Model Steam Engines

Those look fun!

My father was restoring an old Wilesco steam engine for my son, he lost the use of his hands about a year before he passed away. I finished it up and gave it to my son. Here is a short video of it running after putting it all back together.

Nice job! A family heirloom now.

Ha funny yesterday just to distract myself, I built a put put boat engine

Cool TeeBee Good to hear from you , sounds like you had some good ole fun

getback wrote:Cool TeeBee Good to hear from you , sounds like you  had some good ole fun

Yep, Eric. Good fun! I had lost most of my interest in that stuff some time back. Funny how it comes back around.

David, I have a pretty large collection of pop pop boats. Some are homemade as well. Haven’t run them in years but that will probably change. The old timers at the boat event were very interested in my steamer. I described my pop pop boats abs they asked me to bring some to the next outing in a few months.

Steam is so cool! At the Museum of industry at Lake untiom here in The People's Republic of Seattle (I call it that with love,even if the natives don't think it's funny) they have many steam powered Skiffs,and they restored a ferry 120 years old,there's a Daguerreotype of the completed "Virginia V" when it was first built,and another from 2010,and the only difference is the recent one is color. First time I wsaw it I bumped into the Chief Engineer and he walked me through the construction & operation of the progressive steam engine that recovers some of the out exhaust to augment the next stroke,absolute cutting edge technology at the time. Then I became interested in the flash steam engine,typically used for hydroplanes. Then,just last night, I found this:
https://youtu.be/8fGUnNf3OiQ
Perhaps you've seen this before,but I was blown away!

It is really amazing. I am just wondering how safe the open flame boiler on board the balsa plane, carrying fuel on board is?

I was wondering if anyone has already converted a nitro cox engine to run it with steam I have an engine that I would like to convert to steam I don't know if this is possible

I love this stuff, beautiful boat.

Thanks! I had it out several times in 2021 at some boating events in Clear Lake, TX. The guys there really get a kick out of it since it’s the only one running steam power.

balogh wrote:It is really amazing. I am just wondering how safe the open flame boiler on board the balsa plane, carrying fuel on board is?

It was actually done 55 years ago-by a guy in england named David Parker who successfully developed and flew first a FF model powered by steam, and later developed it into a radio controlled version. You can read about it in Aeromodeller of the time-the October 1967 issue-where there is a comprehensive 3 page article on the development of the model and engine-3 views of the model and photos of the first successful public flights. A later issue(1 or 2 years later IIRC) mentions the successful conversion to R/C

'Aeromodeller' dubbed it 'the most outstanding model of 1967'

'Solarbo' even used the successful flight of the model in their balsa adverts of the time...

Over the years since a few people have duplicated the original design-including the bloke in Sri Lanka-but credit where credit is due-David Parker was there-the successful pioneer- over half a century ago-and flew his on the radio gear of the time-which was a lot bulkier, heavier and less reliable than today's gear.

There is even a website devoted to it:   http://www.flysteam.co.uk/     with a lot of data and info-both full size and model.

ChrisM
'ffkiwi'

Thanks ffkiwi for the background info.

That is a pretty cool stuff , didn't even know such a thing exist and to think it really got no love for the efforts

"Mamod" is a UK based company that produces live-steam engines and models for them. Years ago I used to frequent an "Eric Fuch's" hobby store (long gone now..   ) in a nearby shopping mall. They were a Mamod supplier.. and had some beautiful steam-engines on display. I always marveled at them.

https://www.mamod.co.uk/

Billing model boats has a 1:12 scale African Queen kit that would make a fascinating subject for a scale model live-steam launch.

https://www.billingboats.com/index.php/modelboats-footer/49/120/boats/advanced-beginner/P-bb588-african-queen

Not sure if the below vid is of a Billings kit.. but it does appear to be powered by a steam engine.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywvL8r1mi_E

There are other youtube vids that "do" feature the 1:12 Billing kit.. but are electric powered.

It's been a while since the idea to build something powered by steam the little engines I would like to use are affordable but it's the steam boiler that is expensive