The Steamboating Forum

Where can you buy brass pieces like spun metal for the smoke stack. For instance, those inverted brass bowls for the top of a VT boiler. ..
Thanks
Wendell

Elliot Bay Boatworks used to seel spun brass stack caps and smokehoods but not sure if they still have them....they are on the website still

Real brass boat parts have become hard to find. Stainless steel is common for chocks, bitts etc. but not suitable for a traditional steamboat. eBay is where I need to search for the proper parts.

For the crown of the stack, you can troll the yard sales or ebay for the proper piece, usually found on top of an umbrella stand.

fredrosse wrote:Real brass boat parts have become hard to find. Stainless steel is common for chocks, bitts etc. but not suitable for a traditional steamboat. eBay is where I need to search for the proper parts.

For the crown of the stack, you can troll the yard sales or ebay for the proper piece, usually found on top of an umbrella stand.

Or a decorative brass salad bowl or spitoon or ...

Or even spin one yourself, if you are handy. All it takes is a wood lathe. You turn the pattern you want out of wood, mount it in the lathe chuck, attach a piece of annealed sheet brass, and start it spinning. Then you press the brass against the pattern with a smooth hardwood stick held against to tool rest and "Bob's yer uncle!" It's pretty amazing the way it works.

Full disclosure disclaimer: At least that's what the books say. I've done a couple of brass bowls when I was a kid, but a stack collar that actually fit right would take skill beyond my experience, that's for sure. I'm guessing that one could be made up by a fabrication shop for a reasonable price, particularly if you brought your pattern to them already done. That wouldn't be too hard on a wood lathe, though.

Bob
you could only spin a full piece and then cut the ID out to match the stack. I have a machine shop and considered doing it but I dont know that the skill is worth learning so I thought i would draw it up in 3d and send it out to be made. Or do without it for a while
Thanks

I tried this once some years ago and found that the forces were more than I had anticipated. Not so much the power to turn the work and the form but the effort to push on the tool hard enough to make it start to follow the form.

It looked so easy on the film (!) I watched. I was using dead soft (1000 series) aluminum and trying to make an engine cowl for a large model airplane. About ten inches in diameter. I have a larger lathe now and might try it again if I don't find a spittoon the right size first.