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The Water Power of Texas. 
13 
He also has a natural dam, but its fall is six feet. His plant consists of 
an undershot wheel twelve feet in diameter and twelve feet long, and a 
centrifugal pump with a 4-inch suction pipe and 3-inch discharge. He 
pumps through eighteen feet of intake and 100 feet of discharge pipe, 
the lift being thirty-two feet. This plant was built in 1901, and, like 
the former, will sell water for irrigation purposes. 
Below the crossing of the Southern Pacific Railroad, Koehler and 
Blumberg have utilized a natural fall in the Guadalupe to develop power 
by use of a 72-inch Leffel turbine. By artificial means the fall has been 
increased to seven feet. The power is used in operating a gin during the 
Cotton season. At the lowest stages of the river, this fall could easily 
develop 200-horse powers. 
At Seguin there are several water power plants in active operation. 
At the upper darn where the Guadalupe river passes over a limestone 
fprmation, known as Erskine Falls (Fig. 4), it branches, and across one 
branch (about eighty feet wide) is built a dam of crib work about ten 
feet high, and that portion of the flow which passes through the branch 
is utilized in operating a gin. Only one turbine is used, but it is to be 
torn down to make room for a new cotton factory and more powerful 
machinery. A rock dam, twelve feet high, is to be constructed across the 
river proper for the new factory, and from 350- to 400-horse power is 
expected to be obtained. It is the intention to put in three 50-inch Leffel 
turbines. 
At the lower dam are two water power plants, one at each end. At the 
south end of the dam is located the electric light power bouse and a flour 
mill, owned by Scroell & Sons. The dam is partially a natural formation 
of irregular section and plan, and was raised one and one-half feet by 
dumping cemented gravel, on the crest. The head obtained is seven and 
one-half feet, and the turbines used are oue 66-inch New Success wheel, 
which gives 135-horse powers; and one 54-inch Alcott wheel, which gives 
10-horse powers. The mill runs sixteen hours per day, and the electric 
light plant fourteen hours. At the north end of this dam is located the 
pumping machinery of the Seguin Waterworks Company. The head is, 
of course, the same as at the south end, viz., seven and one-half feet, and 
the w r ater wheels consist of one 54-inch Leffel turbine, which generates 
forty horse power, and one 56-inch turbine, which generates fifty horse 
power. This latter turbine operates a pump whose capacity is 625,000 
gallons per twenty-four hours, and which supplies the town at present. 
The smaller turbine operates a pump whose capacity is 378,640 gallons 
per twenty-four hours, and which is used during the summer months 
only. 
At Wimberly, near the Blanco, fifteen miles north of San Marcos, 
there is a water power plant that runs a . gin. It is located on Cypress 
creek. 
