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

May i ask, are the threads on Stuart turner supposed to be BA please?
Kind regards
Ade

The victoria is a beautiful engine. Looking forward to seeing your restoration progress.
crazydoug

Thank you Mr Fox 

I will get some BA taps and dies as most of the threads are stripped or only 2 turns deep

Kind regards
Ade

i managed to sneak an hour today and stripped it, so now i have a box of assorted nuts and studs, none of which are straight or fit well and another box of metal bits for examination...

The whole engine seems to have an alignment problem, the cylinder is not aligned with the cross head which in turn is not aligned with the main bearing mount. i guess that is why everything is so loose as this was the only way to get it to turn over.

The base plate is bent, not sure if it just the way it was cast or if they bent it to try to align stuff    Anyhow none of the mounting holes line up so i am tempted to start with a new base and machine it myself.

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Next nightmare is the cylinder and piston assy.  the small end is scrap and the piston rod bent, so they go in the 'remake' pile.  I had hoped the cylinder would be OK as the piston kinda fitted and the ports looked ok, but closer inspection revealed the bore is at an odd angle and definitly not round, plus the end caps are a real mess with multiple srews fitted to try and make up for the bad machining and subsquent leaks.  Not sure if i should try and fix it or bin it yet.

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The cross head slides are a bit bowed and some dodgy holes but at least i have found one (or is it four) part/s that can be fixed up.

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Ade

Hi Bob,

This site might be of interest, found it the other day, looks like some good stuff.

http://www.miniaturebricks.com/s1011gn

Ade

Hi Bob,

This site might be of interest, found it the other day, looks like some good stuff.

http://www.miniaturebricks.com/s1011gn

Ade

I've seen sites like this before, but don't really know how they work. I'm inclined to find my own ceramic tiles and go from there....

I had a brief job many-many years ago working in some American steam plants that provided water, power &  light. By the latter time period I worked at the sites , only one large Corliss remained, but numerous electric generators and pumps from as early as 1910 onwards still worked . The flooring was almost universally a hard terra-cotta colored glazed square tiles with black grout. I remember this because I saw so much grease ,oil, and water spills on the floors and yet after 80 years the floor's still looked really good. Bases where most former old steam engines were empty, but they were always a concrete plinth painted either grey  or the  same color as the old motor-pump-engine that sat so long on the base. The reason being that over decades of painting, the workers would sometimes slop accidental motor/engine paint onto the plinth and it looked better to finish the raw concrete in that color. No porous brick near any of the engines as it would stain and soak up greases pretty easy, so ceramic or hard glazed tile was standard. Finally, somewhere near the old engine base there was always a cast iron or brass covered drain in the floor. I am still amazed that a steam & machine rooms that had so much work done in it held up so well to the test of time with so little structural or cosmetic changes. My opinion is the model  steam-engine room red and white tiles sure look good; but in hard working actual plant , a red tile,  or mix of dark red & black or red & greens on a floor would last cleaner decades longer. Just a bit of trivia 

(I seen model displays that used antique scraps of old linoleum as bases , or simply color printed doll-house patterns overlaid in clear epoxies or varnish for side backdrop or floors )

http://www.jennifersprintables.com/woodandbricksamples.html

http://www.jennifersprintables.com/floorssample.html

http://www.jennifersprintables.com/bathroomsamples.html