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Blast Pipe
July 2015
From the — HUTT VALLEY MODEL ENGINEERING
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SOCIETY INC.
6 Marine Parade, Petone, Lower Hutt 5012, New Zealand
Email address - [email protected]
Website - http://hvmes.com
Patron
- Ian Welch (Mainline Steam Trust)
President - Claude Poulsen
Ph 568-8507 [email protected]
Secretary - Gavin McCabe
Ph 567-4487
Treasurer - Chris Gousmett
Ph 526- 3705
Editor
- Peter Anderson
Ph 232-4533
[email protected]
and the
MAIDSTONE MODEL ENGINEERING SOCIETY INC
c/o 95 Holdsworth Av, Trentham, Upper Hutt
5018
President - Nathan Reynolds
Secretary - Bob Begbie Ph 976-9114 [email protected]
Treasurer - Brian Hawke Ph 528-4938
Patron - His Worship Mayor Wayne Guppy.
Location - Maidstone Park, Upper Hutt
Blast Pipe is printed with one or two pictures in colour. A Pdf colour
version is available on the website (per courtesy Charlie Lear) or e-mailed
direct to members on request. Webmaster - Peter Targett
Notice of Meetings
Hutt Valley MES
Meeting on the first Wednesday,
1 July 2015
at the clubrooms, Petone at 7-45pm.
the usual ‘Bits & Pieces’ session.
Hutt Valley MES Committee
On the third Tuesday, 21 July
at 7-30pm
NB -- Visit to The Printing Museum
54 Flux Rd Mangaroa
1300hrs Monday 20 July
Maidstone MES
The next meeting will be
Thursday 9 July at 7.30pm
Maidstone Park, Upper Hutt
Maidstone MES Notes - Bob Begbie
We wish the best to our members, to
members at HVMES, to members at Maidstone
MES, UK and to our readers. We got better weather
this month than that which forced cancellation of
our regular monthly meeting and our Annual
General Meeting in May. We held the AGM,
together with our next regularly scheduled
meeting on 14th June. We completed all matters
required in our AGM schedule in that evening.
In his statement to members our president,
Nathan, expressed real satisfaction at the progress
made by the society in the year just past. He
Peter Moyes fathoming out some of the features of the sectioned Ross Pop
safety valve at the end of the formal part of our meeting. The item was
loaned by the Silver Stream Railway Society Inc.
Photo - Anderson
thanked members for, and congratulated them
particularly, on the progress made in development of our
facilities and refinement of operating procedures. He
sees our next important goal as that of attracting and
training new members to better utilise the work we have
done. Minutes of that meeting will be posted on boards in
our meeting room and in our station building.
In a short June monthly meeting which followed the
AGM we considered what we might best do to develop our
club further and particularly to attract additional
members. With regard to our operating equipment we
decided to build a further two 7½” gauge passenger
wagons, preferably to the wood framed design developed
in British Columbia, Canada. We already have two wagon
sets of 7½” G bogies in reserve for that job.
A “Men’s Shed” male hobbies workshop has been
started and is being further developed in Upper Hutt,
already with, I believe, good quality woodworking
machinery. That may provide an opportunity for us to do
some of the work that is needed and to meet local
hobbies enthusiasts who may be prepared to join or to
assist with our railway operations.
We also considered, as a longer term project, the
possible extension of our railway in a loop down toward
Park Street and shifting the passenger loading and
unloading station nearby the children’s playground. That
will be a large and important project for our society.
Ross Hardie showed another of his tricky pieces of
woodwork, a set of three pieces of 3ply, or similar, each
about 2” square with seven vee teeth about 3/16”deep on
each side of the square and mounted, each square on a
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central spindle (nail or tack). The other two pieces
could be driven and rotated by turning the one
squared driver that was fitted with a turning
handle. I am sure most of us had not seen an
arrangement like that before.
We managed to run our railway on the first
Sunday, 7th June. We met new customers and
achieved a good rides tally. We hope for similar
success on our next running day, 21st June.
Activities we have scheduled for July
include:Railway running days, 1.0 to 4.0 pm each
day, weather permitting.
Sunday 5th July, Team 1
Sunday 19th July Team 2
Our society July Meeting will be held from
7.30 pm on Thursday 9th July, in our meeting
room in the amenities block in Maidstone Park.
We will appreciate your company.
Hutt Valley MES Notes
- Editor
The June meeting included our Annual
General Meeting and our President presented his
report as follows 55th. Annual Report
Hutt Valley Model Engineering Soc. Inc.
Members,
Well here we are, in our 55th. Year, and
gong stronger than ever. This can only be
attributed to the support of, you the members, and
the guiding work of your Committee. What we
have achieved this year may not be very apparent.
However, with the assistance of paid help, major
repairs to the buildings outer fabric have been
done. This included the installation of a new, and
more user friendly, main door. All the window
grills have been removed, galvanised, and
replaced and already improve the outer
appearance. Rusting nails have also had attention
so that the building is now ready for a repaint. A
bothersome but necessary need in the exposed
position we occupy. At this stage tentative ways of
improving the inside décor have been discussed.
The outside must be finished first.
The square gear demonstration model shown by Ross Hardie at the MMES
meeting. The intermediate gear would have a changing angular velocity but
the final gear would match the drive gear. Anyone got a use for it?
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Photo - Brian Hawke.
Again I believe we have had a series of fruitful
evening meetings. To all those who contribute my
sincere thanks. It is, you the members, who make the
evenings.
To those who run our rail system, from which the
public get great pleasure, a very big thank you. Without
this facility we would not be able to maintain and
operate the Club. Which brings me to point my finger
at those of you, not necessarily interested in trains, you
can, and I repeat can, help run the system. Do not
leave it all to a small group. Nuff said.
On a somewhat sour note I must report that we
have some sticky fingers in the Club. Not nice but
items have gone missing and money from the “Honesty
Box’ most certainly has. Should we, your Committee,
find the one responsible he will be out of this Club so
quickly he will not know what hit him. BE ASSURED.
Back to more pleasant matters. To the
Committee I tender my great respect. You have worked
hard this year in overseeing the building repair work as
well as maintaining the worthiness of our rail stock. On
behalf of the
members, well done.
I do not propose to
single out individuals,
but, having said that I
must. First to Gavin
McCabe for the wise
guidance he gives on
many matters and to
Peter Anderson for
the work he does in
producing our,
always interesting
Maggie and the Case TE
pass during the fine
afternoon run on Sunday 14
June. The sawmill did not
get into operation as there
were plenty of passengers
available, and David wanted
a change anyway.
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Photo - Anderson
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newsletter. I think at this point a round of
applause would be appropriate.
Finally to all our members I wish a
successful year in whatever project you are
undertaking
Claude N. Poulsen
President.
The Case was set up as usual in the centre of the track on June 14.
Claude is conferring with David and David G-T handles Hercules up the hill
in the background. Wellington in the far distance. Photo - Anderson
Chris Gousmett discusses with Ian some feature of the new
design of heat exchanger under construction for one of his Briggs
boilers. David Turner and Peter Moyes in the background.
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Photo - Anderson
The Treasurer’s report was presented also
and was accepted by the meeting subject to a
satisfactory report from our reviewer.
Claude had a show of hands to give an
indication of who would be able to pay a visit to
the Printing Museum at Mangaroa. It
is not available to the public as it is in
temporary premises since its shift from
the Silverstream site. A group of us will
visit on Monday 20 July as notified in our
Meeting notice. Get there via Mangaroa
Hill Road from Upper Hutt
We then got on with the bits and
pieces report followed by David GrantTaylor explaining how the Ross Pop
safety valve functions on the full size
locos.
Ian Welch started off the
discussion on Brigg’s boilers as built
and fitted into most of Harold Sinclair’s
locomotives. They work well for several
seasons and then the heat exchanger
portion in the firebox area clogs up and
cannot be easily cleaned out.
Construction is difficult too, as it is hard
to get good brazed joints on the multiple
tubes between the headers. He has one of these being
replaced at the moment with a unit built out of Duplex
stainless more in the form of the typical loco boiler with
water legs surrounding the firebox. The drawings for the
unit were prepared by Peter Gibbs and the component
parts were on the table tacked together ready for a
certified welder to finish the job. It will be provided with
inspection plugs to help in washout maintenance. Water
circulation will still be from the pipe connections at the
bottom at the tube plate end, and from the top corners
at the firehole end.
Ian went on to tell us a bit about his recent rail
tour in the UK. Some of the gloss had been taken off it
by the train being diesel hauled instead of the promised
steam. This happened as a result of another steam
hauled special running a red light and a precautionary
ban on steam had been put in place.
He referred to the Stapleford 10½” G Railway and
to the full size P2 Being built by the Darlington
Locomotive Works. The P2 is an impressive 2-8-2 fitted
Peter and John wait for pressure to build on the Simplex, Maggie.
Blast Pipe July 2015
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with Lenz Valve gear and is named Prince of Wales.
(the same firm was responsible for the building of
Tornado, the A1 4-6-2)
Peter Targett then told us that Doug Chambers
is underway with the building of the Dart boiler using
the components he has provided. (Noted in the June
Generator from Palmerston North that Doug had
some bits at their meeting on 28 May)
Peter went on to describe how he produced a
nicely domed smokebox door by turning it up from an
aluminium blank rather than forming it out of sheet
material. The special tool mount used produced the
comparatively large radius domed front on the door.
“If the ally is not up to the job I’ll make another one”
Peter asserted in his confident manner.
David then got going on on the safety valve
topic and with the help of some diagrams on the
board showed the features of the seat, the additional
diameter containing the “huddle chamber” and some
of the other features of the sectionalised safety valve
kindly made available by Silver Stream Railway Soc
Inc. The objectives to be met in the design included
the rate of discharge, reliable operation, secure
adjustment, low leakage, quick opening and closing,
with a set differential of usually 5%.
There was a part of the sectioned valve that we
could not work out and it is the chamber formed by a
screwed ring by Peter Moye’s thumb in the photo but
the light may dawn one day.
(Suitable safety vales for our locos is another
matter and there is plenty of information on the web
regarding them with some folk advocating ‘soft pop
valves’.)
A followup on our President’s report -WILLIAM TAYLOR. As of Sunday 21st June 2015,
William Taylor is expelled from the HVME Society.
This was found necessary following him being
observed committing serious misconduct. He has
been presented with a copy of the relevant motions
passed in committee and a trespass notice. This
trespass notice applies to our Club Rooms and
Station building. It is likely that a
trespass notice may be served on him,
by the Hutt City Council, covering the
grounds area. phone call. We've now caught up regularly since then.
John was keen to try out one of the locos and last
Sunday was a perfect day for it.” David Turner had his
Case in action again too and there are some photos to
cover the run that day.
Back to the 7 June, when Roy was in charge, we
were joined by Jon Mason from Palmerston North in
his roll as a MEANZ Safety Auditor. I represented the
club and managed to show him most of the detail he
required. There were some items that need to be
dealt with, and these are being attended to by the
committee, and the process of registration will be
worked through as a result.
Wheel Castings
Peter Moyes has been looking for some for the
Asia loco he has under construction and tried a
Palmerston North firm but they were not accepting
outside jobs now. He was referred to ‘Casting Shop
Ltd.’ Sockburn, Christchurch and made contact with an
Ian Close of the firm and has been given assurance it
can be done at a price that would be reasonable in the
light of importing costs from the UK. Their cast iron is
of a good quality and imported from China.
The present plan is that Murray McKenzie will be
making the required pattern for the casting process.
An Interesting
Washer Factoid
For quite a while I have
been trying to find the name of
an old style lock washer, and
as near as I could tell no one
else knew the answer anyway.
Eventually I found the answer in the 1934 Brittanica. It
is a Thackray washer. And the
name for the more common lock
washer is a Grover washer.
Now you have it !! - D.G-T.
Claude N. Poulsen. Club President.
At the Track
There have been some good run
days this last month when the weather
had looked doubtful but recovered for
our benefit. On Sunday 21 though we
cancelled ahead of time due to our own
internal workings! On Sunday June 14
there was some extra activity in that
Peter Targett had his Maggie out for a
run with a friend John.
Peter reports -- “We joined the
RAF together in 1966 and until recently
the last time we'd seen each other was
in 1969 when we marched off a parade
square at the end of our training. After
all that time we find ourselves on the
other side of the world and living locally.
Another colleague from those times
mentioned John had come to NZ in the 70's, it took
just 2 mins to find him in the white pages and a
John gets his turn at Maggie’s throttle on Sunday June 14 under
Pete’s watchful eye. Hercules with another load of passengers in the
background.!
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Photo - Anderson
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An Interesting Boiler Factoid.
Schmidt or
the Brotan
system, as in
the two
bottom pics,
but none
exactly the
same as the
Briggs boiler
which has a
horizontal
plate at the
firebox top,
and only has
watertubes for the
sides of the firebox.
And the top header in
the Briggs must reduce
the circulation a great
deal. But it would be a
great deal easier to
replace the watertube
unit than to deal with
the drum in the Brotan
system.
Many of us know of the
BELPAIRE firebox with the almost
rectangular cross section of the shell
at the top of the firebox, Presumably
this is to increase the steam space.
The other sort of boiler with the round
top is known as the CRAMPTON boiler.
-- which leads us onto --
Locomotive Boilers with
Peculiar Fireboxes. - David
Grant-Taylor
At our meeting of 3 June we
heard Ian talk of his Briggs boiler and
someone asked if there were any full
sized Loco’s with that style of boiler. I
have collected a few samples, but I list
only those with boilers which couple a
“watertube firebox” with a more
conventional firetube barrel. If you want
a real surprise at how fertile, and
generally futile the human mind is in
developing extremely complex systems
visit the website Douglasself.com and plunge into some
really odd stuff. Follow the
thread Unusual Steam
Locomotives on the right top of
his web home page.
CPR 8000 2-10-4 multi
pressure boiler Picture (top)
taken from gizmodo.com,
Baldwin 6000 image from
Douglas self.com (middle)
Of course, there are a lot
more, most based on either the
SteamRail Wanganui
Some photos of the recent flood have come through with
some comment from their President, Blair Jordan. This is a full
size rail group but we still feel for them.
“After many years of SteamRail Wanganui missing the
floods we have been hit along with the KiwiRail yard. It was
Wanganui's worst flood on record. This will take several weeks to
clear up. Before we can even start in the shed we will have to clear
the doorways and tracks in front. This will allow us to get the
Locos and rolling stock out so we can do the big job of getting rid
of the mud from inside.” Their locos are small diesels rather than
steam but
they are a
growing
organisation
and steam
trips from
other groups
do call by.
Plenty of muddy
sediment left in the
SteamRail shed.
The water level
shows just above
the Tr axle centre.
Blast Pipe July 2015
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John Romanes’ Latest
Locomotive.
This report is from the Winter issue of the
Keirunga Park PlatformRecently completed and running very
smoothly is the SNCF15020 Built by John
Romanes, this is his 20th engine built in the last 40
odd years — a tremendous effort!! Many of his
engines are to be seen at NZ tracks.
“This loco is the 20th and last locomotive
that I have built. As usual there is something a bit
different about it.
In general it is a standard battery electric, driven
by four 450watt 24v dc geared motors via a 4QD
controller. Four 12v 120amp/hr batteries with a
24v, controlled charger mounted on board. So
what’s different?? Both of the two axle bogies
have ‘Electric Differentials’. No more wheel slip or
loss of power in the curves. Each axle is fixed into
the axle-boxes and the wheels, complete with
sprockets welded onto the wheel, are fitted with
bearings that allow them to run free on the axle.
Mounted at each end of the bogie is a motor/
gear- box which drives the furthest away wheel,
onto which is mounted a triplex sprocket. From
this sprocket a return chain drives the wheel
closest to the motor. Note; the triplex sprocket
allows two chains to run on the outer teeth with
ample clearance between them. (the centre
sprocket teeth are not
used.) The opposite side
of the bogie is a mirror
image, so that each
drive is independent of
each other. The only
common factor is the
24v power supply.
When the loco
enters a curve the inside
motor and wheels come
under a little more load
and slow down whilst
the outside motor and
wheels are relieved and
speed up. With the
controller in a fixed
position there is no
change in speed no matter how tight the curve is.
The finished loco has scale suspension and after a
few hours running, to free up the tight spots,
performs brilliantly and provides a very stable
unit.
Apart from a few extra components such as
scale horns, couplings etc the loco is finished and
I am reasonably happy with it.
I have run the loco on a number of running
days and it exceeded all of my expectations.
With two sit - a - stride passenger cars
(Giles type with bearings in the wheels) I am able
to set the controller at the start of the trestle
bridge and it runs the complete track without any
speed variance at all.
It seems to be a winning system.”
John Romanes
Data - SNCF BB15000 7¼”G Locomotive
Length — 2.184mtrs. (86 inches)
Width — 381mm (15 inches)
Height — 450mm (17.75 inches)
Centre to Centre Wheels in Bogies — 381mm (15”) = 40
x 0.375 inch chain links.
Wheel Dia. — 150mm
Motors — 4x450 watt 24v DC = 1800 watts
Motor RPM — 550
Wheel speed @ 12kph — 426rpm
= Drive Sprocket — 19 tooth.
Driven Sprocket — 25tooth.
Coal Experiments Continue
EBOP Whakatane report in their June news letter
on their use of Huntly Nuts.
Fa 9 has been fitted with an experimental grate
having a top air riser fitted along the centre line
as indicated in the photo. When fired a little and
often it was found to reduce the amount of
smoke which is a problem with the soft coal.
There was however more ash in the ashpan than
with other coal.
The effect of
the top air riser
could be
observed with
the fire bed
level just below
the air holes showing
a jet of flame coming
off each one as the
smoke gases burned.
Dates to Note
24 - 26 October Labour Weekend
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Havelock North and New Plymouth.
7 - 11 January 2016 ME Convention Tauranga.
The HVMES run at the track at Petone 1300 to
1600hrs on fine Sundays -- Welcome
Maidstone MES, Upper Hutt, running on the 1st
and 3rd Sundays of the month.
- Welcome there too.