Author Topic: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel  (Read 573988 times)

Offline steam guy willy

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #120 on: November 04, 2017, 02:22:49 AM »
hi ,its good to be able to get all those drawings !  and looks like a major build project... :popcorn:

Offline Flyboy Jim

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #121 on: November 04, 2017, 02:53:01 AM »
Well, I think the 3D model of the full-size slew/crowd engine is complete - got the valve eccentrics/rods, and piston/conrods, crankshaft all in. Here are some pictures of the engine and some cutaways:

Next on the list is a mock-up of the passages/valves for an attempt at a simpler version that will work at small model scale, but first a few days away from the computer to let the little grey cells recover from this one!!

 :cheers:

EDIT: and could not resist seeing how it looks on the main boom. Still need to make the spur gears for either side, and get the engine placement tweaked so the gears mesh correctly, but looks pretty impressive up there!

Very interesting Chris. I guess this was a really specialized engine. Back then, I guess you couldn't just go on-line and order a "Binford 80-00-80 Steam Engine", bolt that sucker to the boom and go to work!  ;)

Jim
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Offline crueby

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #122 on: November 04, 2017, 12:25:19 PM »
hi ,its good to be able to get all those drawings !  and looks like a major build project... :popcorn:
Definitely going to be a long term build, much more to this one than the Lombard, with two pairs of tracks, the boom assembly, and four twin cylinder engines, plus all the frame and cab. Going to be fun!

Offline crueby

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #123 on: November 04, 2017, 12:34:17 PM »

Very interesting Chris. I guess this was a really specialized engine. Back then, I guess you couldn't just go on-line and order a "Binford 80-00-80 Steam Engine", bolt that sucker to the boom and go to work!  ;)

Jim
Oooh, good question, when did Binford start?!?  :Lol:


Marion makes a big deal about the controls for these engines, all set up with a single lever to control both speed and direction, simplifying the job for the operator. The hoist engine and the hoist drum clutch are also controlled by a single valve, that engages the clutch first, then feeds steam in increasing amounts to the engine. At the off position, the valve also connects the cylinder ports directly to the exhaust, so it can freewheel when lowering the bucket, using the brakes to slow it if needed. All these things let the operator control everything with fewer levers than earlier models. Very clever stuff.

Online Brian Rupnow

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #124 on: November 04, 2017, 03:18:12 PM »
Chris--You're getting pretty handy with the 3d modelling. I know how steep the learning curve is. You are doing nice work.---Brian

Offline crueby

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #125 on: November 04, 2017, 05:15:20 PM »
Chris--You're getting pretty handy with the 3d modelling. I know how steep the learning curve is. You are doing nice work.---Brian
Thanks Brian - For this type of modeling I am going pretty quickly with it, have not spent much time on the 'mesh' side of the application for more organic shapes yet. It is so much quicker and easier for me to do these designs this way than with pencil/paper, which I still use for quick little parts to get dimensions figured out for making a standalone part right away. They still have some bugs to work out in the sketching part, but that is improving pretty quickly too.

Offline crueby

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #126 on: November 05, 2017, 07:18:54 PM »
Okay, bunch of sketching in Fusion360, a few crashes of the application and resketching those bits, and I have a slightly simplified version of Marion's slew/crowd engines that I can build at a model scale. I arranged things so that the cross passages can all be drilled through the sides of a large block, and the ends plugged up to make them internal-only passages. Also, the center piston valve won't have the series of interlocking and varying size holes that the original had, so it will not act as well as a throttle like the original, but should have some throttle effect as well as controlling forward/reverse motion. It should also be possible to machine the valve assemblies as a seperate unit from the cylinders, and mate them up with a flat face above the cylinders to bolt to.

So, here are the concept drawings from Fusion. Starting off, here is an outside view with all the blocks in place, except for the cylinders below and the valve chest covers above. The green block in the center contains the forward/revese/throttle piston valve, the pistons are in blue below, and the steam input pipe is in red at the right, exhaust pipe above it.

Here is a cutaway view, with the steam chest on the near side removed, as well as one half of the center valve block, to show the internals:

Now, on to straight-on side views of the center valve to show its actions. The center piston valve controls which passage that the steam and exhaust flow through to the steam chests above each piston. The piston valve has its center cut away to connect two ports, and the piston is hollow (with ports to take the steam around the end of the control rod at the left) to allow steam to reach both ends of the valve for two reasons - 1, to keep the pressure from pushing the valve to the left, and 2, to allow steam to flow to the port on the left when the valve is to the right.
In this picture, the valve is in the left-most position, connecting port A with the exhaust, and port B with the steam. This will let the engine run in one direction. The grey circle to the right of the piston is a passageway to the steam chests that always lets steam in around the slide valves, more on that later.

Next, here is the control valve in the center position, which does not connect either port A or B to anything, which is the 'throttle off' position, which locks the piston in place to keep the engine from freewheeling, and keeping the boom in position.



Here is the control valve to the rightmost position, where it connects port A to steam (via the hollow center of the piston slider), and port B to the exhaust. This makes the engine run in the opposite direction as it did in the leftmost position.


Okay, now over to the steam chest above the cylinders. Both work the same, so I'll just show one of them. Rather than a typical D-valve slider with just one chamber underneath, Marion's engine used a slider that had the bottom chamber plus a passageway above it that could connect two more passages. Thiers was a nice rounded set of shapes, to make something I can machine in a very small size, I've made it a rectangular set of shapes, with the inner passageway drilled then plugged on the right side.
Notice also that the chamber around the valve is filled with steam, though it is only used to push the slider down, this steam never goes into the engine. It gets there through that side passage from the center valve that I mentioned earlier. One thing that I wonder about on the original engine is where any condensation in that are goes, they didn't seem to give a place for it to drain to. When I get in to see the real engine I want to look for a drain cock in that area.
So, this diagram is showing the slide valve in the steam chest it its rightmost position, connecting steam from passage A on the left to the left end of the cylinder, and exhaust from the right end of the cylinder to passage B on the right. This would push the piston to the right.


In this diagram, the slider has been moved over to the left position by the eccentrics, and the steam from passage A on the left is now routed to the passage going to the right end of the cylinder, and exhaust from the left end of the cylinder is routed through the bottom cavity to passage B, pushing the piston back to the left.

If the central control valve was in the opposite position, the steam/exhaust would be swapped, with steam coming in passage B on the right, and exhaust going out passage A on the left, making the piston move in the opposite cycle. Pretty slick that they came up with a way to make this work with just one central control valve. Thier version has a collection of different size ports on that central valve, to give a more gradual throttle response than my simpler version does.

One thing that this design does not allow is timing the eccentrics a few degrees off the 90 degree position from the crankshaft, in this design the cam must be at 90 degrees.

So, later on when I decide on a final scale for the model, looks like I will be able to design up a version of the engine that looks and operates like the original, but without the very complex inner-passage casting that the original needed.
 :whoohoo:
« Last Edit: June 06, 2018, 07:03:43 PM by crueby »

Offline b.lindsey

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #127 on: November 06, 2017, 12:54:48 AM »
So Chris, what do you have the shop elves doing while you are drawing??  :headscratch: Not making trouble I hope :)

Bill

Offline crueby

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #128 on: November 06, 2017, 01:14:22 AM »
So Chris, what do you have the shop elves doing while you are drawing??  :headscratch: Not making trouble I hope :)

Bill
You're right, it's tough to keep them entertained between builds, so I am alternating them between reorganizing the shop to make useful room for the mini mill I picked up from a friend's estate, carving a steersman for the Lombard model (who looks vaguely familiar), raking leaves, and polishing the carousel horse that I finished carving and painting for a friend. Its kept them mostly out of trouble, between sessions racing squirrels down the street (not sure where they got those little saddles!).


 :ROFL:

Offline Flyboy Jim

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #129 on: November 06, 2017, 03:05:57 AM »
So Chris, what do you have the shop elves doing while you are drawing??  :headscratch: Not making trouble I hope :)

Bill
You're right, it's tough to keep them entertained between builds, so I am alternating them between reorganizing the shop to make useful room for the mini mill I picked up from a friend's estate, carving a steersman for the Lombard model (who looks vaguely familiar), raking leaves, and polishing the carousel horse that I finished carving and painting for a friend. Its kept them mostly out of trouble, between sessions racing squirrels down the street (not sure where they got those little saddles!).


 :ROFL:

Mini Mill?????

PS: Drawings are looking great Chris.  :ThumbsUp: I'm looking forward to hearing about your upcoming visit to the full size machine.

Jim

Sherline 4400 Lathe
Sherline 5400 Mill
"You can do small things on big machines, but you can do small things on small machines".

Offline crueby

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #130 on: November 06, 2017, 01:41:52 PM »
So Chris, what do you have the shop elves doing while you are drawing??  :headscratch: Not making trouble I hope :)

Bill
You're right, it's tough to keep them entertained between builds, so I am alternating them between reorganizing the shop to make useful room for the mini mill I picked up from a friend's estate, carving a steersman for the Lombard model (who looks vaguely familiar), raking leaves, and polishing the carousel horse that I finished carving and painting for a friend. Its kept them mostly out of trouble, between sessions racing squirrels down the street (not sure where they got those little saddles!).


 :ROFL:

Mini Mill?????

PS: Drawings are looking great Chris.  :ThumbsUp: I'm looking forward to hearing about your upcoming visit to the full size machine.

Jim
Yup, picked up a Grizzly mini mill that belonged to one of the rc submarine gang here who passed away this past year, should come in handy on some of the larger gears and such. Bit cruder than the Sherline but has a longer reach. Biggest silly thing on it is that the feedscrews are .0625 per turn. Where did that come from?? I am waiting for LMS to get the .050 per turn feedscrew kit back in stock.


I am really looking forward to seeing the shovel in person, two more weeks to wait! Lots of details on my list to investigate and measure.  Finding all the details in the old patents has filled in lots of details on some parts, but still lots to see.

Correction: week and two days to wait!!
« Last Edit: November 06, 2017, 01:45:12 PM by crueby »

Offline Stuart

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #131 on: November 06, 2017, 03:36:51 PM »
Chris

That is a odd lead screw pitch it’s not even in our language ( mm) very odd

You have heard the term ear worm for a tune that you cannot get rid of ,well elves racing squirrels is in my head ,I have the image stuck now every time I see the tree rats down the garden plaguing the local cats 🐱

Great work on the design work in fusion , just had a bad cam from fusion rammed a carbide end mill into the nearly finished part ,full rapid in Z- 🙈🤯

Still got plenty of  :popcorn:

Stuart
My aim is for a accurate part with a good finish

Offline crueby

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #132 on: November 06, 2017, 07:43:11 PM »
Chris

That is a odd lead screw pitch it’s not even in our language ( mm) very odd

You have heard the term ear worm for a tune that you cannot get rid of ,well elves racing squirrels is in my head ,I have the image stuck now every time I see the tree rats down the garden plaguing the local cats 🐱

Great work on the design work in fusion , just had a bad cam from fusion rammed a carbide end mill into the nearly finished part ,full rapid in Z- 🙈🤯

Still got plenty of  :popcorn:

Stuart
Grizzly seems proud that it is a 1/16th per turn advance, but that was obviously written by a non-tool-using marketoid with his head in the swarf barrel...   :LittleDevil:

Glad I could get the visual of the elves racing on squirrels stuck in your head! Wish I had the drawing skills to do a cartoon of that one!
I did find these two:





Offline tvoght

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #133 on: November 06, 2017, 07:54:18 PM »

Grizzly seems proud that it is a 1/16th per turn advance, but that was obviously written by a non-tool-using marketoid with his head in the swarf barrel...   :LittleDevil:


I'm picturing a shop where the only metrology instrument is  a tape measure with sixteenth inch graduations and the logo "Vote Billy Fox County Surveyor".

--Tim

Offline crueby

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Re: Chris's Marion 91 Steam Shovel
« Reply #134 on: November 06, 2017, 08:37:36 PM »

Grizzly seems proud that it is a 1/16th per turn advance, but that was obviously written by a non-tool-using marketoid with his head in the swarf barrel...   :LittleDevil:


I'm picturing a shop where the only metrology instrument is  a tape measure with sixteenth inch graduations and the logo "Vote Billy Fox County Surveyor".

--Tim
And the tape is one foot long...

 

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