Cosmopolitan Chronicle

politan Chro Cosmo nicle

VOL. III, No. 23 San Diego, Alta California, August 14, 2009 Price: Free

Steam Power steam, which escapes out the in 1769 patented his design, spout. Holding a pinwheel in which had a separate condenser William F. Mennell front of the escaping steam connected with a valve, and

San Diego Coast District will spin the pinwheel. While could be cool while the cylinder Services Manager this example is easy to see, it was hot. The main drawback has some obvious drawbacks, to Watt’s engine was that it he Parsons Brothers, you have to hold the pinwheel used a push/pull operation on who were Albert in the hot steam, and it is a pump, and most factories ran T Seeley’s contractors in far too small to operate any on circular motion like a water 1869 had a shop was driven equipment capable of much wheel would produce. by steam powered engines. work. It certainly would not Thomas Edison may have Although the driving force drive a train up a mountain. gleaned one of his best ideas of the Industrial Revolution, No one person invented the from Watt, an “invention shop.” powering everything from steam engine. The first crude Watt, like Edison almost 200 ships to factories to mining steam engine was patented year later, hired bright minds operations, to locomotives, in 1698 by Thomas Savery, to invent and improve existing steam power today is an English military engineer machines and devices. William considered almost obsolete. and inventor. He wanted Murdoch was one of those But on August 25, 2009 a new an engine that would pump minds, and he designed a gear land speed record of 137.84 water out of coal mines. His system converting the push/ mph average was set -- in two engine was based on Denis pull of Watt’s engine to circular official runs of 136 mph, and Papin’s 1679 pressure cooker motion. The gear system was 151 mph -- by “The World’s called “Digester.” Next, in later refined into a connecting Fastest Kettle.” This broke 1712, Thomas Newcomen rod and flywheel. Gasoline the old record of 127 mph together with John Calley built powered internal combustion set in 1906 by American Fred their first engine to be used engines used in autos today use Marriott in a modified version for the same purpose. James connecting rods and flywheels of the Stanley Steamer, “The Watt, a Scottish inventor and to do the same task, convert locomotive of the highways.” mechanical engineer, (when push/pull motion of cylinders The purpose of a steam you hear the word Watt, as in into circular motion. engine is to convert the a 100 Watt bulb, it is named potential energy of steam into after James Watt) was assigned work. The most basic example to repair one of Newcomen’s can be done with a tea kettle and engines, and noted it was not a pinwheel. When the water in extremely efficient. He worked the kettle is boiling, it produces to improve the design, and