Office of Steam Forum for Model & Toy Steam Gas & Hot Air Engines
The Regular Stuff: Chat, Buy, Sell, Off Topic, etc. => General Discussion - Model & Toy Steam Engines – Stirling Cycle – Flame Lickers – Small Antique Originals => Topic started by: Timvrip on November 19, 2024, 01:56:54 pm
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I may be missing something but I would be a little afraid of wood lagging a boiler with a flame burner under it on a horizontal where the flames can creep up.
No Frank, I don't think you are missing anything here that would make a difference. I agree that wood lagging on a flame fired boiler may not be a very good idea, unless the lagging is some insulative material that is non-flammable, or at least the bottom strips of the lagging are such that the flame can't get directly to the wood strips above it!
Did that make any sense?!?!
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WOW, this post, or topic, has been viewed over 70,000 times. That's a lot of boiler
issues.
Curses, I should of bought stock in VHT.
Now over a million views. Who'd a thunk it?
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cool
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I may be missing something but I would be a little afraid of wood lagging a boiler with a flame burner under it on a horizontal where the flames can creep up.
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Yep ........ Bot Bytes without a doubt!!!
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Now the views are up t 120,000. What gives? I've
seen this sort of thing before on you tube. Sounds
like the work of an AI Bot. Of course, behind every
AI Bot there is a person who coded it and directs it.
We aren't at the 'Demon Seed' movie stage yet!
Thank God AI Bots cannot vote. I'm all in with photo-ID
to vote. Heck, if you want to pick up reserved tickets
at a box office you have to show photo-id.
I'll be running an Empire B30 with breakfast. Restorative.
Wayne
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WOW, this post, or topic, has been viewed over 70,000 times. That's a lot of boiler
issues.
Curses, I should of bought stock in VHT.
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I removed everything from the boiler and scuffed the surface lightly and evenly with 800
grit paper. Wiped it down with denatured alcohol, plugged the holes with corks and sprayed
it VHT Black paint. Once it dried I removed the corks and bake it in the oven at 250 degrees
for an hour. To me it looks good but I can always swap it out for nicer nickel one down the
road.
The directions on VHT,(Very High Temperature), Paint says to heat it to 250, cool it, heat it to
400, cool it, and finally heat it to 600, all in half hour increments.
I only went to 250 for an hour and have not had any problems.
As far as boiler jackets on Wilesco engines, I think they only had them on the D24,28,and32.
If you choose to paint and bake, I would remove the flange, sight glass, and all gaskets first.
Don't just mask it off with tape when painting, then remove the tape and bake with them assembled.
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Neat thread.
Thanks to all of the contributors.
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That work was all very innovative Wayne!
Well done, and the proof is in the running!!!
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My first steam purchase was a MARX upright engine.
The bottom 2/3 of the boiler was leaking from pinholes.
Damn these steel boilers! I will say, sealing a holed
boiler from the inside sounds interesting - but a bit
expensive. I have a Weeden 'force-pump' steel boiler
leaker. Just good for running on air.
As to thge nasty MARX boiler...
I found that a 3-in-1 oil can was the same diameter so
I cut the good top quarter or so of the boiler off, cut
open the oil can, eyeballed everything, and then forced
the top into the oil can till it was the right height and
soldered it together. Wrapped it with a brass band at the
seam joint. Worked pretty well. I did need a new 'thru
the boiler' crank tube as that was very rusted too.
So the reason I added this reply is that I lagged the boiler
to hide the awful joint and ugly solder job. Nothing special,
I had a bunch of coffee stirrers so I cut them to size and
used wire to tie them to the boiler. Singed it a bit during
an early steamup, but I think it looks good.
https://youtu.be/u7kVJGSZBgo
So, I'm all for lagging and using whatever is at hand.
Good Luck,
Wayne
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Now that’s extremely cool looking.
Ideas are swirling …
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What exactly does using lagging mean? I always thought lagging was the asbestos (or whatever) wrapping around steam pipes. A lot of modelers of steam plants use string that is wrapped around pipes and then painted with white paint to simulate the real thing.
I’m learning by doing.
Anyone have any pics of what lagging is?
Thanks
Boiler lagging in the model world, is most commonly done using strips of wood, but strips of most any good insulative material would work.
In many cases, the actual insulative lagging is covered with a sheet metal jacket, as is common on Locomotives!
[attachimg=1]
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Very nice. I’m definitely going to explore the paint option.
Paint availability can be kind of sparse here in France. They regulate toxic substances over here to a greater degree than in the U.S.
I might have to rely on Amazon.
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I'd love to hear about brands of paint used that end up being durable during steaming!
I've just painted a Weeden Big Giant that has a steel tank that was nickel coated. The nickel wasn't in good shape to begin with but then I discovered it had bad rust and started to leak on each steam up.
So it was either a loss or try something. I first sealed the inside with KBS cycle tank sealer, which that has worked. However, the 1st stage of eating the rust out took what was left of the nickel and even exposed 4 pin holes. I used JB Weld as a outside patch for the pin holes. Then I needed to deal with the outside as it was just steel, so I had to paint.
I thought I was being good by selecting Rust-Oleum high heat paint but misread the label. To properly cure this paint, you need to bake it to 450 for 1 hour. Which isn't very good for the lead parts on a early Weeden. I did about 3~4 hours at 325 but I have a feeling the paint will still get soft when steaming up (my first steam up before the 325 wasn't pretty). I'll just have to be care but likely the engine will mostly stay as a "display".
Anyways, I think painting is workable but don't use Rust-Oleum high heat paint or any other high heat paint that requires 450 curing. Even if you don't have lead parts, you likely have solider joints. Granted different soliders have different melting points, unless you know you have silver solder joints (which I am pretty sure Weedens don't).
Here is my painted Big Giant, the black & sliver are the same paint type. The black on the base & stack has done very well but I think that is because it gets fairly hot from the burner. The Silver on the tank, is where I think it will keep on getting soft during steaming. Or perhaps after time it will get harder...
[attach=1]
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That looks really good. I might give that a try.
Thanks
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I've painted a boiler before, back in 2012 and it still looks as good now as it did then.
This may sound like sacrilege but it was a Jensen boiler that needed a new plating job
but I wasn't going there.
I removed everything from the boiler and scuffed the surface lightly and evenly with 800
grit paper. Wiped it down with denatured alcohol, plugged the holes with corks and sprayed
it VHT Black paint. Once it dried I removed the corks and bake it in the oven at 250 degrees
for an hour. To me it looks good but I can always swap it out for nicer nickel one down the
road. It looks like this.
[attach=1][attach=2]
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What exactly does using lagging mean? I always thought lagging was the asbestos (or whatever) wrapping around steam pipes. A lot of modelers of steam plants use string that is wrapped around pipes and then painted with white paint to simulate the real thing.
I’m learning by doing.
Anyone have any pics of what lagging is?
Thanks
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I think the idea of using lagging would look so much better and more realistic!!!
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I'd just de-grease and spray the boiler with some heat resistant paint, and leave the bottom part sitting within the firebox unpainted.
Downside to just spraypainting as is, would be that the paint obviously won't stick extremely well, to such a smooth surface.
But if handled responsibly, I think it will suffice for normal use.
Upside would be, that the paint can be very easily removed again with paint thinner or similar solvents, and the boiler returned to original condition.
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Stefan’s Oldsmoky has painted several Wilesco boilers, maybe contact him and see what has worked best
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That looks pretty black to me. Maybe Wilesco has a black jacket for sale, although I doubt it.
I’ll post some photos as this build progresses. It’s going to be fun.
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The D20 does look good with a black boiler, this may just be the lighting in this photo as it is listed as a polished nickel plated boiler on the Amazon page. Not sure I would advise painting yours though.
[attachimg=1]
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A jacket. I didn’t think of that. Good idea.
Merci beaucoup!
I’ve been collecting drive models of different woodworking machines. I have a table saw, drill press, lathe and a grinder/buffer. Only thing I lack is a band saw and I’ll have a complete shop.
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Either put a jacket on the boiler that you are willing to paint instead of the boiler itself or possibly consider lagging it.
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If I want to paint a nickel plated boiler black is there a way to do that?
I’m thinking about doing a diorama of a steam powered woodworking shop and I want the steam plant to be all or mostly black.
Worse comes to worse I can leave the boiler in nickel and make everything else black.
I plan to use a Wilesco D20 that I just purchased. I was going to use my Jensen riveted-boiler 25, but can’t I bring myself to deface it.
Any suggestions?
Merci, Tim