Beam engines

[Bierjunge]

Is the engine in the Princess fully functional? Steam powered? Or is she too only for display?

Alistair Deayton tells in his Directory of the World's Steamships:

"(...) Propulsion: Paddle Steamer
Engine type: 1-cylinder walking beam, 20 hp
Built: 1984 (...)
1984: Built for use at San Francisco as the private yacht Tule Princess by David Sarlin, who built the engine himself to blueprints of an 1857 walking-beam engine.
1996: Following the death of David Sarlin, sold to Ed Morris, moved to her present location and renamed Princess. Offered for charters on the Saginaw River.
Princess is the only operating steamer in the world with a walking-beam engine, once very popular in American side-wheel paddle steamers."

If she would have an additional (diesel) engine, I'm sure Alistair would have mentioned it, as he does for a couple of vessels on the Nile ore Mississippi, for example. And fake steamers aren't listed by him at all...

[campbellman]

Sorry Guys, been awol with a sick laptop for a while.

The video clip with the extremely clear explanation was fantastic. It has answered all my original questions & I'm more hooked on beams than ever.

Tony   

[mjt60a]

This engine was running at Kew Bridge Steam Museum during the model show, although designed to operate as a static (but 'rotative') engine I could easily imagine it turning a paddleshaft...

[Roderick Smith]

I enclose a photo of the restored beam engine at Goolwa (South Australia), in operation for a 3 day festival over Sat.4-Mon.6.10.08.  It isn't large, and is towed on a trailer.  For this event, the steam was coming from a pipe from PS Oscar W.  IIRC the engine began life working a winch at a slipway (see the url which I have in an earlier post in this thread).  I have a 12 MB quicktime movie of the engine in operation, if I can find a way of transmitting it to Eddy to place in a relevant section.

This is the only working beam engine in Australia, but there is another at Mannum (formerly powering a dry-dock pump?) on which restoration is imminent.

There are some good explanations and animations available by googling on 'beam engine'.

Regards,
Roderick B Smith
Rail News Victoria Editor

[paddlesteamerman1]

Keys Beam Engine at the Mannum Musuem was used to operated a centrifugal pump for pumping out the dry dock.
It is now nearly fully restored and looking great.
I dont have a photo but can post a completely up to date photo of it by Sunday/Monday if needed?
I am firing two private charter cruises on the PS Marion at Mannum on Saturday/Sunday.

[Roderick Smith]

I have sent to Eddy a 12 MB 10 sec .mov clip of the Goolwa beam engine at work.  He will advise where & when it is available for downloading.
I haven't the time this week to download and master the software to convert it to a more economical format (.mpg or .avi or .wmv).  I will try for that after I have printed Sept.08 RNV.

Regards,
Roderick B Smith
Rail News Victoria Editor

[Eddy Matthews]

Roderick's beam engine video is now available to download. You can find it at: http://www.paddleducks.co.uk/index.php?ind=downloads&op=section_view&idev=246

Regards
Eddy

[Dinosaursoupman]

Hey Pd's,

Just found this video of a model walking beam engine from the U. S. Naval Academy. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUDQYzE9gcM.

Excuse the poor quality of the video, but it gives the general idea.

Randy

[andy]

Hi PD´s.

don´t be angry, but I think these beam engines were the biggest nonsens in the development of steam engines! The diagonal or horizontal engine is the right one which was developed for paddle steamers. Beam engines I think, came from the early steam pumps of the mining companies and were used for the early steamers.

Andy

[Red_Hamish]

Hello all, you are quite correct Andy that these engines while not entirely suitable for ships, they were common enough to be appreciated for their simplicity. The development of steam compounded upon itself and soon made the beam engine obsolete.

cheers

Jim

[mjt60a]

True, diagonal engines must have been far better, not least for their lower centre of gravity - imagine all the metalwork of a beam engine so high up above the waterline...probably why they built the side-lever engines - http://www.norwayheritage.com/articles/templates/ships.asp?articleid=87&zoneid=5 - to get the beam as low as possible in the hull.
knowing what we do now, it's easy to wonder why certain other designs were even attempted, just look at the 'puffing billy' locomotive ( http://www.usp.nus.edu.sg/victorian/photos/tech/puffbilly2.jpg ), it's driven by a couple of beam engines when we all know what you need is the cylinders driving the wheels directly!

[Dinosaursoupman]

Hello PD's,

Andy, I don't know if they were "nonsense", they obviously served a purpose. Hundreds of vessels were built using this type of propulsion, even during a time when there were other technologies available. The side lever engine, as mentioned, was as old a technology as the walking beam, yet they weren't suitable for the designed purpose of the vessel. The advantages of propellers had been proven within a few years of the advent of steam propulsion yet was not adopted in all vessels. Otherwise our forum would be called "Propducks"! Diesel engines have overtaken steam, yet we still want to see steam. Remember too, ducks have wings. Flying is a far superior technology than traveling by ship. Yet there are still plenty of ships around. Why, because they serve a purpose.

While it is true that they added a lot of top-end weight, keep in mind the type of vessels they were going into; wide beamed or very deep hulled vessels, stability wasn't a big issue. They weren't going into the floating toothpicks that grace the coast of Great Britain or the Lakes of Switzerland today.

One "advantage" discussed earlier, mentioned in the book "Paddle Wheel Steamers and Their Giant Engines" was that they could place a very powerful engine in the hull of a ship, taking up comparatively little floor space as opposed to a horizontal or inclined engine. This configuration freed up a lot of deck space for storage and passengers (hence more money (hence the motivating force for any venture)) since the majority of the machine work was vertical. The crossbeam engine, which was the direct ancestor of the walking beam engine was built with the idea of taking up as little floorspace as possible. The limits of that technology led to the walking beam engine. Secondly, since the cylinders were so large, i.e. 6 foot bore by 12 foot stroke, boiler pressure didn't have to be excessive.

Randy