Ed Blakeman's Homemade Steam Engine

Ed had developed mobile home parks for a living in Michigan and then retired in Florida. Along the way he popularized the spinning cup burner, which was not well-known at the time and he constructed a full size complex Doble Triple engine using solenoid actuated poppet valves. I have the parts complete and dissembled from the Doble engine and do not know that it ever ran much or successfully. Many have considered an electro-magnet (solenoid) to control the valving in a steam engine as changing the cutoff would then be very simple. However, what most people do not know is that the problem is always in the degaussing of the iron armature, which means it is easy to make an electro-magnet actuate, but difficult to demagnetize the iron core fast enough to get any speed out of the engine. Here is a little home made steam engine made mostly from off the shelf parts. No castings were required and not much milling. The crank was built up, but without any journal or wrist pin (gudgeon to U. K. people) bearings and provision for their lubrication. The hydraulic control valve is a good basic design as it is a spool or piston valve, which is what Doble and Besler used. But, I have not taken it apart to see if there are any “O” rings that will not stand high heat in there. And, it is not clear that it is any other than 100% cutoff. The steam and exhaust lines are in the same very long tube and thus the incoming steam is cooled, making it inefficient. Also, it adds a great deal to the clearance volume, another negative. The piston and valve require lubrication, which would be a steam oil injector. The moral of the story is that a new steam person seldom (never ?) comes up with a fully developed good idea right from the get-go. One needs to make something first and then to run it for a while to test longevity of the components and then do an efficiency test with a prony brake. On the other hand, if a person is planning on doing something, anything, in the steam area they should start by making something or doing something. It is always a learning experience. One does not have to design and make the perfect steam engine from the first try, just make something that runs on compressed air and moves and makes noise. One starts with small successes before getting into a complex steam power plant.