Turbine Motors for Model Ships

[Colin BishopModerator @colinbishop34627]

Are dental drills the answer?

[Colin BishopModerator @colinbishop34627]

In the May 2016 issue of Model Boats there is a very interesting article by Dr Marcus Rooks on building a metal model of HMS Dreadnought as a marine model engineering project.

As well as making a very interesting read I was particularly intrigued by his intention to use dental air drills as 'turbines' to power the model using steam power. It will be very interesting to see how this turns out as the drill motors apparently only cost around £20 each. I have included a couple of photos from the article below together with the captions.

I wonder if this motors offer a solution in other applications and they would certainly repay a bit of experimenting with given the price.

Colin

An overall view of a dental air motor, partly adapted for HMS Dreadnought. This is all very much an experimental project, but these motors are easily available from about £20 each, an unbelievable price bearing in mind the high quality engineering involved. These are NOT the high-pitched motors that are often associated with a trip to the dentist, but bench tests have been most encouraging as to the power output of these units which are 6 inches (15cm) long.

The turbine unit comprises a basic air driven motor and a slip-on straight section rod which will connect to the propshaft. The collar around the motor is part of the fore and aft speed control and is not a standard fitting. A special coupling will be needed to connect to the air (but in this case steam) supply and is also readily available.

[ashley needhamParticipant @ashleyneedham69188]

Colin. That's some project! I wonder how much air they use, and more importantly how small a compressor you would need to keep (presumably?) 4 of them running.
This is a great engineering challenge and all hail to Dr Marcus for having a go.

I would think that the issue is more likely to lie in the air supply department rather than using the actual drill unit, in regards to quantity, power consumption and noise. I wonder if they work with steam???

Amazing price for such sophistication.

Ashley

[Malcolm FraryParticipant @malcolmfrary95515]

Compressed air that these are designed for is nice clean stuff. steam, on the other hand, comes in a variety of forms, thinking back to my reading about railways back when I was into such things. I wonder just how well they will survive being battered by lumps of very hot water as opposed to quite cold compressed air on its way to being ordinary air? No doubt they will work, but how long and how reliably?

[Paul TParticipant @pault84577]

I read the piece in Model Boat Magazine and was very impressed with the concept of not only building in metal but also using dental equipment as turbines.

Marcus would have already tested running the air drills with steam and be satisfied with the results before committing pen to paper and I am looking forward to seeing the finished model steaming through the water.

I am keen to learn from Marcus as he overcomes some of the more technical problems associated with this project.

Paul

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