Hot Air Stirling Engine Model Education Toy Electricity Power SC005

Product quality is very good however there no much activities to be done. Not interested for kids or people looking for some assembly work.

I have reviewed other Stirling Engines and have had issues with them working as advertised, but this one works great, and the kids love it. Especially as it powers a small generator powering a LED multi-colored light.The manufacturer gives an extra heat bulb with the kit just in case the original breaks, which is nice, but I don't think is necessary as long as you are careful.The manufacturer stats to use alcohol for the burner which works well. If alcohol is used then use 91 to 99% so that it will burn fast/evaporate quickly. I have not tried lamp oil yet, but it may be a good as well as a safe alternative. Please check with others with the same engine before attempting to alter what the manufacturer recommends.PROS;This Engine is beautiful to look at (even without it running).It is well designed, polished (no kidding, it is shiny) :).It is Mechanically sound. (very quiet)Fun to watch working.A great teaching tool for young engineering minds.CONS:ABSOLUTELY NOT FOR CHILDREN ("DANGER" Will Robinson "DANGER")High heat issues/FIRE (watch over carefully)

Arrived in good condition. Works Great!!! I was so impressed with this that I bought another one for my son. O have put over 10 hours on my Sterling Engine. I contacted Sunnytech to purchase some spare parts in case I had a failure. The parts were priced very reasonable and arrived from China in less than two weeks! Great Customer Support!!!

Disappointed that it was made in China

it's not working and broken

This is a very impressive machine, with superb craftsmanship and flawless mechanical operation. It is a very attractive display item that I plan to keep on my desk at work, with a supply of fuel and a lighter handy to demonstrate to curious passers-by. My fellow engineer coworkers have also been very impressed with it. It runs surprisingly fast, and is not overly loud, but does make some noise.I am so impressed with its good qualities that I did not deduct a star for the failings of the instructions that came with it. I'll never understand why Chinese companies do not take the simple extra step to have someone who has English as a first language proof-read and clarify the almost universally poor English translations that ship with their products. The instructions that come with this are quite typical of that problem. For example: "Heating 20 seconds, and then began to gently turn the flywheel, (follow the starting direction shown in the figure) until the flywheel can since Dynamic operation so far." Yes, most will be able to figure out what that means, but why not state it in proper English? I'll note that the instructions cover both a Stirling engine and a steam engine. Paper is cheap, why not have separate instructions for each model? And the instructions for the Stirling engine include a figure of a different type of engine than this, leaving me wondering initially if I received the wrong instructions.The model comes with several loose parts, some of which are spare parts, like and extra of each glass cylinder and generator drive belt, which is nice But there is no list of parts with a description, including those needed for operation. Again, it was easy enough to figure out, despite no instructions. But should either of the cylinders need replacing, there are no instructions for how to do this. There is an LED light that also came loose. This is a very cool, color-changing LED that demonstrates that the engine converts heat into usable electricity. Why it is not assembled to the model as delivered, nor even mentioned anywhere in the instructions is a mystery to me. It may also be a mystery to anyone who is not mechanically (or electrically) inclined that you have to spread the LED wires apart and bend the ends so they can fit into the holes in the terminals on the outside of the generator. The alcohol lamp had 3 parts, the glass bottle, wick, and lid. The lid is not threaded and just sits on top of the bottle, so be careful not to knock the bottle over while lit, or you'll have a little Molotov cocktail on your hands. When feeding the wick through the hole in the lid, some instruction as to how far the wick should extend would have been nice. I found that about 1/16" is sufficient, and more extension to give a larger flame did not seem to make the engine run any faster. So far, I've transported it back and forth to work a couple times and put a piece of plastic wrap over the wick and wound a rubber band around the bottle neck to seal it. A bottle with a seal-able lid would be a nice improvement. But I suppose the alcohol is cheap enough that you could just dump out any unused fuel if moving it. As is, all the alcohol in the bottle will evaporate rather quickly with the wick exposed to the air. (Here's a tip for filling the bottle from a can of alcohol without spilling more than goes in the bottle: dip a straw down into the can of alcohol, seal the top of the straw with a finger, then put the straw into the bottle and release your finger. Repeat until bottle is full.)Despite the above nits, I think this is a very cool "toy", especially being a mechanical engineer with a deeper understanding of how it works, and am very happy I bought it. But I don't think you need to be an engineer to enjoy this. I thought the price was a little steep, but feel better about the price after seeing the high quality design, workmanship, and materials used. Oh, since I plan to keep it on display at work, I am concerned about dust collecting and possibly gumming up the linkages and power cylinder that is open to air, so I bought a mini-football helmet display case that it perfectly fits in...see the picture. The case is a "Ballqube Mini Football/Helmet Display Box".