Muncaster No.1

[Mark EasingwoodParticipant @markeasingwood33578]

This is the third engine I have made, it was completed earlier in 2025, but I have only recently got around to photographing & videoing it.

It is made to a Jason Ballamy design. LINK HERE

I have no access to a CNC mill, but I decided to make the elliptical base using a manual woodworking router. (Full face Visor required!!!)

I also really really like the flywheel with curved spokes, that Jason made using his CNC mill.

So I fabricated one with a mild steel rim and hub. I made an aluminium centre piece, again using the woodworking router, plus quite a bit of file and emery work, with a bit of Milliput to form a fillet.

For the curious, a retractable pin in the router table is used to follow a template fixed to the underside of a spoil board, the piece to be machined is fixed to the top of the spoil board. The router head can be plunged up & down using a foot pedal, the spoil board needs to be big enough to add a bit of mass to proceedings and to keep one’s fingers away from the cutter, ideally fitted with a couple of handles.

I scalloped the edges of the tension nut by racking a HSS lathe tool back and forth, using the lathe carriage.

I also managed to turn a handle on the end of the reversing lever, once I’d found a piece of free-cutting mild steel. It took me a few goes as the first piece of steel I used turned out to be a bit brittle.

The finished Engine.

 

 

Mark.

[cedric 1Participant @cedric]

Wow, came up looking a treat. I like your thinking outside the box using the router for the flywheel. Very nice work.

[DiogenesParticipant @diogenes]

Yes, that flywheel is great – goes to show what can be made when there’s a will to make it..

[renardiere7Participant @renardiere7]

That’s a beauty,  very impressive work with the pin router. Good old Wadkin, is it a high frequency motor?

 

I’m, wondering where the reference to Muncaster comes from, a person or place?

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

That one has turned out well, I like the colour and slight texture of the paint which makes it look like a cast surface.

Henry Muncaster wrote for Model Engineer over 100years ago. He also published a small book “Model Stationary Engines – Their Design & Construction” it is from these that the model here is based. The book does not give full details of each part but general arrangements and some details of a number of different engines from simple like this to a lot more detailed.

You can get a reprint of the book from Tee Publishing for about £7.

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

Lovely work!

That’s an elegant engine -it’s nice to some of these early model-engineering designs still being made.

[renardiere7Participant @renardiere7]

Thanks for the information Jason.

[half whitParticipant @half-whit]

Hi Mark

A very finely detailed model, I like that a lot.

Very impressive, the reversing lever is a nice addition.

Well done

Geoff

[Roderick JenkinsParticipant @roderickjenkins93242]

Simple yet elegant, beautifully finished and some interesting manufacturing techniques. Thank you for sharing!

All the best,

Rod

[Mark EasingwoodParticipant @markeasingwood33578]

Thank you all for your kind comments.

 

Renardiere7:

The router head on these 3-phase LS routers is driven from a large rotary frequency changer sat on the floor, giving two speeds, 18,000/24,000 rpm, so fast and faster!!

 

Jason:

The paint “effect” is barely visible in daylight, I painted it using a Halfords rattle can. Although it would be a good “cast” effect if I knew how to acheive it. In the photo, it’s probably a combination of side lighting and my over enthusiastic sharpening in Photoshop which makes it appear more pronounced than it really is.

Whilst thinking of photography, looking at the overhead shot the exhausts are quite straight in reality, the crooked look is a lens abberation, (pincushion?), which I coulda/shoulda sorted in Photoshop.

Mark.

 

[Author]

Posts