Miniature live steam

[Berk765]

How do you operate a G-scale live steam powered engine? Do you use a radio controller with servo motors just like an R/C car, or do you set the throttle and let it go?

[kstrong]

Yes.

Live steam locos can be radio controlled, or they can be run manually depending on the whims and preferences of the operator. Jeff Young has covered R/C and live steam on a few occasions in his "Raising Steam" column.

Later,

K

[cabbage]

The answer is -both!

http://www.roundhouse-eng.com/models.htm

regards

ralph

[two tone]

You can use both, but always remember live steam needs water and fire 20 mins is a usual time for a run on one fill of water and gas/coal

[Semper Vaporo]

My alcohol fired Aster Mikado's get about an hour's run on one fill of the fuel tank and if I am careful to run mostly in the "company notch" on the reverser then I only have to refill the tender once or twice (but if I run in the corner the whole time I have to refill the tender 3 or 4 times).  Radio control is great for controlling the Throttle, Reverser and Blower.

[whiterab]

If you have a rod steamer like a Mikado R/C is needed if you have any grades.  Live steamers are more sensitive than sparkies to grade.  Some like the big Accucrafts will handle a 3 % upgrade with no problem but the same throttle setting coming downgrade will make them fly.

Smaller engines like the Ruby just won't make grade at all.

R/C on a geared locomotive such as a Shay doesn't make any difference unless you want to change from forward to reverse.  My Shay just runs about a scale 6mph no matter what the throttle setting, grade or load.

Hope this helps

[wa1lbk]

As some of the other respondants have said, live steamers can be operated either manually or via RC control.  It's also possible to convert a manually-operated live steamer to RC operation; I did this with my Accucraft 3-cylinder Shay, plan to do it with my Ruby 2-4-2 (which REALLY needs RC control - my layout has grades, & trying to run Ruby manually on it has resulted in a couple of spectacular wrecks from runaways going downgrade!),

Probably one of the biggest appeals of live-steamers is the show they put on when working hard - here's my Shay blasting up my 3% grade with a heavy train in tow:

 

 I have produced a 3-part series on the basics of running this engine on "YouTube" - here's the links to them:

 Part 1:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qfsJGphS0bY

 Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4BnNupaXkE

 Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8z9-MqBHv4

 

Hope the videos will answer a lot of your questions!  Enjoy!                            Tom

 

[Mr_Ash]

Nice Video's!