Stuart No 9 - A simple Horizontal Steam Engine

[Alan Haisley]

No thank you I don't want Hydrochloric acid near my machine tools.

Thats why I do it outside and rinse them off very well before they come inside, another man who makes these wheels commercially does exactly the same thing except the does about 30+ at a time

Jason,
How do you store and later dispose of the used acid?

Jo,
The brass packings add good looks to functionality.

Alan

[Jo]

Thanks Alan, sadly the Workshop gnome has not returned the missing gauge  so I still have not been able to drill the bronze packer

How do you store and later dispose of the used acid?

As the water pipe coming to my house is steel the usual chalk build up in the sanity wares is rust coloured  and the easiest way of getting rid of it is Hydrochloric acid.

But you can't use a lot or very often and what every you do make sure you won't need the throne until the acid has worked and it has been well flushed or you won't forget it a second time 

Jo

[Jasonb]

Just don't get any on your limestone or marble tiles

[zeeprogrammer]

Just don't get any on your limestone or marble tiles

Oh why not? Produces memories. 

[Flyboy Jim]

Just don't get any on your limestone or marble tiles

Oh why not? Produces memories. 

If my memory serves me right from my High School Chemistry class: Limestone is a base material which neutralizes acid.............at it's expense...............which might not be pretty!  There's smarter folks here that should be able to give a better explanation.

Jim

[Thor]

Yes Jim,

 Limestone is calcium-carbonate, and if exposed to an acid will dissolve into a salt and produce carbondioxide. If you use HCl the salt will be calcium-chloride ( and you will of course also get water and CO2).

Thor

[Jasonb]

Thor, could you explain that to one of my client's cleaners who had been using limescale remover in one of the bathrooms and then left the cloth on the floor infront of the washing machine ready to be cleaned. When picked up off the black limestone floor shall we say it had left its mark

[Mike Bondarczuk]

It also releases chlorine gas which is a hazardous gas to take care.

[Thor]

Hi Jason,

 If the cloth was wet with HCl - or some other acid - I do understand why the limestone floor is "marked". There is an explanation of the reaction here:http://geology.com/minerals/acid-test.shtml.
 Other acids give similar reactions, but will of course produce different calcium salts. We used the reaction to produce carbondioxide or to show that a certain rock contained carbonates or just to neutralize acid used in some experiment.

Thor

[Jo]

Lets find a nice casting to play with: A pair of balance weights as a casting which is shaped like a banana 

Its CI so its best not to try bending it  The balls are well over sized so in theory they can be used as our reference surface 

I first tried holding it by the local ball and turning the spigot but that didn't work  I then hit upon the idea of holding it by opposite ball and turning the one furthest out from the chuck using a pot chuck to hold the ball. Centre in, face of the opposite ball taken to 12.7mm. Turn it round and holding in a collet by that nice new parallel ball face. Mr Silky got his travelling steady out to help 

So a slightly modified casting which is no longer banana shaped, some faces to hold it by and so far nothing that we want to keep has been harmed 

Jo

[Jo]

The face of the arms have been milled to width and to depth. The two flat reference faces were turned on the lathe, with a bit of jiggery pokery to get the appropriate spacing for the balls to the arms, before using them to find the location for the two pivot holes.

Ball turning 

Jo

[Bluechip]

So what's happened to the little Orphans then ??? 

Abandoned ? 

Dave

[Jo]

The large diameter piston rings on the triplets are a bit stiff as were the ones on the No 9. So time for an experiment.

The number 9 has two rings that go in the same slot in the piston, with the gaps on the opposite side of the piston  the drawings do not give a thickness for the rings so I made them  just under 2.4mm thick: they gapped easily were very stiff to put on the piston and had too much spring to them which made the piston solid in the bore 

The rings have been mounted in a collet and bored out so that they are now only 1.6mm thick. They are fitting on the piston easily (without fear of breaking  ) and the piston can go up and down in the bore.

I have fitted the gland with graphited PTFE packing and there are a pair of studs missing on the gland  .

Jo

[Jo]

Back to the weights.. I chose to hand turn the balls using an engraver. Before cutting off the two tails and rounding over where they were cut off from.

The shaping of the arms was a bit of a faff and had to fettled to fit. In the end the balls only fly out a little 

Jo

[Jo]

I have been looking at drive belts for the No 9 governor. Normally the mamod springs are the easy way out but clearly they are too thin for such a substantial engine. 

Does anyone have any better suggestions?

Jo