The Steamboating Forum

Spent this weekend building pumps. I had made a crude feedwater pump in 2010, using ordinary brass pipe and fittings, 1.3 inch bore x 6 inch stroke, and it has given good service for five years now. However it is about 6 inches wide, and takes up too much room in the boat, especially since I am adding a steam surface condenser.

So the new pump, 1.062 inch bore x 4 inch stroke, will only be 2 inches wide. Brass pipe and fittings again for all wetted parts, with a brass piston and two "O" rings for sealing. These have worked flawlessly for years, with waterproof grease between the two o-ring grooves. Drawings will follow soon.

Also ran across a fitting that is perfect for making a steam jet eductor. This brass fitting has 3/4 inch copper sweat connections, with a 1/8 inch NPT threaded connection for the steam jet. I can spin some copper discharge tube into a recovery cone, and should get a very robust bilge pump. Will need to experiment with this setup. I made a similar pump with 1/2 inch copper fittings, it works OK but is a little small for rapid bilge pumpout.

Finally completed welded pump frame and pumping lever. 1-1/16 bore x 4 inch stroke on Bronze pipe for working cylinder. Made everything from light weight steel tubing, so trusswork is used to avoid high stresses. This new hand pump will weigh about half as much as the previous one, and is only 2 inches wide.

Next to make the pump piston & Connecting Rod

The (very late due to my illness) Steamboating Magazine Mar/Apr 2015 issue will be in the mail in a couple of days and has a reprinting of about 20 previously published articles on the construction of feedwater pumps. If you don't subscribe, find someone who does and take a look.

Finally got the new manual feed pump into the boat.

The short connecting rod is made from three brass pieces, silver soldered together. The drilled shallow "wells" in the connecting rod are each filled with a short piece of solder, and when the solder dissapears on heating, a very strong joint is made.

Using a Heim Joint removes many alignment problems inherent when machinery is fabricated by welding. Weld distortions make close fit-up of parts difficult, unless the ball type joints are used.

Getting the pump, suction piping & strainer(for this hand pump, plus the engine driven pump), discharge piping, recirculation/relief lines in place is tricky with a narrow beam boat, fortunately I have the wheels and paddleboxes off, otherwise I would have to hire a teenage contortionist to get things in place.

Fred,

I like it, good design and machining/welding. A little overkill perhaps - but it may look appropriate for you boat.

Incidentally if you any of you folks are members of the International Steamboat Society - their Mar/Apr 2015 Issue of the Steamboating Magazine Vol. XiX, No. 2 was all about feed water pumps - all engine driven from different folks - but the principles are generally the same. Most were reprints from other publications such as the Funnel, Steam Leak, Steamboater's Handbook, etc - but from the Greats of the steam boating in the last 50 years such as Cliff Blackstaffee.

-CB