Rays Latest Engine - AKA Alyn Foundry RLE

[RayW]

Thanks to Graham, I became the lucky recipient today of this set of castings for the Alyn Foundry RLE hopper cooled engine.
 
I understand that, officially, the initials RLE stand for Roy's Little Engine, but as you will see from the title of this post, I have given them another meaning.

In addition to the plans, Graham also supplied a copy of a series of articles from Model Engineer magazine of 1991/2 by Stan Bray,giving step by step details of construction of one of these engines, which should be really helpful.

If anyone on the forum has built one, I would be interested to hear of any tips or advice regarding construction.


Edit Jo: Ray requested a change of title 

[Jo]

Hi Ray, I built my one on this thread: https://www.modelenginemaker.com/index.php/topic,7664.msg161750.html#msg161750

Jo

[Jasonb]

Ray, are these original castings as they look to be suitably aged?

Not made one myself though I did also get some castings from the same source this week but not a full set and no drawings let alone a build article

[RayW]

Thanks Jo. Your build thread will be a big help.

Yes Jason, they are original castings and I believe Graham said they are the last set. I know he told me that some of them are from the original Rhuddlan Foundry (hope I have the spelling right) and are really good quality, but I'm sure he will correct me if I'm wrong.

[Alyn Foundry]

Hello to All.

Good to see the system worked Ray.   

There's thanks to be given all around.

Jo provided me with a pdf of the Stan Bray article and Jason has been busy drawing up a flywheel pattern for the Brayton Readymotor.

Yes Ray, that's the correct spelling of Rhuddlan and it's the cylinder only that came from there. All the other castings are from Buckley foundry. I chose that one because the grade is 17 and a little more wear resistant than my special grade " M " that Buckley used to do for me.

" M " stands for " machinable " a specific grade of softer, more malleable cast Iron.

I too will be following your progress, cheers Graham.

[RayW]

First swarf, or should I say cast iron dust, made today with the boring out of the water hopper. I managed to achieve a workable setup on my 12 1/2" faceplate with three clamps holding the casting securely in position, with a piece of Tufnol as packing between the casting and the faceplate. By pure chance, I already had a piece with a hole of the exact diameter to fit the cast boss on the hopper.

In order to locate the hopper, I made up a mandrel to fit through the two holes in the casting, with one end turned down to fit in my largest tailstock chuck (as seen in the attached photos). I then opened out the holes with my boring head at lowest lathe speed until there was sufficient clearance to use my much heavier boring bar mounted in the toolpost. Before removing from the faceplate, I faced the raised boss , then changed to a 3 jaw chuck to hold the casting by the bore, and face the boss on the other side to achieve the overall dimension of 2.75" as per drawing..

[RayW]

I have been working on the cylinder today. Plugged and centered both ends with aluminium plugs, then faced both ends square and turned the outside diameters to fit the hopper. The holes in the hopper differed in size by a couple of thou so the cylinder was machined to match. With just a light smear of Loctite sealant on the mating surfaces on assembly, I should have a good watertight seal.

To coin a pun, next job is the boring one!

[Alyn Foundry]

Nice going Ray.   

I've just noticed that your cylinder liner is actually a MK 2 version. The R.L.E. that Jo built has a MK 3 version. I extended the pad for the sight feed lubricator a little further forward in comparison to yours.

The MK 1 was a complete disaster two or three were cast, one used on my engine two more reside on the shelf.

Note the " stalk "

<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMH21SK_BN8" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMH21SK_BN8</a>

Cheers Graham.

[Jasonb]

Graham, you could always have run the stalk up inside the hopper, if it was good enough for full size then good enough here. I have done a couple of engines like that.

Good progress Ray.

[Alyn Foundry]

Hi Jason.

Yes indeed, I'm familiar with the idea mainly done on American stationary engines.

I do recall an incident on the rally field many years ago where the tube had corroded through as the engine was running. The water was gushing and splashing everywhere . Luckily due to the low compression ratio no damage was done in the combustion space.

I telephoned Ray this morning when I noticed the error but it appears that a 1" / 25 mm lubricator will fit nicely.

Cheers Graham.

[Alyn Foundry]

I must be getting old Jason.

I was wracking my brain for an example..... Duh, Fairbanks,Morse. My second open crank was a 1926 3 HP type " Z " I then downsized to a 1920 1.1/2 HP motor fitted with an American Bosch flick magneto.
This was about 40 years ago.

Here's a nice example with the famous " wrap around " metal base that also housed the Paraffin tank.

My second 1.1/2 HP acquisition was minus its carburettor, by now I was getting quite good at Aluminium casting so I copied the shape using Dental plaster moulds and made a replacement. I even made my first coreboxes for this job.

[Jasonb]

Ruston Hornby BPR is another example as is the Root & Van Dervort.

More common on engines where the hopper goes right up to the main frame. That FM has a cylinder head layout very similar to the Ruston.

[RayW]

The cylinder is now bored and honed to a really nice finish. Had to go slightly oversize to remove a mark left by the boring tool, but no problem as I can make the piston to fit.
Drilled and tapped the holes for the cylinder mounting studs, and for the four bolts to attach the top frame casting to the base. Roughly assembled everything and it almost looks like a finished engine - just have to do the piston, cylinder head, carburettor, bearing caps, exhaust, governor, flywheels, etc,etc,etc.........................

[RayW]

The last week has been a combination of progress and setbacks.
The piston, yoke, and connecting rod complete with big and small end bearings is now complete, apart from the odd oil hole still to be drilled. That's the progress side of things.

On the downside, I made seven piston rings from the extended skirt of the piston casting and succeeded in breaking six (Don't ask!). I have now reverted to my original plan, which was to use Viton O rings, which I have used with great success on other engines. Even I can't break those, and the packet says that you can even fold them.

On the machinery side, the motor on my milling machine burnt out and the speed controller seems to have failed in sympathy.  By a stroke of good fortune, I already had a spare motor, having purchased it when I thought that the previous one had failed, only to discover that it was the original electronic control box. Fortunately, the speed controller that has failed is less than £20 to replace, so not too much of a disaster.

My bench grinder has been seeming to lose power slowly for some time and eventually got to the point that I had to spin it by hand to get it started and it would almost stop if any pressure was applied to the grinding wheels. After a bit of investigation, I found a large capacitor hidden in the base and this proved to be the source of the problem. With a replacement fitted, not only does the motor start instantly, but it has far more power than before. Fortunately, another fairly cheap fix.

[Jo]

Sounds like you have been having the same sort of week as me Ray 

At least you are moving forward  Unlike some of us   

Jo