[SEL] What was your best engine trip?

[Listerdiesel]

On Thu, 3 Mar 2005 08:49:19 -0800, George Best <George_Best at adp.com> wrote:
> I've been disappointed that hardly anyone has shared their engine trip
> stories.
> 
> Don't you people ever go anywhere????
> 
> For me, visiting collectors makes any trip a great trip.  Well.....
> Maybe not 100% true as you may go visit a collector and find out he
> isn't interested in showing you anything and has no interest in starting
> up anything.  However, with a little planning you can locate collections
> where you know you'll be welcome and the person is glad to give you a
> grand tour and truly enjoys talking about engines and showing their
> collection.

It's not quite the same over here, but I can understand your comments
and frustration. Many serious collectors do not encourage casual
visits, and even organised ones can be a bit difficult to organise.

> Visiting collectors is the only way you will ever see some engines.  I'm
> sure a lot of us know of rare engines that are never shown at public
> shows and you can only see if the collector is willing to show it to
> you.

There is a better array over here perhaps, as you may have seen on
your European trip. We do have a lot of engine museums, including Paul
Evan's Internal Fire and the Anson Museum, but in addition there are
also large public museums with engines on display like the Birmingham
Museum of Science & technology, and we also have a lot of museums with
engines in that are part of a larger setup, like the Kew Bridge Museum
which has probably the largest beam engine in the world in operational
condition.

> Seems to me if you enjoy this hobby that you must have gone somewhere at
> sometime to buy an engine or at least look at some engines!

I guess that our climate doesn't help, but certainly the USA should
have better weather than us, particularly the western prairie side.

> Some people, including myself, say that SEL is dying.  Which is true if
> you're not interested in posting any engine related topics or stories.
> Being a "lurker" doesn't help, and only making wise cracks or off topic
> postings doesn't help either.

I think that is not quite correct, George, folks don't have the same
amount of time these days that they seem to have had five or ten years
ago, and many of us don't always have anything interesting or unusual
to say, so it often takes another remark or thread to bring us out
:-))

> WAIT George

Peter
-- 
Peter A Forbes
Email: listerdiesel at gmail.com
Web: www.oldengine.org/members/diesel