Thread: Steam - the power of the future?

I have been doing some thinking about getting a permanent space set up for working on razors and had a bit of a thought.

Some friends are into model steam engines, and I know from experience that the shoebox sized stationary engines are plenty powerful.

I also read about how people are having issues with electrical engines having too many rpms.

Why not set up a steam stationary engine to power belt grinders/polishers, grinding wheels and drills?
- Hooking up a belt sander, buffer or grinding wheel to a steam engine would be child's play.
- For a drill press I'd set up a hand drill on a pedestal mount, just replace the hand crank with a flywheel hub, and set up a lever to life a plate up to the drill. Ye olde steam powered drill presses used to lift what was to be drilled up to the drill unlike the modern electrical ones where you push the drill down to what is to be drilled. Also you can use a flexible extension from a dremel for other work needing fine rotary tools.
- The RPMs are in the hundred to low thousands which is kinder the materials we work with.

The only real problem I see is that you don't have the instant on/off that you get with electrickery.

High pressure boilers are incredibly dangerous! That would be my first worry with steam power in the workshop

Low pressure! A 1/4 HP workshop engine has a very small boiler and doesn't go to high pressure. High pressure steam engines are what get used in ships and trains.

Most steam applications for driving any machinery ordinarily need to be fairly high pressure, there is also the added risk of burns through contact with steam pipes and leaks. Most modern steam applications utilise the embedded energy associated with the latent heat of phase change (condensing of the steam releases relatively large amounts of steam. Pneumatics are a safer and more cost effective way of using pressure to drive machinery and the components are readily available.

But are pneumatics as manly and old school as steam?

In terms of steam High Pressure has a specific connotation, engines used in high performance warships and express trains, which took a very long time to get right and are rightly considered if not highly dangerous temperamental and needing to be treated with utmost respect. The lower pressure workshop engines work similar pressure to steam rollers and traction engines and if they fail tend to split and vent rather than explode.

Your right pneumatics are probably not as old-school as steam. There a a lot of things to consider; energy source for creating steam(coal, diesel, gas, electricity), water treatment for scale, corrosion and removal of dissolved gases. Reticulation, and condensate return also need to be dealt with.

I agree that it would be very cool to have a steam driven workshop, but there is a reason that it is not used for these types of applications any more.

Most people that complain about electric motors end up having picked up the cheapest most available thing rather than the right thing. You can get electric motors of varying natural speeds which is dependant on the number of "poles" (strictly magnetic poles) formed by the windings. A common 4 pole motor runs at about 1760rpm on a 60Hz supply (1800rpm synchronous less a little slip), but a six pole motor runs slower and an 8 pole motor slower again. Picking the right motor can make all the difference to performance as well as power consumption.
If you need fine speed control you can get variable frequency drives relatively cheaply (compared to a few years ago) that can do amazing things. Alternatively, if you can only get a given motor you can always use a belt and pulleys to adjust the drive speed to something less aggressive. It won't be easily adjustable, but pulleys aren't particularly expensive.

Catastrophic failure of electric motor=motor stops working, small chance of fire.

Catastrophic failure of steam powered motor=chunk of steel blown clean through the skull.

And for the record, pneumatic power has been known and utilized longer than steam power and electric power combined. There are some records showing that ancient Greeks made great use of pneumatics over 2000 years ago.

There are plenty of low rpm electric motors around, and reductions are easilly added if required.

bear in mind that as far as I know, electric motors are the most efficient thing around to do this kind of thing.

using pneumatics is incredibly inefficient, requiring a lot of continuous airflow, which means a massive compressor is required,
hydraulic machinery (water) is simply a waste unless if you live on the side of a mountain with a creek streaming down next to your house.
and steam requires you to continuously tend to the boiler, and firing it up a long time in advance before you start your work.
and then needs to be attended to while it cools down to a safe level again after you've finished your work.

OK, so it is totally unsafe. But SO COOL! Build lots of little engraved brass doohickies in to give it the steampunk look.

My grandfather had what must have been the 'multi-power-tool' of the time. It was a wooden frame about 4' x 4 with lots of leather belts and pulleys to drive a table saw, a band saw and lathe. I don't remember that he had a drill press. Granted, it wasn't powered by steam (he had a big electric motor powering it) but it was a marvelous contraption. Unfortunately it disappeared after he died, probably tossed out as 'old crap'. I would have loved to have it, but I wasn't old enough to have a place of my own to put it (and never thought it would disappear until well after the fact.)