French River's Mission

French River Land Company (FRL) develops small and micro hydro resources.  As hydro developer, French River provides the unique experience, engineering and craftsmanship to build and operate hydro projects in the Northeast. 

FRL was incorporated on February 10, 1992. Since 1992, French River has owned the dormant South Village hydro project. In 1995 it purchased  Building 9 in the Ware Mill Complex. In June of 1997 FRL purchased the Tannery Pond Hydro Project in Winchendon, MA. It went on line in June of 1999 to satisfy FERC license requirements. Due to contract negotiation problems, with Templeton Power & Light, it did not commence commercial operations until May of 2004. At that time, Will & Celeste negotiated a new power sales contract, with with the Massachusetts Electric Company. They received their first check from the Massachusetts Electric Company in June of 2004! This was the first cash flow the site had earned in over 50 years!! (see the Tannery Pond sidebar) In December of 2003, Celeste and Will Fay purchased the entire stock of FRL. In March of 2004, FRL purchased Golden Pond Hydro in Ashland, N.H. This site was last operated in June of 2002 when it was badly damaged by a lightening strike. On January 3rd of 2008, Golden Pond Hydro began commercial operations with a signed contract with the Ashland Electric Light Department. It took almost four years, of weekends, to rebuild the badly damaged and thoroughly worn out tube turbine (see the Hydrolec disassembly, Hydrolec Rebuild and Golden Pond Hydro sidebars).

William K. Fay P.E., FRL's Chief Engineer and General Manager, is a licensed hydro engineer who has inspected 80 dams for the Massachusetts Dam Safety Division and is authorized by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to perform Part 12 inspections of licensed hydropower facilities.  He and his children, Celeste and Will, have rebuilt many small hydro plants located throughout New England.

Hi everyone! I am sorry about the hiatus. My computer crashed and I had a terrible time getting Microsoft Frontpage reloaded.

We helped the Munch's from Valatie Falls get their site back on line. One of the blades from their Leffel "B2" runner had broken off and gone down the tailrace. Bob Munch located it with a magnet and pulled it out of the tailrace. Celesty, Will Ronnie and Messrs. Bob and Fred Munch welded it back on.

Celeste Fay, Will Fay and Ronnie Johnson have removed three of the wicket gates from the Valatie Falls, Leffel "B2" unit. They are grinding the cast iron back from around the root of the blade stub. Note the wicket gates stacked against the pressure case wall.

Freshly ground blade root prepared for welding the blade back on. Note the conical throat the runner tips sit in.

Here, Ronnie Johnson has welded washers onto the blade so that we can suspend it from ropes so that we do not lose it down the draft tube. Note the paint and rust has been cleaned from the edge so that a nice clean, structural weld can be made.

Valatie Falls blade has been reattached and aligned. Final welding is in progress. Note the rope that is temporarily attached to the washers. We wiggled the washers back and forth and broke them off. We ground the residual weld off with a 4 inch grinder.

Will Fay having a quick bite of pizza in front of the Valatie Falls generator and switchgear. It was 3 degrees Fahrenheit down in the pit. It always amazes me that we are playing in the water at these temperatures. Every time we came up out of the hole the water from our boots froze on the steel rungs of the ladder. By the end of the day, the rungs had become horizontal icicles!!

We have been very busy. The Thursday before Christmas, we twisted off an 8 inch thrust shaft. It was the one with the 10 inch forged thrust discs. We ordered a 10 foot long by 10 inch diameter billet. Warren chucked it in the lathe. He made a new shaft. We had the unit back on line two weeks to the date it broke. This time frame included Christmas and New Year's vacations. I am very proud of our crew including Sam Melanson, Cole Zub, Bill Carabetta, John Remington, Warren Fay, Davis Hobbs, Wayne Bailey, Wayne Roberts and Peter Clark.

Friday, December 23rd, the number One Turbine's mainshaft has failed. See the seperation in the shaft between the coupling and the thrust stand.

Broken thrust shaft. Note the small circle of fresh metal that was taking the shear. Note the heavy rusting coating the rest of the break. We concluded that this was a problem we had inherited from when it was installed in Missoula, MT.

Here is the new 10 inch billet being turned in the Poreba roll lathe. You can see the new thrust discs emerging from the solid billet. We are so lucky to have Warren Fay "The Wizard" on staff!! We had the new shaft installed and the No. One Unit running exactly two weeks later!!!

The new shaft is finished. Warren Fay is going to cut the new keyways, in the shaft ends, with the Bridgeport milling head. Note the massive steel plates he designed and built as a support frame for the Bridgeport head. I was amazed that "The Wizard" turned my Poreba lathe into a lathe/miller!!!

Cole Zub, Pete Andersen, Bill Carabetta and Sam Melanson are installing the newly minted thrust shaft into the thrust stand.

Contact Information

Telephone

1-413-244-6445

 

Electronic mail

General mail: wfay@frenchriverland.com
Webmaster:    bfay@frenchriverland.com

 

Last modified: 01/19/11