Garden Railway Forum

I've wanted to be able to run Live Steam indoors during the wicked winters we get here in Colorado. The problem was finding a suitably "clean" running engine that wouldn't spew oily water all over the room.
Additionally, there was only room for a small switching (shunting) layout, so a high speed running engine was unsuitable.

So I decided on a small vertical boiler "De Winton" type engine, and it was a choice between Roy Woods' De Winton or a Regner Chaloner.
The Chaloner won out for 2 reasons - it has a condensate tank for cleaner running, and it is gear driven for slower shunting type running. Placed one on order, and it will probably arrive at the end of winter, but that's OK as the layout isn't built yet.

The layout is the "Elk Mountain Lodge Light Rwy" and I've got a thread running on it's construction in the Railways and Layouts section.
So check it out for my adventures in Live Steam Indoors!

If you want it to run clean do be warey to keep draining the condensate tank down, when they get full I've seen then start to leak around the exit pipe on the Regner Willi

My Willi will start spitting up the stack once the tank is full. Some guys remove the plug in the side and fashion a drain pipe that points downward and it just dumps the crap on the road bed. Thats ok outdoors, maybe not so much indoors. The Chaloner will fill up the tank faster than a Willi with its twin cylinders. I did find that wrapping the hot side of my steam pipes with cotton kite string(lagging) helped reduce the condisate. Usualy after the first couple loops of my small layout, I will stop and drain the tank, then I am good for awhile as the cylinder and pipes are warmed up. I love my Regner, has the build quality of a Roundhouse, but much more controlable with its gear reduction. A Chaloner is high on my list of wants in the future. BTW, Jason over at the Train Department is working on a coal fired conversion for the Willi, complete with trailing water tank car. Mike

Mike, thanks for the idea of 'lagging' the steam pipes with string, that will help cut down condensate a lot. Since the Chaloner will be running indoors switching on my small 8.5 foot layout, the condensate shouldn't fill up too fast. I intend to rig up a tank drain of some sort, like maybe an Accucraft lubricator drain valve, to be able to pull up on the engine service track along the edge of the layout and drain the tank off into a cup.

I've been talking with Chris Bird about installing a Chuffer on the condensate tank, to drain into it, but he is saying the gear reduction drive will negate any exhaust note improvements. It will just make a louder 'whirring' sound. I've got Chuffers on my other 3 tank engines, and they sound fantastic!

I ordered the engine thru Jason, just waiting (not so) patiently for it to arrive. I'll be doing break-in runs on my 45mm deck track to prepare it for indoors running on the 32mm switching layout. And occasional trips up to the Denver Garden Rwy's club track, which is dual gauge 45/32mm.

I'm on David Bailey's build list this year for a coal fired 'Robert' kit. Should be fun to build and then operate. I've heard it's a very good steamer. This engine is also convertible from 45 to 32 mm, although I won't be running it on the indoors layout!

Cheers,
Jim B.