A while ago I was able to lay hand on a Schoenner "Imperator" Lipsia.
This is a very rare engine.
Schoenner is the brand, Imperator the model, and Lipsia the institution is was made for.
Lipsia in German means, Leipziger Lehrmittelanstalt, roughly translated "school supplies from Leipzig".
The engine was in very rough state, heavy brass corrosion on the boiler and several missing parts.
If it was not so rare I would left it where it was, but now it's a saver worth while.
Here is a mix of photos taken by the seller and me how it came…
This is how it was advertised at the time around 1906…
Last week I started on the restoration of the "Imperator".
As always took the complete engine apart.
The base was oiled in with Ballistol oil and left to do it's magic overnight.
The real work started with tackling the heavy corroded boiler.
carefully sanded the corrosion away then polished to get a nice brass shine again.
Then it was taped off to recreate the nickel stripe.
Then taped the nickel of for the blueing patina, and gone is the ugly corrosion.
After that I first de-nickeled the door by reverse electrolysis.
Then Polished the brass and re-nickeled it again.
And the slow start to reassembling began.
It starts to look like a gem again, but still a lot needs to be done…
Next step was the rebuild of the motor it self.
And to my unpleasant surprise a not visible part of the motor was missing.
Wenn I opened the the steam regulating chamber I noticed that the steam slide (I hope that this is the correct englisch term) was gone.
Fortunately this part was a universal Schoenner part, and was also used on many other types of engines.
So I borrowed one of an other engine to make a copy.
To make things clearer I made some photos…
Here you see the original part and the new one together with the timing rod it's connected too…
The H shaped plate is a spring plate.
So this is what the total look like…
to explain the working…
The block attached to the cylinder has 3 holes.
The middle hole is the outgoing steam hole, the other two go to the cylinder camber, one on topside, the other underside of the cylinder chamber.
The steam slide always connects only one of the outer with the middle outgoing hole.
So the steam coming from the boiler goes into the chamber where the steam slide moves in (top).
Depending on which outer hole is not covered by the steam slide, the steam pressure finds it's way on the up - or under side of the piston and pushing it away with an upper pressure.
While this happens the other side of the piston, the piston chamber is connected over the steam slide to the atmosphere creating an under pressure.
This motion is constantly change by the up/down movement of the timing rod letting the cylinder do it's action.
So the steam slide is the hart of the engine so to speak…
Anyway after all was reassembled with the new steam slide, I had to make a new cover around the cylinder camber.
This cover has no real purpose except an esthetic look.
So this is how it looks at the end of the day…
Another defect that was found was a crack in the steam pipe, so also a new pipe will be made, but that's for later this weak…
Cheers,
Danny