Steam Engine
This weened I decided to fire up my steam engine. I took it to my friends house and fired it up twice there, once for my friend and then again later for his dad when he got home from work. Then the next day I fired it up at home for my mom and her friend. I have not run it ever since I got it so I figured I should start it up and have some fun with it, besides it's probably good to run it every now and again.
Though the third time when I fired it up which was for my mom and her friend, the valve wouldn't turn off all the way for me to check the oil and add some more to the steam flow, I think it was ok though, it didn't run for that long. Instead of trying to fix the valve I might just put lots of oil in it to start and then if I need to then pull the fire out of the boiler and calm the boiling to add more steam to it otherwise it will shoot all the oil out in your face if you open the valve to put more oil in it. Just now though I looked at it again and it looked like the bolt thing under the valve wasn't very tight so I finger tightened it down and it turned quite a bit, I think maybe that might have fixed it, I'll have to fire it up again sometime and see if it did.
I really like this steam engine, it's a nice little model. It burns solid fuel called “Esbit”. My granddad in Colorado sent it to me a few years ago because he was cleaning stuff out at his house and didn't want it anymore and since I played with it there once or twice he figured he'd give it to me which was nice.
This was shipped to my grandparents house in Golden Colorado directly from Berlin Germany in 1996, the invoice thing is still with it. It was pretty expensive too, like $445 but it's really nice.
Here is a short video I made of it with my digital camera which was my grandmother in Colorado's old one when she got her new one.
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