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

Hi Rich,

Seems there's nothing more scarce than an Empire heater (a working one, anyway.) 

The bottom cover is just a piece of sheet metal with two holes, retained by two 1/4-20 nuts on the boiler bottom mounting studs. I believe the cast iron retainer is meant to absorb some of the heat from the element, and reflect it back to the boiler, as well as hold the element against the boiler.

If I remember correctly, there were several layers of mica between the heater element and the cast iron retainer. Pretty difficult to duplicate this setup from scratch. I do have a plan to rescue a heaterless B30 with a contoured aluminum block, drilled for 2 cartridge heaters. It would be retained against the boiler with the same two studs that held the original heater retainer. I will detail it on the forum if/when it ever happens.

Paula

This little guy looks like a close cousin to my Empire Turbine, B35.  It is nice that you posted the underside - which mine is missing the steel (?) cover and the iron (?) overlay on the water tank.  I expect there is some kind of ceramic part between the tank and the iron (?) overlay... it is a mystery to me and feel unless I find a donor my Empire will be shelf art.

I guess I now know I am missing bits of the whistle too... but I am a long way from making any kind of steam!

Great facelift and that is saying things lightly!  Thank you for posting too!