I have finished up on rebuilding our 1914 Stanley's rear axle. The bronze spider gear hub had worn too large to properly fit the inner ends of the half axle shafts. With new bearings, seals, and the such in the rear axle, the roadster should be ready to tour as soon as I finish doing the annual on its boiler and burner. After over ten years on the road, the Howard Johnson 10 hp engine kit is still doing what it was designed to do. The only thing that I have had to do to the engine is to take up on the pump drive wrist pin just a notch. Another day of the Northwest's sunshine and 61 degrees weather here today. Ben is probably buried in Maine's deep snow....

Been buried with work lately so projects are progressing way too slow. The boiler will be coming out of the 735 soon as time allows in preps for a new one. Need to go through the pump box and start on general clean up.

We are getting some great temperatures here lately. It was a bitter weekend, warmed up near freezing Monday/Tuesday but was a nice calm drive in today at 0. I don't mind the cold, but I'll take some warmer weather soon....

Still working my way down the to-do list from the last tour on the 735. Tried another fix using shims on the loose wheel spokes, fixed the horn button, the fuel gauge and a slow leaking tire. Now onto the speedo, and then a good long test drive.

Finished up my 1914 Stanley 606 roadster's annual boiler cleaning and testing, and then we steamed about the neighborhood with it on Sunday. After waiting two moths for a replacement pump drive gear, the 1916 Stanley 826 Mt Wagon rear axle is finally going back together. The axle is just about finished being assembled but I will have to wait a bit before installing the axle into our Mt Wagon as I have new counter weights coming from REMCO. It will be easier to install the counter weights on the engine's crankshaft with the rear axle out of the Mt. Wagon. The counter weights will be here in about four weeks. One of the biggest tasks on the Mt. Wagon was straightening up the axle tubes. They both were bent out of line enough that the axles didn't have a chance of running their inner and outer bearings in a straight line.

Any possibility of a photo of your horn button? I have to rebuild the one on my 740 roadster.
Regards
Mark

EBG Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Still working my way down the to-do list from the
> last tour on the 735. Tried another fix using
> shims on the loose wheel spokes, fixed the horn
> button, the fuel gauge and a slow leaking tire.
> Now onto the speedo, and then a good long test
> drive.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/26/2015 08:00AM by Marksteamnz.

I have our 1916 Stanley model 826 Mountain wagon's rear axle finally completed. I am waiting for the counterweights for the engine to get installed before I install the rear axle. Photos attached.

Carolyn and I decided that we will finish The BettyAnne this spring, and to that end, we have been busy.

The body is in Oklahoma at the body skinner's shop and it is all but ready to go onto the chassis. The chassis is not quite ready.

The Cruban burner is at the sheet metal shop having a stainless steel ring made to fit it to the 23" boiler, which is all but completely piped. The boiler ring will go to the welding shop next week (after Chickasha!) where the boiler hold down and the burner hold up brackets will be welded in place. No, I don't do welding - yet!

There is a huge roll of mohair in my office along with the seats and seat springs and upholstery patterns.

I just hope we don't run out of money!

Very best wishes!

Don & Carolyn Hoke

Wanted: Parts for 1924 Stanley Model 750 and 1925 Stanley Model SV 252. We buy steam car parts and literature. Visit the virtual steam car museum at www.virtualsteamcarmuseum.org.

For all your steam car needs, visit www.vintagesteamproducts.com.

My H5 has axles and wheels now.
I am working on the steering gear, and the perch poles, and then will be ready to paint the yellow gear.
The engine and boiler will be ready in April.
I will ordering tires soon and then will be able to move it!
Still needs the hood, plumbing, water tank, oil tank, upholstery, and several zillion other things......hoping to steam in 24mo.
Tom

Sorry it took so long, here are a few pictures of the horn button. The center portion connects to the wire to the horn, I must be missing part of the insulation around the wire connection area, have in the past wrapped this with about 10 inches of electrical wire, put it in the steering column, and tightened down the set screw. Works well, except the car is on display at a museum, behind the ropes, but every few months someone manages to reach in and pull the button out. Luckily I have not lost it yet, so will probably have to come up with a more secure mounting system before that happens.

Also, took the Stanley out for a drive yesterday in between rain storms. It fired up well, maybe a tad slow due to a full boiler. Only managed a few miles before it was time to put it back in, but, I am so happy to report there was nary a squeak or creak from the rear wheels. If the fix holds as well as I hope I will do a article on it, although I doubt I am the first to try it this way.

I've been rebuilding the Octopus oiler in the 1903 Locomobile Stanhope B. I finally figured out I need to bend some (easy to bend) aluminum, then copy it with the brass tubing. This is the last thing I need to do after taking out the original packing and repacking with new. I asked for Harry Hiblers advice on how he did it. He said "very carefully"! Turns out you stand on your head or bend over in an uncomfortable position to put the new packing in upside down. This should now stop the steam leak I had in the crankcase and probably double the speed and halve the water use.

Don,you have done really well inspite of not welding....If you did learn, try learning TIG for in the shop work.You have wide varity metals you can do.With bronze
rod you can even weld copper....
At the same time,that sheet metal shop probably had a CNC plasma torch cutting it out...something else to know if you did learn welding.To help you "cookie cutter" parts from your layup drawings and raw metal sheet /plate stockpile.
If you do machinist work, welding will come in handy for the your fixtures and tooling as well.
In the short term,if you don't do very much...letting the guys named, might work out cheaper than rigging up a shop for that.
If you were closer to Nacogdoches...wouldn't might helping out sometime.

I was able to bend up my superheater this weekend. Photos in my 735B thread. Came out very well, just some minor tweaking needed now and on to the superheater ring fabrication!

I was able to take a photo of the early 30 HP super heater coils’
This is when they came off the throttle down through the tubes and back up to a fitting and out to the engine.
Rolly

Hey Rolly,

The ends look to be tapered.

Were they hammered into the firetube bores to seal them?

Cool picture by the way.

Caleb Ramsby

Yes Caleb
The tapered end was hammered into some of the bottom tubes not into the boiler water but the tube to pass the superheated steam up to the top fitting. Like the early Rocket super heaters see photo of the top of the Rocket boiler
These tubes would have been on the bottom to feed the steam back up to the top distribution fitting. On the Rocket they then went back down to a common fitting and out to the engine.
This set was on something like the Vanderbilt or the K, M, Z.
It kind of leads me to believe the bottom tubes of the superheater on the Rocket were not all the same length.
Rolly

Thanks Rolly.

Yeah, it looks like they would be unequal in length.

What is interesting about it is the stabilizing effect of the steam passing through the flues after it is heated, thus protecting the engine, but giving a lower superheat temp for a given superheater length. Thus the experiments documented in that old MIT paper.

Thanks again.

Caleb Ramsby