The first day of the Skagit tour I toured with Pat and Merrily Farrell in there 1914 Stanley Model 606. I was happy to have him traveling with me on the road because I was having issues with my driven fuel pump. The shaft is quite warn and the new packing wasn't sealing like it should. After many adjustments I finally got it to stop leaking before we left the parking lot but by the first stop I'd already overheated the pump so the fuel was starting to vapor lock. I obviously got the packing a little too tight. By the time we left the stop the pump had cooled down and seemed to be working just fine. We traveled about 10 miles before I started to smell what i thought might be raw fuel. Unsure if the fuel pump had started leaking again or not I decided it was wise to pull off into a parking lot and take a look. Knowing about my ongoing tribulations with my fuel pump Pat followed in suit. I hopped out and lifted my floor boards to check on the pump and by the time I turned around to ask Pat a question I witnessed the following.
After Pat removed the smoke bonnet it was clear that the feed water line from the feed water heater to the boiler check valve had failed right at the flare. There was no way to isolate this line to make the repair so he had no choice but to blow off all the steam in the boiler. Of course neither of us had a piece of the right size copper to repair the line so Pat befriended a local fellow with a hot rod who took him to the near by general store to source out the necessary parts. After he returned Pat made short work of putting the whole thing back together. It ended up taking about an hour and a half before we were back steaming down the road. An impressive showing by Pat of fixing a problem on the side of the road that would have put almost all Stanley owners on the trailer.
The reason for the break was most likely vibration fatigue that caused a crack right at the base of the flare on the copper line. The location of the line was what made the issue a real problem. Because of this I would recommend using Stainless Steel tube for anything that is located under the bonnet.