Riveted Steel Boilers

[domo1977]

Just reading through a few books from the '50s and '60s and quite a lot of the model locos of the day in 7.25" gauge (Bassett Lowke for one) had riveted steel boilers and it got me wondering:

1) does anybody own/run a model with a riveted steel boiler?
2) would a new design/new build be approvable by a club inspector today?

On the face of it they should be easier for most inspectors to handle due to the absence of the un-knowns associated with the welds. The simple rivetted construction, being similar to the way copper boilers are constructed today should be easy to analyse stress-wise and inspect.

I assume the down-side is the forming of the various flanged plates - steel harder to work than copper so I assume bigger hammers, more anealing etc.

Also another downside I think would be the need to keep plate thickness relatively thin to ensure that sensible diameter rivets are used - thus the effects of corrosion would come to bear sooner than a welded one with thicker plates?

Anybody have any real experience or knowledge in this area as it seems like a bit of a lost art?

[ejparrott]

Flanged steel plates are done hot, not annealed in the sense of copper.

[fostergp6nhp]

Flanged red hot with aluminium sledge hammers unless something has changed recently.

[ettingtonliam]

I've spoken in the past with several old guys, now no longer with us, who had experience of hand flanging full size boiler plates, including one who had hand flanged Scotch boiler plates in a Hull shipyard, but none of them ever mentioned aluminium sledge hammers. They certainly commented on the need to hit the flange square on to avoid bruising it. An aluminium hammer must be jolly big to get any effective weight, or are they just aluminium faced?

Richard

[fostergp6nhp]

From memory the head was solid ally and about the size of a 1 gallon paint tin.