Elbow steam engine.

Built by an 11 year old using old school tools. Since the video, we have "Tuned it up" a bit. She's smooth as silk now. Swapping pistons into differnt positions, and matching cylinder hole 1 to cylinder hole 3 (for example) made a big difference.

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• Steam
• engine
• elbow
• home
• made

[bigjoe12345678910]

cool im 14 and just started on making one at school any tips? cheers joe

[rcplanebuilder]

Some things we learned. Drill rod did not seem to want to aneal well, nor bend when red hot, per plans, and hence our mods.. Making pistons from cold rolled would be much easier. Number the cylinder holes and pistons as they are drilled. It helps to match them up later. Keeping everything as square and centered as possible is paramount in the running engine. We also milled counter bores for O-rings at all the base joints. Close fits and leak prevention helps a lot. Good luck!

[rcplanebuilder]

Correct, except there is actually steam/air ports directed to both brass cylinders. The steam/air is routed through the(square) "Control Valve" plate mounted on the base, but also up through the vertical rear support to a similar valve machined into it, and into the cylinder that is pressed into the large flywheel. Therefore, both brass cylinders are drivers, and both sides of the 3 pistons are exposed to pressure, therefore, all "6" pistons are active drivers.

[orangmakan]

Great, sounds exactly like a "bug"-engine from the 60thies :-)

[cowtippingrocks]

I have a set of small steam engines that my grandfather built years ago, and one of them is an elbow. I was looking on youtube to try to find out what it was called, and this vid is the first one I stumbled on.

[bigjoe12345678910]

thanks

and cheers for te reply

[Tonyv1951]

Well done. That engine is a fine achievement for anyone, let alone a youngster. When I was that age, my metalworking 'triumphs' consisted of a paint scraper and a screwdriver. 

I'm trying to grasp how it works. I suppose the cylinders rotate past a steam port in the base and then exhaust as they rotate away. An interesting idea, and it seems quite powerful too.