Hi Jon -

Steamboats and Modern Steam Launches gives the following: 5 sq ft/hp for water tube boilers, 10 sq ft/hp for fire tube boilers. This is close to right, I think; it obviously depends on fuel, boiler cleanliness, etc.

- Bart

I agree with fredrosse; you really want to stick to the 5 gph/hp rule. Note that the big issue w/ oil in the water is coating the tubes at the water line; this causes hot spots to develop, which can be a problem particularly with copper tubes. Since you're near salt water, you really want to run con...

I needed a sched 80 3/8" pipe nipple when I replumbed my boiler.My local plumbing wholesaler did not have it but the hydraulic hose company had it in stock.Cost -under $2 -pretty cheap insurance! I have a saying-"we poor people can only afford to do it once-so do it right the first time!" At least ...

To protect the pipe, you can just make it heavier, or lay it close to the hull. Any thing that will hurt the pipe (aside from perhaps knocks getting on and off the trailer) will destroy a spinning prop, so this is much less of an issue than one might think. I find a set of guides that insure that th...

Such "hydronic" boilers are typically not rated for the pressures we need to run our steam boats, and have no provision for the collection and distribution of steam, so they are not suitable.

- Bart

Yup - got it exactly. In fact, I used one of these for a while:

http://www.webstaurantstore.com/6-deep- ... 20369.html

Round ones work well as separate oil separators, too.

- Bart

Schedule 80 pipe is mandatory for all boiler/steam connections. This is because the threaded schedule 40 stuff will fail too easily due to a mechanical mishap. I stick to schedule 80 for the feed connections as well, of course. Inside the boiler, you can use schedule 40 when it is used as tubes. - B...

Can you explain the condensation idea a little more. What I think you are saying is that I can take the exhaust steam as supplied by the engine, route it through a pipe that goes sthrough the hull to be cooled by the lake/ocean water and then back into the hull and into a reservoir of some kind. Al...

I am surprised that I can run with that low a horespower. I was guessing I would need a 5hp or better. 5 hp will certainly work, but remember that these engines are driving large, slow turning propellers moving lots of water. This means that steam engines will make more effective use of their limit...

1. What size engine should I be contemplating ? The engine should be rated at about 2 hp per ton of boat displacement; a bit more or less works fine. The Tanzer 22 has a displacement of about 3000 lbs, so 3 to 4 hp would work very nicely. Details on the Tanzer 22 are here: http://www.msogphotosite....