Engines > Your Own Design
Chris's New Steering Engine
Sanjay F:
The CAD drawing looks amazing, and thanks for the explanation; I never realised they had so much redundancy built into the systems in case of damage - makes sense!!
crueby:
--- Quote from: mklotz on June 11, 2025, 09:34:07 pm ---Thanks very much, Chris, for that very thorough answer. The take-away seems to be that everyone did it the way that best fit their vessel design which makes a lot of sense. Modern electronics have saved a lot on actuator weight and by running redundant paths provide much better reliability.
--- End quote ---
Exactly right Marv, every builder did things differently, even when buying an off the shelf steering engine. There were a lot of companies building the engines, lots of patents on different designs. Very interesting topic!
crueby:
--- Quote from: redhouseluv on June 11, 2025, 10:00:08 pm ---The CAD drawing looks amazing, and thanks for the explanation; I never realised they had so much redundancy built into the systems, in case of damage - maked sense!!
--- End quote ---
From what I have seen, the Navy ships had the most backup systems, which makes sense to handle battle damage. Even today, there have been accidents with cargo ships where a backup could have helped, though accidents like the one that took down the bridge in Baltimore probably happened too fast.
crueby:
Got the holes for the steam chest bolts all drilled/tapped, and laid out the locations of the ports for the throttle/control valve. As you can see, the ports are a lot farther apart than on a steam cylinder. This will allow for a much longer throw on the valve rod, letting the helmsman get more turns ahead of the engine/rudder before the control nut catches up and re-centers the valve. The valve slider will also be longer than normal, with a long recess underneath to connect with the exhaust port over the whole range.
Then switched over to make the valve rod and steam inlet/exhaust pipe glands. The bar was drilled on the lathe for the center opening, then centered up on the rotary table to drill the mounting holes and mill the sides down. This one piece will make all three glands needed. The first one is for the valve rod, and is thicker with a larger hole for the rod, and will be counterbored on the back for the o-ring seal.
Here they are after the rest of the shaping and parting off from the bar:
Next time I'll get the ports milled in to the base block and start on all the passages and mounting the glands. That will not happen for a few days, I have an outside event to attend over the next few days so will not have playtime in the shop till Monday.
:cheers:
cnr6400:
:ThumbsUp: :ThumbsUp: :ThumbsUp: :popcorn: :popcorn: :popcorn:
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