A Rocking Good Engine from Malc Tompkins.
There have been a number of creative interpretations on the Rocking Engine. When regular site visitor Malcolm Tompkins saw my art decco interpretation it inspired him to have a go. Malc has doubled up all dimensions to produce an impressive sized engine which not only looks good but sounds wonderful too.
Like many, including me, Malc was rather sceptical about the simple but unusual method of running. Air is continuously fed into the cylinder head forcing the piston down. On its travel down the bore the offset crank shaft twists the combined piston and rod out of position allowing the air to ‘exhaust’ – momentum pushes the piston back up the cylinder where the cycle is repeated. Not too good a description perhaps but it’s the best I can do. Just follow the plans and I promise you it will work !
This is an excellent project and within the scope of the newcomer to model engineering. Particularly clear and concise plans are available for download from http://www.john-tom.com/html/SteamPlans3.html (you’ll need to scroll down the page to find it).
If anyone else has produced a restyled version of this cracking little engine maybe they would like to send a pic or two or even a short video for inclusion on this site. You can contact me at john@start-model-engineering.co.uk