Searching for my Steamboat's History

For the non-technical side of living with Steamboats, videos and general pictures.
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RNoe
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Re: Searching for my Steamboat's History

Post by RNoe » Fri Aug 16, 2019 10:06 pm

More progress: I got the prop shaft cutlass bearing/support installed and aligned.
Also installed the shaft and prop, and have it all running nicely on compressed air.
Some photos and descriptions below of the process.

I machined a sleeve to hold a laser gun-sight alignment tool, centered in the Cutlass bearing.
ST Cutlass Bearing 1 sml.jpg
ST Cutlass Bearing 1 sml.jpg (183.79 KiB) Viewed 7001 times
ST Cutlass Bearing laser sml.jpg
ST Cutlass Bearing laser sml.jpg (172.71 KiB) Viewed 7001 times
My Good Wife and I installed the Cutlass bearing and support using 11 stainless through-hull bolts into the upper stainless steel plate.
ST Cutlass Bearing installed sml.JPG
Continued on next entry.
RussN
Last edited by RNoe on Sat Aug 17, 2019 3:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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RNoe
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Re: Searching for my Steamboat's History

Post by RNoe » Fri Aug 16, 2019 10:11 pm

Continued:

I drew a target on a piece of white tape, placed over the opening of the flywheel shaft receptacle.
The laser shined through the shaft log onto the target. By tightening the 11 bolts properly, I aligned the laser onto the center of the target.
Alignment achieved! Picture while I was aligning the bearing support.
ST shaft alignment sml.jpg
Then I removed the laser setup and slid the shaft into position through the Cutlass bearing. Easily done with the alignment correct.
ST prop installed 2 sml.jpg
Picture of the Cutlass bearing upper support plate.
ST Cutlass Bearing top plate sml.jpg
It now happily blows air when the engine is running. :D
I have since installed the floor boards, too.
I suppose this could be a normal method for aligning the shaft, but I'm relatively ignorant of such things and did it the best way I could think of.

Now to finish creating the 2 pages of plumbing items, and get the boat into the waters for testing! Several weeks away still.
RussN
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PeteThePen1
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Re: Searching for my Steamboat's History

Post by PeteThePen1 » Wed Aug 21, 2019 12:18 pm

Well done Russ. That was a neat solution and I like the idea of tightening the bolts varably to adjust the angle. I can sympathise with the issue of the plumbing bits list. I think must be on my fourth or fifth "final" list of bits. I always seem to find that in doing the job there is a simpler way that looks neater but for which I need another piece not currently in the bits box.

Regards

Pete
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RNoe
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Re: Searching for my Steamboat's History

Post by RNoe » Wed Aug 21, 2019 3:17 pm

Thanks, Pete.
So... which one of us will get our boat back into the water first?
I'm not proposing competition, just being realistic about life's interruptions.

Because my recovering shoulder precludes some of the hefty metal work needed to finish the cab roof of my latest steam locomotive,
I'm putting my energies into this Steam Thistle.
Gosh, life has such hard choices sometimes...

Keep smiling and working on our task lists.
Russ
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Re: Searching for my Steamboat's History

Post by RGSP » Wed Aug 21, 2019 9:15 pm

Lining up engine and prop shaft accurately is obviously a nice thing to do, and congratulations on doing it. However, having suffered seriously from the effect several decades ago, I have to rather reluctantly point out that all hulls distort when put into water, particularly normal open launch hulls, and that distortion depends on loading, and will increase if the launch ever sees waves of any size - even the wash from another boat. Again reluctantly, I have to say that a slightly flexible coupling between engine and main prop shaft is very desirable, though in many cases there is enough flexibility in the prop shaft and its supports to give the same effect.
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RNoe
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Re: Searching for my Steamboat's History

Post by RNoe » Thu Aug 22, 2019 4:50 am

RGSP:
I agree with your observations about hull and shaft flexibility.
That was quite apparent when I observed that I could change the position of the red laser alignment dot simply by changing the position of my feet in the hull.
The hull is also a thin cold-molded wood structure, so I do expect alignment changes during steaming.

This hull and engine were in service for several decades without observable damage to the hull or engine bearings.
So I am assuming it should continue to be OK when steaming.
I expect I will wear out before this steam launch does!

I contemplated a flex-coupling between the engine flywheel and the shaft. It remains a possibility, to be defined with steaming experience.
Thank you for sharing your observations.
RussN
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PeteThePen1
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Re: Searching for my Steamboat's History

Post by PeteThePen1 » Thu Aug 22, 2019 3:59 pm

Hi Folks

Having read the post about the Welcome page and in so doing re-read the rules for the Forum, I should perhaps make a suggestion. If one were to come to the forum as a stranger the topic title "Searching for my Steamboat's History" does not accurately reflect what is to be found here now. What we probably need is to have a new thread under Members Boats into which all this data on the good work Russ is doing could be placed. However, that raises another issue.

Can we as ordinary members do such editing work? My suspicion is that the task would fall on our hard working webmaster Simon. So what does everybody feel about that? (Sorry not well phrased. I mean how do we feel about splitting up a topic that has wandered away from its original title, not how do we feel about Simon acquiring yet another job. We know the answer to the latter - grateful for his efforts).

Regards

Pete
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Lopez Mike
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Re: Searching for my Steamboat's History

Post by Lopez Mike » Fri Aug 23, 2019 2:08 am

Sort of two issues here

One is whether those of us who are very active and follow any new posting are likely to be confused by the topic title. Probably not.

Another is whether someone in the future might be searching by topic for information and might be misled. Possibly.

I find that I seldom limit my searches to topic titles so I get the search hits that I need.

Maybe a larger problem is having topics hijacked. As one of the worst offenders on here, I will try to do better though often the flow on a topic lends itself to drifting away like any conversation.

I wouldn't make any changes for now but thanks Pete for bring this up.
If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito.
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RNoe
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Re: Searching for my Steamboat's History

Post by RNoe » Fri Aug 23, 2019 3:24 am

I am fine with any topic and location "adjustments" the Board Managers choose to do.
I'm the newbie here.
Russ
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Re: Searching for my Steamboat's History

Post by RNoe » Wed Oct 23, 2019 1:30 am

I designed and fabricated an oil burner, centered around the commercial burner CNC machined by Eccentric Engineer in California.
https://www.eccentricengineer.com
He is a fabulous producer of injectors in several sizes. Food for thought. The burner he offered is out of stock at this time.
It was designed for use in steam locomotives of larger size (1/8 scale +.) Contact him if you want one!

It produces a nice well-atomized ball of flame similar in volume to a football (Not the US kind). Perfect for my Blackstaffe-style boiler.
In the pics posted below you can see the drawing of the two-part burner with it's slots producing a tornado output to atomize the oil.

I needed to make a way to hold the burner to utilize it for my boiler.
I also set it up to use propane to atomize the oil until steam is available. It seems to work quite well on the test bench!
RussN
Burner 1 sml.jpg
Burner 2 sml.jpg
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Burner 3 sml.JPG
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