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

Sounds like you may have the dodgy Accucraft gas filler valve fitted.

Accucraft UK had lots of problems with the Chinese sourced filler valves failing, so switched to a UK sourced filler valve (do not know if Accucraft USA also used them). These UK sourced filler valves suffered an even greater failure rate (over 75%) so they switched back to a Chinese sourced filler valve.

Unfortunately this was not widely discussed online at the time, so I ended up buying several of those faulty filler valves (with a nice removal tool) off the original manufacturer through eBay UK. I've had 2 of these faulty valves fail so far, and will continue to work through my remaining stock until they've gone.

The faulty valve style is the one in the middle, the one on the left has failed (the plunger dropped down with the bottom fitting & spring ending up in the gas tank. The one on the right is the current style sourced from an Accucraft UK service agent.

I have not run my pre-owned Dora much. I get about 8 - 10 mins on one fill of gas but do need to use a goodall valve to put in some water during a run so it does not boil dry. Unfortunately is loses pressure quite a bit with just a couple of pumps.

Chris Cairns

PS - Cannot seem to post an inline image?