Hello guys.

[sutty]

Hello guys. will definitely need some advice along this route I've taken.
I desperately feel the need to pass on the last fifty years of making mistakes to my grandson. Ive been an engineer all my life, apprenticed as Fitter Turner at 15 then after the traditional 6years set off on a lifetime of interesting jobs all involved making and mending in various industries.
When I retired I vowed not to become a vegetable or grow them, so I built a small but well equipped machine shop and stocked it with British built machines of the best quality I could afford.
The reason I've joined this and other forums is that I want to get the 11 year old grandson away from screens and into the real world of making things. We have decided to build from scratch a steam driven engine, the engine will be machined from a kit of castings but the boiler we have decided to copy a design we found on the net from Myfordboy.

Best regards Sutty

 

[stevehuckss396]

Welcome to the forum. Look forward to seeing your project and watching another young man learn something. My boys were in the same boat years ago and now they make and fix all the time. Don't know if it's my love of building things that rubbed off or that I'm just too cheap. Either way your grandson will be better off for it.

 

[GreenTwin]

Welcome.
We definitely need to pass skills to the next generation, and there is no substitute for hands-on work.

Good luck with your builds.

Pat J

 

[Gordon]

Welcome to the forum. Look forward to seeing your project and watching another young man learn something. My boys were in the same boat years ago and now they make and fix all the time. Don't know if it's my love of building things that rubbed off or that I'm just too cheap. Either way your grandson will be better off for it.

I wonder how many of us have spent two hours fixing something which we could have bought from Amazon for $10. I hate to see something which could be repaired just thrown away. I have fixed things that I will probably never use again but I hate to see something which can be repaired just discarded. Guilty.

 

[davesmith729]

Hello guys. will definitely need some advice along this route I've taken.
I desperately feel the need to pass on the last fifty years of making mistakes to my grandson. Ive been an engineer all my life, apprenticed as Fitter Turner at 15 then after the traditional 6years set off on a lifetime of interesting jobs all involved making and mending in various industries.
When I retired I vowed not to become a vegetable or grow them, so I built a small but well equipped machine shop and stocked it with British built machines of the best quality I could afford.
The reason I've joined this and other forums is that I want to get the 11 year old grandson away from screens and into the real world of making things. We have decided to build from scratch a steam driven engine, the engine will be machined from a kit of castings but the boiler we have decided to copy a design we found on the net from Myfordboy.

Best regards Sutty

I have made two of the copper boilers from P M Research and you can find them on the web. The make very complete steam engine and boiler kits and their catalog is worth having for itself. They also offer a line of fittings and castings that I have used and employed on my projects including a donkey engine and a three truck Shay in 1 1/2 scale. I have attached a photo I took last month at Train Mountain.
Dave

 

[animal12]

Good luck & I hope your grandson enjoys himself .
animal

 

[Apprentice707]

That's a great thing to do Sutty, I would love to do the same. So far my 8-year-old Grandson is stuck on Lego and enjoys that which is a step n the right direction. We mustn't be sexist on this, one of my granddaughters seems keener than her brother. I am monitoring the situation.

Regards

B

 

[awake]

Welcome to the forum!

 

[Peter Twissell]

Hi Sutty and welcome to the forum.
I did a similar thing with one of my son's (the only one who showed any interest).
Together, we built a P&M vertical boiler and a Stuart oscillating engine.
I mounted both on a base and added a dynamo, a 5v regulator and a USB socket.
He can use his steam plant to charge his MP3 player!

 

[sutty]

Thanks for the encouragement guys, we've got enough material to start making things I think the first job will be the burner set and meths tank, I have some spare copper plate for him to practice his silver soldering on.
Like I said I'm totally ignorant where steam is concerned and didn't realise there was so much involved but I'm not new to modelling, i've built a couple of half scale cars for the grand kids and enjoyed that, both were powered by mobility scooter motors and axles, the guy in the Jeep is Eddie, the one who will be doing all the work.

Best regards Sutty

 

[ShopShoe]

Sutty,

Good job on the small vehicles. Can the kids ride them in any public events? The cars are certainly "parade-worthy."

--ShopShoe

 

[Thread man]

Thanks for the encouragement guys, we've got enough material to start making things I think the first job will be the burner set and meths tank, I have some spare copper plate for him to practice his silver soldering on.
Like I said I'm totally ignorant where steam is concerned and didn't realise there was so much involved but I'm not new to modelling, i've built a couple of half scale cars for the grand kids and enjoyed that, both were powered by mobility scooter motors and axles, the guy in the Jeep is Eddie, the one who will be doing all the work.

Best regards Sutty

View attachment 138585

Great looking vehicles ☺ In this day and age I'm wondering if it might not be more "futuristic" getting him interested in batteries. In fact any type of "green" energy. That seems to be where the money is today. I'm also wondering what dangers a steam engine might have to a kid if things go wrong.