Peterborough Lift Lock

Peterborough Lift Lock from bottom

On the Trent Severn there are three very significant locks.  Two hydraulic and another one called the Big Chute, which is a rail lift lock.

There are only five hydraulic lift locks in the world.  Two are located on the Trent Severn Waterway, the other three are located in Europe.   The Peterborough Lift Lock is the tallest in the world at 19.8 Meters. The infrastructure of the lock is impressive.  The Lift Lock design was selected as it is one of the fastest locking methods.  Fast locking was necessary for commercial use in its earlier days.

The Peterborough Lift Lock (A National Historic Site of Canada) was constructed  between 1896 and 1904.  It was the largest concrete structure in the world at that time (26,000 Cu Yds), and there was no re-rod used in its construction

How it works: CLICK FOR VIDEO

There are two chambers that are adjacent
to each other, their size is 140' long x 33' wide x 7' deep +1.
The chambers are mounted to a Hydraulic ram which is 7.5' in Diameter and  65' tall.  There is an inter-connecting  valve system between the rams for controlling water flow during the raising and lowering of the chambers.

View of Upper Chamber

View of Lower chamber

View of half of the bottom
of the (currently) upper chamber

There are gates on each end of the chambers that fold down for entry and exit, they also,  hold and seal the water in the chamber during a lift or decent.

Lower chamber is filled and ready
for lifting

When the lock is ready for a lock through.  Another foot of water (earlier years it was 8") is added to the upper chamber, (this is done by stopping the upper chamber one foot below the upper surface, and water is let into the chamber) thus creating an uneven weight, and, the system then starts to lower one chamber and raise the other chamber when the valves are adjusted to allow water to flow between the rams.

There is a tunnel under the upper river portion
The upper chamber can be seen behind the tree

The average time for a cycle is 10 minutes.  I asked about the packing glands.  They are one foot in height around the seal, and several inches thick.  They use square rope, some times waxed square rope, and now they use the rope on the top and bottom and a rubber seal in-between.

A hot morning for Daisy and Vicki at the lift lock.
Canada Parks do an awesome job of maintaining
the grounds around all the lock stations.
Many flowers, seating, visitors centers etc.