Office of Steam Forum for Model & Toy Steam Gas & Hot Air Engines

Ouch!

Yep, that would seem a very good price as I paid about $20 more for mine several years ago when money was worth quite a bit more. Of course, not regretting as I've gotten plenty of value out of mine in the ensuing years.

On the other hand, for most of our electric fired engines that only have a single heating element, these lesser options my prove even more economical, and are far easier to find space to store.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/155864120970?

https://www.ebay.com/itm/386101233861?

https://www.ebay.com/itm/166229771320?


These are likely not the best prices you can find on these units as I didn't actually look around, but simply grabbed the link to the first ones I saw, and there are other styles of these smaller ones out there as well.

With that being said, the larger variac as is being shown by Gil in the first post, really is the Cat's Meow for this sort of thing, and they can handle about any power requirements that you can throw at them, like Jensen 50's even with their three heating elements, or multiple engines for that matter!

Daniel, don't feel bad about $20 more. My first one set me back about 120. Still no regrets as it has been serving me well.
The next 2 were considerably better priced like yours. I would go for one of these at this price except for having the good sense to not think I need a 4th.

I just use the one that Roger showed us how to make from "The Temple of Steam".

[ Guests cannot view attachments ]

I bought one of the middle selection in Daniel's post above.

It just arrived today and so far I am not impressed other than that it is smart looking.

On the front it says 15 amps max and on the back it says current capacity 10 amps.

When connected to a load, starting at zero, it doesn't register any power at all until you get over 40.

And.....

It doesn't put out more than 106 volts with 115-118 volts feeding it.

In a second test with a 500 watt hair dryer nothing registered until the dial reached 56 volts and then it was only 13-14 volts on the LED read out. At this point the hair dryer started buzzing. Then turning up to 65 on the dial it was only putting out 30 volts. At 80 on the dial, it put out 65 volts. At full power, 118 volts in it reads 108 volts out with the hair dryer.

I think I will check it with an external volt meter.

This one:  https://www.ebay.com/itm/386101233861?


Edit: I just shared this info through ebay with the seller.

Sorry Gil, didn't mean to misdirect anyone!

It does seem that this is a "second hand" unit, and not actually factory new. Perhaps the seller determined that it didn't work quite right and passed it on?!?!

Hi Daniel,

No worries at all. He handled the situation perfectly and quickly. He apologized and asked me to let him know if I don't want to keep. I wrote back that I could return it and how did he want me to proceed. He very quickly replied with a full refund and said I could toss it or keep it whichever I prefer. For his professional customer centric responses, I gave him very good feedback.

I doubt he ever even tested it as it looks like he buys things at close outs and clean outs and resells it all on ebay.

Gil

Well dern Gil, I thought this might be a good alternative to my built in voltage regulator, also with a built in gauge. Well since I can no longer buy from eBay I found some on Amazon...but sounds like the quality is as cheap as the price.