Streatham Pumping Station
Mineral springs were discovered at Streatham Common in 1659.
To meet the demands for a public water supply, work was started on drilling a well in 1881, and the well was brought into use in 1890. The original pumping equipment was housed in a corrugated iron shed. In 1894 work on a grand new station started, built by the Southwark and Vauxhall Water Co.
The steam pumps were replaced in 1943 by electrically driven pumps. The yield from the well gradually deteriorated until it was no longer viable to use it as a supply source, but the equipment was retained as booster pumps between the mains and Norwood Reservoir. In the 1980s the building was adapted as one of eleven pumping stations serving the Thames Water Ring Main, which used an 8ft diameter tunnel 50 miles long.
The above information is condensed from here[1]
1898 The pumping plant was from the designs of James William Restler, the engineer to the company, and was constructed by James Watt and Co. Two sets or triple-expansion horizontal engines, geared to countershafts, each countershaft being connected by means of cranks at either end to a set of deep well pumps, and a bucket-and-plunger pump. The high-pressure and intermediate cylinders were arranged tandem, the cranks being set at right angles. The diameters of the cylinders were 8 3/4in., 13in., and 25in., with a stroke of 2ft. Steam at 160 psi was supplied by Babcock and Wilcox boilers.
The well pumps were initially placed at a depth of 140ft. from the surface. The well, driven into chalk, was 244ft. deep, and lined throughout with cast iron cylinders, an outer lining of brick steining being carried to a depth of 148ft.; inside the br1ck steining, cast iron cylinders 9ft. diameter, were taken to a depth of 190ft., and the inner cast iron lining, 7ft. 6in. diameter, continued to the bottom of the well. From the bottom of the well a bore hole 28in. diameter was carried through the chalk to a depth of 810ft.; this bore hole was reduced successively to 24in., 20in., 18in., 15in., and 4in. diameter, to a total depth of 1271ft. Water rose in the well to within about 50ft. from the surface when the pumps were at rest, but when at work the pumps lowered the water to about 100ft. [2]
See here for high resolution photos of Streatham Pumping Station [3]