Posted by Jerry on September 3rd, 2006 — Posted in DIY, Journal, Steam, Technology
Inspired by McCabe’s runners I decided to have a go at adapting one of McCabe’s designs using standard plumbing hardware and a few basic tools. I bought an ‘L’- join from a hardware store, and a brass screw cap for the valve chest. The one I modelled mine on was the ‘Paul-Zee’ design.
I smoothed the bore as McCabe suggests – using a dowel in a drill with some sandpaper wrapped round. With the bore smooth, I took a three-eighth inch bolt and mounted it in a portable drill and spun it against a grinder wheel – with the grinder going in opposite directions – that gave me a nice rounded bolt head ground to just fit the bore of the plumbing pipe. I then found a washer and ground it to fit inside the plumbing sleeve on the end of the joiner.
I cut off the threaded portion of the bolt and drilled a small hole near the end – this would take the connecting rod.
I then took a small bolt, cut off the head and drilled down through the centre to make a small tube with a thread. I then drilled a hole in the plug cap just big enough for the bolt and cut a thread into it using a tap and die, and screwed it in place, held by a lock nut to keep it in place. This is the steam inlet pipe.
Then I drilled a transverse hole through the plug in line with the body to take the slide valve. The valve is made from small diameter steel rod, with a hole drilled near one end for the valve connecting rod, and another hole drilled to line up with the steam inlet hole when the piston is about halfway along the cylinder.
I filed the valve flat about half a centimetre from the steam inlet hole so it would line up with the edge of the valve chest internal wall – as I hadn’t used a solid plug as recommended.
Then I made a wooden base for the engine
Then after scraping off the flux from a steel welding rod I then cleaned the rod and cut it to be a good length to make the crankshaft. I carefully bent it to make two cranks 90 degrees out of phase, then made short connecting rods from wire to connect the crankshaft to the piston and the valve. With lots of spray grease the whole lot rotated quite smoothly, and when spun in the chuck of my drill it made a very satisfactory engine sound.
Tomorrow I shall make a flywheel, and then hopefully I will know if I have made a fatal error in construction. Here is the current state of the engine, and an animation based on rotating the crankshaft.
Anyhow – it’s a fun weekend project 🙂
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on August 19th, 2006 — Posted in DIY, Journal, Steam, Technology
For those who remember travelling on steam trains as a kid and are surfing the internet now – here is a project that combines the two! Turner art prize-winner Jeremy Deller and Alan Kane have set up a steam powered internet machine to bridge the gap between the steam age and the digital age. This appeared in an article in The Guardian and was uncovered in the Makezine blog.
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on August 18th, 2006 — Posted in DIY, Journal, Steam, Technology
Ever imagined an alternative future in which steam powered remote controlled centipedes walked the streets, or a steam-powered six-wheel-drive mars rover? Well Japanese artist I-Wei Huang has not just imagined – he has built them!
From a radio controlled walking robot to a trilobite steam tank to a truly amazing steam centipede, there seem to be no limits to I-Wei’s imagination – and ingenuity. His site crabfu.com is filled with his award-winning creations. Watch the videos – I love the one where his six-wheel-drive rover tows him on a skateboard 🙂
Imagine someone from a distant planet sending this to Earth!
A kind of Jules Verne meets Bruce Sterling – check out his site – and check out Makezine for more of this guy’s amazing work
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on January 22nd, 2006 — Posted in DIY, Journal
At Christmas I bought a cheapie garden arch and had it assembled and in the garden in about half an hour on Christmas day. The Gardman Gothic Arch comes in a long flat box with clear instructions for assembly. But despite following the instructions carefully, on Boxing Day a strong gusty wind shook it apart. But not to dispair – it is just one of life’s challenges – here’s how I solved the problem so sucessfully that I bought another one.
Find a flat surface to assemble the sides and follow the instructions to the letter – it is very easy to over-tighten the screws that hold the connectors to the legs, so just tighten until it doesn’t move easily.
The side rails just push into the plastic connectors – so here is where I make an improvement. Carefully drill a small hole right through the connector and through the side rail, and do the same through the body of the connector and the upright leg, like this:
Then cut a short length of thin galvanised wire – the sort you can buy for AUS$2.00 in Clints or Go-Lo – about 80mm, and feed it through the hole and twist it together. This will not pull apart in a wind!
The thoughtful manufacturer provided a separate piece of rod to hammer into the ground to make holes for the legs. I quickly found that with Canberra’s heavy clay soil the piece of rod was not up to the task. Here’s a workaraound – take a short piece of galvanised water pipe and an end cap – this will fit neatly over the end of the rod and provide a good striking surface for a heavy mallet or hammer – now you can make holes deep enough for the legs so that the structure will be stable!
So now you are all set – here is the completed structure is in the ground ready to grow a climbing rose or star jasmine over it 🙂
And here’s one I made earlier…
Enjoy!
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on January 16th, 2006 — Posted in DIY, Journal
What’s so special about this tile and the one next to it? No cracks or chips – that’s what. The cracked tiles in the toilet had bugged me for ages – should I spend big bucks to get a tiler in to replace two tiles, and how difficult could it be anyhow?
I looked on the net and found several sites – like this one – on doing whole bathrooms. Here’s what seemed to be in common – first, remove the grout (the mortar-like stuff surrounding the tiles) with a small chisel or steel shafted screwdriver and a small hammer. Then lift the tile and clean all the dust and grout debris from beneath the tile, the spread tile adhesive, lay the new tile and regrout. Sounds easy? Well yes it’s not very difficult.
During a trip to Bunnings for some grout, I asked one of the staff about tile adhesives etc, and he asked “how many tiles?” I said “two” – and he gave me the best tip ever: he suggested I use a Bostik product called “No More Nails” – that way I’d be spending $4.00 rather than $20. I looked dubiously at all the grout mixes and then found a great product called “Tile Grout” (duh) in a handy premixed squeeze tube from Red Devil. That was my level of technology!
I had some spare tiles of the same sort that had cracked, so I set to work on the grout. I chipped it out with a chisel – not too difficult as the stuff was brittle and it chipped out fairly cleanly. Actually it wasn’t easy to remove all the grout – so I removed enough to get a screwdriver under the cracked tile, and levering aganst a piece of wood (so I wouldn’t chip the adjacent one) gently prised the cracked tile loose with a gentle rocking motion. The offending tile came up easily without breaking further. I found it had been fixed with something very like No More Nails – but with blobs only at the ends – it had been unsupported in the middle – hence the crack.
Then, with grout brush, I carefully removed every piece of loose grout from the base surface, having chipped out the remaining grout, and then applied some blobs of No More Nails and positioned the new tile in its space. I left it for an hour to allow the adhesive to begin to set, and then went around the edges with the tube of pre-mixed grout ensuring that all the gaps were fillled.
After allowing fifteen minutes for the grout to begin setting, I took a damp cloth and ran my finger along the grout line to smooth the surface and to ensure all gaps were filled. I then rinsed out the cloth and carfully wiped up the excess grout from the tile surfaces. And there it was – a new tile – perhaps not a fully professional job, but certainly serviceable. This grout stays slightly flexible too – perfect for laying tiles on wooden floors.
I have a couple of cracked tiles in the laundry too – so I’ll photograph the whole process when I do those ones.
Cheers
Jerry
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