Breamore House and Countryside Museum once again hosted its wonderful Working Weekend in May, hosting of course a fine collection of steam traction going back and forth between the museum and house, A stop on the Ford Model T centenary tour, and a collection of tractors and military vehicles. But most importantly to this article, a strong turnout of around 30 visiting stationary engines accompanied by the museums resident engines.
The row of engines once again had the prime location against the back wall of the courtyard, providing a lovely backdrop of the brickwork. Brickwork that is the perfect height to leave the engines in perfect sunlight, but providing ideal shade for the owners. Good fortune gave us a huge variety of engines, 2 and 4 stroke, hot bulb, hit and miss, throttle governed.
With an engine to cater to nearly enthusiast, It’s hard to know where to begin.. So I’m going to start with my favourite which was a rare Hamworthy hot bulb generator set owned by Nick Maloy. If European engineering is your thing, David Lacey brought his lovely, brilliantly over-engineered Moteur-Pan. My love for 2 strokes was pleased with the choice of a Villiers W-X11 LZ, Petter VS8, and a pair of Tangye model ‘M’ pump sets in both 4 and 2 1/2hp.
Horizontal hot bulb power was provided by Pete Gear with an incredibly pretty Ruston Hornsby L Type. No shortage of American open cranks, ranging from an original condition and restore Galloways, same goes for Ingecos (One badged Worthington), a pair of 1 1/2hp Nelson Brothers ‘Little Jumbos’ and a pair of Grays, 1 and 1 3/4hp examples. Throttle governed covered by an Amanco Hired Man and a 1 1/2hp International.
British iron was covered by a variety of both radiator and hopper cooled Lister D’s, a lone Lister A, a Petter A1, Ruston-Hornsby PB and a BSA Power Unit.
Australia’s lone representative came in the form of a Cooper by Sunbeam engine, Type XC 3hp.
A big highlight of Saturday was the start-up of the museums new resident, a mighty Hornsby-Akroyd No.3232 oil engine. Now permanently fitted in its new home, a large crowd gathered to witness the start-up of this mighty engine. No easy feat, even cranking the blower to heat the engine took a good five minutes!
Please enjoy the video of the visiting engines, detailed videos of most engines, including the Akroyd will be uploaded to my Spoonersshed channels on your social media of choice!
This wonderful day provides a good taster for the Power and Machinery show at Breamore this July 12th & 13th, absolutely not one to be missed!
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Country: GB
