Dickerson, Frank James Jr.

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 The Knowledge Bank at The Ohio State University Ohio State Engineer   Title:  Razing the Stack : How the Old Power House Stack Was Brought Down Creators:  Dickerson, Frank James Jr. Issue Date:  Apr-1928 Publisher:  Ohio State University, College of Engineering Citation:  Ohio State Engineer, vol. 11, no. 6 (April, 1928), 11-12. URI:  http://hdl.handle.net/1811/34282  Appears in Collections: Ohio State Engineer: Volume 11, no. 6 (April, 1928)   THE OHIO STATE E N G I N E E R 11Razing The StackHow the old Power House Stack was brought downBy FRANK DICKERSON, '27"What goes up must come down."This old apothegm holds true with allmaterial things, and was very forcibly-proven to us, here on the campus, Fri-day afternoon, March 23, when the oldabandoned power house stack crumbledand came thundering down to earth. Agiant who had breathed fire and smokefor many years is no more, crushed un-der the mighty and ruthless wheels ofprogress.Early in the year of 1913 the erectionof this stack was started and the con-struction lasted for nearly two months.This stack was 204 feet in height, theoutside diameter at the base was about17 feet. The footing and foundationwas a prodigious, stepped pyramidalmass of reinforced concrete, and theshaft was made of large radial hollowbrick cemented firmly together by a richmortar. At regular intervals bent bars,in the form of a box "U," were imbed-ded in the brick work, these bars thenmade a metallic ladder on the face ofthe stack and served man as a simplemeans of traveling up and down. Avery important feature of every stackwas added also, that of a lightning rod,which ran from the top down to theearth wThere it was well grounded. At intervalsalong the rod were metal fasteners which wereimbedded into the masonry. The fasteners andthe rod were joined together by a platinum joint;platinum was used because of its great infusibil-ity. The top of the stack was capped with a largecast iron ring.About five years ago the old Power House wasabandoned and the heating and power equipmentwas transferred to its new headquarters in theexpansive new Power Plant. Since that time, thisFig. I. Cutting and timber supportAPRIL, 1928Fig. 2. The stack comes downfaithful old stack has had no part in helping tofurnish power and therefore has remained sadlysilent and inactive.A short time ago contracts were let for thebuilding of the final addition to the new PowerPlant, making it a complete unit. One of thesecontracts was for the building of a new 245-footsmoke stack, which will be located just north ofthe Power Plant. The old stack was to be thrown,and all the good bricks salvaged and used inbacking up in the new chimney. The H. R.Heinicke Company, Inc., of New York, buildersof the old stack, being the low bidder was awardedthe contract. This company sent Mr. W. M. Bar-ber, a veteran stack and chimney thrower, tothrow the stack on the Ohio State Universitycampus. He and his few helpers arrived on Mon-day and started to work. It had been Mr. Bar-ber's plan to throw the stack late Tuesday after-noon, but when this time arrived only a small holewas visible. Mr. Barber and his workmen werequite perplexed by the hardness of the brick. Thismasonry was playing havoc with their chisels andhammers. After continual pecking from the in-side and outside the hole gradually grew. Whenthe opening was large enough huge timbers werewedged into place. For example, illustration No.1 shows the process of cutting and bracing, andalso the thickness of the masonry at the base.12 THE OHIO STATE ENGINEERThere are always two holes in a stack some-where near the ground, one is where the breech-ing from the boilers enters the stack and the otheris a clean-out door.On the left side of the first illustration may beseen the aperture where the clean-out door wasformerly located., The opening for the breechingwas located on the opposite side. This stack pre-sented Mr. Barber a different problem from thatwhich he was used to. All the stacks he hadthrown before could have been thrown in any di-rection that he desired, and he always made hiscut under the breeching hole; the stack falling inthat direction. But in this case there were build-ings on the breeching side; therefore the stackhad to be thrown to the west instead of the south.There was the everpresent danger of these holescausing the stack to slip to one side or the otherand fall partially or totally on the surroundingbuildings. A fairly large amount of steel hadbeen used over the breeching aperture and thiswas thought to be strong enough to keep the stackfrom falling southward. The clean-out door open-ing was strengthened by wedging large timbersin place, thereby attempting to keep the stackfrom falling towards the north.The chipping of the bricks continued untilabout 3:20 Friday afternoon, at which time thestack was resting on a half circle of masonry onthe east and on a few huge timbers on the west.The ring resulting from pounding on the timberstold that the stack was settling heavily on thewooden bracing and that the time was ripe. Agreat pile of inflammable materials were placedaround the timbers and a quantity of oil pouredon. At 4:25 the oil soaked wood burst into flames.The fire burned briskly from the start as the oldstack breathed again and for the last time, aminute later smoke rolled from the top. For25 minutes the crowd stood silently watching,waiting; then at ten minutes to four a few bricksbroke loose from the base and fell. A second laterthe top started to describe an arc to the west andearthward ever so slowly. Then as the timbersgave absolutely away the bottom of the stackkicked out and it settled heavily. In this settlingthe stack twisted, resulting in an immense torqueon the stack, causing a crack to start from thebase and wind cork screw like up the end aroundthe chimney until it reached about two-thirds thedistance up. When the crack reached this pointthis section of the chimney seemed to explode.The momentum earthward increased rapidly andmore rapidly as it neared the ground. Illustra-tion No. 2 shows the stack when it was half waydown. About two seconds after this picture wastaken over 700 tons of masonry struck the groundwith a tremendous crash.With all the possibilities of causing damage tothe surrounding buildings the stack fell almoston the line Mr. Barber said it would. Althoughalmost encircled with buildings not a window wasbroken.

Razing the Stack : How the Old Power House Stack Was Brought Down

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Razing the Stack : How the Old Power House Stack Was Brought Down

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