A question for Derek

[barca1au]

our GRP hull of the Waverley has arrived, so now is crunch time; we
have to decide whether steam is feasible here in South OZ - does
anyone know what fuel is available here? Our local model engineers
club only has model steam trains running on charcoal, and our local
model stores seem to speacilize in R/C only. Its illegal to send
hazardous items through the post so while we are interested in the
Wilesco plant - which we can get quite cheaply from the UK (nearly
half the cost of the Graupner plant), fuel is the main concern.
We have been reading the comments on Stuarts experiences. Presumably
some of them will apply equally to electric power as well, though by
our calculations we will only need about 60 revs per minute to have
the Waverley at scale speed.
Cheers
Wilf & Caroline

[Derek Warner]

Hi Wilf & Caroline in beautiful (but cool) Adelaide

a) I thought I read on a site that Wilesco boilers ran on fuel (liquid) - 40 years ago my Dad
built a single cylinder steam engine and its boiler was fired by a rectangular box tray say 6"
long x 2" wide x 1" high, with endless layers of stainless steel mesh & I think steel wool in the
centre - I think Dad filled it with methylated spirit

b) and yes - Stuarts issue with no more than 80 RPM is very interesting - I was sort of hoping
other PD's would come back with the actual shaft speeds they use etc

regards Derek

[wsnowdon]

The Wilesco and Graupner steam paddle engines ru on GAS, there is
alovely easily filled gas tank with both engines. I use cigarette
lighter gas as it is cheap ,convenient and the filler nozzle is
exactly the right size for the gas tank. I get exactly fifteen
minutes burn time per filling.