Gallery, Projects and General > Project Logs
French Beam Engine
doubletop:
OK I had to share this with you as soon as I could.
I remade the melted con-rod yoke today, this time in steel to remove the risk of another meltdown. I then assembled the whole thing to see how it all fitted together. It just needed a little skim of the piston, (I’m using O rings so the seal won’t be an issue), adjustment of the length of the piston rod (the design provides for this) and an ‘eyeballed’ setup of the valve timing. With plenty of oil it was a little bit tight but no really tight spots that required a hammer to shift. It felt ‘right’ so I had to give it a go so I quickly made a ¼” x 40 inlet port and connected to the airline. With a flick of the flywheel it was off (this is not a self starter).
This video is the first run, I didn’t even have time to tidy up the bench
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5E8lTwT2RNs
Its running on about 10psi of air, not a single gasket or any silicon in sight, just metal on metal. None of the bolts or pins are secured with loctite. You can see one of the pins working its way out, hear the leaking air and see oil seeping out of the bottom cylinder cover.
All in all I’m pretty pleased with that. It just needs a strip down, parts finishing, a bit of paint here and there to highlight things and the obligatory wooden base.
……………….and before Murray says it, it probably now needs its own boiler, but that’s another day.
Pete
sbwhart:
Well done Peter :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:
:clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap:
:ddb: :ddb: :ddb: :ddb: :ddb: :ddb: :ddb: :ddb: :ddb:
:nrocks:
Stew
Bogstandard:
A very nice first run there Pete, congratulations to you.
I am sure that heavier weight flywheel has made all the difference to how it runs. I reckon that when it is fully tuned in, it will tick over at just a few rpm.
I looked at the plans for both these engines, and came to the conclusion that just doubling everything up would make really impressive display models.
I doubt if ever I would have the time to complete just one.
John
doubletop:
Stew & John; once again thanks for your support.
I'm pretty pleased with it working out of the box. As you say it should run nicely once, sealed, run in and properly finished. A doubled up version would look impressive although this was at the maximum of the capacity of my little lathe.
This guys plans are pretty good but as I had said previously I did find an error on the crank and there were inadequate dimensions on the A frames that I had to re-draw to work out what where the cutout holes needed to go (attached). None of which would stop me doing another of his at some point.
regards
Pete
Rob.Wilson:
Well done Pete :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap:
Thats a fine engine you have built :thumbup:
Rob
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version