Member postings for Pete Verdon

In case anybody's interested, here are a few photos I've just taken: http://s1168.photobucket.com/user/ybw_prv/library/steam%20lorry

Pete

Edited By Pete Verdon on 14/10/2014 00:59:30

Thanks for the link, Harry - lots of PoPs sold in various conditions, but I don't see any prices there.

Pete

I'm still looking to sell, but that address (with the dots replaced, obviously) doesn't seem to work.

Pete

I still have it. I've been distracted by other things and not yet responded to the dealer.

Pete

Thanks. The problem, for one not already a part of this world, is knowing where to advertise it.

Pete

Apologies if this is an unwelcome subject on this forum, but I'd be grateful for some advice. I have inherited two steam models, a boat and a lorry. I'm keeping the boat (and hope to get it working on my local pond) but the lorry is too big to keep and will be sold.

It's a ModelWorks Pride of Penrhyn, but I'm told it's one of their earlier ones and substantially similar to the original Winson, inheriting the design problems that is reputed to have (I don't know what those are). I also, unfortunately, do not have and cannot get the boiler certificate for it. It has never been steamed, but the mechanism does all seem to move freely. It does not have any bodywork on the back, just the chassis (the cab around the front is fitted). It's painted reasonably competently but in an undecorated and basic style.

A dealer has offered me £600 for it (he is also the one who told me about design faults etc). Does this seem like a fair price?

Thanks for your help,

Pete

Thanks for all the advice. Ideally I want to get the thing boxed up tomorrow as I will be passing by the garage in question tomorrow night. So I think I will just go with the grease as I have it to hand and nobody thinks it's a terrible idea. The lathe has survived ok in my grandfather's workshop for the last ten years or so without, as far as I know, any special preparation since he stopped using it.

Cheers,

Pete

When my grandfather died a few months ago, he kindly left me his Myford Speed 10 lathe and a variety of accessories (milling adaptor, etc). I would love to have this set up in my own workshop, but at present this is merely a garden shed that's mostly used for woodwork and also has to act as storage space. There is no room to install the lathe. In time, I expect to be able to build a larger workshop with space for standing tools, so until then I want to box up the lathe and store it.

I have build a crate for it out of Contiboard, with a pair of 2x2 "skids" underneath to carry the weight (they're spaced correctly for the lathe feet to be screwed down onto). The crate will be kept in a dry but unheated garage, for anywhere from two to ten years. My question is, how should I best preserve the machine to avoid any deterioration during storage?

Currently my plan is to simply wipe it all down (around the headstock there's a lot of old grease, blackened from the belt dust) and then use a paintbrush to apply a light coat of general-purpose grease (I think the stuff in my shed is Carlube LM2). When the time comes to resurrect it, I'd dismantle and clean all the moving parts, and relubricate with the products recommended in the manual (or modern replacements).

Is this a good plan, or is there something else I should do instead or as well?

Thanks,

Pete

Sure, I realise it can't be done under the current system, and I'm not trying to change things myself. But maybe the current system ("become a full club member or sod off" ) isn't the only one there ever could be.

Pete

Edited By Pete Verdon on 11/07/2014 10:58:57

"About the size of a sheepdog" - that's a new one on me when it comes to describing machinery

If I'm oiling the works via the lubricator then I wouldn't add any oil to the air.

Thanks,

Pete

Yep, I know what the lubricator looks like. I'd been puzzling over the almost identical device on the traction engine at my dad's house, then when googling for steam oil I found a reference to one pump stroke per 30 or 40 piston strokes, and I immediately realised that was what the mystery mechanism was doing.

No sign of any paperwork for the lorry (it is a Pride of Penrhyn, by the way) but I did find the original plans and the boiler maker's certificate for the traction engine, which I'll hand over to my dad to keep with it. The certificate was dated 1984, when I was two, and I remember him still working on that model when I was a lot older than that!

Thanks for the compressor figure - I'll hit eBay tomorrow and see what I can find.

Pete

Club membership costs a fraction of an independent test - but as Julian points out, it's unfair on the club to join it just to get a cheap test when you have no intention of properly participating. The honest approach would be to allow non-members' kit to be tested in exchange for a donation to the club's funds. By all means set the price higher than the club joining fee if you want to encourage membership, but making it mandatory drives the silly "fake member" situation that people find so annoying.

There's an analogous situation in my field, sailing. Many countries abroad require an International Certificate of Competence, a kind of boat driving license, so for holidays or foreign voyages we need to get one. In the UK, the government has arranged for the Royal Yachting Association (the national club) to issue them. If you're an RYA member you get it free (with the necessary proof of competence etc) whereas non-members have to pay a fee. The non-members' price is £5 more than the price for joining up, but plenty of people choose that option.

Pete

I think I'm going to take Ian's advice and just run it on air to see the machinery working. I'll need to buy a compressor; can anyone suggest a rough idea of what flow rate (CFM) I should be looking for?

I do need to decide whether I'm buying this compressor just for the lorry, or whether I might also want to get into the world of air tools for general use. Obviously in the latter case it's worth buying a decent compressor, but I'm unlikely ever to do much spraying and I already have a reasonable complement of electric power tools.

Presumably, given the mixing of oil into the steam that Jason describes, I need oil mixed into the air too. I know proper workshop tool compressors add oil, but maybe a small one won't. Is the oil necessary if running on air, and if so is there a cunning way of introducing it or does it have to enter the engine pre-oiled?

I'm not going to pursue the boiler testing; the bureaucracy seems insurmountable for someone who is not interested in joining a club. A cynic might wonder if that was deliberate

Thanks,

Pete

Edited By Pete Verdon on 09/07/2014 17:42:29

Ah, ok, thanks for the heads-up.

It's highly unlikely that I would join a steam club. My free time is already more than occupied by a little sailing and a lot of boat refurbishment. Realistically, I will probably be selling the lorry within a year or two - I want to have a play with it first as I love old-fashioned mechanisms and machinery, but I have no space to keep it long term. It will be going in my living room tonight - which may not be entirely popular with my housemates!

I appreciate Julian's point about people joining clubs just to get certificates. In the sailing world we have similar problems with people joining clubs to avail themselves of cheap moorings or other facilities, and then never participating socially or with the upkeep and other work. It's fair to say I have half an eye on resale value when it comes to certificates, but I would not want to be that person taking advantage of a club. That's why I proposed being up-front with a fair fee for services rendered.

Pete

Thanks for those extra details - less of a mystery now

John makes an inspired guess - the pictures of the Pride of Penrhyn do look very familiar.

Picking it up after work tonight so I'll know for sure.

I've found some details for the Southampton model engineering club. Realistically I'm unlikely to join - I don't have the time to make a major hobby of this. But if I decide to get the boiler tested, hopefully one of their guys will have a look for a suitable fee.

Cheers,

Pete

Thanks for the answers so far. Some assume a bit more knowledge than I have though, especially Jason

to run in public it will also need a 1.5 times test and steam test - how would I go about doing that?

Tap is OK with the addition of a boiler water treatment to stop scale etc - what sort of treatment?

Steam oil will take care of the internals - I guess I can google a supplier of "steam oil", but how does it get into the internals? I was expecting to just apply a little light oil to the obvious bearing surfaces of the machinery, like for any small mechanism.

you could connect it to a compressor, and run it on air - sounds like a good first step to check the machinery works, though I don't currently have a compressor. What sort of pressure should I look for, and how would I connect it?

Where abouts are you roughly - I'm in Southampton.

Thanks,

Pete

Hello,

My grandfather sadly died not too long ago, leaving me his model steam lorry. Unlike the traction engine that he built practically from scratch, which had pride of place in his dining room and is now in my dad's study, the lorry was from a kit and seems to have held much less interest for him. It was kept under a cover behind an armchair, and I didn't even know it existed until last month. Too late to ask about it now

I've come here because I know very little about steam models. I understand machinery in a general sense, and I played with my Dad's typical old Mamod models as a boy, but I don't know about bigger steam stuff. The lorry is maybe three feet long. I am going to collect it later this week, and I don't want to inadvertently do anything silly. So I have some questions:

The traction engine was never fired up - he wanted to keep it pristine. It's quite possible that the lorry is the same. I would like to run it, but is doing so a major irreversible decision in the steam engine world, or no big deal?

Do I have to worry about boiler certificates like I've heard of for full-size engines? Even if not, worth taking precautions with an unknown boiler?

What would a model like this typically run on as fuel? Is tap water ok for the boiler, or might it scale up?

I assume the moving parts will need oiling - ordinary 3-in-1 ok?

Any other advice on moving, storing, and especially running a machine like this is welcome. I know I've given no useful details, but I don't yet have any myself. When I collect it, I will come back here with more information and pictures for you.

Thanks,

Pete