Fairbanks Morse Generator and Howitzer

(Update: content that was here concerning tractors and marine engines has been moved to Beloit, WI factory.)

While driving through Williston along US Alt 27 in Florida, my eye caught a grey machine off to the right, so I pulled into the next parking lot. In a city park they had a Fairbanks Morse engine coupled to a flywheel, a Fairbanks Morse generator, and a couple of belt pulleys.

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Note the spanish moss hanging on the tree in the background. And that is the first time I've seen an exhaust pipe that looks more like a smokestack.

The sign says:

An electrical distribution system was purchased for $33,000 on June 11, 1923, from the Williston Manufacturing Company. Included was the generator, ice plant, cold storage plant, water tank, a ten-year-old bay horse named Charlie, and a wagon with a harness. This generator was used for seven years to produce electricity and had a capacity of 100 kilowatts.

 I assume one of the belt pulleys drove the compressor for the cold storage and ice plants and the other drove a pump for the water tank. I recognize the Fairbanks Morse name as one of the companies that made diesel-electric locomotives in the 1940s and 1950s. They made an opposing piston design that did not work very well in locomotives, but did work very well in the submarines of WWII.

The coils on the engine side of the generator are in good shape. This shot is framed by the rim and a spoke of the flywheel.

But a lot of the coils on the pulley side have been damaged. Most of the coils on the left side are gone or severed like those that you can see at the bottom. Also the 2 contacts are not aligned with the 2 slip rings. And I had expected to see 3 slip rings because normally 3-phase power does not have one of the phases at ground level. I guess it worked for only 7 years because something slipped or fell off and caused a lot of damage. I don't think vandals would have enough energy to cause this kind of damage.

The city park that is displaying this generator is also displaying an 8-inch Howitzer.

You can see the generator in the background below the elevation arm and the exhaust stack to the right of the tree. The sign says "This Howitzer 8" M2 Cannon was secured by the City from the Anniston Alabama Army Depot on April 30,1975."

Both signs had the information:

Williston was incorporated as a town in 1897 and chartered as a city in 1929. On October 10, 1915 this area was designated as a public park by the Mayor and Town Council in a deed from J.B. and P.A. Epperson It is known as Epperson Park.

Update:
Steve Bolte posted four pictures with the comment: "For the Fairbanks Morse aficionados. 300 horsepower and 300 RPMs." But the fourth picture seems to be a different engine.

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They made small engines as well.

Screenshot from Ted Gibbons' posting
1945 Fairbanks Morse used to run the Vacuum pump in my great Grandpas cow barn we believe it's been in our family since new.
Bill Adams Love those salt blocks!!
Ted Gibbons It's hard not to love them so simple and robust.

This power plant has 1940 and 1960s generation of F-M engines plus the first and second generations of EMD engines. I don't care for the "tour" format, but there are enough useful scenes to make these videos worthwhile. For example the slow and fast starter motors on the modern EMD self starting generator.
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Using internal combustion engines to power generators has scaled up over the decades.

Sean Brady posted

A 12-cylinder Nordberg diesel radial engine. This engine displaced 29,556 cu in (484.3 L) and produced around 2,000 hp (1,500 kW). Note the fuel injector in the center of the cylinder head.

The Nordberg radial offered several advantages over the stationary inline engines that were the current standard. With its cylinders horizontal, the Nordberg radial’s output shaft was in a vertical position. Although the engine was built primarily to generate power for the electrolytic reduction of aluminum, its arrangement was perfect for pumping applications. In addition, the configuration of the radial made it more compact and much lighter than a comparative inline engine. The Nordberg radial took up about half the space of an equally powerful inline engine and could be installed on a much lighter foundation.

The Nordberg radial was first introduced in 1947. The first engines were spark-ignition natural gas burning units that quickly established themselves as reliable and economical. These engines had two spark plugs located in the cylinder head. A single cam on the crankshaft actuated a gas valve for each cylinder. This gas valve allowed the natural gas into the incoming scavenging air for the cylinder.

Nordberg continued to develop the radial as its use spread to central power stations and various pumping applications, primarily for flood control and at sewage treatment plants. Nordberg soon developed a diesel version of the engine and a version that could run on a mixture of diesel and natural gas, which Nordberg dubbed Duafuel. The Duafuel engine could run on 100% diesel or as little as 5% diesel and 95% natural gas. This flexibility allowed the engine to operate with the most economical fuel mixture possible. In the diesel and Duafuel engines, the single cam now actuated a fuel pump for each cylinder, and the diesel fuel injector was in the center of the cylinder head.

Frank Duncan: Long ago, in the early 1970s, in a place far away, I worked at the Kaiser aluminum plant in Chalmette, Louisiana for 18 months just before they shut it down. Lines 1&2 at the aluminum refinery used Norbergs like this! They ran continuously 24/7/365 and were REALLY quiet. They ALWAYS ran them at 105% capacity! I stood by the cylinder head of one and all you could hear was a muted chuff as it fired. They were on the second floor, and the generators that looked like huge green pears were under each one on the first floor. There was a huge bank of radiators to cool the lubricating oil on the outside of the building. I think we averaged about 1,100,000 pounds of aluminum every day. Good times and fond memories.

And many of them are now powered by natural gas.

Jeffrey Riche posted via Dennis DeBruler