No information is out there for tourists, I guess they figure toursits do not care about old powerplants. Your website is the best tour, something that statisfied my curiousity and was like walking in a familiar place. Any powerplant is special to me as it is a place where electricity is (or was) generated. I cannot help but wonder what the power made in an old plant was used for: who was born in a hospital powered by it, what industries did it power and what did they make ? What were the engineers like who designed the plant ? What was the construction and the times like ? A powerplant is hallowed to engineers like me. Thanks for showing it to me.

I.P. Morris and Cramp Shipbuilding were all part of Baldwin Locomotive Works in Philadelphia, PA. I.P. Morris became known as "Baldwin-Lima-Hamilton" or "BLH" for their hydro turbines and built them under that name into the late 1950's.

Hydro turbines, with large generators turn very slowly compared to steam turbines. It's all a function of how many poles ("magnets") the generator has. The hard and fast number is 3600, which is 60 Hz current x 60 seconds/minute. RPM x number of poles on the generator must = 3600. Big machinery has to turn slow due to centrifugal force, but the rim speeds are up there. Hydro turbines are built custom for each application based on head of water (height), type of flows, and the turbine runner ("water wheel") determines the horspeower and rpm . Oncet hat is in hand, the generator design follows. A hydro turbine turns slower, so a bigger generator with more poles is needed. I've worked on older units that run at 90 rpm. You stand in the turbine pit and look up and can damned near count the poles on the generator rotor. Steam turbines usually run at 3600 rpm, and the combustion "gas" turbines (derived from aviation turbines) turn faster yet. Hydro turbines are friendly, massive machines. Smooth running and generally quiet at openating speed with a nice "60 cycle hum" from the generators and a little dull background roar of the water.

Years ago, powerhouses were built as temples as the production of electricity and the benefits to society were seen as a momentous thing. The part that has "General Electric" on it is the stator of one of the generators. In the days when a plant like this one was in operation, the house crew kept the plant "spit shined". I work in a plant build in the 1970's, and we have terazzo floors and marble in the lobby. A powerplant is "mothership" to those of us fortunate enough to work in one. We are proud of our plant and the fact we produce the power. We stick tight as a cohesive crew and we do our own engineering and overhauls in house. Any real powerplant had this sort of ethic to it. A hydroelectric plant is even more special as it can "
black start" itself. If the grid power fails, a hydroelectric plant can be "black started" with no outside power. The older plants like this one could be started by the crew using manual means. A modern plant like a "fossil fueled" (oil, coal or natural gas) generating plant or nuke uses tremendous amounts of power to black start. A hydro plant is most often what jump starts the other powerplants. A hydro plant has big, slow turning machinery and it is kept spit shined and well maintained. A well aligned and maintained hydro unit with bearings properly adjusted will run so smoothly you can balance a nickel on edge up on the generator housing, even when the unit is tripped off line. Been there and done that.

You are seeing what we call the "spider" or bearing bracket and generator lower guide bearing. Above it, where you see a little dim light seeping thru, is the generator field. The field rotates. The light is coming thru air slots in the stator (the stationary part of the generator which has "General Electric" on it). The rotor has a series of vertival fins on it that are also partially visible. As the rotor turns, aside from inducing a current in the stator to produce power, the fins ont he rotor act as a cooling blower to move air thru the windings in the stator and rotor. Generators get hot when producing power. This old unit is air-cooled.


This is a little guy as generators and turbines go. I work at a plant where the generator rotor alone weighs 500 tons and turns at 257 rpm.

You are seeing the turbine shaft . Below the floor is the actual turbine. The bell shaped housing may contain a guide bearing for the shaft. The weight of the rotating parts (generator rotor, shaft and "wheel"- which is known as the turbine runner) would be carried by a Thrust Bearing. The bell shaped housing is a bit small for containing a thrust bearing. Chances are the thrust bearing is located between the exciter and main generator, up on top. A thrust bearing for a unit this size would proably be about 4 feet in diameter, and run in an oil bath.

You are looking at the exciters. These are Direct Current Generators . They are stacked on top of the big AC power generators. The exciters make DC current to magnetize the field (rotor) of the big AC generator under them.

You are looking at the governor for one of the tubines. The governor regulates the speed of the turbine, using oil hydraulics to pen or close wicket gates to admit water to the runner ("wheel") as required to maintain speed. Once the generator has been synchronized into the grid, the speed is held solid by the frequency of the grid power, so the governor just controls load. Very similar to cruise control on a modern automobile. The "dispahn" on top is a shroud covering the governor ballhead. The ballhead spins, as speed drops off, the balls drop down and open a pilot valve- which ports oil to the distributing valve- which sends massive flows of pressurized oil to work hydraulic cylinders (servomotors) which open or close the wickets. The gauge with the dark face and single pointer is a wicket gate position indicator. The white faced guage is the tachometer. The rusted lever arms on top are part of a very sensitive mechanism to take the small movement /low force of the ballhead and use it to work the pilot valve.

The governor is an extremely sensitive and incredible piece of work. Very fine machine work needede build a governor. To maintain a ballhead hydraulic governor took the finest mechanics. Each unit had its own governor. Without a governor, there is no controlling a turbine's speed so it 's generator could be synchronized into the grid.

Sure, you pretty much nailed it - lens fogs up a bit in extreme temperature/humidity changes, batteries die quicker in cold weather... that's about it.

Romanesque (smooth sided) columns with ionic capitals?
Sort of a "mixed bag" of column design ....Neat shot...
Do you ever have any trouble with your equipment as a result of the cold, Motts? (Lens fogging, battery life,etc.?)

That is the way it was back then, make it bigger than it needed to be, more mass= more stability, plus the fact that casting large pieces was cheaper than today......

it reminds me of the chocolate boat from that movie "charlie and the chocolate factory" lol

Radiant green against greys and browns,very nice.

Wow, what an unexpected view...to just open the door and see that.