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Steam Engine / Power Idea

Started by marsofold, November 28, 2019, 03:52:13 PM

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marsofold

Saw a you-tune video where a guy used a 12 volt pump to feed water into a heated copper coil to make a rather impressive steam cleaner. 6" piddly water flow until he heated the coil with propane, then a continuous 5 foot gusting steam output! Thought that the same setup heated with wood might be able to use the steam flow to power an air drill cranking an alternator for power (use a small percentage of the power to run the pump). Other than corrosion issues that I see as fixable, might this be a safe easy way to use wood heat for electricity?

Southside

Without a lot of safety designed into the system I would say it's a better way to turn wood into a bomb than electricity.
Franklin buncher and skidder
JD Processor
Woodmizer LT Super 70 and LT35 sawmill, KD250 kiln, BMS 250 sharpener and setter
Riehl Edger
Woodmaster 725 and 4000 planner and moulder
Enough cows to ensure there is no spare time.
White Oak Meadows

sawguy21

X2 High pressure steam is nothing to fool with, you better know what you are doing. It went out of favor for a reason, a lot of fuel, water and manpower is required to keep it producing.
old age and treachery will always overcome youth and enthusiasm

Don P

It is a great way to get hurt. We are used to things that stop when they hit overload, steam doesn't do that, it keeps going till something breaks and once released the volume is huge. That said, look up the flash boiler used on the old Stanley steamer, really neat stuff. John Hartford wasn't kidding, there really was a steam powered aereoplane  :)

Gearbox

we run 2 steam engines at our show and use 4000 gallon of water in 3 days .
A bunch of chainsaws a BT6870 processer , TC 5 International track skidder and not near enough time

marsofold

There's NO big explosive boiler tank to explode. Zip. None. Nada. Yeah a pressure relief valve at each end of the monotube is probably a good idea. As is running it in a block small enclosure. But 50 psi isn't superheated steam. It isn't rocket science, nuclear, or deeply mysterious in any way. It is an attempt to generate power self-sustainably. As in not needing propane. As in not requiring oil for an oil change for generator pistons every 100 hours of running. While safety is always a valid concern, there is much value in attempting to think outside the box. Suggestions on how to improve safety or improve the design are always welcome. Telling me that it's above my head or discouraging me from trying will be ignored.

Don P

Well, that's a shame, this could have been interesting.

I misspoke, it was a Doble or White that used the coil type flash boiler, the Stanley was a conventional fire tube boiler.


Southside

I saw a Youtube video where a guy convinced his girlfriend to shoot a book he was holding up to prove it was bullet proof, because he had already tried the stunt without him holding the book.  Appears a couple of parameters changed in an un-planned way, it didn't work out so well for either of them.....
Franklin buncher and skidder
JD Processor
Woodmizer LT Super 70 and LT35 sawmill, KD250 kiln, BMS 250 sharpener and setter
Riehl Edger
Woodmaster 725 and 4000 planner and moulder
Enough cows to ensure there is no spare time.
White Oak Meadows

doc henderson

It is great fun to think of these things.  like a perpetual motion machine.  this would have added energy from wood, but I would start with compressed air to see if it works. usually the generator would require a fair amount of power, and often the "pump" may pull more juice than is in the system.  Just like a car running an alternator, it pulls the 350 hp motor down a bit when it kicks in.  As well I agree with your safety plan, as the air drill/turbine may generate back pressure (equal and opposite forces)  as it begins to turn the generator.  You are aware that this is read around the world, so folks are trying to make sure things are safe.  I made a potato gun out of 3 inch pvc pipe.  we used it in a cub scout Christmas parade and got first prize shooting confetti in the air and singing let it snow.  6 years later in boy scouts, we got out the potato gun and started testing it.  at about 50 psi heard a creaking sound, and I told my son to get behind a pallet.  thought maybe it was contorting under pressure and making the sand make noise on the drive.  touch it with my foot and it exploded.  dented my garage door.  4 neighbors came running, and 4 years later we are still finding pvc in the yard 100 feet away.  I had a tiny spot bleeding on my sternum, but we were not otherwise injured.  
so invent something cool, let us know how it goes, and be safe.  If you or friends have engineering info, try to match the steam motor to the power required to drive the generator.  have a valve to shut off water, cause you cannot turn off the wood fire fast.  might be able to remove the coil, or flood the fire.  maybe the water can run by gravity instead of pump (if that is what the pump is for).  someone can tell you the BTUs per hour required to generate steam at a volume and pressure to produce a hp to turn that generator.  each change will be associated with losses so the whole system needs to be insulated and very efficient.  good luck and best regards.
Timber king 2000, 277c track loader, PJ 32 foot gooseneck, 1976 F700 state dump truck, JD 850 tractor.  2007 Chevy 3500HD dually, home built log splitter 18 horse 28 gpm with 5 inch cylinder and 32 inch split range with conveyor powered by a 12 volt tarp motor

doc henderson

sterling motors are interesting, but not powerful enough to do anything.  what is your background.  that may help us understand where you are coming from.  I built my log splitter and put a car muffler on it.  bought a coil of 1/4 inch copper tubing to wrap around the muffler.  this was to be able to pour water through to make instant soup or hot chocolate in the "field".  never wrapped it, cause the log splitter sits behind my shop.  we cut trees in the field, and buck into logs and split them in the yard.  I am getting too old to expend energy on novelty. 
Timber king 2000, 277c track loader, PJ 32 foot gooseneck, 1976 F700 state dump truck, JD 850 tractor.  2007 Chevy 3500HD dually, home built log splitter 18 horse 28 gpm with 5 inch cylinder and 32 inch split range with conveyor powered by a 12 volt tarp motor

Nebraska

@marsofold There's a whole truck load of nice, learned, caring folks on this board, who on first instinct don't want to see someone inadvertently hurt themselves.  Some it's their job, they do it every day, some like me have floundered around plenty and try to learn from their mistakes, my first thought was  well it probably could, my second thought was scalding ones self would stink.  People just care.
 I totally get the desire to be self sufficient and live simply minimizing  or eliminating the power grid.  I have a small creek with about 20 or so feet of fall I have threatened to try to build a small water wheel or turbine generator. But frost would limit it's usefulness 3 months out of the year.  It's just the challenge to see if I can do it. Its also an unecessary piddle project, that is a ways down the list.  Welcome to the forum share a little back round in your profile. It would be an interesting project to watch.

scsmith42

You would first want to calculate the number of btu's that the propane torch was putting out so that you could determine how much firewood would be required.

As others have indicated, steam boilers can be extremely dangerous.  Having said that, a quick glance at the your tube homemade steam cleaners don't seem to indicate that they have a pressure chamber, so there may be some inherent safeguards to the design.


Quote from: Gearbox on November 28, 2019, 08:33:55 PM
we run 2 steam engines at our show and use 4000 gallon of water in 3 days .
Rollag show?  My brother and I are talking about trying to make it up there for the show.

Peterson 10" WPF with 65' of track
Smith - Gallagher dedicated slabber
Tom's 3638D Baker band mill
and a mix of log handling heavy equipment.

GAB

When you calculate the BTU's don't forget to factor in an efficiency of approximately 10%.
Also, I'm told water is unstable at pressures over 3990 psi and 1000 + degrees F.
Be Careful as mother nature does not allow dropouts.
GAB
W-M LT40HDD34, SLR, JD 420, JD 950w/loader and Woods backhoe, V3507 Fransguard winch, Cordwood Saw, 18' flat bed trailer, and other toys.

Iwawoodwork

GO For IT, about 25 years ago I put 3/8 copper coils ( bought a coil of soft copper tubing and used the whole coil) in a old steel wood heating stove to heat my hot tub. ran the copper out of the stove to about 6 feet of !/2 water pipe then to plastic to the tub, worked well, but at times controlling the temp was an issue.   It would get hot enough that only steam was pulsing into the hot tub that was about 20 feet away. Nothing ever blew, the plastic pipe and soft copper would both split and release pressure before any explosion happened, as said before if you have relief valves or built in weak spots I don't see any reason it would not work.

Don P

Disclaimer, I know squat about steam :D
But like Doc's perpetual motion machine it has been fun thinking about today.
So, thinking about an auto alternator, I've heard they consume 2-5 hp from your engine so we have a big air drill of some volume and pressure, probably running at around 100psi standard air pressure to get any kind of power out of it (the air drills I've used I can stop in my hand, this needs a serious size upgrade, hydraulic pump running as a motor?). The feedwater pump needs to be capable of injecting water at higher than that pressure and be positively checked to prevent steam backflow. That is the first significant draw on the alternator, magnetism required to create that power steals some of the drills output power. Now start loading up the alternator with lights or whatever, the drag on the drill increases, the heat required for the load increases as does the feedwater required, getting quite a fire going. To produce that 100psi steam pressure the water needs to be close to 400 degrees, think about a car radiator system, pressure raises the boiling point.

One more bulb gets switched on and the drill stalls, now we have a problem, the fire is roaring (where is all this wood coming from? this is not a lazy woodstove you just became married to this furnace) this isn't a regulated air supply, when the drill stops, the pressure spikes, instantly, temp follows. The drill explodes. Need a safety valve.

At the same pressure, a big variable, steam is 1700 times bigger than the water that created it. As the temperature climbs that can double, steam is huge. If the tube water is at 400 degrees because it is under pressure, as soon as the system ruptures and hits atmospheric pressure all the water flashes to steam. We have enough piping to heat and run that drill, that is a gallon or two at a minimum the way I'm seeing it unless the fire is a roaring jet. This is not a big boiler but is certainly not zero.

So there is a safety valve, the drill is locked, the feedwater which has somehow been governed to load needs to stop and the safety opens, it needs to be able to dump that steam volume right now. I wouldn't dump it in a small block building or risk having anything breach inside a brittle structure that would simply be the next thing to rupture. If the tube is empty and the fire is roaring you're about to lose the tubing, I'd dump the steam and tube water into the fire.

Like I said I know squat, just trying to provide constructive criticism.
I did see where the steam car's ran at around 80% efficiency, GM even prototyped a couple as recently as the late 50's.

marsofold

I'm thinking of using a turkey cooker to prototype the design (happy Thanksgiving all!). Do air drills really obstruct the flow if stalled? I had assumed that they would just uselessly vent if stalled. I have a 2 HP air compressor, so I would try out the air drill under load using compressed air first to see what would happen during stalling. My neighbor has both a turkey cooker and an alternator that I can borrow. All of the other parts are relatively cheap and total to less than $100. A cheap experiment. The other angle I could try would be that instead of using an air drill, to vent the end of the steam line into a large piece of ductwork pipe to induce airflow. They sell commercial versions of this as "pneumatic air blowers". A small wind turbine at the inflow end could generate power. And if it didn't work I'd still have a wind turbine. But since that would be a lot more expensive to try, I'll try the air drill idea first. 

doc henderson

give it a shot.  it takes a lot to turn and alternator.  get one off a Toyota maybe, not a diesel truck.  the drill is a place to start if you can borrow one.  not sure if the heat will destroy an air drill, I honestly do not know.  I know if they stall they bleed air but not sure of the pressure.  there has to be some to create the force.  If you rig it on an air compressor tank, you can try it at different pressures and see if the volume is adequate to keep up and if it does turn at the proper RPM.  you should be able to see the proper rpm range for an alternator, or do the math from the car pulley system and based on engine rpm range.  higher rpms should make more watts of power. may want an amp meter and volt meter.  amps x volts equals watts.  love to see pics or video if you get it.  be careful! and good luck.  the air compressor should be safe.  but it may far out produce the "wood fire and water" for volume and pressure.  Hope it works!  
Timber king 2000, 277c track loader, PJ 32 foot gooseneck, 1976 F700 state dump truck, JD 850 tractor.  2007 Chevy 3500HD dually, home built log splitter 18 horse 28 gpm with 5 inch cylinder and 32 inch split range with conveyor powered by a 12 volt tarp motor

Ianab

The physics is OK, you can boil water, run the steam through an engine, and make power.

It's the practicalities that are going to bite you. To get real power you need high pressure and temperature. Think 100+PSI etc.  Sure a stream of steam from a boiler looks impressive, but if it's only at 1 psi, you don't get much energy from it. 

Burning wood waste for power works on an industrial scale, but the local sawmills that run that are talking 50 mW steam turbines, and then using the still hot steam to heat kilns. Scaling down doesn't work quite as well. 

Thought about a wood gasifier and running a small generator off that? Several members have trucks and tractors that run off wood gas. 
Weekend warrior, Peterson JP test pilot, Dolmar 7900 and Stihl MS310 saws and  the usual collection of power tools :)

doc henderson

the stihl mechanic here is Amish.  he went to an auction and bought a little steam engine.  smaller than a lawn mower engine.  he demonstrated it on compressed air.  had the governor and all kinds of working parts.  I bought years ago a 3 cylinder radial air engine, for powering an explosion proof fan.  they were set up like the old rotary bi-plane engines.  got it for a paint room.  there is stuff out there.  
Timber king 2000, 277c track loader, PJ 32 foot gooseneck, 1976 F700 state dump truck, JD 850 tractor.  2007 Chevy 3500HD dually, home built log splitter 18 horse 28 gpm with 5 inch cylinder and 32 inch split range with conveyor powered by a 12 volt tarp motor

doc henderson

Timber king 2000, 277c track loader, PJ 32 foot gooseneck, 1976 F700 state dump truck, JD 850 tractor.  2007 Chevy 3500HD dually, home built log splitter 18 horse 28 gpm with 5 inch cylinder and 32 inch split range with conveyor powered by a 12 volt tarp motor

Al_Smith

The mention of the iconic Stanley steamer brings to mind the way they were built .Those flash boilers were wound with piano wire to bind them and hold the high pressure .I think it was a speed run on Daytona Beach ,if memory serves one crashed at something like 150  MPH in 1906-7.The boiler became dislodged and the escaping steam propelled it about a 1/2 mile down the beach .Debris was scattered over 2 miles .The driver lived by some miracle .
The Stanley brothers would only sell to those they felt worthy of owning their automobiles .Rather an arrogant  lot .
All that said steam is not to be taken lightly .At boiling  point 212 F zero pressure one quart of water equals 800 quarts of steam.Think about how much that would be under pressure then multiply it again if you think of just one stage  of super heat . You have the potential of a bomb .

Al_Smith

Alright already now another story .In the village of New Hampshire Ohio not so long ago a water heater failed ,don't know the cause .The explosion blew the owner into the street,leveled the house and escaped skyward  after going through two floors  and a roof .Where it was later found I have no idea . :o

Don P

Pictures and warnings get written up in builder magazines every so often, usually walls blown away, etc. That is usually a double failure, the thermostat fails and then the TPP valve, the blowoff, is frozen from years of sitting there unchecked. So the advice is to check them every so often, blow a little water and make sure it is free and then make sure it reseats, if in doubt replace it.

Years ago I was working on a restaurant remodel and noticed steam coming out of the kitchen floor drain. They had hard piped the dishwasher boost heater blowoff valve down into that drain and the boost heater thermostat was shot. The valve was working overtime almost constantly blowing off. Aside from the water and power waste the kitchen staff was basically working under a bomb the whole time completely unaware. But they had really well disinfected dishes :D.

I was wandering around on the net last night and came across a Stanley's boiler rebuild. It is a vertical firetube full on boiler and like Al said wrapped in about 3/4 of a mile of high tensile piano wire. If the boiler was made of boilerplate steel it would have needed to be 1" thick plate, much too heavy so the brothers came up with that method borrowed from early artillery cannons that were also wrapped, they then used I think it was 1/4" plate. The 700 or so 1/2" firetubes acted basically as staybolts to reinforce the ends. There has never been a boiler explosion in one of those. They ran at up to 750 psi. Typically they lose a firetube and sure enough the water/steam dumps down onto the fire quenching it, but also cracking the grate. The hydrostatic test on a boiler is holding at 125% of max pressure using water, a non compressible liquid, rather than steam. If it fails it leaks rather than popping like a balloon under steam or air pressure.

I saw another efficiency number saying they ran at 40-60% where an IC engine runs at about 25%.

Apparently Abner Doble, in his late teens at the time, visited the Stanley Brothers in a steam car he had built, it had a condenser so could go long distances between water stops and was heating hot water, was a coiled monotube flash boiler design, could be fired and driven in under a minute, all things the Stanley did not have. They turned him away. I think Al's description of them is probably right on. Not that the Stanley was any slouch, at 5,000 lbs it could pop a wheelie. In that article they said the driver that Al talked about was trying to best his 127 mph clocked speed of the year before. They said he was running close to 180mph when he lost it, with a kingpin suspension, pretty much driving a tractor, I cannot imagine that ride.

Al_Smith

More to the story and I don't remember the time line .Evidently some rich collector had a totally restored 1927  Stanley he drove coast to coast on 8 dollars worth of kerosene .Even if it were 15 -25 cents a gallon that's pretty good .It might have been an article from Popular Mechanics where I read it .
Steam fascinates me but I know I don't know enough to fool with it .

Al_Smith

If it's any interest to steam buffs my buddy who has a Case steamer went to see this one under power early this fall .He BTW retubed his  engine this summer.  --Google 150 HP Case road locomotive .

Don P

That thing is a monster :o, fun to watch.

I've been googling around, I think every kid of every age has secretly dreamed at some time of running on steam :D. Mars, go to youtube and search for LynxSteam and get on his channel, boilerwise he's basically done what you are describing I think. His rig is producing ~150 watts from what I could tell, it looks like it would top out at about 500 watts. The pressures I've seen him playing with are around 20-40 psi and he's running a model steam engine that is about 1/4 hp which turns a homemade alternator.

51cub

Quote from: Al_Smith on November 30, 2019, 05:46:48 PM
If it's any interest to steam buffs my buddy who has a Case steamer went to see this one under power early this fall .He BTW retubed his  engine this summer.  --Google 150 HP Case road locomotive .
He did an amazing job with that engine! I've been following him in one of the magazines I get. The research and the physical work makes for great reading

Quote from: Don P on December 02, 2019, 09:25:13 PM
That thing is a monster :o, fun to watch.

I've been googling around, I think every kid of every age has secretly dreamed at some time of running on steam :D. Mars, go to youtube and search for LynxSteam and get on his channel, boilerwise he's basically done what you are describing I think. His rig is producing ~150 watts from what I could tell, it looks like it would top out at about 500 watts. The pressures I've seen him playing with are around 20-40 psi and he's running a model steam engine that is about 1/4 hp which turns a homemade alternator.
Thank you for another steam channel. I never thought David Richards would have any competition on you tube on my computer and yet here we are

I believe in the hereafter, because every time I take two steps into the tool crib to get something I wonder " what did I come in here after"

If nothing else I'm always a good last resort or the guy to hold up as a bad example

Al_Smith

You can find just about anything on the internet if you can find the right search parameters .Which often is not all that easy  .On the subject of steam power about everything from a Case steamers ,triplex marine engines to steam turbines in a coal fired power plant.In my life time I've seen them all in addition to serving on US navy nuke submarines which are amazing but duty and honor  bound I can't talk about them .
I will say only this comparing a nuke U-boat to a big nuke power house is like comparing a Piper Cub to a Boeing 747 .Worked on one of those on the shores of Lake Erie---huge .

sharp edge

On my next go around I'm going to make a steam engine as safe as a v8.

Here how I will do it.
   Get a wood boiler, fill it with oil. take it to 300f-400f

   Find a old hot water heater and take the side iron off.

   Get a high pressure washer.

   Hook up one side of the side iron to the oil, the other side to the high pressure washer and a pipe to a new intake manifold on the escort engine with a one to one timing chain.


After the cut stop the blade, back it up, then make the next cut. Lot safer this way.

The reason they didn't make the steam engine this way, the first  time , they didn't have high pressure washers,   8) 8) 8)

SE
The stroke of a pen is mighter than the stroke of a sword, but we like pictures.
91' escort powered A-14 belsaw, JD 350-c cat with jamer and dray, 12" powermatic planer

Don P

 ;D I had a similar idea one time, using a setup sort of like that to save some spoiled corn.

Al_Smith

They had pressure washers of a sort .Same deal as hydraulic mining .Water is 44  PSI per 100 foot of head  .Start 800-1500  feet above the monitor with an 8" pipe go 200 feet then neck it down to 6" then another and a 5" then a 3" etc ..as the diameter decreases the velocity and resulting pressure  increases.It would blow a stream of high pressure water 200 feet and move boulders .Killed people and washed a bunch of California right down the hill ---but it wasn't portable .
I'm not certain exactly how the calculations are derived but they claim the monitor pressures could reach 5000 psi --trivia ,means nothing to a steam engine .--more next post---

Al_Smith

Moving along this use of high pressure water done by gravity was used some time ago by a group in W Virginia .They started up in the mountains with a big pipe taking water from a mountain stream and necking it down ,about 800 feet of fall .The end was an undershot Pelton water turbine with a 2" nozzle at about 200 psi connected to a 75 HP 3 phase motor . They'd spin it up via the power company and over speed it above slip frequency and it became an induction generator and sold it back to the power company at reduced rates of course . --more trivia still no steam engine-- ;D 

retiredmechanic

my first question would be abt the "air drill" are you talking about something like an impact wrench type drill ? if so using steam would quickly deteriorate the drill by dissolving the rubber seals. next question would be what would the electricity be used for? an automotive alternator produces 12 vdc or 24 vdc and that will charge a battery very easy but it takes about 45 min. at rpm above 2k to charge an almost dead 12v battery  how much wood would it take to keep the water in steam format for 45 min. and how much water would it take for the steam period. 

very interesting project to play around with though, but in my opinion the gain wouldnt be worth the effort for a reliable power source to live by, I had a neighbor that did a similar project only no steam he had a battery bank built a fire used the heat of the fire funneled through a chimney that slowly turned a sml turbine charging the batteries that powered his yard lights for his parties  and the fire doubled as his firepit he was a tinkerer 
gunfire and chainsaws is a Sunday afternoon Lullaby in the country

Cjross73

I'm sure glad to hear I'm not the only one that has these type thoughts,  sometimes I think my lack of time to try them is the Lords way of saving me from myself. I love the idea of a steam powered generator,  i feel like it can work but will take someone smarter than me to figure it out 
LT40, Stihl saw, Old green tractor

Al_Smith

Another thought on steam .I'm not certain where this happened or when .This was an example of a novice operating a steam traction engine .Rolled a big steamer over a low ditch and with a full head of steam .Gravity caused the water to roll off the crown sheet exposing it  and when it leveled out gravity caused it to be covered again .Of course by then it was red hot and the steam pressure went bonkers .It exploded and killed a couple of people .Shortly after that a new law was passed concerning steam engine shows in that state .

Al_Smith

Still another thought .The standard pressure cooker has a weighted pressure relief that limits the pressure to 15 PSI which equates to 250 degrees of heat .
On rare occasion those weights would fall off throwing themselves right through the roof and blowing the contents of the cooking device right behind them.That's only a small device at 15 PSI .Imagine what could happen had it been a large steam engine at 75 PSI . 

Erik A

I know not the same as you are proposing but the best mythbuster episode was them blowing up a hot water heater ( search youtube) 

Maybe a type of pelton wheel and skip the air drill.

I read something like that using a flat plate mounted to the alt. with luvers in it

peakbagger

The Cog railroad in NH still has a few home built steam engines running to the summit of the mountain. They are coal fired. Most of their rolling stock has been switched to Diesel electric rigs (also hand built using purchased diesels) they mix in a bit of pure biodiesel with their dyno diesel to make it sound green. They switched to the Diesel rigs as they can run more passengers to the top but run the steamers in the mornings for steam buffs. Look around on You Tube and there are lots of videos. The news rigs are equipped with camouflage to make them look sort of like and old steam engine. Pre Covid they had a steam day where all sorts of steam powered equipment showed up.

Its not that hard to make a steam turbine but its hard to get them efficient. Several sawmills in Maine put in steam turbines about 10 or 15 years ago I know of three of them and at least two never meet their performance guarantee.

If you want to do the math, the maximum efficiency of a steam cycle is a pretty simple formula. eff- 1-(T cold/T heat). T cold is the exhaust temperature, T hot is the steam temperature going in. Its called the Carnot cycle efficiency. This is the absolute best highest efficiency irregardless of friction leaks and losses.

Maine Wood Pellets put in an Organic Rankine Cycle power plant several years ago. These plants are real popular in Europe pellet mills. Instead of boiling water they use refrigerant that boils at lower temperature.

moodnacreek

Tinkering with alternate energy is a great hobby. People have been fooling around with steam for a long time. Then there is water power. One problem is that most of us where born with a switch and a meter on the side of the house. How many hours a day do you want to work to make power and clean up the mess at the end of the day?

Don P

Quote from: moodnacreek on January 12, 2021, 07:24:37 PMHow many hours a day do you want to work to make power and clean up the mess at the end of the day?


It sure makes you realize what is involved in the tremendous amount of power at our fingertips that we take for granted. I just finished watching a course on Greek and Roman technology and it is amazing what they did with so little available power. They utilized just 4 sources of power. Animal, Man, water and wind. Wind was used exclusively for sailing, water almost exclusively for grinding grain. Which left animal and human, which is only capable of about 1/10 hp sustained. And yet look at the things they built and did.

Hero of Alexandria did invent what is commonly called the first steam "engine", late 200's AD. It is the spinning sphere connected over a kettle of boiling water with 2 angled exhaust jets often shown in drawings. Unfortunately the museum of Alexandria, a great think tank of the regions greatest minds that had operated for several hundred years was burned down and those men were scattered during that period and his work was never advanced for about 1500 years, what a loss!

J-holden3285

Quote from: marsofold on November 28, 2019, 03:52:13 PM
Saw a you-tune video where a guy used a 12 volt pump to feed water into a heated copper coil to make a rather impressive steam cleaner. 6" piddly water flow until he heated the coil with propane, then a continuous 5 foot gusting steam output! Thought that the same setup heated with wood might be able to use the steam flow to power an air drill cranking an alternator for power (use a small percentage of the power to run the pump). Other than corrosion issues that I see as fixable, might this be a safe easy way to use wood heat for electricity?
In the late 80s I learned how to separate hydrogen from water I was in my teens and didn't know how dangerous it was I thought I could build a furnace to burn I'm very lucky that I'm here today lol but then I changed my ideas to steam I converted a old 8 hp Briggs to run on steam it actually worked I have thought about revisiting the idea again now that I'm old and understand steam concept a little better but I think steam has a place If you  have the resources and I think it's safer than people want to admit if you set your safety up and test them as you go.

Walnut Beast

Bring it on Steam!! The mighty Case 150 pulling 44 bottom plow.

https://youtu.be/5xDj45zF-l0

bigblockyeti

^ That's way cool but looks like a logistical nightmare when it needs to be moved somewhere, heck, even driving it a couple miles away would take much time and some serious planning.

DMcCoy

there is research into a 6 stroke diesel/steam engine.  Uses the latent heat from the diesel cycle to make the steam.
Made me curious if a guy could use a small gas engine, with diferent valving and water injection.  The thought led me to realize I was thinking perpetual motion.  BUT - could a person use the cooling fins and firewood to heat the cylinder and have water injection like a diesel for the steam.
Sounds so simple I would suspect it has been tried.

Walnut Beast

What is amazing is how many technology and invention concepts were from years and years ago before we where around and they have been perfected. And people don't realize it and think it's a new technology 

Al_Smith

Generally  speaking nothing is brand new it's more that a known idea becomes revisited and refined .Like wind generators ,they 've been around since the 20's on the old Delco systems .They go back to the windmills used in colonial days and maybe further back .
Another example are the huge engines used by the steel mils in Pittsburgh, steel city .Prior to WW1 these great mills needed huge amounts of electrical power more so than the electric companies could supply at the times .Allis Chalmers for one made enormous horizontal cylinder engines that ran on the flammable gas that was a byproduct making  steel .It was called "producer gas " .In essence it was free .As things evolved it became more cost efficient to use other methods .

Al_Smith

Throughout history people have always looked for a free or inexpensive source of power usually based on heat .Rudolf Diesel used coal dust on his early engines .Thomas Edison is credited with inventing the rotary concrete kiln which also used coal dust .History left out the fact  it was my great grand father Fred Smith who actually invented it .Later in life great grand dad also owned American non gran brass that  made the engine bearings for the Spirit of St Louis . 

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