Re: Fuel question
Gary, I've started looking into this as well, I have the tank out of an old Colman two burner stove. It is on the list of projects, just need to find the time! ;-) If you get a burner designed, I'd like to hear about it, sharing information would save time. Terry Griner Columbus Ohio USA [EMAIL PROTECTED] 02/19/02 07:03PM I am going to revamp a Steamlines Shay burner into a radiant burner. While looking up parts needed I thought, Why isn't white gas or camping fuel or Coleman fuel used to heat small live steam boilers?. White gas has low pressure. It burns very well at high altitudes and below freezing temperatures (after the throttle tube warms up). I have warmed up my Svea stove in my sleeping bag to get enough pressure to run in very cold conditions. If all else fails a drop of liquid fuel can be set on fire to warm up the fuel delivery tube and burner head. It is incredibly cheap and I believe widely available. No stinky fumes. Fuel tanks can be pressurized with a few pumps of a simple low pressure pump. I am sure others have considered this fuel. I am just not able to think up on my own why this fuel is not used. Gary - Eugene, Oregon
Cheap Water feed pump
I just returned from Harbor Freight with three Pressure Fed Oil Guns. Regular price is about $4.00. Now they are $1.99! Item number is 36629, the box is yellow, and the oil can reservoir is red. I cleaned the test oil out with Simple Green, then filled it with water. This oil can has a pressure regulator screw as well. I simply placed a one inch clear neoprene tubing section on the end of the pump and used it to inject water into the Steamlines Shay's Goodall valve. This pump works! I bought the Sulphur Springs water feed bottle a few years ago. It sort of worked with their smaller one way valve, until the pump completely failed. I bought three of these little oil cans. I thought I would have to alter (read screw up) a few before I made one pump water. In any case, if you seek a simple low cost, reliable feed water hand pump for filling via Goodall valves go to Harbor Freight. ~Gary - happy with a bargain in Eugene, Oregon
Re: Cheap Water feed pump
At 01:28 PM 2/20/02 -0800, you wrote: I just returned from Harbor Freight with three Pressure Fed Oil Guns. Regular price is about $4.00. Now they are $1.99! Item number is 36629, Gary, Looks good, but not available on-line at that price. Must be a friendly local neighborhood branch manager's spatial. It's hell being Harbot Freight depraved, I mean deprived. hw
Re: Cheap Water feed pump
Harry, I suggest writting to the online store and ask for that part number. I expect Harbor Freight does not list every item they carry online. There are also many train stores with web sites that do not list all items. ~Gary - when motivated, I keep knocking until I find it in Eugene, OR or some other city, state, or country. - Original Message - From: Harry Wade [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Multiple recipients of sslivesteam [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, February 20, 2002 2:05 PM Subject: Re: Cheap Water feed pump At 01:28 PM 2/20/02 -0800, you wrote: I just returned from Harbor Freight with three Pressure Fed Oil Guns. Regular price is about $4.00. Now they are $1.99! Item number is 36629, Gary, Looks good, but not available on-line at that price. Must be a friendly local neighborhood branch manager's spatial. It's hell being Harbot Freight depraved, I mean deprived. hw
Re: Cleaning coal burner pipes
Good evening Bob and everyone else. I had to write to ask how to get in touch with Small Parts, Inc. I had traded with them about 20 years ago but cannot find my old catalog. Perhaps there's a website. My name is Dick Griffith, of Connecticut. Machining results include a small launch steam engine .50 bore, a partially completed Stuart #10 vertical, and a nearly completed 1.5 scale CliShay that will run on 7.25 gauge track and uses a 2 cylinder launch engine, 1.25 bore. The engine in done sans rings. The boiler shell, flue sheets and flues were made by a professional, Don Marshall, in VT about 18 years ago. I need to finish it. 1.5 scale is too big, too heavy and requires specialized trailers or motor trucks but they do pull a lot of weight. I have about 50 more hours of work to complete the piping, smoke stack and boiler shroud, piston rings, and miscellany such as head light etc. My son is anxious to drive it, but will not help finish it. Oh, well. It occurs to me that Gauge I, or .75 scale is the way to go. I have made many HO scale rolling stock and engines, so the smaller scales should be no problem. The smaller scale should be fun. Well, that's enough for now. Please drop me a line when you have a moment. Dick On Tue, 19 Feb 2002 23:11:33 EST [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Opening up this subject again. I just got my most recent order frm Small Parts Inc. (It's really dangerous having an open account!). Anyway, I included one of the bristle brushes that they carry. I got a .25 size because the coal fired boiler that I am building will have that size flues. It has a nylon bristle and is six inches long, cost was $2.50, I think. The bristles are pretty stiff and should be able to handle cleaning with no danger what so ever to the flue tubes. I think that I would also consider having a brass one around too, just for the stubborn stuff. Bob Starr GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO! Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less! Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/web/.
Re: fuel question (long response)
Friends, The operative thought here is . . . designed to use . . . I'm not sure how many of us on this list are design engineers or who, like me, are tinkers. We tinkers would rather cobble something together to get it to work and that includes patience with many false starts, inefficient designs, and early failures of equipment, even when it seems to be working OK in the beginning. The design engineer would noodle something that is more likely to work correctly out of the box, but that requires a different kind of patience, and a grasp of theory and practice that many of us do not have. An efficient coal fired locomotive boiler is very different from an efficient alcohol fired locomotive boiler. In the first case the boiler typically features fire tubes and a firebox that is surrounded by water spaces on the sides, front and back. A coal fire produces a good deal of radiant heat that can be captured in the water spaces surrounding the firebox. The alcohol burner is more efficient when designed to use water tubes and maybe porcupine quills in an elongated firebox, perhaps of a Smithies design. An alcohol flame does not radiate to the sides and is much less intense than a coal fire, hence the need to capture the heat somewhat differently. Water tubes and porcupine quills in contact with the flame work more efficiently here but these are features that would burn out very quickly in the intensity of a coal fire. The firebox of our butane fired favorite, Ruby, is an airtight single flue firetube design, quite different than the other two. I remember the kerosene fired sidearm water heater from my early days at home in Brooklyn. That was a round burner in a cylinder that enclosed a coil of pipe within which the water was heated. There again, quite a different design from those mentioned above. Similarly, a gasoline fired boiler might well require a very different firebox design, probably something that more closely resembles the coal fired firebox or sidearm heater, rather than something like the water tube or single flue designs. Those differences alone can make the difference between a boiler that last for generations vs. one that lasts for a few seasons when fired by a fuel for which it was not designed. There is much room for experimentation here. The folks who are experimenting with the radiant burner concept are setting the example for the rest of us. Casey Sterbenz From: Gary Broeder [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Multiple recipients of sslivesteam [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: fuel question Date: Tue, 19 Feb 2002 20:01:19 -0800 Regarding the use of white gas: I have posted on this before although it has been some time. I have a model traction engine that my Grandfather scratch built some 80 years ago. It was designed to use white gas and still runs to this day on said fuel.. _ Join the worlds largest e-mail service with MSN Hotmail. http://www.hotmail.com
Re: Cleaning coal burner pipes
Richard, try: Http://www.smallparts.com Richard S Griffith wrote: Good evening Bob and everyone else. I had to write to ask how to get in touch with Small Parts, Inc. I had traded with them about 20 years ago but cannot find my old catalog. Perhaps there's a website. My name is Dick Griffith, of Connecticut. Machining results include a small launch steam engine .50 bore, a partially completed Stuart #10 vertical, and a nearly completed 1.5 scale CliShay that will run on 7.25 gauge track and uses a 2 cylinder launch engine, 1.25 bore. The engine in done sans rings. The boiler shell, flue sheets and flues were made by a professional, Don Marshall, in VT about 18 years ago. I need to finish it. 1.5 scale is too big, too heavy and requires specialized trailers or motor trucks but they do pull a lot of weight. I have about 50 more hours of work to complete the piping, smoke stack and boiler shroud, piston rings, and miscellany such as head light etc. My son is anxious to drive it, but will not help finish it. Oh, well. It occurs to me that Gauge I, or .75 scale is the way to go. I have made many HO scale rolling stock and engines, so the smaller scales should be no problem. The smaller scale should be fun. Well, that's enough for now. Please drop me a line when you have a moment. Dick On Tue, 19 Feb 2002 23:11:33 EST [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Opening up this subject again. I just got my most recent order frm Small Parts Inc. (It's really dangerous having an open account!). Anyway, I included one of the bristle brushes that they carry. I got a .25 size because the coal fired boiler that I am building will have that size flues. It has a nylon bristle and is six inches long, cost was $2.50, I think. The bristles are pretty stiff and should be able to handle cleaning with no danger what so ever to the flue tubes. I think that I would also consider having a brass one around too, just for the stubborn stuff. Bob Starr GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO! Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less! Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/web/.
