More work carried out on the steam reverser

We are thankful to Ben Dingley for the following report regarding the overhaul of the Steam Reverser.  It would have been added a couple of weeks ago, but Ben was in Scotland chasing Steam Locos! Ben and Ian Furguson are progressing with the steam reverser, though there have been a couple of weeks with slower progress due to holidays etc.

They have now completed the manufacture of replacement studs to hold the appropriate cylinder covers on.  To do this, the steel rod was cut to length, the threads turned on each end and then the ends were domed using a special lathe tool which needed to be ground to produce the correct dome profile.

 

One of then new studs manufactured by Ben Dingley (all photos Ben Dingley)

A new piston also required manufacture, which has now been completed.  This was required as, following the re-bore of the cylinder to remove the ovality and pitting then existing clearances were found to be too great.
 

The new studs located in the reverser cylinders

The new piston head was machined to size, and a tapered hole was carefully cut in the centre of the piston head to allow a good fit with the newly manufactured piston rod. The taper was cut very carefully using cuts of no more than 5/1000ths of an inch between test fitting, this ensured that the hols did not go oversize.

Machining the new piston

Trial fitting of the piston rod

The new piston located on the piston rod together with the original piston

The next operation will be to start the production of the new cap which is located on the top of the piston and holds the piston rings in place.