Re: Dressing hand valve seats
Posted by:
SSsssteamer (IP Logged)
Date: October 28, 2013 02:44AM
Through the years, I also have had problems with the blow down valves' stem faces pitting from rust and then leaking. To fix the problem, I have been making new valve stems out of stainless steel. No more pitting occurs on the new stainless valve stem faces. For re-seating the new stem into the bronze valve bodies, I take the new stainless stem and I twist it back and forth in its bronze valve body's seat. I have found that 99 percent of the time, it is the valve stems' fault for leaking. If you are ever on the road and a blow down valve starts to leak and it cannot be turned off, temporarily switch the valve stem out with another one on the car, one that is usually left in the "on position". A fuel shut off valve stem at the fuel tank would be an example of one to switch it out with. On a tour at Steamboat Springs, CO, my boiler's hand bypass would not shut off. That time I found a foreign piece of something that had found its way to the seat and fowled it. I removed the bypass stem and the piece was flushed out. It was just like new again.