Franz?
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Mon May 12, 2008 8:03 am

Rochester NY had DC in the core city (inside the Inner Loop) until 1965. AC was also available, and many buildings had both systems. The DC was generated by Court St Dam on the Genesee river, owned and operated by NY State DOT. The generators and wiring were pulled from the dam in 1980, and the State paid a man to stand there and make sure everything was smashed and not rebuildable. Your tax dollars at work!

50 and 25hz systems also existed all over the country into the 50s. Churchville NY operated a 25hz system generating power from the falls in Black Creek and when their village municipal system tied into the grid from Niagra Falls, Churchville installed a rotary converter to change 60hz to 25hz power. The 25hz was discontinued around 1955 when the converter let all its smoke out and it became aparent switching the system to 60hz was more cost effective.

In the Rochester area the Interurban trains did a lot more to prove the transmission efficiency of AC over DC than all the professors in the world could have.

Many industrial plants and even downtown buildings generated their own electricity into the 1930s, when the PoCo, RG&E proved they could sell steam plant operators electricity cheaper than they could make their own. Only Eastman Kodak continues to burn coal and make their own electricity. Kodak can still make it cheaper due to economy of scale.

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JasonC
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Mon May 12, 2008 4:46 pm

The picture is to low of quality to read any of the prices, this is one of two pictures from the brochures on eBay (the other being the cover).

Some of the old Sterling lit I had listed 25Hz A.C. current as a voltage, as well as a small quote that says they could provide motors for any voltage specified. Adam Pollak has pretty much all my literature now.

Robert Gift
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Mon May 12, 2008 10:10 pm

Franz? wrote: ... The DC was generated by Court St Dam on the Genesee river, owned and operated by NY State DOT. The generators and wiring were pulled from the dam in 1980, and the State paid a man to stand there and make sure everything was smashed and not rebuildable. Your tax dollars at work!
Why?
Why ensure no rebuildability and destroy such historic equipment - unless it is really of no historical value.
Perhaps worth much more in scrap value.
Franz? wrote:50 and 25hz systems also existed all over the country into the 50s. Churchville NY operated a 25hz system generating power from the falls in Black Creek and when their village municipal system tied into the grid from Niagra Falls, Churchville installed a rotary converter to change 60hz to 25hz power. The 25hz was discontinued around 1955 when the converter let all its smoke out and it became aparent switching the system to 60hz was more cost effective.

In the Rochester area the Interurban trains did a lot more to prove the transmission efficiency of AC over DC than all the professors in the world could have.

Many industrial plants and even downtown buildings generated their own electricity into the 1930s, when the PoCo, RG&E proved they could sell steam plant operators electricity cheaper than they could make their own. Only Eastman Kodak continues to burn coal and make their own electricity. Kodak can still make it cheaper due to economy of scale.
How interesting!
Until last year, the 1932 Denver City and County Building had four AC motors turning four generators to create the DC for the four elevator motors.
Sorry they changed. The commutators were works of art!

Franz?
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Tue May 13, 2008 2:39 am

Actually, the State of NY knew and understood they had historic value, and so did the man who removed them from the dam. Several hours of time were spent determining how to remove the gensets in pieces and a new home for them existed at the WNY collector's site in Alexander and the Steam museum in Canandagua.
Unfortunately, such objects as generators hold no historical signifigance according to the people making such determinations for the State, whereas jars of urine with submerged crucifixes do have value. The a$$holes making such decisions obviously went to College where they learned to be total wastes of breathing air.

Since the State was footing the bill to remove the gensets, the State has a duty to recover as much salvage value as they can, which includes scrap iron and copper. To that end, the State placed an employee on scene to verify the scrapping. (consideration was given to drowning him)

The basturds even refused to sell the gensets in place so they could be removed by museum members who were willing to pay scrap value +, because that would have eliminated paying Union Electricians from Local 86 IBEW to do the work, at a cost much higher than the recovered scrap paid. Union votes must always be bought whenever possible using taxpayer money. (that's why bridgedecks get carved apart with jackhammers to impede traffic for 2 months when the job can be done by a machine in 36 hours.)

We even had a handfull of Assemblymen and Senators involved all of who sold out for the Union votes they hoped to buy thinking there were more votes there than the membership of 2 museums. Aparently they were right.

The only justice was that the Foreman on the job got his ancle crushed on his next job, revenge of the machines. The contractor that bid the job went bankrupt too.

DC elevator M/G sets are fairly common. When RG&E wanted to abandon the DC system downtown, RG&E bought and paid for the installation of solid state rectifiers for all the DC equipment that remained in service.

The old iron in this part of the country is quickly heading for China to return as paperclips thanks to the educated morons masquerading as engineers today. I've had a lot of laughs watching them. 3 "engineers" standing in front of a stage lighting control looking at 6 variacs the size of trashcan lids and complaining they can't locate the SCR light dimmers is hilarious. Trying to get the concept of a variable transformer output to stick in the solid state head of a 30 year old "engineer" is an exercize in frustration. Charging $100- a page to write the explanation for the engineering firm is rewarding.

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Tue May 13, 2008 5:43 pm

JasonC wrote:Image

There is a 5hp variant about 20 miles east of me on the Yanceyville, NC city hall. One of the many Sterlings in NC.
Lol don't forget in Lower Yoder Twp. there is siren that has the same Hp. but with a few modifications.
Image
Image
Monitoring Cambria and Somerset Counties.
http://s821.photobucket.com/albums/zz13 ... n_archive/

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Daniel
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Tue May 13, 2008 9:06 pm

Do you know approximately what year that ad ran?
Lex orandi, lex credendi, lex vivendi.

Franz?
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Wed May 14, 2008 3:36 am

That's not an ad, it's 2 pages of a salesman/distributor catalogue for Sterling products that the salesman might have passed along to a potential customer.

The pic of the front cover bears the rubber stamp impression of the sales company in Needham, Mass with a telephone number indicating 1930s vintage. The pic on the front cover is definitely 1930s, possibly an artist's drawing of Main St Rochester.

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500AT
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Fri May 16, 2008 8:25 pm

Did anyone bid on that sales sheet that was on eBay?

Sincerely yours,

Ron W.

"When your siren's a failin', chances are it's a Whelen."

Franz?
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Sat May 17, 2008 4:24 am

500AT wrote:Did anyone bid on that sales sheet that was on eBay?
No bids this time around, it'll probably be back up.

vfdfirefighter78
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Re:

Wed Jun 12, 2019 5:26 am

CTsirenhunter wrote:
Sat Apr 19, 2008 5:34 pm
Given your knowledge, I would like to ask a somewhat off-topic Sterling question. This is a VFD siren in Pine Meadow, CT, a part of the town of New Hartford. We presume it's a Sterling...can you shed any light on it?
Image
Just inquiring did you ever figure out what model siren this is? We just recently put an old one back in service and looks exactly like this one. The name plate is painted over so it is hard to see some of the numbers. It does say rochester ny on it so it is made there. Thank you for any info.

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