Need for speed, 19th Century style

Just a well designed passive system and a benign climate... Queensland, perfect one day better the next?.... 70m above sea level NE views over the Pacific, sheltered from the cold SW/SE winds, cooled by the summer breezes..... no restrictions on power usage - just use what we want/need to keep comfortable... last bill was 1200 KWH for the preceding 90 days....

 

OK, so you live in Paradise (climatewise, anyway, that really is ideal, you fortunate bathplug ). I noticed you ducked my question.

 

Sometimes she dances (my wife) for me but that just makes me tooooo hot... And cannot find any fans?? - did you mean 7 veils? - - that is my business - private........

 

Back to Fred's question and PAR's comments about modern steam power innovations:

http://www.pritchardpower.com/Our History.html

http://www.amovis.de/en/dampf.htm

Both companies are looking at automotive testing initially, but there doesn't appear to be any reason the technologies could not be adapted for marine use.

 

The problem is still in generating steam.... - - - For the steam engine silly....

 

Pritchard's boiler looks pretty compact, has to be to fit under a Falcon bonnet. The site doesn't give any specifics, though.

Here's a proposed compact boiler:

"This paper describes the design and preliminary testing of a steam boiler suitable for use in a steam engine powered car. The boiler has a nominal rating (based on water entering at 100 °C when producing steam at 40 bar, 400 °C) of 135 kW. The volume of the boiler (excluding the burner) is approximately 0.06 m3, giving a volumetric power density of over 2 MW/m3. Mechanical design of the boiler is such that the operating temperature and pressure may be increased to improve overall system performance."

http://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...serid=10&md5=6ef9c2a509d6e5c2f411fc18e8a62c6e

 

You're not quite alone on that one. count me in.


Also noted in this thread, steam:
Steam is not a (real) problem it can be generated from a boiler, there is not a big problem making a boiler suited for wood, coal, propane gas. As a possible solution, and "fast" take off, a superheater for generating steam can be used (fast, as in approx 10 minutes). that superheater will need gas, in the starting period, but the boiler can then be switched over to wood/ pellets or whatever, you only need a fire...

One funny thing about most steam engines; max torque at minimum speed.

Steam for mr.average; Nag Nag (me...).
Handling a boiler is not for fools, I've noted as the TV programs get more stupid, the newspapers get more orientated towards fame, and papparazzi targets, we tend to be let's say comfortably numb. What the average Joe normally wants is something he can put a key into, engage, drive, brain unengaged...
A boiler is not a thing, it's a creature, it can take you places, where you intend, or straight to St.Peter (or to the furnaces of Hell).
I've seen a 2 year old boiler to go scrapmetal due to bad water treatment and neglect in operation - 2 years!

And here's the catch....
If I remember correctly 1 bar of dynamite expands to 730 ltrs of gas, (okay where's this fool goin now, with his arguments...)
Please read this, carefully:
You need only 3-4 litres of water, overheated, at 12 bar pressure to replace that with 1 bar of dynamite.... Got your attention there eh?
Now to the scenario: A boiler is in fact a wound up spring, It's not an explosion waiting to happen, it's already happened, but the steel is your friend ("Steel is Strong, and God is Good") The steel keeps all of these unvanted alternative experiences in place. A small boiler for a boat would have, mnjaa, letssee, 60 litres (really small) thats equivalent to 20 bars of dynamite if something goes wrong.

Ok you're in a boat, steam operated, not alone, the boiler is not propery maintained, a standing boiler, let's assume they have not blown off the setteling water for a while, that will result in some shoepolish looking stuff at the bottom of the boiler, this will act as insulation, The steel in the furnace room will not be "cooled" from the water in the boiler. Steel temperature in the furnace of the boiler will rise, higher temperature, lower yield strength in the steel....
Now, one of the kids have a birthday, so instead of taking all these noisy little people to Mc Donalds, you take them out on the water for a different experience... Operation is "normal", pressure is normal,
and then the furnace room in the boiler caves in....
A perfect recipie for a bad day, is parts of steel flying around, "high speed steel" suddenly get a strange twist to the understanding of it, add some steam at scolding temperature (scolding by steam cannot be described -period), add a sinking/ burning boat to that again.... Can't get too much more interesting than that.

Personally I would never have a problem with a steam engine/ boiler, I openly admit I'm partly nerd. So a boiler/ steam solution is in my opinion perfectly ok for a tech nerd. Most brainless people should however never be let close to a boiler, much too close to a Darwin award experience.

And the youth factor (been there, done that), if you feel it's not going fast enough, you can always knock the safetyvalves down, all you need is a piece of wood, remove the cap of the safety valves, place the wood on top of the spindle, force the wood against the roof; Voila! "anyboy wants to go waterskiing?" (seen that... )

How far a steam engine solution can go? Just put some braincells to the problem, read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doble_Steam_Car

Take todays technology, pressure switches, PH indicators, O2 measuring equipment, safety valves, and burst discs with venting to safe area, Something that measures the scale thickness, put that in a 100% foolproof box: I'm in, even with the fool mentioned above, "behind the wheel".

Btw; when I die, I know where i'll be going.....

 

There may be a potential for steam yet, but the same things that doomed it 100 years ago still haunt it today. Weight, startup time and fuel stores, not to mention boilers that can go boom. Leaving aside the blowing up boiler thing, this new engine does address the massive weight within the system issue, but you still have fuel stores, start up time and boiler weight problems to contend with.

Boiler weight pretty much cancels out the gains made with the dramatically lower weight engine. Even though there has been a weight reduction in the engine/boiler combo, the modern world will not wait even a few minutes to build up a head of steam. They've got to drop it in gear after "cranking it over" and go. This coupled with having to really monitor gauges (or else) just is a death nail to low power steam applications.

With computer organized controls, you could take the operator out of the loop in regard to systems management, but this brings us full circle back to start up time, fuel stores weight (and volume) and critical decision making when a system failure is detected. Even the most automatic systems usually require people to intervene at certain points along the critical failure curve. This is a difficult option if the system is nearly autonomous.

My electrical load isn't particularly high. I live on the 28 parallel, which places me in a sub tropical environment. Charlie is correct in that we meter KWH. With the size of my house and barn, I'm fairly far under the norm. The usage was much higher, when I got here, but I balanced out the 6 different panels, tossed in some diodes, sealed things up and placed high but non-essential loads on timers, to curb their continued draw when not needed. This coupled with programmable thermostats have reduced the KWH use by about 30%.

I've given serious thought the to the prospect of using a solar boiler to drive a 12K generator with this light weight engine (likely about 20HP). This would eliminate my electric bill, plus some, if driven around 6 hours a day. One thing Charlie and I have in abundance is sunshine, maybe 350 days of the year. Putting it to work making steam to drive this little engine sounds reasonable, but more importantly cost effective, which is the biggest stumbling block to many alternate energy sources.

Wind generators can work, but they need at least 10 steady knots (plus zoning), everyday, which isn't common, where I'm at. Then the initial costs take many years to pay down with the energy savings. Solar is worse in this regard.

This is why I like the idea of sun powered boilers and a simple steam engine. The initial cost is modest, water can come from a well (I have two on the property now), sunshine is intense and daily, up keep appears modest and developing a size that can take me off the grid is within grasp with a single unit, not several wind mills or many banks of solar panels.

 

Steam used correctly is an extremely good carrier of energy (can I phrase it like that?). But as mentioned, also dangerous.

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/07/18/buildings-evacuated-after-midtown-explosion/

or;

http://images.google.no/images?hl=no&q=steam boiler explosion&btnG=Søk etter bilder&gbv=2

Look at the spagetti at the first picture...

But to point out (midtown -explosion); to have a 24" steam pipe from 1924 buried in a way that makes it more or less impossible to inspect (/pressure test?). That is hardly not "Sound Engineering Practice"...

Christ, Osama Bin Laden can take a vacation....

1924 and 24"......

 

That does it, now I have to dry up the keyboard, forgot to close my mouth there for too long time.

btw, I like most of these lines, think of modern materials....

 

Paul,

Good thinking. I'm convinced a solar boiler would work and pay back within a reasonable time, particularly in view of the projected increases in US electricity charges (pun unintended). Be careful and treat your feedwater. Even seemingly "sweet" well water has far too many dissolved minerals for boiler use.

 

Well, you ought to be able to. A fuel cell (i.e. hydrogen) is just an energy carrier, just like a normal battery can be thought to be a carrier of energy. Neither of those are energy sources, but "merely" a way to store the energy produced.
So, yes, steam is certainly an energy carrier.

Now, caveat emptor, I'm the guy who apparently ends sentences with a preposition, so nothing I say makes sense


Edit: I did a search on "energy carrier" and "steam", and I found a - to a pure amateur like me - great link. Not so much because of the energy carrier-information, but because it shows a modern "steam plant", and examples of products that were manufactured with the help of steam:

http://www.spiraxsarco.com/resource...rials/introduction/steam-the-energy-fluid.asp

 

That flaw in your English posting is something up with which we will not put.

 

Well done!!