The Stuart Turner Beam Engine

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The column setup in the lathe for the inner surfaces of the top and bottom plates and the outer
surface of the bottom plate to be machined. The spigot in centre of the base plate was left on as
there is a large hole in the main base for it. The base plate was machined first as the top plate had to be a
set distance from it.

 

The column in the mill having it's top surface machined to dimension. Setting the
column squarely to the direction of cut was the hardest bit. I could have used a longer mill but did not have one so I had to set locating blocks to allow me to rotate the column half a turn and get it back in the same position.

 

The top of the column having the slots cut for the entablature arms, these support
the parallell linkage for the piston rod. I used a narrow slot drill for these and set the width of cut using the
table traverse scales. The end result was a perfect fit :-)

 

The base, column and entablature arms being test fitted.