Greetings

Greetings,

My name is John Geelhoed and I recently became a member of the SACA.

A couple of years ago, I was bit by the steam bug and have been working with and on traction engines here in Iowa and on a couple of trips on vacation in England.

My long turn goal is to design and re-power a “modern” tractor (1950-60’s) using steam with higher efficiency’s then the traction engines I have been around. Prodding around on the internet opened my eyes to what had already been done in the early 1900’s. I found the SACA site and am slowly working my way through reading the discussions on the forums. I am delighted with the wealth of knowledge the group represents and hope to come to the September meeting hoping some of this will rub off on me.

Hi John,

You might want to google Bryan steam tractor. They were made in the 20's with an interesting boiler design. Could be a good platform for you project.

Keith

Welcome John,

Bill G.

Hi John.

Here are some patents relating to the International Harvester steam tractor of the early 1920s. For best performance a higher circulation ratio pump could replace or supplement the ejector. Overall this looks quite a bit more sophisticated than the average steam project....of the 1960s and 70s.

Two were made before almost all experimental work was dumped in order to fixate on a product to compete with the Fordson. See image below and compare to drawings, the other engine's condenser looked just like the patent drawings.



Regards,

Ken



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 07/29/2015 07:43PM by frustrated.

Hi John,

I forgot to give you my "official" greetings as President of SACA. As a group we are always happy to have new members and even happier to make their acquaintance. I hope you can make it to Berrien Springs this September, am looking forward to meeting you in person.

Regards,

Ken Helmic,

Hi John,

I forgot to give you my "official" greetings as President of SACA. As a group we are always happy to have new members and even happier to make their acquaintance. I hope you can make it to Berrien Springs this September, am looking forward to meeting you in person.

Regards,

Ken Helmick

All,

Thanks for the welcome and interesting information.
I am still reading through the various forum discussions and plan to make it to the September meet.

John

Interesting patents Ken. The steam automatic, unlike Stanley's version is either on or off rather than modulating as the Stanley's does in practice. That is a significant improvement which makes the burner fire or not fire instead of half firing. The Model T Ford steam special here in the UK uses a Stanley vaporising burner which is fueled by an electric pump with a definate on and off action - it works brilliantly. French aimed for the same result by mechanical means.

Both pilot and main burner are supplied by a carburettor style jet and venturi with a pumped spillover constant head fuel supply. Might have been a bit tricky on steep hills!

The circulation, apart from the use of an injector rather than pump is very Lamont. I see the back pressure in the coil circuit needs the water feed pump to supply at 200psi over the working pressure to get the desired water and steam velocity in the coils - this might use a few amps. As a matter of curiosity I wonder what the pressure is in Stanley feed pumps delivering to a pot boiler at 600psi?

Mike

Hi Mike,

Water spouting from a nozzle reaches its highest velocity somewhere between 150 and 200 PSI, below that pressure you aren't getting your money's worth and above it you are wasting power. French is using this flow in his jet pump to force circulation and fortunately it's an engine driven pump.

First of all, I should note that the circulation ratio is probably higher than it looks because he forces the feed water through a preheater coil before introducing it to the nozzle, that heating expands the water and produces some steam, both of which accentuate the jet pump action.

The French boiler has come in for some criticism because the recirculation is not as high as a Lamont and is only available when the boiler is being fed, unlike Lamont. While this is true I find these criticisms unfair for a few reasons. First of all, the date and sophistication of the hardware. Patent #1,703,228 was filed in 1922 and granted in 1929. This wasn't a paper design, the power plant had been undergoing testing (as the patent makes clear) for a while and French's US military draft card shows he was working for IH in 1918...about when the project started.

Compare this patent to Lamont's aircraft boiler patent #1,545,668 filed in 1918 and issued in 1925 and his automotive boiler #1,920,907 filed in 1927 and issued in 1933; neither is anywhere near as practical or as fleshed out --- it's an open question whether the patents reflect hardware that was ever built and tested. What some insist on calling a Lamont boiler (unfairly because forced recirculation predated his birth) is far more developed in French's hands at this date than were Lamont's efforts.

Perhaps more notable is that many consider the Doble to be the premier automobile boiler of the day. There is little doubt that the French boiler with the drum and forced circulation has the potential for better output and reliability; then consider he was forced to stop about the time Doble Steam Motors got rolling.

I find that burner fascinating. If you look at the SES burner carefully you find that it has many similarities including a radial flame distribution. With the vaporization means provided it should have been very unusual for the day .... a fan driven, blue flame, vaporizing burner rather tan the less clean and efficient atomizing.

Sorry if I seem to be going on-and-on with great enthusiasm but French later went to Coats and then Endurance with Staley as an advisor; I have little doubt we would have seen some remarkable developments if they hand managed to secure the kind of funding others had.

Regards,

Ken

frustrated Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Hi Mike,
> Sorry if I seem to be going on-and-on with great
> enthusiasm but French later went to Coats and then
> Endurance with Staley as an advisor; I have little
> doubt we would have seen some remarkable
> developments if they hand managed to secure the
> kind of funding others had.
>
> Regards,
>
> Ken


Don't worry Ken it's very illuminating and food for thought.
Mike

Mike,
Fear not, Ken and I certainly burned up the e-mails going into the French-Staley concepts vs.the Doble Series D and E ongoing developments at the same time. We had not only a great deal of fun. but the education we got was eye opening. The long held idea that Abner was the supreme steam car designer is sadly mistaken. Quite honestly, French was a far better engineer with a much broader and more correct grasp of what was needed than Abner.
These two brilliant engineers far surpassed Abner in many areas, especially French with his post mix vaporizing burners and his semi, for want of a better term, Lamont type of steam generators and their control.

That the Endurance steam car apparently never got beyond the one prototype was the crime if the century.
Sure we will find some hardware improvements to be made today; but for that entire era, the Endurance was far superior to anything else. The car is certainly worthy of intensive study and understanding.
Jim

Hi Jim.

In all fairness to Doble.

What we see in the comparison is the same problem we face today. It takes a lot of money to do the research. What we see with Doble is production supported research in a startup. It was the best one could buy. But not the best that could be done. On the other hand a much better design that stalled and didn't make it to market.

In Doble's time there was no Internet with the information access we have today. No computer aided design. Doble is not an isolated case of reinventing the wheel and coming up short. It's to easy to judge in hindsite.

There are so many things involved in a good design. The success or failure is in the details. But also other factors such as sales and finance are just as important.

Today we do not have the research on piston steam engines to know if a high compression counter flow engine is as efficient as a uniflow. In "The Uniflow Engine" book we have it compared to a Corliss engine that is not all that significantly different in performance. True the uniflow had better efficiency. But the Corliss was not running as high a compression. The uniflow was simpler and less costly to produce.

I think there is potential for a high efficiency positive displacement wide power range steam engine.

Andy

Andy,
Perhaps Scott or Ken ought to create a new entry, the Doble stuff is far too complicated to keep it under this heading. Production didn't come close to paying for the research. The Series E chassis sold at first for $8,500.00, later $6,500.00, while the actual cost was $43,000.00 according to both Warren Doble and Marc Lothrop.
Jim



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/03/2015 08:36PM by Jim Crank.

Jim, I agree.

My point was that information technology has and still is advancing exponentially. We could reach a point of catastrophic collapse because of rapid technology changes. But that's not the point here.

In Doble's time information of new developments were slow to propagate. Even now Doble information is in only a few hands. And the details even more rare.

I havn't seen a thermodynamics book older then 1935 that actually covered the various processes with a rigorous mathematical aproach.

Andy

That modern steam tractor idea is amazing.....They actually have Massey Ferguson steam tractor from South Africa(during the 50's several African countries were trying do make steam tractors that were competitive with modern gas tractors in 30 to 40hp range.)As usual Preston steam Products is charging about 2 to 3 times .What this club would have listed it for in the steam club classified.
Have trouble finding it now, but it didn't have the three point hitch like tractors it was competing against.
If bryan had done that it would have been taking out 100hp modern gas tractors today.
Does anybody know if Chuk still has the pieces of the Bryan engine that someone can scan and do at least the casting patterns ...if not the castings.

Hi Arnold
Can you give me a link to this steam Massey Ferguson tractor? Outside of USA I am aware of Dr Moulton's design which was never built, and the Chinese tractors of the 1950's but no others of this period.
Cheers Brian

There a few engines out there if you got the money.
I’d say 10K could get you an engine.
Rolly

I saw an amish horse implement company that builds a three point hitch powercarts that go from grounddrive to 90hp implement.Originally saw them about 20 years ago and forgot them.Check last night and they still around...quess the horse farmers are still alive and well.Apparently some steam tractor guys figured out how install a hydraudilic "pto pump" that would drive the
a hydraulic motor on the powercart instead of the gas and diesel engines.
For what it is worth ,they are :
I&J Manufacture
5302 Amish Rd.
Gap,PA. 17527

What I saw was 4.5 " scale model on Preston Steam products back in Britain....
They a named who designed it, but it went in one ear and out the out on memory.
Me I has been kicking around among noumerous unfullfilled dreams converting a 14hp. Kubota compact tractor to turbine
power.The changes over time with steam efficiency from when steam tractor were first built with about 5-10% to 40%+ at the electric utility company.A "3hpboiler" using piston rating would power a 12-24hp turbine running 40% efficiency.
Ironically the model gasturbines ,I was going to use were also British ...Wren and Jetcat running on 30 psi recirculating steam with the turbine literally condensing the steam.( any rate if GE can do it at utility plants all over the globe,why not a hobby steamer at home.)

Rolly Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> There a few engines out there if you got the
> money.
> I’d say 10K could get you an engine.
> Rolly


So Rolly, does that mean you have or know of one for sale?

Keith

So Rolly, does that mean you have or know of one for sale?

Keith

No
As far as I know, no one is offering one for sale.

There are six engines not in use that I know of.
Most likely there are more.
There are about eight running tractors also out there.

A 30 HP Stanley type 8 engine is larger and just as tuff.
Two I know of went for 35K
It’s not a cheep hobby.

Rolly

Hi Arnold
Take everything you read on the Preston Steam Services site with a pinch of salt.
What you saw was a model design that was published in the Model Engineer during the 1990's It was the designer 's vision of what a modern steam tractor would aspire to. Nothing to do with anything actually built for Africa or anywhere else. There are a few of these 3" models around but I can't remember why they were called Caradoc.
Got the magazines somewhere and know it's going to annoy me now.
Brian

Rolly,

Every hobby I have is not cheap, boats, ham radio, pipe organs and steam cars , go figure...lol

Keith

All,

The Bryant cylinder block casting in the picture of Rolly's post, is that available to reverse engineer?
If it is a steel casting, I can make a pattern and work with a local foundry to produce a casting(s).
If it is cast iron, or ductile iron I have no local resource.
Producing sleeves and valves out of ductile bar stock is certainly possible
I am interested in designing and building a (perhaps revised) copy of the Bryant engine design.
I hope to discuss this in great depth at the meet.

John Geelhoed

John-

The sliced Bryan block is mine, and it is cast iron. Unfortunately, some guy with no experience tried to repair a small crack-which resulted in numerous cracks that he chased all over the block-brazing as he went.

The block is available for measurement and pattern work-all I want out of the deal is a usable casting!

Chuk

John
The Bryan block is a cast iron casting and the core work is very complicated .
I have drawn the out side in 3D but not the inside cores
A few yeas later Chuk Williams let me cut a bad section of his block in half to get the valve sleeve to do the drawing but I did not do the cores.
Rolly

Rolly,

Looks nice.
I am using SolidWorks, is that what you are using?
If you have some idea about wall thickness from the actual section one should be able to design a core and core boxes.
The pattern work and molds are expensive for a hobby...........
Personally I thought about machining a fabricated steel block and sleeving with cast or ductile iron.
Realizing that there is a relative big difference in thermal expansion, but what is your thought on using 6061 or 7075 aluminum and sleeving that?
New to this, I am not sure if anyone uses aluminum as long as you don't get too high of an operating temperature. I think that 7075-T6 anneals around 800F, so aluminum is probably not a viable material choice

John

John
I think you should forget it.
You can build up a very strong engine with a Nergaard Stanley piston valve block same bore and stroke as the Bryan. Use a box frame and 4140 cranks
Rolly
I use Autodeck inventor.
And am not very good at it.

Good Evening, John and welcome to SACA!

If you have not yet found the Virtual Steam Car Museum, let me invite you visit. I'd be happy to add you to the VSCM monthly email list. The July/August issue is about to come out.

Vintage Steam Products carries a wide range of tools and materials and parts for Stanley Steam Cars. Carolyn and I purchased the company from the late Art Hart.

The forthcoming biography of Hector Halhead "Steam" Stewart has an extensive section on the Bryan Steam Tractor. Stewart came to America in 1924 and spent three months in Newton helping to design the new 1925 SV Stanley. He visited everyone who was anyone in America and did stop in Peru, IN. As late as 1938/39 he was corresponding with Bryan about building the tractor in New Zealand.

Yes, we are still accepting donations to help publish the book. 160,000 words and 450+ Illustrations. It goes to the book designer on July 7th.

Best wishes!

Don Hoke

Thanks Don.

I will send you a pm with my e-mail.
I am certainly impressed with everyone's enthusiasm in the steam automotive field. There are lots of people I know involved in traction engines, but am not aware of this much broad interaction between fellow "traction engine engineers".
Not sure if you are coming to the September meet, but if you are I hope to meet you there.

John Geelhoed.

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