Anyone recognize?

Interesting engine, anyone know what it is?

Real nice looking workmanship. Unfinished, Looks English.

Rolly

The base casting of this engine reminded me of a three cylinder compound engine I designed thirty years ago. I never built the engine; it took me two years to figure out how to build the core boxes and patterns. Big learning curve for me at that time.
Attached is the drawings of the one piece cylinder block.

Rolly

Hi Rolly,

Looks good! I always liked compound recips with more than one LP piston -- it keeps the mismatch in reciprocating forces under much better control. I also like that it makes the proportions a bit more regular, which simplifies installation.

Regards,

Ken

Ken -
You failed to mention that Jay Leno is looking to identify this engine. Yes, I received the latest Bulletin where Tom Kimmel visited Jay Leno. Can you attach the top view of the cylinder, pictures please.

According to the article, Jay sort of thought it came from the White steam car history. I agree by looking at the head design, shape and from a top view. It very much reminds me of the two (2) cylinder compound in the White Steam Car. I think that is the secret, that head design is the key to it's heritage.

I cannot think of any off shoots from the White Company. The only other avenue would be the offs of Doble like Besler or even Williams...just a thought.

Cheers,
Rick

Hi Rick,

I was a CC on the photos and didn't expressly have permission to include Jay's likeness, so I just showed the engine.

One guess seems to be that these came from a Delling, since the configuration appears a bit closer to what we know of that car, but there's not enough out there to be definitive.

The photos were recently taken by Tom Kimmel, I was mostly trying to get photos of the only remaining Baker steamer. If the car is largely original, and I have no solid reason to suppose it is not, then most of the Baker advertising was misleading. The engine was not the Stevens semi-uniflow (which is a fascinating patent showing how you can turn a piston or slide valve DA engine into a semi-uniflow with just a few small modifications). The engine was a modified Stanley with a dog clutch on the rear axle, a different power takeoff to drive the fuel and water pumps, and basically Stanley boiler controls fitted to the Baker boiler rather than the patented Baker controls. Piecing all the press coverage together, I have to conclude that Baker simply didn't get enough of the plant into operation so as to build the full car. It appears they purchased cars from another manufacturer and only managed to manufacture boilers and some modifications to the Stanley power plant. It's ironic that the car seemingly only has a Stanley style vaporizing burner because the only way the Baker company managed to turn a profit was by building fan-driven oil burners, as did other steam car companies such as Doble-Detroit and Scott-Newcomb. The dog clutch was a good addition to the Stanley engine, especially in mountainous territory. Given that Pike's Pead dominates the skyline behind the Baker factory, it's probably a given that they addressed the issue.

The only other two images of the three cylinder engine, which I possess, aren't real informative but I've appended them below.

Regards,

Ken

Hey Ken,

The old Navy designers seem to agree with you. The battleship Texas has two triple-expansion engines, with a pair of 83" diameter low pressure cylinders. Just a bit bigger than this case.

Tom H

This picture just came in my e-mail. The sender is trying to determine the make of car, it was believed to have been photographed in Canada. I marked a few characteristics that I thought might help. There seems to be what might be a flue on the upper backside of the vehicle. I see no louvers on the body. The dash is a bit higher than typical, but not excessive. The seatback is not one piece, nor is it held on with the almost cliche spindles -- there appears to be two vertical braces holding it in place.

Can anyone identify this machine? It sure seems familiar, but I can't put my finger on it. Any help would be appreciated.

Regards,

Ken

Do you think it is a Dos-a'-dos?

From that angle, I would have to flip a coin as to whether it is a dos-a-dos or a runabout. I used to be a lot more assertive about this sort of thing but, over the years, I have been tricked too often by perspective and details hidden just out of sight in photos.

Hart, Victoria

I would say your mystery attachment is an earlier version of the Hart Steam Victoria Four-Seater. Note the front springs are longitudinal, not transverse. Also, the rear view is very similar.

I would say the Hart attached here is a later version with a phantom body style.

I would further confirm the 4-seater by virtue of the side exhaust you point out.

This is my take...I could be all wet.

The 1901 Kidder has the same square holes on the sides of the rear body.

Rolly

Hi Rolly,

I hadn't known that the Kidder had flues in the side of the body -- probably need to go back and look at the patent drawings more closely. That's a second car so equipped, and it looks closer to the photo than any Toledo that I ever saw. The strange thing in that photo is that there appear to be manifolds over the flue. I know that a lot of the earliest steamers had problems with strong winds squelching the burner -- I believe Locomobile had a couple of patents covering just that issue. Maybe those were windbreaks.

At the moment, I am sort of assuming that the photo either covers and unknown vehicle (lots of steam car startups in the early auto magazines had no photographs, usually because the cars were still under fabrication). Or, as you said, some builders just stuck on whatever body was handy -- I hadn't realized that George Whitney never made any two cars alike -- undoubtedly a hold over from his experience building steam launches; to the best of my knowledge, carriage and buggy builders tended to standardize -- which is understandable given that they had to build more units and charge less than a boat builder...

As far as the photo goes, your suggestions of it looking like a Breen or a Century were interesting. I hadn't noticed the resemblance to a Breen but I had thought of a Century even before you mentioned it. Who knows, we may identify it yet. Some years back, I asked Bulletin readers to identify a steam vehicle circa 1920 -- and got no replies. A few years later I ran into it -- purely by accident -- reading an old logging magazine on Google Books, only to find that Tim Nye had also recently stumbled over the Phoenix log hauler powered by a Winslow boiler.

Regards,

Ken



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/23/2022 11:46AM by frustrated.

The 1901 Locomobile also used a square exhaust outlet. Not the same configuration I did extensive work making this 1901 Locomobile run. The burner was all wrong as well as the vaporizer. The boiler tubes all had to be re rolled to keep it tight.

George Whitney held the Patent on the glass water column till Locomobile bought it from Whitney. Locomobile had bought the patterns from Stanley for the car then sold the patterns and business back to Stanley. Stanley never used the water column on his cars.

Rolly



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/24/2022 05:24AM by Rolly.

Hi Rolly,

That is a new one on me, thanks for sharing. I am used to Locomobiles that have a T-shaped cylindrical exhaust on top of the rear deck.



Given that there were supposedly over 200 steam car builders, the variations have to be huge.

Regards,

Ken

All files from this thread

File Name	File Size		Posted by	Date
unknown1.jpg	340.7 KB	open | download	frustrated	06/10/2021	Read message
unknown2.jpg	547.4 KB	open | download	frustrated	06/10/2021	Read message
ENG0008.jpg	90.9 KB	open | download	Rolly	06/11/2021	Read message
ENG0014.jpg	60.3 KB	open | download	Rolly	06/11/2021	Read message
ENG0015.jpg	91 KB	open | download	Rolly	06/11/2021	Read message
a.jpg	290.2 KB	open | download	frustrated	07/01/2021	Read message
b.jpg	277.5 KB	open | download	frustrated	07/01/2021	Read message
IDENTIFY.png	601.7 KB	open | download	frustrated	10/20/2022	Read message
1901_Kidder_Steam_Runabout.jpg	60.5 KB	open | download	Rolly	10/22/2022	Read message
Bob Driving his Locomobile-1.jpg	156.4 KB	open | download	Rolly	10/23/2022	Read message
water glass.jpg	91.4 KB	open | download	Rolly	10/23/2022	Read message
new vaporizer tubes.JPG	862.1 KB	open | download	Rolly	10/23/2022	Read message
new cable end caps .JPG	841.6 KB	open | download	Rolly	10/23/2022	Read message