A Two-Hobby Trip: Motorcycles And Steamers

(Page 3 of 3)

May/June 1991
John Moffat, 64 Gourok Ave 
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Friday arrived and we helped raise steam in the two moving machines, chopping wood and stoking the fires. The big boiler for the stationary engine is oil fired. After inspection, I was invited to run both the Russell and the Buffalo. In two minutes, I was aboard the Russell, and for the first time since I drove an old Fowler at threshing time back in Scotland I had my hands on the controls of a steamer. I recall one winter in Scotland I drove several traction engines, including a Fowler, a Ransome Simms and Jefries , and a Foden wagon which had a flywheel set up to drive the thresher

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After delivering the Russell to its destination, I walked back for the Buffalo. It is a two cylinder machine and with about sixty turns from lock to lock on the stearing gear, I had a real workout just shuffling the big machine back and forth till I got it pointed in the right direction.

The big stationary engine, which has a Corliss valve system, had been the chief motive power in a cotton mill and with a flywheel of approximately twelve feet in diameter, could be regulated down to only seven and a half revs per minute.

By late Friday afternoon we started our return journey to Nova Scotia, which we reached by Sunday evening. We kissed our wives hello and decided that another such adventure would be undertaken in 1991.

Ian tells me that it will take at least a year to wipe the smile off my face after driving the two historic machines.

Perhaps by the end of 1991 I will have my own 2' scale model of the 6NHP Fowler ready to steam up, and I'll be able to get behind the controls every weekend.

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