Running coal fired 5 steam engine on gas

Kevin - thanks for clarifying your reasons. Kozo Hiraoka uses his propane torch for testing/lighting up. Look at any of his books. (he uses coal for actual running)

Dave - for the burner I made for my Kozo Shay, it has a stainless arch which, according to the writeup, should be incandescent when running, so will help with the radiant heating of the firebox. As mentioned above, still have to test it, but it built to the "Raritan" plans, so is a published design.

Duncan - like you, I'd love someone (with your analytical abilities) to actually go through and figure this out. Many people seem to make it work, so there must be some definitive work "out there" that I have not found yet. Either that, or, it's actually simple, and hard to screw up!

John.

It might be easy when you know how, but when I had a play I found it very easy to screw up, flames going out, yellow flames, mini explosions. Gave up eventually, but would still like to know how to do it. By it I mean burn enough gas in a small space to run a 5"g loco. Full size men managed to burn oil, and gas must be easier than oil surely.

Incandescence( radiation) is the big provider up the front end of most boilers, think Sun , long way away, no convection or conduction but gets a bit hot at times.

hi , if american use propane in 5' models , why we cannot make it ? for me its interesting but I need drawing of the boiler and the burner .... who have ?