This is my rifle Stuart S50. There are many like it, but this one is mine. Completed a Stuart S50 this month which is part of my multi-year quest to reduce the number of unbuilt kits located at the bottom of the closet. At first I thought I waited too long to build this kit as it's targeted for beginners, but enough embellishments were added to the build to keep it interesting and one also notices that a Stuart kit is a bit different than a PM kit so it still ended-up as a good bit of fun. Followed the Tubal Cain (Tom Walshaw) build articles and also added a few of his suggested enhancements. Things sure have changed since he wrote that article!
Following samc88's lead from his S50 build article in this forum all the cast-in bolt heads in the base were milled away and drilled/threaded for studs. Of course, all the bolts were replaced with studs in the cylinder head and steam box as well. Very little of the kit's BA hardware was used as it was replaced with 2-56 (small nuts) and 3-48 which is much easier to source in the USA from MMC.
Got to play with the T-Slot cross slide that was added to lathe which worked well and a feature that will be really handy as the models get larger.
The tapered connecting rod was made using a boring head to offset the tail stock which worked really well. So nice to turn the taper and then immediately return to normal by just ejecting the boring head.
After some fiddling about and wondering why the engine wasn't working properly, I discovered the kit-supplied valve was a dud with the pocket milled incorrectly. Made a new one from scratch and all was well but this would be a problem for the genuine beginner.
Also made my first tapered key following the excellent posts located in this forum. The head of the key is a little big, but it gets tight as the dickens between the flywheel/shaft and I wanted to make sure I could still remove it if needed. Now that I have all the support hardware made the next tapered key should go much quicker.
I've been thinking about adding a relatively simple, non-functional ball governor since it's such a noticeable feature of steam engines of this type although I'm not that great at making stuff completely from scratch. Gotta take a break from model building for a bit so if I don't get to it then the S50 will be officially completed as it is. Next kit in line is a PM generator which is intended to be driven by this engine.
Proof of life video:
