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I'd suggest using aluminum from soda cans as your displacer. Very light and easy to work with. Use something like JB Weld as the glue and it should be airtight. Take a closer look at the link DB posted. If you follow that design correctly, you should have no worries.

-Stefan

Awsome, Antidartan! That "tincan" displacer cylinder looks familiar! Replicating the first run's success can always be a challenge. Be prepared to tear down the whole engine, clean, dry, and lubricate where necessary. Depending upon what you used to assemble the displacer and chamber, heat...

Hi Canuck! Welcome to the forum. The two cranks should be 90 degrees (or 1/4 rotation) offset from each other as you suggested. If you use a balloon as your power diaphragm, it will be easiest if you set it first, when cold, at the 6 o'clock position. Then adjust the crank length for the displacer s...

Hi Julian, The biggest issue I can gleen from your post is that the two cylinders are not correctly timed. If you design moves one piston to the top of its cylinder while the other piston is at the bottom of its cylinder, your system is out of phase. That is: one piston should be half way up its cyl...

Hi Antidartan, The displacer moves air back and forth between the hot and cold ends of the displacer cylinder. The material it is made from should be as light as possible for two reasons: first, thinner material conducts heat less than thicker material and second, a lighter displacer requires less w...

One other tip,

be sure to build your tolerances with the engine's application in mind. Cold causes metal to contract, heat causes metal to expand; and different materials and thickness are affected differently!

-Stefan

Hi Antidartan, Welcome to the world of Stirling engines! The displacer should travel the entire length of the displacer cylinder so that at either end of the cycle it is either almost touching the top or bottom of the cylinder. The location of the hole to the power cylinder is of little consequence ...

Hi Adam, Take a look at this article from a couple of years back: http://www.gizmag.com/go/4936/ . It looks like reusing engine heat has been around for a while. There are two things you need to keep in mind about a Stirling engine's design (in this particular case an alpha configuration). First, th...

I've actually used a paper cone and a sewing needle on a turntable and could hear the recording. Not exactly good for the record, but it sure was fun!

-Stefan

I really don't know much about pressure values, so I will leave that information to someone else more qualified. What I can comment about is the steam versus Sterling issues. Two of the reasons that hot air engines "lost" the battle with steam engines was their size and the materials requi...

Hi Guys, I'd actually believe the notion that the displacer piston is functionally part of the flywheel - most of the time. Darryl is right to say that it interferes with the motion of the flywheel at the extremes. But, during the rest of the cycle, the mass of the piston is following the law of con...

Hi Xaero_Vincent, Take a look at this image: http://www.stirlingengine.com/product-file/84/howi84/product.jpg . It's the cover of a book that describes the process of building a 5hp Stirling Engine in Bangladesh. It's a water-cooled 10 foot long behemoth. There are two significant disadvatages in us...

Hi Charlie, I've built this particular engine and it ran the first time I fired it up. There are a couple of things to consider if you wanted to turn it on its side. First, it is designed to have the heat source below the displacer cylinder. It might still run if the heat came from the side of the c...

TJ, When sealed, the engine should "bounce" back when you try to spin the fan/flywheel. Does it do this? If so, does this bounce become less pronounced when you light the burner? If that "bounce" is diminishing, it means that the engine wants to run, but may need more heat/better...

Hi Joe, Two very interesting questions. As far a weight goes, you can theoretically counter balance the mass of the piston with a mass on the flywheel. The final product should have a free spinning flywheel that shows no preference in terms of the piston's position. (Without a counter balance, the p...