The Home Machinist!

John, I remember that turbine build article well. I built the one Mike layed ouy in the article. I cut up an old flourecent light ballast and pretty much followed the directions. I used ball bearings from a die grinder and four neodymian magnets machined into a S.S. Rotor with the steel caps and lit...

Beautiful engine there, I remember seeing one at Cabin Fever also. Ive been down to the Mariner Museum a few times also. First trip down the outer banks I was sitting in a bar one night talking to a couple guys seated next to me, turns out they were divers down there working on salvaging the Monitor...

I must agree that the tube holes should be large enough to accommodate any misalignment in the assembly of the boiler components. the question is how much over size can one get away with. I'm not there yet but I am getting close.

Marty, do you ever allow that ligament to go below 1/4”. I did my home work on this and upon finishing my tube sheets I noticed my outer holes were too close to weld zone. I looked up specs on sugartech.com and the cinder sniffers site. I .625 O.D. tubes on an .813 pitch. My .188 ligament looked goo...

I like your cnc method, it beats the hell out of swinging these on a rotary table. I use a similar method mounting to a fixture and climb milling into the rod sides and shimming the gap on opposite side. I might try 1144 stress proof or 303 next time. I made my A3 side rods out of cast iron and a se...

I went with the graphite/teflon rings with an O-ring backer in built up pistons on my A3 in 1.5” scale. Ran well on air, no steam yet. I cant find the pic or info I had on them. I sourced them from McMaster/Car though.

I like the casting it looks sharp. What do you think of the Fusion 360 , I was using Draftsight for years till they pulled the plug on the free version. Still use Autocad LT a little at work but I’d like a program at home again.
Thanks for the pics.

I have a question on brake material. I built my A3 tender with pull lever mechanical only operated brakes per Kozo drawings. The difference was in the shoes I made. Their cast iron backings with an actual brake shoe material bonded to them. Its a heavy black composite material from replacement shoes...

Getting back to O.P. Topic in regards to drawing cost’s. Anyone who generates drawings on cad programs usually carries an annual license fee and maybe support fees too. Pencil/paper is cheap but takes way longer with mistake corrections, redesign, spilled coffee.....: )

Looks nice Marty, as usual. Coal burner? You've got alot of tubes there. What is the barrel tube, it looks smoother then pipe? Is that a foundation ring around the bottom of the fire box, Isaw it used in the Australian model boiler code book. I guess its not used much as I have only seen the water w...

I used a very similar set up but I found needle bearings with rubber lip seals. I think it was McMaster Carr. Running em on hardened/ground shafts. I like the split collar /felt washer fix on this one.

You might try looking at The Golden Gate Live Steamers web site, I found some useful info there on boiler design.Also the Sugar Factory TEMA site is useful for tube sheet calculations such as Ligament sizes. I haven't been able to find a coralation to tube sheet thickness like min. thickness in rela...