I’ve done some digging, and it looks like costs can vary a great deal depending upon the engine type. A kit for a Stanely engine will cost you $4K. If you wanted to build your own Doble engine (the best known steam car engine), it looks like it’d cost you $38K or better.
Here’s a discussion on converting your V-8 to steam.
A discussion on steam-electric hybrids.
And Hoodoo Ulove, why would I want a Lycoming? Tucker’s used a Franklin.
Thanks for the links - quite interesting. The first is a rather basic “kit” consisting of little more than the castings and some materials that a machinist would need to build an engine - a lot of time, effort (and probably money) need to be added. And you’d still need a boiler, plumbing, valves, etc.
I learned some other things about Stanley Steamers:
Ten, 20 and 30-hp models were sold. These ratings were the continuous power that the boiler could put out - because the steam stored a lot of energy, bursts of up to (and over) 100 hp were possible. But over a stretch of, say, 15 minutes or more, you were limited to about 35 mph (assuming level ground).
Early models were non-condensing: they got 1 to 2 miles from a gallon of water. Later models were “semi-condensing”: they got up to 10 miles per gallon of water.
Fuel economy was around 10-12 mpg (presumably at the top continuous speed of 35mph).
It was obviously a very interesting car. It’s a bit less obvious that it serves as any sort of model for developing an economical alternative to modern internal-combustion engines.
Stanley steamers, however, aren’t good models if you’re trying to figure out things like fuel economy and performance. The engineering that went into Stanelys was cutting edge when they first debuted, but became obsolete fairly quickly, and the company was slow to adopt (if they ever did) innovations which were standard with other steam car makers. The Doble steam car was the most advanced steamer ever produced (or nearly produced, since Doble’s never went into mass-production) and got much better fuel economy and developed more horsepower than Stanley’s ever did.
Jay Leno took his Doble and ran it through emissions tests in California a couple of years ago. Running kerosene, the Doble had lower emissions than a modern gasolene powered car. Not bad for a car that was over 60 years old.
Don’t forget that when Dobles and Stanleys were being built, the automotive industry was in it’s infantcy and concepts like aerodymics were relatively unknown at the time. Not to mention that cars, while looking lightweight and fragile, were in reality quite heavy, with models outweighing modern cars by as much as a thousand pounds or more. Packards, for example, had engines which weighed almost a ton (and this before power steering had been invented).
If you dig through the massive thread linked to earlier on steam cars, inbetween the shouting, you’ll find numbers being tossed about by Una and another poster, which indicate that there’s a possibility a steamer could produce the same levels of fuel economyas a modern car.
I don’t think that one could take the engine out of a Stanley or a Doble and just drop it into a modern car and get decent fuel economy out of it. But the Carter steam car showed that it was possible to get better than standard fuel economy with a modern designed steam power plant. The investment costs, however, would be quite steep, so that it would be difficult to get a decent return on your investment in a short period of time. Trying to put that into mass-production would be even more costly (car makers routinely spend as much as a billion or more on designing new models which have little more than cosmetic differences than previous models, developing a “new” technology like a steamer and putting it into mass production would cost at least twice as much, I’m sure).
Good point. I kind of ignored T[sub]MIN[/sub] because even if your heat engine is perfect, the lowest you can get is the temperature of the world outside. Plus IC engines get around the whole issue by exhausting their hot gases - T[sub]MIN[/sub] is the gas temperature at the bottom of their power stroke.
T[sub]MAX[/sub] as you say is limited by practical considerations - how high a temperature can you contain in your engine? It’s easiest to have a high T[sub]MAX[/sub] with a diesel - only the cylinder head space sees the peak temperatures, and only intermittently. Gasoline Otto engines are more limited because they have to avoid compression-ignition, which limits their compression ratio and so indirectly their T[sub]MAX[/sub]. And a steam engine has to have the boiler at T[sub]MAX[/sub] for sustained periods, which makes life more difficult in terms of materials technology.
However, steam cars have other efficiency advantages. I’ve already pointed out that they have a fixed T[sub]MAX[/sub] whether they’re running flat out or pootling along in the car park, whereas gasoline (and to a lesser extent diesel) engines have lower T[sub]MAX[/sub] and efficiency at lower power. Arguably you can easily get a low T[sub]MIN[/sub] of 100 deg. C with a steam engine, and possibly even lower in a condensing steam engine with a big radiator. They can run at very low revs, which reduces frictional losses within an engine considerably. Finally, they don’t have to idle at all - they can sit with the boiler at pressure and the burners off.
Good discussion. My only other question is: if you have a condensing-type steam engine, you can use a fluid other than water as a working fluid. The Israelis (ORMAT LTD.) have used ammonia and freon in lowTmax. steam turbines for years (with great success). Could you use freon as the working fluid? That would reduce the weight further, and allow for higher efficiencies at lower pressures.
Supposedly, the late Bill Lear’s foray into steam cars involved the use of a specail working fluid-anyone know what he used?
From what I can recall, working fluids like freon and ammonia are usable only in specalized situations, and wouldn’t work well for an auto. I’ve seen the breakdown on the numbers and water’s far and a way the best fluid for most applications.
This one is brilliant!
hey old timer, i read this in back issues of life magazine. it was a two-toned car driven by two brothers, right? and i think the top speed was 70mph. never read a follow-up on that one though i never tried googling it (you just reminded me after 30 years.)
nah, those were american. wiki tells about the SAAB model (1973) and pelland steamer (1974.)
one thing though: the steam car was superor to the internal combustion-driven car up to the time electric motor-assisted starters were invented in the 1920s.
remember the stanley steamer?
Do zombies run on steam?
No, but they do get amused when someone bumps one of their threads from 6 years ago.
I worked at a garage/gas station from high school through college. One day this dude pulls up in a Stanley. our owner jokes with the guy “I guess you’re not looking for Regular, eh?” Guy did ask if we could spare some water, though.
one thing that caught my eye was how bloody huge the thing was, relative to other cars of the time.
Just out of curiosity, how hard would it be to convert a semi truck to steam ?
Declan
I have read this thread and have not seen this safety issue mentioned. I definitely would not be too comfortable with a boiler of high temp/pressure steam in the engine compartment of a car I was in. It seems to me that a head on collision could cause it to rupture. Now, no one wants a head on collision, but I can not see how havng a boiler explosion thrown in could do anything to improve the experience.
Most steam cars used flash boilers, or water tube boilers, so there was no large tank of above boiling temperature water waiting to explode. This also greatly shortened the required preheat time.