Water strainer

[rspringer]

Quick question, what mesh should I use in the supply line to my injector. Super Scale economy and EE 1 inch. thanks Rod

[Bill Shields]

depends on how much crud you have in the water and how much surface area you have for the strainer....and the capacity of the injector.

what you need to do is setup a strainer in a tank and see how much water will run out BY GRAVITY....at say 1/2 a tank level (average).

if the water that runs out is equal to or greater than the supply rate of the injector, you are good to go.

If not, you can starve the injector..

100 mesh screen is a good place to start if you have a large surface area.

[Fender]

I use a plastic-body Y strainer from McMaster, with a 100-mesh screen, and haven’t had any clogs in the Ohlenkamp injector. This mesh should strain out any particles larger than 0.006”.

[Bill Shields]

there you go...I got something right!

[ccvstmr]

My water fill adapter hose used to fill the boiler and tender for initial steaming has a marine gas-line mesh filter (available at places like Ebay or Walmart). Don't know the "mesh factor", but have been surprised how much stuff is collected from using rain water.

In the tender, the loco builder wrapped stainless screen around brass riser stands. That screen is held in place with O-rings. Here again...don't know the mesh factor, but would guess that screen has a mesh that's coarser than the fuel filter.

Still, something is better than nothing to trap large particles even before the water supply reaches the water supply valve or the injector (or anything else on the loco for that matter). Carl B.

[Fender]

While at the Ridge live steam track in February, I had a discussion with Anthony Duarte of Eccentric Engineer on this subject. I think he said that the minimum clearance inside of the “small scales” injector was 0.023” (or thereabout). If so, then you should be ok with the 100 mesh.
Perhaps Anthony can chime in and correct this if I remembered it wrongly.

[AnthonyDuarte]

Carl,

I use those for my injectors and have never had an issue with flow or particles getting stuck.

Dan,
Close! The smallest holes in the small scales injector are .02”, and .031 on the standard, so 100 mesh would be a safe route.

[cp4449]

Carl, if it was good enough for my '68 Mustang, it is good enough for my 1" LE 0-6-0....the same filter. Looked up Spectre inline filters, they will catch particles down to 40 microns.