Steam powered Landrover

**LINK**

Thomas the Tank Rover (affectionately christened 'Mildred' by its creator, Frank Rothwell) has had its 2.25-litre petrol engine replaced with a custom-built steam engine. The vehicle is now fully coal-powered, makes all the required chuffing noises and is capable of 15mph.

Rothwell, a 67-year-old traction engine enthusiast, said he was looking for a project to keep him out of the pub in the evenings. "We all need a hobby and I like doing things that are difficult," he said.

"I'm always looking for challenges, something that hasn't been done before. And there's not many things that have not been done before!"

Rothwell thinks the project took him around 400 hours – split between building the engine from scratch, and converting and restoring the Land Rover. The 50-year-old machine looks remarkably close to stock, but the tall funnel protruding from the bonnet marks it out as rather special.

'Mildred' gets through coal at the rate of around 45kg an hour, with the firebox accessible from the driver's seat. Currently, top speed is only around 15mph, but Rothwell reckons with some fettling higher speeds could be achieved.

"We've just increased the pressure to 200psi," he said. "I'm expecting it then to do about 12 or 15mph max. And, if I'm going from here to work, I don't do much more than that anyway. There might be a couple of bits where I might hit 25mph but that's it, so... I'll be able to go to work in it in summer."

Looks a tad heavy on the steering, must be a heavy old lump up the front end (Driver excepted),

If he can source a couple of Rover '90 diffs he'll go a bit quicker, or save some coal, had the same problem when I replaced a 21/4 with a Perkins P4 - it would pull the side of a house out - at 40mph flat out. on the standard axles.

I wonder what youngsters of today will come up with when they are 67.

Regards

Lofty

What a lovely guy! Long live the true British eccentric!

Lofty,

One of the chaps in Fuel Injection Department did just that. He had quite an animal for caravan towing!

When I was Quality Engineer for our satellite factories, the Inspection General Foreman for them ran a Rover 105 with a P4 in it. He used to drive around Peterborough just swopping between Direct and Overdrive 4th. It pulled away in 2nd and then into 4th. (Lots of low speed torque). He used it for caravan towing, also.

As a total contrast, the other year at Newark there was a Fordson N type with a Perkins Prima in place of the original Petrol/TVO engine! Once moving it would much much faster than when it left Dagenham, but probably useless at ploughing.

Howard

Edited By Howard Lewis on 30/01/2018 15:25:44

Was posted on here a week ago:-
"The Future for JLR?" http://www.model-engineer.co.uk/forums/postings.asp?th=133337
Picked up from a Porsche owners website !!!
Response when copied to friend at JLR was to send me this link:-

**LINK**

"Defender Works V8 is the most powerful and fastest version that Land Rover has ever created.It will accelerate from 0-60mph in 5.6 second, while top speed is increased to 106mph."

106 in a Defender?

As the new JLR in-house diesel engines don't include a V8, this must have been the 3.6L V8 version of the 2.7L "Lion" V6 diesel that was co-developed by Ford and PSA when they were part of Ford's "premier" group. Mostly fitted in Range Rovers and Range Rover Sports (different vehicles, despite the name). Apparently the Yanks get these in the silly F-150 trucks, enlarged to 4.4L. Compared to the lorry engines they are used to in those things, this must be the best diesel engines they have ever seen over there. Of course, VW have seen to that particular market.....

Murray