The Steamboating Forum

So, One of the things I'd love to do with the boat once she's done, is take her from Thunder Bay to Toronto. It would be a somewhat historic recreation, as a lot of things from the west of Canada went to Europe along that same route (Although they continued on down and out to sea via the St. Lawrence).

This is an approximately 1400 km journey by road, somewhat shorter by water. Are there anything special considerations I should make to have a boat fit for such a journey? Obviously bunks / small kitchen, and comfy seats would come in handy!

Thanks for your insights!

--Steve

Why not use the Trent/Severn Canal?
http://www.transcanadahighway.com/ontar ... nCanal.htm
I had friends take their sailboat acrooss Canada and then used this canal-They loved it. The open waters of the Great lakes does not lend itself to small steamboats. I could be wrong but I don't swim well!!

Yes, that's not a terrible idea. That'd be fun to go through the locks.

Fuel supply.

I have no idea what fuel you intend to use but you will need to fuel up many times along the way.

It might be hard to find wood, for instance, on a Friday evening in a strange place.

Mike

Lopez Mike wrote:Fuel supply.

I have no idea what fuel you intend to use but you will need to fuel up many times along the way.

It might be hard to find wood, for instance, on a Friday evening in a strange place.

Mike

Mike, Is that when you have to start burning the furniture and decking?

Lopez Mike wrote:Fuel supply.

I have no idea what fuel you intend to use but you will need to fuel up many times along the way.

It might be hard to find wood, for instance, on a Friday evening in a strange place.

Mike

Fuel supply is something I've thought of. I was thinking I could setup fuel caches along the way before hand. Go to a bunch of preset locations, and drop off 500 lbs of wood in each spot.

It'll depend on how fuel efficient I can make the boiler and engine, and what my fuel economy ends up being.

--Steve

I has an ancient and rather frail couple out for a spin recently and he asked if I could burn pretty much anything. I told him that, "Yes, and if you croak while were out here, in you go." His wife said, "That would save us a bunch of money!"

This was followed by snatches of The Cremation of Sam MaGee.
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/174348

Mike

Haha. That's hilarious! I'm hoping I can have my boat on the water before my grandfather passes. He was a 1st class stationary engineer. He jokes he boiled water for a living. I think he'd love it. Although he'd probably not be up for a 2000 km trip like this one.

--Steve

So, I did a bit of math. Not an exact science especially when I don't have real performance numbers, but I can come up with some decent approximations.

The boat is going to weigh about 7000 lbs when she's done, and I'm standing on the deck.

That means i'm going to need about 7 hp to drive her at a reasonable cruising speed, perhaps slightly slower than hull speed.

So, for that i'll need roughly 7 hp * 40k btu / hp = 280k btu / hr.

Except that's for a perfectly efficient boiler... So it's actually more like 400k btu! (assuming 70% efficient boiler)

That's about 44 lbs of wood per hour.

That's not as bad as I was thinking! Now i'm hoping through the use of my feedwater heater (15 sq.ft), and the higher thermal performance of the boiler, compared to traditional firetube , that I'll be able to beat these numbers. Everything is going to be insulated like crazy as well, in the hopes of squeezing out a few more percent efficiency.

The other way I can improve efficiency is to make her lighter.

Have to wait and see I guess!