18. Coal bunkers under construction. This photo is a slight turn to the right from the last, the corner of the wet pit excavation is visible in the bottom left. The poles carrying the electricity supply are evident, including a low level one with wires leading over insulators into the wet pit. I’m assuming this is mainly for lighting as portable electric tools were not common at that time (though I stand ready to be corrected). Also I would not be surprised to find that the power was low voltage DC, maybe 50V? (Internal power in the mill later included 50V DC for portable equipment before the days when 110V AC became the standard).
The pipe emerging from the pit and crossing under the SG track is probably for dewatering the excavation, given the depth and gravel substrate here (when we did mud clearing in the ballast pit during mill shuts in the late 70s and early 80s though we pumped out most of the water with no5 reservoir pump, percolation through the gravel at high tide always partly refilled it. When the building dept dug a sump in the no 4mc basement to collect leaks and washings from no 3mc size press, the hole filled with water quite quickly due to rising tide).
Standard gauge and narrow gauge track in evidence. As the NG in particular was moved around to suit the requirements of the building work, it was treated much like model railway sectional track, pick it up and lay it down where needed. The SG trolley visible in this photo (there were maybe more than 1), appears in later photos and looks remarkably like one which still existed in the early 80s by the water tower and east mill rail weigh bridge. It’s just about discernible in this rather poor photo I took as one of a series when we sent away the last chlorine tanker to be used on site.
