I am attempting to build a mississippi stern wheeler from scratch. The plan that I have is for a generic one rather than a specific one and has 18 paddles (if that is the correct terminology) but I see other models with 12 paddles and I expect that some have even fewer. What is the optimum number of paddles? Please tell me that I can use fewer than 18 because I'm finding it extremely tedious glueing 18 spokes onto 3 rings and having to do this for 4 sets of rings. Is there a formula that determines the number of paddles or is it just whimsy on the part of the designer?
Morning Jack...........with respect to the paddle blade question, we could also throw the following into the equation....
1. number of blades
2. width of blades [overall]
3. height of the individual blade
4. immersion depth of the blade
5. position of wheel axis to the wheel diameter to determine the number & % of blades immersed at any one time
6. diameter of wheel
7. prototypical rotational speed
These are just 7 variables that could be used to consider a wheel set construction........alternatively if it is a specific Mississippi paddler....you could consider researching and deciding on a scale ...& then consider basing your wheel on a scale rendition of the actual :hammer
Another pointer :whistle you may consider, is keeping all of your question postings in one main thread....it will ultimately be just like reading a book with pictures & so munch easier than flicking between books to read the story
Derek :beer