Interisting: http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=669 In the first couple of decades of the 20th century these brothers were building cars... powered by steam rather than IC. Their final model, the "Model E", perfected in the mid-1920s, did 0-75 mph in 10 seconds and topped out at over 100 mph. This while another contemporary car, Ford's famous Model T, took about 40 seconds to reach its maximum speed of about 50 mph. Alas as with many great inventions, it fell victim to marketing, disputes, and other such things and their company ceased to be.
I can't check the video but did ya have to load that engine like a steam locomotive? Would that be wood or coal?
The slow startup time was also a key to its demise. Most likely the real reason is that on the scale of an automobile engine the rankine cycle would have a difficult time matching the same thermodynamic efficiency of the otto cycle.
The only mention of fuel I see in the article is kerosene. And in the final model, they claimed a warmup time of 40 seconds and a torque output of 1,000 ft/lbs from an engine that would allegedly pass a California emissions test today.
I had a kerosene heater and it kinda smelled funny when in use. I question that 40 second warmup time.
Are you talking warm up or start and go? Its not really good to just start and take off. Ya gotta adjust the radio, put on seatbelts and look all around before take off. And a very small percentage of people require so-called getaway cars. I had one though. Didn't need a keey to start. Just turn the key housing or use any old key that fit in the slot. But its not good to let cops see you driving a car without the keys in the ignition. But that car was a fast hot rod. A 70 Torino GT.
Well there is only one radio channel worth listening here in Atlanta so not much radio tuning for me. I can't say I am a big fan of American muscle but I can appreciate why people love those cars. Lots of Va Va Voom for very little money. It's like when I lived off the sweet foods in the vending machine in my undergrad days. Most calaries for less than a buck.
The 40 second warm up time is accurate. If you poke around on the intarwebs for information on Doble cars or "flash boiler," you'll see that they all list a similar amount of time for warmup. A boiler built today, with modern insulation and burner design could probably have a much shorter warmup time. Whatever you might think of Leno of a standup comic, he knows his cars (he was a Mercedes mechanic before he became a comic). I've met several professional car restorers (who have Pebble Beach trophies to their names), and to a man, they all say that Leno's no slouch when it comes to cars. His mechanic (who was on an episode of "Monster Garage") has been described by folks who've met him as the smartest mechanic on the planet.
FWIW, even the 40 second warmup would be no issue if you used compressed air initially. I've heard of steam engines setup that way before - a tank storing compressed air powers the engine from the start until the boiler is up to steam, at which point it automatically switches over. Then while the engine is running on steam power, it also turns a compressor which repressurises the air tank. The tank for a doble wouldn't need to be big either, since it only needs to power the engine for a minute or two (technically 40 secs, but a bit of overlap is nice to make sure everything runs smoothly).
Really? What's the reason? Because every problem I've ever heard about them having was either solved before steamers ceased production, or can be easily solved with modern technology. Midnight Funeral, I've seen a photograph of a locomotive engine built in the late 1800s that ran on compressed air. It was used to move other engines in the roundhouse as they didn't have to worry about sparks from the exhaust setting things on fire.
Not according to the engineers I know. One of whom who works in the powerplant industry and is incensed (even though she now makes a lot more money because of it) that most electric companies are switching to gas turbine generators because they can be built faster. I've seen Doble fuel economy claims of around 15 - 20 MPG, which is about par for cars today, and done without the benefits of streamlining.
There's also the issue of it requiring a boiler. Boilers and cars don't mix well, especially if there's an accident.
Okay, if I burn something that directly causes pressure on a piston versus burning something that causes pressure on a fluid which then drives a piston, which do you think is more efficient? I'll give you a hint, it's the one with the least amount of steps.
A flash boiler only has a small amount of steam/water in it at a given time. During an accident, if the boiler was breached, the steam would disappate rapidly, unlike the gas in the fuel tank. You're ignoring the gains that can be made by superheating the steam. Not to mention that things like turbines used in jet aircraft are external combustion engines. Compared to a Prius, yes. Compared to a modern SUV which has the benefits of modern materials and aerodymaic theories and weighs as much as a Doble did, it's roughly identical.
That mighta been funny if there was no such thing as a power converter so that you can use the car battery.
So the steam iron powers the car which powers the steam iron? Hell, if you can make that work, warp drive should be no problem.
Yes a steam engine with large-scale turbine and huge cooling reservoir i.e. a powerplant would be very efficient but this type of engine doesn't scale down very well. The same can be said for large jet engines. On the automobile scale the IC has the advantage.
It'd be great to power a single seat car the size of a Suburban, though. Assuming you want to do highway speed and with a range of 250 miles.
