Aptil 2020

The April meeting that never was

(and the May and almost certainly June meetings.)

Because it was clear that we would have neither an

April nor a May meeting I sent out an e-mail asking if

anyone would like to send me some information on

what they had been doing so that I could put together

a newsletter (of sorts.) So here we go:

Mikes Drill Press

Nick Jonkman was first to reply and when I first

glanced at his e-mail,

I seem to recall that before equipment from the far

east became available at a price the average person

could afford, making one’s own equipment from

castings etc. was quite common. People stretched

their budget to buy a lathe then used this to make the

other things they needed for the hobby. The Dore-

Westbury mill and Quorn cutter grinder are other

items that come to mind. This approach has largely

gone by the wayside but looking at the Hemmingway

Kits website, they still offer castings etc. for special

items like boring/facing heads that are probably still

worth making one’s self.

square reinforcing wire mesh, cut to fit. Time to

complete this model was about 100 hours.

The present-day equivalent of producing one’s own

machine tools is probably buying a basic machine and

carrying out a CNC conversion. This is still a cost effective

way of getting yourself a CNC mill or lathe.

Don Eastman was recently asked to build a model of

the 80’ by 20’ "Ahmic". This ship was the “baby” of

the Muskoka Navigation Company fleet and sailed the

Muskoka Lakes from 1896 to 1951, when it was

scrapped. It usually ran twice daily from Rosseau to

Port Carling on the Ahmic River.

This model was constructed with a solid pine hull and

styrene upper structure. The railings are of half-inch

Tony has also managed to do a few more things on

his Case traction engine and is hoping to be able to

steam it up this spring.

During this time of doing things on a “virtual” basis

Bruce has been doing some virtual model

engineering. In truth it is some 3D solid modeling of

the next item planned for his 4½” howitzer. The last

time I corresponded with him he did not have the

material to proceed with the real thing but here are

some of the images from his CAD program:

It looks a little like the Segwun that currently runs on

Lake Muskoka, going through into lake Rosseau on

special occasions. The smokestack on the Ahmic

does look a little out of proportion – perhaps they

needed the height to get enough draft for the boiler

and to get the smoke clear of the decks.

In between yard work and long walks to get some

exercise, I have been doing more work on my

Sealion. The ignition side now works well using large

(large) 6V motorcycle coil and home-made electronic

ignition system and I have been experimenting with a

carburettor system to work with propane. Engines run

much more cleanly on this than gasoline and there is

less “stink” when testing inside. The current problem

is to get uniform running over a wide speed range – in

principle it should be easy but in practice it is not.

Using the large motorcycle coil is really overkill but it

is good to have a reliable spark (particularly from a

Lucas coil) while playing with the carburetion and

other aspects. However, it is not really in keeping

changes in the electronics, I can dispense with the

distributor. The idle spark is no big deal; all small 4-

stroke engines with a flywheel magneto (e.g. lawn

mower engines) work like this.

Some other Offerings from Banggood

While searching around for the coils I found that they

supply quite a number of ready-made engines. I have

seen Stirling engines from them but they also supply

a couple of hit and miss engines ready to run: