Sold March 2007 Back to Archive

I would be grateful for a bit omre information about this one. New and unsteamed, it comprises a small side flue boiler with coiled water tube, connected to a most unusual little engine. Can't see how it works - indeed would have been more than happy to say it can't work except that, if I blow into the boiler, the flywheel goes round. The cylinder has a slot down one side with a peg screwed into the side of the piston. The end of the pen ends in a ball, which engages in a matching socket in the propellor shaft. So far, so good, the conversion of reciprocating to rotary motion is ingenious, but what has me beat is how the steam is routed around the (double acting) cylinder - I can't see how the valve works.

Answers on a postcard please...