The British Steam Car Challenge. Can It Ignite a Steam Powered Renaissance?
by Warren McLaren, Sydney 
on 11. 6.08
At over 7.5 metres (~25ft) long it is unlikely you’ll be driving the kids the school in the British Steam Car any day soon. But then again you probably don’t need a vehicle designed to reach 274 kph (170 mph) for such a purchase. But maybe one day the technology developed for this land rocket might find it’s way into commuter vehicles.
Although powered by steam (enough, it seems, to make 23 cups of tea per second!) it does not exactly run on water. To get the water superheated to 400°C, the British Steam Car chomps down on LPG (or Liquid Petroleum Gas). And to do its thing it can slurp its way through 1,000 litres (1 ton) of water every 25 minutes. So not exactly what you might term ‘environmentally responsible.’ But that’s not to say other steam cars haven’t or won’t be in the future. Read on.
The first record of a self-propelled vehicle capable of transporting people is generally attributed to Frenchman, Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot, for his 1769 three wheeler. But it wasn’t until about the early 1900’s that steam cars really took off commercially. For many years the US Stanley Steamer, as well as holding a land speed record, was also the best selling automobile of its day. Around this time Abner Doble was tweaking his own steam car so that he could get 1500 miles (2400km) from 24-gallon (91 ltr) water tank.
However the ease of use of the Internal Combustion Engine (ICE), which is the cause of so much of our problems today, would soon rule the roost.
Although in the late 1990’s a Volkswagen offshoot, known as Enginion AG, were again developing a steam engine suitable for cars. Their ZEE (Zero Emissions Engine) was also said to be an "oilless" engine with ceramic cylinder linings using steam instead of oil as a lubricant. Unfortunately after seven years of development the company failed to find a manufacturer to commercially produce their engine.
That doesn’t mean it’s ‘all over rover’ for steam engines. Apparently BMW are still tinkering away at a ‘turbosteamer’ hybrid engine that could make their cars 15% more efficient. And maybe the speed demons involved involved the British Steam Car prototype, with its 12 boilers and 3km (1.8 miles) of tubing, will help propel such technology back into the 'mainsteam' -- if we might be allowed such an awful pun.
::British Steam Car Challenge, via Popular Science
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British Steam Car images from their website.
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Why, exactly, should we be promoting a return to steam engines?
All heat engines, steam-powered or ICE included, are terribly inefficient compared to either electric motors or fuel cells. This is basic thermodynamics that we've known for well over a century. Maybe this was the right choice for the particular case of this vehicle, but not for everyone.
And realize, whatever we discover in terms of biofuels or or anything else, the vast majority of this planet's renewable energy is most effectively harvested as electricity, not organic material. Total production of biomass here on earth is significantly less than 100 terrawatts, about 6 times current global primary energy consumption, and that just isn't going to cut it if we want to lift the world's soon-to-be 9 billion people out of poverty and enable everyone to live a wealthy lifestyle like the average American or European does. If you want a global fleet of vehicles to be renewably powered, then they're going to ultimately need to be electric. And if so, why bother boiling water?
Why should we waste more power and more water on this?
Brilliant! The British have learned to make a car that doesn't leak oil by making a car that has no oil!!
God bless British Automotive prowess!
(Tongue in cheek, of course. I love British roadsters, but man do I go through a lot of kitty litter)
I can remember my father telling about how the construction of a steam car was one of his high school projects. I guess the fascination of moving things with steam has never disappeared!
Being a historian of science, I know that simple steam engines are very simple machines and that they can be made to be long-lasting and powerful. Why not advance every type of technology available to us? Are we that sure about what the future holds to limit ourselves to a single technology? Oh wait, I think that we have done for close to a hundred years with the ICE.
Cheers!
Yes, Thad, you're right that we haven't been that smart to use the ICE so exclusively for so long. But what you forget is that we used steam engines just as exclusively for the century or two before that.
Of course we shouldn't limit ourselves to one technology exclusively, especially right now when we really don't know what ideas will pan out and when. But to have a steam powered vehicle you need to carry with you the fuel to produce the steam. The only ways we know of to carry enough energy to power a car are as electrical potential (in batteries or capacitors), as a combustible fuel (fossil, bio, synthetic, or hydrogen-based), or as nuclear fuel (which I certainly don't think we would or should start putting in private vehicles).
We already know that combustible fuels can be used more efficiently in an ICE than a steam engine (we figured that out a century ago). We now know that a fuel cell (esp. with hydrogen) or an electrical generator (like in the volt) is more efficient than an ICE, while providing plenty of power.
And if instead we carry electrical energy in the form of batteries or capacitors, and we already have electrical motors that provide enough power to make a sports car and can reach 90-95% efficiency, why would we instead use the energy to boil water and have the steam to work with efficiency lower than what ICEs get now?
I don't know what the engineering reason was for using steam in the really cool vehicle displayed in the post, nor do I know what the future holds technologically, but I know it doesn't involve steam engines in a billion cars.
Near the end of the steam locomotive era in North America, steam engine averaged at best about a 6% efficiency. Small scale steam is a waste of energy in my opinion.
-Lego
well, lets not forget that most powerplants today (including nuclear) use steam turbines - they can be called steam engines as well. Anyway, the main idea of a steam powered car would be the wide source of combustible fuels it can use. I mean, you can power that puppy with logs if you want. So, if you have the supply handy, you can be independent from fuel prices. Then again, if you have a supply of combustible matter handy, you can turn it into biofuel and use it more efficiently. So I guess main attraction would be low-tech and reliable solutions for the post-industrial survivalist scene. I hope we can do better than that.
By the way, if you want reliable power from any combustion source, a Stirling engine is far superiour in terms of efficiency than a steam engine.
Does the green steam engine really work ? As the inveentor claims.