A steam powered Model T? On Craigslist for the person who needs everything. (2024)

FAQs

Is a steam-powered car possible? ›

Steam engines powered the earliest cars, and steam vehicles outsold gasoline-powered cars into the 1900s. Steam power was safe, reliable, and familiar to Americans, although the range of steam-powered automobiles was limited by the amount of fuel and water they could carry.

By the 1850s there was a flurry of new steam car manufacturers. Development was hampered by adverse legislation (the UK Locomotive Acts from the 1860s as well as the rapid development of internal combustion engine technology in the 1900s) leading to the commercial demise of steam-powered vehicles.

The earliest steam-powered car we know about was finished as early as 1769 by French inventor Nicolas Cugnot. It was a large three-wheeled vehicle that moved at the speed of a walk and was meant to haul cannon.

A steam boiler with a diameter 23" produced the steam that powered the vehicle. The boiler's nominal operating steam pressure is 600 pounds. They ran on any combustible material and water, produced large amounts of torque, were quiet and light, had few parts and did not require gears.

On Aug. 25, Charles Burnett III smashed a record that had stood for more than a century: the land-speed record for a steam-powered car. On a track at Edwards Air Force Base in California, Burnett was clocked at up to 151 m.p.h. (243 km/h) in his British Steam Car, which is 25 ft.

Steam cars had fewer moving parts than gasoline powered cars. Also steam cars are very quiet. A major disadvantage is that a steam car has to "fire up" its boiler (has to get up to operating temperature). This can take as much as 20 minutes before the car can move.

In the 20th century, the rapid development of internal combustion engine technology led to the demise of the steam engine as a source of propulsion of vehicles on a commercial basis, with relatively few remaining in use beyond the Second World War.

1925 Dobles Model E Steam Car was fairly high priced in 1925 at $18,000. It featured a steam engine that could produce 1,000 ft-lbs of torque and could reach operating temperature using kerosene burners in as little as 90 seconds.

Operating a steam car took several steps. These included checking the water level in the boiler, priming and igniting the fuel source (usually kerosene), and waiting until the pressure allowed the engine to run. Since this process could take more than a half hour, there was no running a quick errand into town!

Steam engines remained the dominant source of power until the early 20th century, when advances in the design of the steam turbine, electric motors and internal combustion engines gradually resulted in the replacement of reciprocating (piston) steam engines, with merchant shipping relying increasingly upon diesel ...

How does a steam train reverse? ›

Steam (later, compressed air) powered reversing gears were developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Typically, the operator worked a valve that admitted steam to one side or the other of a cylinder connected to the reversing mechanism until the indicator showed the intended position.

The 1924 model Doble Series E steam car could run for 1,500 miles (2,400 km) before its 24-gallon water tank needed to be refilled; even in freezing weather, it could be started from cold and move off within 30 seconds, and once fully warmed could be relied upon to reach speeds in excess of 90 miles per hour (140 km/h) ...

Due to its big boiler and furnace, a steam engine is huge, heavy and clumsy. Since the boiler of a steam engine is very heavy, therefore, a steam engine cannot be used for running small vehicles like cars and buses. Moreover, a steam engine does not start at once.

“It was no longer efficient for railroads to use steam locomotives to pull things. Then they start to become more specialized and can only thrive in one or just a few areas pulling heavy things and maybe moving longer distances.”

There are around 200 steam locomotives still operable in the United States in 2022. Preserving those existing steam locomotives has become an important mission for locomotive enthusiasts.