New to the Forum

Steam Models · New to the Forum

Hi … I just joined your forum a couple of days ago.
My name is Les, and I grew up in the country town of Geraldton in West Aust.
I’m retied now so I will be pursuing my hobbies again, one of which is Model Engineering, so I will continue my teenage days, were I built an odd engine or two from salvaged bits and pieces.

I was 11 years old when I built my first engine, a very simple and crude thing, made from an old disused paint tin, I took it to school on the day that our school had Science Lessons and our Teacher was blown away with excitement.
He ask that we start it up, and I tried to. But it didn’t work very well, and all the other kids jumped up and came to the front of the class to watch.
Our whole class stunk of paint and smoke, so we had shut it down, and open up all the windows to clear the air.
But I got nothing but praise from the Teacher, who then asked why don’t you other boys take an interest in Science like this boy.

Inventions … I’ve an idea for an oscillating engine with an improved breathing system, so I will need to make a small model, so that I can test it. I might even go to Steam Co. and ask if I can buy an already made up engine from them (to convert) … to save me a bit of time.
I also have an idea for a uniflow engine with a back pressure relief valve, but again I’ll have to make a small model so that can be checked as well.
So I’m going to have some building to do.

Collections …. Ofcourse I have just started, and have three so far.
I have a big interest in German engines up to the 50’s. The first of which will be arriving soon.

Gradually from time to time I will get to know some of the other members on the forum.

Yours,[/b]

IndianaRog

Welcome Leslie,

We have a significant population of folks from OZ so you should feel right at home. We love to share photos of our stuff, our projects and videos of things running. If you have a question there is always someone who can seem to help.

Again, welcome from Indiana, USA

Sandman

A big Scottish welcome to the forum Les.

You've come to the right place, and your friends here will be only too glad to help in any way we can.

I look forward to seeing your projects and talking steam with you.

johnreid

Welcome aboard

Steam Models

Well that was a big surprise!

And thank you Roger.
Yes I can remember talking with you, after I lost an auction bid.
Thanks again

And thank you too Sandman.

MrMamod

Welcome Leslie from the UK..

mogogear

Thanks for joining our lot of steamers

A hearty Welcome to you---

tmuir

Hi, and welcome from Perth Western Australia

jakesm

hello and

from the rugby opposition

its a great place to be!!

magpie38

welcome to the forum mate

Alf

benchmark

welcome to the forum from Denmark.

The Denying Dutchman

from the Netherlands.

Interesting idea; an uniflow with a back pressure relief valve. You'd never have to worry about water entering the cylinder again. The downside is that the efficiency of the engine will be a bit lower, hardly a concern for a model/toy steam engine.

Steamfan

Hello and

from Illinois!

Ross

Welcome to the forum!

MrDuck

Hello and welcome, Leslie

Steve_S

Welcome to the forum Leslie. Sounds like you have some very interesting projects in mind. Please post plenty of pictures... we love this kind of stuff!

steamyjim

Welcome to the forum!

ozsteamdemon

G`day Les and welcome aboard mate .

Sounds like you have some interesting projects in the pipeline .

Yeah , and we like plenty of pics and videos around here , so dont be shy !

Dean W

Welcome aboard, Leslie. Join in on the fun!

Dean

scorpion2nz

oh no another Aussie

any way welcome from across the ditch here in New Zealand

verithingeoff

G'day mate Welcome to the forum--

Wallace

Hi and welcome to the forum

Les

Hello and welcome to the forum,

Steam Models

What a wonderful welcome from such a small group?

But firstly for the benefit of scorpion2nz
And I Quote …. "oh no another Aussie"
for me.
I’m just another member from Australasia.

And lets give a very special THANKS for our non English Speakers
from ... Finland, Demark, Sweden & Holland.
It’s so much harder to converse in a foreign language and it’s a big credit to all of them.

And finally a big thank you to all the rest of you.

Kritika

Hi Leslie a big forum welcome

from the South of England.

dampfmaschinenjoe 1967

Welcome from a forum member from Northern Germany !

cheers Joe

Freespawn · welcome

welcome from wet south england

Steam Models

Love that animated Flag Kritika!
Thanks.

And another non English Speaker from Germany
who also has a Dampfmaschine
Location: northern coast of Germany ... must be close to Hamburg Joe?
Thanks

Southhampton ... The Port of the twin Queens
and to Quote ... "welcome from wet south england"
Why do people in England always think that it's raining?
Go to New Zealand and watch some real rain.
Fiordland National Park NZ .... 400 inches + each year.
You'll actually get wet.
Thanks Dan.

Burnmafingers

Welcome to the site, hope you enjoy it.
Post updates of any progress with your project

Steam Models

Thanks Burnmafingers.

Well like yourself who wrote .... Post updates of any progress with your project

It's wonderful that people are so interested in this.
and I like that.
What I failed to mention was that I'm still at the stage were I'm building my work shop,
and I haven't even got the money for my Lathe yet, mind you I'll get there, but it's going to take some time.

THANKS for your interest.

Mamodman123

Welcome to the forum

Little Bandit

A big welcome from Bavaria

Greetings Dennis

Swift Fox

to the forum.

Kritika

Steam Models

Thank you very much for the welcome Mamodman123

And another member from Germany ... Fabulous!
and he has 2 Dampfmaschines
Bavaria, eh! ... close to the start of the Great Danube?
Thank you very much Dennis ... hope to talk with you later.

And thank you for your welcome too Swift Fox.
Faux Pas on The OzFoxes FoxWeb ... What's all this?

Hi again Kritika.
What a fabulous Rolla?
I love it ... that's the best Rolla I've ever seen.
Is that yours? ... Wow!

kusuchi

A warm welcome, Leslie, from Richard and Andrew in the US Virgin Islands!

Loved the story about the first engine you built!

Andrew, (my son), will be eleven next month. He's just learned how to operate a lathe. I'm looking forward to him starting his first hand built engine.

Steam Models

the Virgin Islands ... my we are getting around.

Quote ... "Loved the story about the first engine you built!"

Yeh! .... made from a paint can, ... the things you do as kids eh? ... and I couldn't even solder.
I tried but failed, so it was half soldered and half blocked up with a rag hammered home, well even that wasn't good.

Hope I can talk with you again,

scorpion2nz

Steam Models

"insufficient solids"

Yes

It's almost as though NZ bleeds the South of OZ dry.
Innisfail & Tully in Nth Qsld get 180 inches + each year.
and most of the North have regular floods,
but nothing down here.

Nice to talk with you.

Swift Fox

Ross

Welcome to the Forum!

Steam Models

A small Quote,

"As you probably have guessed from my username i like foxes, and faux pas is a online webcomic run by the Carspecken's"

OK ... I can understand that. I like foxes too.
When I was 20 my wild friends took me out shooting,
and the very first thing that I was asked to shoot was a fox,
I rather like him, so couldn't shoot. SHOOT SHOOT everyone was calling out,
but I missed (ofcourse) ... we'll get you another one was their reply.

and to Quote again,
"I look forward to seeing your collection and any homebuilds too."
I like the interst that people are showing in this .... and it's good ... (no it's wonderful)

Not much to say Ross? ... Welcome to the Forum! ... is that it?
Well thanks Ross.

Steam Models

Oh! I've just found how to attach a file.

This is a picture of my new workspace that I'm building.
I will be intalling a new Gas Discharge Lamp, for some nice lighting.
And two fans for exhausting the fumes from soldering.

Later I will be getting a new Lathe, probably a C3 which is 770mm long.

I will now be able to Post some more pictures from time to time.

xlchainsaw

welcome to the forum from liz and glenn queensland.

logoman

Steam Models

xlchainsaw wrote:

.. welcome to the forum from liz and glenn queensland.

Thank you liz & glen

Steam Models

Hi there logoman
who wrote:

sounds interesting, tell me more!

I will be installing a Metal Halide Downlight ... It's manufactured in Germany, very efficient, and with the light output @ 4200k
At the moment I'm waiting for the paint to dry.
Maybe to-morrow or the next day you will see a picture of it running.

It's nice to see people interested. .... Thanks

Steam Models

A picture of 2 welding torches that I bought from a retired jeweller,
The smaller one will need some repairs (welding on it)
They run on Bottled Propane and compressed air, and I have a rotary vane air compressor under the bench,
which will supply a constant stream of air without the use of a tank

dampfmaschinenjoe 1967

Hi, Les,
I live 190 km west of Hamburg on the northern shores ! But you´re right; Hamburg is the biggest city around in a radius of 250 km. I own 23 "steam engines" at least and it could be even more over the times!

I am very heavily interested in live steam locos and own 10 of them !

Don´t be buggered off please by the amount of engines I own as I think even one engine could be a good foundation for a big collection: Iam collecting for 15 years now so it´s no wonder to own more than one engine!

cheers Joe

Steam Models

Thanks for your reply joe,

Yes I guess if you're in the North you would have to be close to Hamburg.
Must catch up with you some more.

Tomorrow I will add a Photo of the new light that I've just installed.

Timonade

Welcome to the forum, Leslie!!

I'm sure You'll really like this forum.

Waiting forward to seeing some of Your projects.

As for the torches, those things need a flow of burnable gas, e.g propane and/or butane and pure oxygen to ensure the hottest flame as possible from the gas. Air flow will work, but it won't burn nearly as hot as it would with pure oxygen as the air we breathe in only contains about 21% oxygen. The two gases are sold in tanks.
It's like.. when using compressed air you use 5 times more gas to get the same amount of heat as you would with using pure oxygen.

You may know all of this, but I'll still point it out as a tip.

Those torches are quite expensive, you know. Brazing torches.

Cheers! From Estonia.

steaminon

Welcome to the forum from Bozeman, Montana. This is a great place to hang out. Lots of help here.

Stilldrillin

Welcome to the Forum Family, Leslie!

From a damp, grey, Derbyshire, UK.

Steam Models

Ha! Ha! … another non English Speaking country.
This time we have Timo from Estonia. ... One of our Baltic Staates.

How come all you people write English better than myself?
I was only talking with Joe about this a couple of days ago.

Thank you for your welcome Timo, and it’s lovely to read that people are taking an interest in my projects.
Quote … "Waiting forward to seeing some of Your projects."
I have some more to talk to you about in a minute Timo.

And thank you for your warm welcome too steaminon.
Montana what a great name … and I bet it’s a great state as well

Say what a great Rolla you have there!

and ... Welcome to the Forum Family, Leslie!
Thank you David … love that animated drill.
Hope to talk wih you again soon.

Steam Models

Now Timo.

and another

Now Timo ... These torches run on Propane, you can see the bottle, I seem to have misplaced the pressure regulator at the moment,
and everything is very dusty at the moment because I've been painting my work room out.
And you can see a photo of a compressor. Although I'm using a different unit, a little smaller one and a direct drive from the motor.

I tried out the smaller torch, and was surprised at just how large the flame was, and the noise was quite something as well,
also much louder than I would have expected.

I've also tried soldering a small job with the smaller Butane Torch (above) and it seemed to work OK.
Well OK for a small job that is.

Hope to talk with you again some day,

MrMamod

Hi les BIG welcome from (sunny NO ) Rainy UK and great to have you here my friend and can't wait to see some models or projects.

..

Stoker

Interesting stuff you have on tap for your experimentation. Hope great things come of it, at least in the personal satisfaction department!

Welcome to a great forum full of fine folks!!!

Timonade

Hi Leslie,

Yes, the torches are quite loud, I thought the same about my small blowtorch - right now I'm used to it

Is that a scroll pump compressor? Looks nice, they are quite a nice bit of engineering. I guess not so noisy as a piston compressor?

The torches will work with compressed air, but as I said before, they just don't put out that much of heat. Check with your nearest welding supply store, they should have oxygen tanks for brazing torches.

For small jobs compressed air will do better than an ordinary blowtorch, but for brazing bigger boilers a little blast of oxygen into the torch will really get the job done. Otherwise the rest of the boiler will just act as a radiator and give away the heat.

Looking forward to seeing some nice steam engines,
Good luck,

Timo

Graham-Jilly

from Brisbane