The Steamboating Forum

Hi All,

i know you have tried to help me with this before but I still dont have clarity on how to proceed. I am going to be running a 5hp single. Will I be OK with 3 gallons of water in my hot well or do I need to go larger ?

jon

P.S. - $700 of copper from McMaster Carr is arriving today........Drive train will be in by the end of the weekeknd and we will be plumbing the boiler and pumps etc.

JonRiley56 wrote:Hi All,

i know you have tried to help me with this before but I still dont have clarity on how to proceed. I am going to be running a 5hp single. Will I be OK with 3 gallons of water in my hot well or do I need to go larger ?

jon

I assume you've calculated how much steam your engine will use per hour to determine feedwater requirements, etc., so you should know how many gallons of water it will take to make that much steam. Your hotwell should hold enough for at least 10+ minutes of steaming.

I have a five H.P.. engine and my well holds at most two gallons. It doesn't seem to get that hot and looking at the return flow from the condenser, I would say that it would take a lot longer than ten minutes to empty it.

As the last post suggests, you might do the math and see how it comes out.

Mike