The Steamboating Forum

Some time ago I bought for a “nice price” an old, wooden sailboat hull with in that a Semple engine set. It’s the Semple VFT40 boiler with fittings and a Semple V 3+5x4 compound engine.

The boiler has no certificates, but it's possible to get it if the boiler is well built, in good order and a drawing of the boiler with weldingdetails is necessary.

Does someone have boiler drawings or other information about materials, specifications of the Semple VFT40 steamboiler?

Thanks in advance,

Kees Hellinga

I don't know if this will be of any help but ultrasonic thickness testers have come down in price. That won't give you things like tube wall thickness but can easily determine most of the other numbers.

And it will give you the wall thicknesses now rather than when it was built.

I have one of those Ultrasound thickness testers and they are very accurate to within .001", verified after testing it on varying known thicknesses of ground parallels etc. I paid 150 for it off of Ebay.

-Ron

I found one for $90. Hah, hah!

The first thing I did with it was to slap it against my forehead. It read 3/4" (calibrated for steel). My partner was not surprised.

We've done a ultrasonic thickness test and the smallest thickness of the firebox is 8,5 MM and the boiler itself 8,8 MM.

But, does anyone have the Original drawings and technical details of this Semple boiler? It's necessary for the first inspection.

Thanks in advance,

Kees