32 



M. S. GORDON AND R, A. BOOLOOTIAN 



Figure 3. — The two redwood gravity-feed tanks on the fifth floor. 



ters maintain a considerable bacterial pop- 

 ulation which seems to remove much toxic 

 material from the water. The only main- 

 tenance necessary on these filters is occa- 

 sional (about every 4 or 5 months) 

 back-flushing of ihe filters with fresh 

 w^ater. Each filter tank is fitted with suit- 

 able fresh-water and compressed-air lines, 

 and back-flush drain lines, for carrying 

 out this operation w^ith minimum loss of 

 sea water. 



The system is equipped with an alarm 

 system which immediately notifies the 

 University maintenance department of any 

 interruption in operations. Maintenance 

 men are available on short notice at all 

 times. 



RECOMMENDATIONS 



As it is, the system functions very well. 

 However, if redesign of the entire system 

 were practical several things would be 

 done differently. 



First, we would not use centrifugal 

 pumps as motive power. Centrifugal 

 pumps are relatively inefficient in terms 

 of the amount of power needed to pump a 

 given volume of water a given distance. 

 This is especially true for the rubber-lined 

 pumps we use in order to avoid metallic 

 contamination. Recent developments in 

 pump design liave made available several 

 other more satisfactory types of pumps 

 for continuous surge-free operation 

 against large pressure heads. Surge-free 



