Morris Minor Owners Club

I've been searching Google for images and found this - http://www.steamcar.net/car-reg/moore.jpg
Makes an interesting change to a A Series engine

Paul Humphries

Looks like there are still some A-series bits in there though! I recognize that rockergear

Why does it still have a radiator ?

bmcecosse wrote:Why does it still have a radiator ?

Possibly to condense the steam back to water ?
Water is a consumable in a steam vehicle so needs topping up.
MAYBE the idea is try and "recycle" to reduce number of water fill ups.
I like stream power (I want to make a small steam powered outboard for my dinghy !) so a steam powered Minor, to me, is brilliant.

Paul Humphries.

Nah - I don't buy the condenser idea. Sure this isn't a 1st April posting ?

bmcecosse wrote:Nah - I don't buy the condenser idea. Sure this isn't a 1st April posting ?

The car is on the Steam Car of UK web site and details are show as -

Morris Minor Special-1971-"The Windrush Moggie".
Mr David Moore.
Notinghamshire.

Looking at photo's on the site it seems other steam car have radiators.

Paul Humphries

Condensers are fairly common on steam cars. As well as reducing the water consumption, they increase the efficiency of the system because the condensate is already very hot before you feed it back into the boiler.

what heats the water to make the steam?

The guy in the passenger seat must spend ages shovelling Coal?

wibble_puppy wrote:what heats the water to make the steam?

Some of them are petrol fired, believe it or not, but they're a bit of a hassle to get started because you need to pre-heat the vapouriser coil before you can fire the burner up. LPG would probably be a good choice these days because you could use the type of tank and filler fitting that allows you to fill them up at many petrol stations, and you can fire it straight up with no hassle. A flash steam boiler takes very little time to heat up and start producing steam, so you needn't be sat on the drive for half an hour before you can set off.

Ok you guys you will probably have a good laugh at this but could you use the original A-series engine to run on steam straight away??

If you took off the inlet manifold and manufactured a new one onto which you coulld connect an air supply. Then with huge alteration to the timing could you not have it so that when the inlet valve opens the pressure is released into the cylinder driving the piston down. when the piston reaches the bottom the inlet valve closes and the exhaust valve opens to release the pressure and allow the cylinder to travel to the top again for the next cycle.

Problems i can see is:
- Number of strokes per a cycle (would need a completely new cam shaft re-designed not just altering the timing of the old one)?
- Inlet valve not being able to take the pressure forcing it open?


Or another idea! have it electronicaly controled from the dizzy. The inlet valves have the rocker gear taken off them so they never open. Have 4 pressured lines feeding to each spark plug hole and are controled by electronic valves. The pressure in the pipes leading to the spark plug holes is determined by the accelerator. When the dizzy lines up to one of the terminals (to spark a plug) the signal is instead used to open the air valve (Time of valve being open would need to be controled) therefore driving the piston down and then the exaust port would allow the pressurised air to escape afer.

Overall problems.
- The time the inlet valve is open for would change depedning on the engine revs and therefore would need some control.
- Would a steam boiler generate enough pressure to drive an engine this way? Steam powered engines may need a bigger bore to opperate?

Ok guys! have a good laugh and prove me wrong

Just found out! it has been done!!! Using an original engine block crank etc and then re-building the valve system/head etc sucessfuly converting it into steam powered! this particular project seemed to work very well

The standard crank won't guarantee self-starting (you'd need to use the starter motor to turn it over a bit if it stopped exactly on TDC). Generating sufficient steam pressure shouldn't be a problem particularly if you use a flash boiler.

Hi Alex

Thanks for your reply. Do you think with a new head and home built valve system the A series could be sucesfuly converted to steam?

if anyone else has some input it would be greatly recieved! I feel yet another project coming on here

No doubt it could be done - whether it would be efficient and driveable is another question. I doubt you would get high revs out of it. Something like a marine triple expansion compound engine and a higher ratio transmission would probably work better.

No point - if it caught on, they would tax the water.

Pete

I'm sure it 'could' be done - but all manner of problems! Steam locos start on full steam admission, and then are notched up to reduce the admission time to give decent efficiency and economy - variable valve timing which is still only on very few internal combustion engines. Good piston and ring lubrication will be essential too!

The one pictured at the start of this thread, is a steam powered pickup. The rear load bay houses the boiler and it is a modified A series engine - well crankcase with the original cylinders used as sliders, with new cylinder block fitted on top.
Theres a good picture of it in the custom and modified section of one of the Morris Minor books (can't remember which one offhand) showing the original builder tending the boiler with smoke and flame coming dramatically out of it!
More recently (about three years ago I think) it appeared in a steam engine and tractor type auction in Cambridgeshire with a rather different looking boiler arrangement and was bought by David Moore.

Now that is what I call an alternative engine. I do like that very much. Shame theres no more pictures on that website, nothing came up on google either.
I imagine it is driveable otherwise it would have been taken apart. For me though it would have to be run on coal, thats part of the attraction with steam. I'd love to own a small traction engine, recon if the right offer came up I'd sell up my collection, not sure the neighbours would like it.
Don't think i'll convert the traveller, cream leather and coal don't mix

You could have a "half-moggie" at the back with the coal in!