Wrong Color

After taking a year, the model Bucyrus steam shovel finally took it's display place in the showroom this weekend. I'm almost certain it is the wrong color, but at least it is photogenic. I would suspect that the originals were dull black or something like that, but I'm not worried because there are not too many people around that can remember that far back.
Several days ago my little friend, Max, "Kactiguy's" 5 year old son, was here visiting. He told me that I should put pieces of candy and brass in the bucket, so when he came I could pull the trip rope and dump them out for him. Even at his age he knows that brass is good material to build neat things out of. Who said that the younger generation is not taking an interest in our hobby?



And yes I do have some candy and brass in the bucket for the next time Max comes to visit!
Birk

Elevator

Most people as they grow older go through a period called a second childhood, But not me, I do not have to worry about anything like that. I have not grown out of my first childhood yet. When my body was little I had a toy elevator that was lots of fun, but it was cheaply built out of tin can type material and did not last. I was longing for that toy, so recently I constructed a replacement as near as I could recall. It is not exactly the same, as 70 years is a long time to remember something. The original used large glass marbles. I think they were called a taw. The reproduction uses 3/4" steel ball bearings. A release mechanism releases one at a time into the elevator car which travels to the bottom and is dumped out. Then it returns to the top for another one. There is a propeller on the pulley shaft powered by a one way clutch out of a computer printer that adds a little commotion.







It will keep running as long as there are balls on the feed chute, so it is a lot of fun for kids to keep putting them back up there.
The problem I have with it is that whenever our great-grand kids come to visit, they always want to play with the elevator, and they do not want to let me have "my" turn!

Oh, and by the way I got a corrugated roof formed and shaped for the steam shovel yesterday, although it is not fastened down yet.

I do not know if roofs were to provide protection from sun or storm, but either way I'm almost ready.
Birk

Buffalo Springfield Steam Roller

Setting on a display pedestal painted to look like the world, In Gibbons and Reed General Contractors yard, right next to the Freeway was a little Buffalo Springfield Steam roller. It would cause awful twisting of the necks of mechanical people like myself as we drove by. How wonderful it would be to have a steam roller to play with, but of course it was not for sale, and besides there was no way that a person like myself would have room for it, or move it to tales to shows, etc. BUT I could certainly handle a baby one. I called the company and talked with Mr. Reed and got permission to come in and take photos and measurements. Several trips were required over a period of time to acquire enough information to put a complete plan on paper.
I might mention that the front roller and water tank were not original. At some time they had been replaced, so I I followed a picture in a book as to what the originals looked like. Also the yellow paint was not the original color.
It took 10 months of construction time to complete the model.

Here are right and left side views.

Perhaps you'd be mused at looking at some close ups.

Here are some loose engine parts.

This is the engine put together.

And the engine installed on the roller.

This is the gear train. I strayed from the original, by installing Bikini type guards over the gears. I just could not stand to hide those little gears with the full covers. Some things need to be seen to be appreciated! Don't you think so?

This is the drivers seat. I never did figure out which was front and back of the machine. I think the steering roller is in front, but that makes the driver facing back. You figure it out!

And here is the whistle. All steam things need a whistle, don't they? The bell is made from an empty 30-06 cartridge case. For a miniature it has a very pleasant sound. I had to design a restriction into it to limit the pressure or else it would be too shrill.
This little roller is not a "loner", It has a twin. Some other fellow; he is listed on this site as "paulj84003" built one too. The models were built simultaneously in our respective workshops, but we shared drawings, materials, patterns, fixtures, etc, which expedited the construction. Perhaps he will post some picture of his baby roller too.
Birk

Frisbie Engine

While I was looking through one of those Shire Albums #137, titled Toy Steam Engines, printed in England I noticed a rather simple little engine, that had a unique "patented" valve mechanism. The cylinder is stationary and it has a wobble valve plate actuated by a lever connected to the connecting rod. They were built in Connecticut around 1871. The name Frisbie comes from the inventor. He had invented a number of different toys and things.

It intrigued me enough that I made patterns, and castings and built one. The steam pressure gets up to the cylinder through drilled passages in the support bracket.

Here is a picture of my replica. I have never actually fired it, but I have run it on compressed air and it runs beautifully. Other pictures that I have since seen show an alcohol lamp type burner under the boiler.

After completing the model I found that they also made a walking beam version. The above image was scanned from a full page picture in a book about toys. I have not got around to building one of these yet.
Birk

Olds Engine

Here is a picture of a model Olds Engine built from Breisch castings. As models go it is a fairly large model, but a real pleasure to work on. I did not have to use a magnifying glass or tweezers to pick up the parts. It has one of those 10mm Honda spark plugs, and another of those homemade buzz coils for ignition. They really seem reliable for slow speed engines. It must have been a good system, because Ford used them for the model T and the Fordson tractors. When this engine was finished and fueled up, it took off running the very first time it was pulled across compression, and it has started about that way ever since.



Striping seems to add a nice finishing touch to models, and an old draftsman's ruling pen works very well for that job. Do not try to dip the pen in the paint, but rather pick up a drop with a toothpick and place it between the blades and let it run down to the points. You will need to use a straight edge or French curve to guide the pen unless you are much steadier than myself. Be sure to block the guide up so that it does not contact your freshly painted line and smear it, otherwise you might be inclined to use some of those unmentionable words stored in the back of your vocabulary.
Birk

Oh, and the "B" on there can also stand for Birk, as well as Breisch

Bucket's of Rivets

A little more progress on the steam shovel. The rivets give it that finishing touch. This bucket sure has bite. Just look at those teeth.

Cutting Gears

This morning I went out and machined the teeth on a couple pinions. This is the last two of twenty three gears required for the model steam shovel presently under construction. These two will work in unison to push the dipper stick out and in.

I do not know how many viewers of this blog machine their own gears, but it is not a difficult task. When you look at all the charts, tables, math, etc. it is scary. But I have taken the attitude that if the early settlers could make working gears for their grist mills and sawmills, etc. by pounding pegs in a log, then shame on me if I cannot make a gear on my milling machine. Over time I have collected a few commercial gear cutters, and they are nice, but most of the time I do not have the right one and end up grinding a lathe tool bit for a single tooth cutter. You can use a gear of the same pitch and very near the same number of teeth as a template to fit the cutter bit to. Most often I make a layout using the drafting table, and grind a bit to fit my layout. The small paint brush is wetted with cutting oil and held next to the cutter so the bit wipes through the brush providing a film of lubrication each round. It is a lot cleaner than a flood system, for such little jobs.
Birk

Non-Identical Twins

A while back Rowland Manufacturing Company in New Washington Ohio advertised model engine castings in just one issue of Home Shop Machinist magazine. Normally I do not buy castings, but these looked kind of unique and the price was reasonable. I believe it was a college student using his new computer design skills to design engines, same as POWDER KEG does. He had done a lot of work and had designs so the engine could be made into any kind of piston engine, gas, steam vacuum, etc. He sold the castings and plans separately. In order to maintain a little personal identity of my own I just ordered castings and made my own plan. When the castings arrived, in order to get more than my money's worth, I used the castings as patterns and poured a send set. One engine was fitted with an eccentric and a spool valve. The other with poppet valves. They are also timed to run on opposite directions.


Nothing spectacular, just more engines to look at.
Birk

Which Way

I'm a little slow getting a post today, because the first priority of the day was to get about 4" of that famous Utah powder cleaned off the drive and walks.
That Surplus Center place in Nebraska had a "grab bag" special on pneumatic cylinders; 10 for $20, their choice. So I placed an order, I like surprises. When the package arrived it was opened and one of the Bimba cylinders had a rod sticking out both ends. I thought what will I ever use that thing for. Then all of a sudden the little light blinked on in the attic. How about a double ended engine?

I already had a flywheel pattern that would work, and being symmetrical it only required a couple new ones. It has a rotary valve that rocks through an arc of 90 degrees, operated from a crank on the right end. The wheels on the right always turn the same direction, because they are timed with the valve, but the ones on the left can rotate either direction, depending on which way they get started. What is it good for? Like most of the other stuff I build, nothing,---except perhaps a bit of amusement.
Birk

Flame Licker

It seems that sooner or later almost every model engine builder makes a vacuum, or fire eater engine. I'm no exception, so here is a picture of how it turned out. The visual exterior appearance is of my own doing, but the actual working mechanics were borrowed from Phillip Duclos.

Spoked Wheels

Today I'm in the process of machining some spokes cable sheaves for the steam shovel. The operations are similar whether your making a sheave, a gear, or a flywheel. I thought that those new to the hobby might be interested in the process. These are fairly small being 2 1/2" diameter and 3/8" thick. First rough blanks were sawed from some plate steel, then blued and laid out. Under size pilot holes were drilled at what would end up being corners. A hole was drilled and reamed in the center. It will eventually be fitted with a brass bushing. Then the blank was put on a mandrel where the O.D. and sides were turned in the lathe. On this particular job I drilled a 3/8" hole in the center of each space after turning, just to hog out some metal. I don't always do that. Then the part is moved to a three jaw chuck on a homemade rotary table on the milling machine. The circular arcs are milled by simply turning the table and leap frogging over the spokes. The sides of the spokes are milled by traversing the mill table, and indexing the table the proper number of degrees for each spoke. Spokes are nearly always tapered from the hub out to the rim. These sheaves have a 6 degree included taper. That needs to be taken into consideration when setting up, but is easy enough to do with the rotary table.


The first picture shows a sheave in the process of milling the spokes, and the second picture shows two sheaves. One after turning, but before milling, and the other one after the spokes have been milled. The spokes come out rectangular in shape, and the could be rounded of with a radius cutting mill, but it is hard to find a cutter the right size to fit those tiny spaces. So I just use a file, and within a couple minutes can have the corners rounded enough to look ok. The rounding is cosmetic anyway, so it does not matter if it is not perfect.
Try it you might like it.
Birk

Beam Engine

Although maybe not the most efficient design for a steam engine, beam engines are certainly interesting machines to watch running. Anything they lack in efficiency is more than made up in entertainment. The beam engine posted here today is a little more refined than the Coffee Engine that I posted yesterday. This engine very closely follows the Stuart Turner beam engine drawing, but I made my own patterns and castings, and that allowed me to add a few of my own embellishments.


For a simulated masonry base, I reworked a little cutter similar to a slitting saw. It was put in the mill on a extended mandrel and set at the height of a mortar joint, and then I slid the casting past the cutter by hand to scribe the joint. Then the elevation was changed to the next joint line, and so on. The vertical joints were chiseled in with a graver and a small hammer.
A flyball governor was an optional accessory on the Stuart engines and I had no drawing for that, so I simply designed my own. It works nicely, controlling the speed of the engine. I have it set a slow pace which makes it more realistic. Working from someone else's drawing is sometimes easier, but I spent over forty years working at a large metal fabrication and construction company, much of that time doing design engineering, so it comes quite naturally. The only difference between models and the real thing is simply size.

Half Beam Engine

After building the Beam Engine that I posted yesterday, I built a Half Beam engine. I have no idea why they call the half beam, because they still use the full beam. They have also been referred to a grasshopper engines because the action somewhat resembles a grasshopper leg. It only required making two new patterns. One for the A frame on top the cylinder and one for the rear beam support.


The brickwork for the foundation was cut in the same was as for the beam engine, only on this one, after the brick red paint had dried, it was sprayed with an off white paint and immediately wiped off with a rag. This left some white in the grooves and smeared a bit on the face which gave it a rustic aged appearance that I rather like.
An advantage of making your own patterns and pouring your own castings, is that you can make them unique to your own workshop as seen if you look closely at the rear beam support.
This engine does not have a governor.
Till next time
Birk

Steam shovel update

After setting nearly a month being dormant waiting for drawings to be made, and then followed by parts being cut and fabricated, my baby steam shovel sprouted a thing on the front late yesterday. I'm not sure just yet, but I think that means that it is going to be a boy one.

That is hardly a start on the boom, there is so much still left to do on it. In fact right it is now only being held up in place with a piece of wire. It needs to come off to be worked on some more, but I have to do things like that once in a while to spur my enthusiasm. Anyway Wes said he wanted to see a progress picture.
Birk

Grasshopper or Half Beam Engine

The engine above is a Grasshopper or Half Beam engine. The one to the right is a Beam engine, and the black one in the background is a Table engine. All three were built from Stuart drawings, and they share a lot of interchangeable parts. (Castings)

more progress

Here are the latest photos.

Steam shovel Platform

Birk just sent me this photo and says, "The past couple days I've been extending the platform on the steam shovel. It now has three times the area of the casting that supports the machinery. It is starting to look pretty big, and I have concluded that if the digger does not work I can remove the hoisting machinery and use the thing to haul hay. An image taken day before yesterday is attached. Since then I almost have the deck plates fitted and installed, but their installation has to be worked in with cutting holes for control rods, etc, so it goes slow."

Steam Shovel

This is the project that is currently taking all of my time in it's many stages.