Hello I'm gathering information to build a 40" sidewheel steamer and would like to power it with a working walking beam steam engine.Are there any suitable plans available.I have Elmer's drawings.

Hi,

in 1996 I made a live steam model of "Mount Washington" using the kit by Dumas.
It was necessery to extend the depht of hull by 25 mm, for this I cut the hull above the waterline in two and set in a 25 mm wide ABS piece with the lenght of the complete hull. Later it was sanded, plasted and colored, a difference to the original hull wasn't visible.
For the walking beam engine I used cylinder, slide, excenter, flywheel and other parts from the Regner 12/36 engine, the frame I made of wood like the original. Because it was 1 cylinder, the engine neeeded a flywheel by 90 mm diameter and a 1 : 2,5 gear reduction by belt drive to the paddle shaft. To make the beam, I was able to use the original beam made of white metal by Dumas.

The 12/36 engine also today is available by Regner to a rather low price, it has a piston slide and so it's simple to reverse it by a reversing valve (also available by Regner).
It's difficult to start a 1 cylinder engine by radio control. This does a small electric motor with great gear reduction switched on and pushed against the flywheel by R/C when necessery. If the steam pressure is at least about 2 bar, the engine will run immediatly, when it's pushed above death point.

After some minor faults in the beginning the whole steam plant shows a nearly perfect function.

Normally the "Mount Washington" has a dangerous toplast. For further stability of the model there are removable rafts of balsa between sponsons and water. The rafts are formed and colored correspondending to the hull in white and red. One can be remove it in seconds, if the model is outside of water. When it's in, the rafts are unobtrusive within a distance of a few meters.

Unfortunately the model is 400 km far from me in the house of my mother, but I will see, if i have some photos here.


Tom

Tom
Thank you for your reply it will be a good start to my project.I actually have the Mt. Washington kit ,it like many other, had to have models is sitting in the building yard.My plan was to scratch a new boat but perhaps I'll review the Mt.W. A few years ago I talked to a fellow who built the Mt. W. and solved the  top heavy condition by mounting a long arm to the rudder servo with a counter weight on it.When he came about the weight went opposite to counter balance the list.
Also as they say about pictures and a thousand words at your convenience a picture will be worth a thousand thanks.
Rich

How about if you put a second cylinder inside the model, not visible while sailing? I know it isn't correct/realistic but it'd make it self starting and reversible.....

My main concern would be the fairly small size you want to build at.... Sidewheelers generally have fairly narrow hulls, and riverboats such as the mt Washington have a shallow draft. Add to that the weight of a boiler, a beam engine (which by it's very design has a lot of weight high up), and your potentially looking at something which is very unstable....

Personally I would build a model of around 60"-66" in length, which is still transportable in a normal car, but will help to overcome a lot of the problems outlined above - Increasing the hull depth is virtually essential!

Regards
Eddy

Thanks to all for your inputs.This project is still in the information gathering phase nothing is cast in stone.I'm looking for the successful and unsuccessful opinions. I've built a few boats and like the challenge of this one.
Rich