MANY POWER FAILURES

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1063, 29 August 1930, Page 11

MANY POWER FAILURES

TROUBLE AT STEAM PLANT MANAGER OUTLINES POSITION A poor quality section of coal and the dirty condition ot certain boilers Avhich have been worked since the Arapuni breakdown without cleaning, Avas responsible for a number of short interruptions in power supply in many suburbs last evening. Chief trouble was experienced betAveen five o’clock and 6.30 last evening, but tram services Avere kept going even through this Period* There Avas little actual inconvenience throughout the city, although interruptions Avere frequent in the Mount Uoskill, Herne Bay, Remuera, Grey Lynn, Ponsonby, Point Chevalier and Epsom districts. Lights failed for about 10 minutes at Onchunga, and flickered several times at Newmarket and Otahuhu. “When the King’s Wharf station took over the load from Arapuni every unit Avas in perfect condition and ran splendidly, but demands have been so great and so continuous that we have been unable to shut down any units in order to give them the attention they need. As a result the boilers are all in need of cleaning and noAv require a. larger amount of heating to keep up the same head of steam. This heat could not be supplied last evening oaving to a. poor section in the “dirty” coal we are using to minimise expense.” This was the explanation this morning of Mr. R. H. Bartley, general manager of the Auckland Electric-Power He added that the position had appeared so hopeless that men had been sent into two of the boilers last evening while' they were still “almost white hot” in order to clean tho tubes, and this had enabled a continuation of the service after some delay. There are about 16 boilers at the King’s Wharf plant and all will rave to be attended to shortly. It is expected that this can be done without serious inconvenience to users by closing one at a time, and the decreasing load through longer daylight hours will help considerably in reducing demands.